>>1593294as a noob, the safest way is to imagine (just a mental model, although sometimes it's actually true) that *every* single car on the road is *intentionally* trying to kill you, but the bike lane/meter from the curb is safe. it may not always be, but for the purposes of the mental model. in my experience it is truly rare that people intentionally fuck with you, but it's that they just don't see you, but using this model accounts for that.
so, any time you want to enter traffic, change lanes, whatever -- track the movement of all the cars around you and only make your move when the cars just cannot physically get to you at their current speed. signal your turns; if you see someone letting you in, then cool, they aren't trying to kill you, go ahead and merge. but if there's no reaction to the signal, you just have to get to the next light and cross over via the ped crossing.
I think of it as a chess game. all the other pieces are more powerful than me, but my piece can out-maneuver everything else.
with experience, you develop a spidey-sense and can flow more assuredly but it takes a while to just get good at riding and also not being scared of cars as much. playing the game will keep you safe until then. since your city is bike friendly that won't be as long as other places but use the game to ease into road cycling.
