Re: Cyclists Cycling - do they annoy you ? : Fri Aug 09, 2013 6:18 am  

WormInHand wrote:

I'd guess most bicyclists also own a motor vehicle. I love my bike for getting to work and small local trips but wouldn't fancy pedalling for the weekly shop or with my dog slung across my shoulders to get to the beach. Or any longer distance journey that needs to be made quickly...

Have you heard of public transport? Or Shanks's Pony? Or even cabs?

That, at its most simplistic, is my personal transport system – and has been, even when I lived in semi-rural environments (see – this isn't just a London-centric post! ).

As it happens, I'm off on me jollies ("to the beach"!) later today – by train. I'll get there tomorrow morning. It's actually probably the easiest and most hassle-free way to go.

I do the shopping on foot – and that means both the weekly shop, while anything in midweek can be picked up via my usual routes to and from work. Bulky stuff (bog roll, cat food and litter etc) I get delivered.

I do think that we have a wider problem of too many vehicles on roads that simply cannot handle them – it's most certainly the case in London, where even a small incident can cause the most massive snarl-ups. And – across the country – bad traffic problems are a negative for the economy, losing it money.

But some of that is down to the culture that's grown up that sees car-ownership as a right (how many teenagers now expect one?), even where that can mean a single household having two, three or even more cars.

My parents live on a fairly small road outside Croydon, and there's frequently a big car parked outside their house that's then left there for weeks at a time by a two-car household further up the road that do not need to use both cars every week, never mind every day.

The destruction of local shopping areas and the advent of edge-of-town tin-box supermarkets has increased the cult of the car, because it encourages the entire idea of the pile-it-in single shop for which you need a car.

In the UK, we don't have the highest rate of car ownership per 1,000 people in Europe, but we're not far behind the likes of Germany and France. The point is, though, that those countries are one hell of a lot bigger, and we actually have a population, in our much smaller country, that's close to theirs in their much bigger ones.

We need politicians of any and all parties to think about this seriously and be prepared to grasp some nettles. Whether they will, with so much vested interest and so much of a cult of the car, remains to be seen.

Successive London mayors, for instance, have merely tinkered around the edges of the problem, and it isn't getting any better.

The added issue of pollution from motorised vehicles really does mean that we should be acting.

Re: Cyclists Cycling - do they annoy you ? : Fri Aug 09, 2013 6:34 am  

JerryChicken wrote:

Poor response to the two very good replies you received to your rather predictable question.

So where do you propose the money comes from to create all this infrastructure?

Re: Cyclists Cycling - do they annoy you ? : Fri Aug 09, 2013 7:12 am  

Mintball wrote:

Have you heard of public transport? Or Shanks's Pony? Or even cabs?

That, at its most simplistic, is my personal transport system – and has been, even when I lived in semi-rural environments (see – this isn't just a London-centric post! ).

I would guess then, that your semi-rural environment was a lot better served than most. I've just moved out of a village to which the bus service was unreliable and overcrowded (particilarly at peak times). I certainly wouldn't have liked to have been relying on it to get anywhere in a timely fashion.

The reality is that, unless you live in London, public transport is often less than adequate. Oh, and, good luck getting a bus/cab/train to allow you to ride with two labradors.

Re: Cyclists Cycling - do they annoy you ? : Fri Aug 09, 2013 7:24 am  

wigan_rlfc wrote:

Why do pedestrians get footpaths?

Because everyone is a pedestrian.

Mintball wrote:

...In London, it's like a war...
And I do wonder how much of it is 'encouraged' (for want of a better word) by so many cyclists riding racing bikes instead of sit-up-and-beg bikes, which you see a great deal more on the Continent.

I think you've put your finger on it there, many aren't happy with a commuter bike and want to go the whole hog.

Also, especially in London, the culture of the carefree courier, jumping lights, zooming through pedestrians and unfettered by the laws and normal courtesies sets a different standard of behaviour.

Outside London, only last week, I obeyed a red light at some pedestrian lights and stopped my car, only to see that it was a thirty-something bloke on a mountain bike who had obviously got there via the footpath and wanted to cycle on the opposite footpath.
Having crossed, he wove his way through pedestrians on the other side.
The sheer irony of his action was probably lost on him.

If we had the infrastructure, @rses like him would have no excuse.

I think the lack of identification is a factor here, if bikes had to be registered and the reg displayed, it would cut down on an awful lot of misbehaviour.

Where I live, we get many cyclists in large groups, especially at weekends, who seem to think it's fine to ride abreast along the only valley-bottom road ... it's like the Grand Depart some weekends but at least they are doing 30-ish, so that's not much of an issue.
The hills usually thin them down to single file, anyway.
However, even they tend to weave through pedestrians in the clearly-signed pedestrians-only zones in the town to get to the cafe of their choice.

Re: Cyclists Cycling - do they annoy you ? : Fri Aug 09, 2013 7:52 am  

Big Graeme wrote:

So where do you propose the money comes from to create all this infrastructure?

In the same way that is is found in the likes of the other European states that I have mentioned - by means of a slight shift in planning attitudes, which need cost no more to a new road marking scheme than would otherwise be expended.

The likes of Londons super cycle highway would be nice in every city but that takes a lot of new money and it isn't absolutely necessary (although nice), we don't do too bad in this country for cycle lane provision and guidance is already in place for planners to consider cycle lanes, there are certainly plenty in my home city, but we could do a lot more and make it the norm rather than a nice side benefit of new schemes.

As a "for instance", and I appreciate you won't know the route, but the road that I used to commute down was Meanwood Road, it runs from the suburbs right down onto a major highway junction at Sheepscar and during peak times is solid with motor traffic - a couple of years ago someone in the planning department decided that the road was a little too wide, not wide enough to have two "official" lanes in each direction but wide enough to encourage motorists to try to form two lanes during peak times, so they discouraged that by painting white hatchings for a width of about four feet to the left of each side of the road and thereby missed an ideal opportunity to provide a decently wide cycle lane for a good couple of miles on a major commuter route which is used by hundreds of cyclists.

Strange enough though they did make cycle by-pass lanes around a set of traffic lights and a roundabout when they were constructed so they are obviously following some guidance when roads have new construction work but not when simple line painting works are carried out.

It just needs some joined up thinking.

[John_D]

Re: Cyclists Cycling - do they annoy you ? : Fri Aug 09, 2013 8:07 am  

Cyclists don't annoy me. Road users - all road users, that is - who do not observe the rules of the road annoy me.

Re: Cyclists Cycling - do they annoy you ? : Fri Aug 09, 2013 9:53 am  

Dally wrote:

As someone who walks along one of London's cycling superhighways twice a day, in my experience cyclists do not help themselves. Every day I see them doing things like:

1. Ignoring traffic lights.
2. Crossing junctions when pedestrians have right of way.
3. Undertaking other road vehicles - including HGVs at junctions. It is simply impossible for a lorry driver to see a cyclists on his inside. IMO, any accident involving a left-turning lorry hitting a cyclist on his inside when the lorry driver has been shown to indicate in a timely fashion should be down to the cyclist, who if they survive should be prosecuted.
4. I even still see them riding in dark clothes at night without rear lights!

I think people should be able to cycle safely but currently a large section of them (known as the "lycra mafia") totally diregard other road users, others safety and their own safety.

Possibly the first time I've ever (almost) fully agreed with one of your posts. Aside from the lycra mafia bit, this is also my grumble with many cyclists. I dislike the attitude of many motorists that think cyclists have less rights on the road, but by the same token I have a problem with the amount of cyclists who seem to think they have less obligations.

I don't think that cyclists should have to contribute to the upkeep of the roads/infrastructure, but I do think that they should be more accountable for their actions and require some sort of insurance. Every other road user does.

[John_D]

Re: Cyclists Cycling - do they annoy you ? : Fri Aug 09, 2013 10:17 am  

carl_spackler wrote:

Every other road user does.

Pedestrians? Walking uninsured is a thing now?

Re: Cyclists Cycling - do they annoy you ? : Fri Aug 09, 2013 10:36 am  

John_D wrote:

Cyclists don't annoy me. Road users - all road users, that is - who do not observe the rules of the road annoy me.

Or the rules of the pavement, as is the case with a large number of cyclists.

Re: Cyclists Cycling - do they annoy you ? : Fri Aug 09, 2013 10:58 am  

The only place a cyclist should be seen in public, is zooming around a very expensive Velodrome winning much needed medals for the UK.

Dally's observations are spot on regarding the antics of a great majority of these people, and remind me of an incident I witnessed a couple of years ago in Leeds.

I was waiting outside a large office building in the town centre when one of the plastic hat brigade came cycling down the wrong way in a one way street. Unfortunately for him, there was a 30 yard trench being excavated down one side of the street restricting it to single file, and coming the other way was a white van. In traditional white van mode, its driver took umbrage at this display of bad manners, and asserted his right of way which resulted in the cyclist coming off his bike in the roadworks.
Did I laugh....yes I did, especially when the cyclist indignantly appealed to the other pedestrians. When it was pointed out that he was actually in the wrong, his reply was if he followed the designated route he would take twice as long to get anywhere in Leeds!

Karma can be a bitch.