A rant about MK cyclists (and peds, for that matter)

[mjr]

MK hates anyone who isn't driving. It is built solely to encourage people to drive from one building to another.

Not solely, but facilitating motoring was one of the aims of the masterplan IIRC. It's why the original redway network was more about keeping bikes as far from the grid roads as possible, than being a good transport network itself. That enough people tried to use it for transport that the CNT felt it better to add grid redways than dual the roads is interesting IMO.

 

[Drago]

MK hates anyone who isn't driving. It is built solely to encourage people to drive from one building to another.

This is true. By and large the road network is quite good, there's minimal congestion compared to neighbouring Northampton, Bedford or Luton. It's a motorists dream, and as such motorists feel incentivised to drive all the more.

There's one other unwelcome by product of the road network there. The wide dual carriageways and glut of roundabouts mean the major roads are split up into little sections from 1/4 to 1/2 a mile long. They're perfec tlittle drag-strips, and the bulk of drivers treat them as such. If you're a sedate (but not dangerously slow) driver like me then you'll hate driving there, as you have to drive at 10/10ths all the time or you'll either not get anywhere or you'll be killed. It's not at all restful, and is a horrible driving experience. As such I do as much of my shopping as possible either on line or in Towcester.

One other unforseen quirk of the grid network - it's notoriously hard on brakes and front tyres, particularly NSF tyres. Business is so good that local tyre and brake fitters turn up for work in Jags and Rangies.

the place was originally conceived with a tram netweok running up the deliberately wide central reservations, with the main terminus under the flyover outside Burger King at CMK. Alas, the real estate was set aside but the money to actually install the network itself ran out, which is a real shame. To this day the site intended for the terminus remains unused, nearly 40 years after the centre opened.

 

[CharlieB]

MK hates anyone who isn't driving. It is built solely to encourage people to drive from one building to another.

That is one other thing I'd particularly noticed, but it wasn't in context for my rant.

 

[snorri]

LOL! I meant in the sense that having bright lights "might" alert one of the numpties on headphones that someone's heading towards them.

Ah, ok.
I've never been to MK but it does seem a strange problem they have there. Even if people have never cycled on roads or driven a motor vehicle, it should soon become obvious to cycle on the left if you want a relatively uninterupted journey with fewer near misses. .

 

[mjr]

They're perfec tlittle drag-strips, and the bulk of drivers treat them as such. If you're a sedate (but not dangerously slow) driver like me then you'll hate driving there, as you have to drive at 10/10ths all the time or you'll either not get anywhere or you'll be killed.

I've never found it too bad, but I do tend to try and travel off the obvious lines like V4 and H8 that are busier than average. Then I spend the first few hundred metres accelerating and the last few hundred metres coasting in the hope of rolling through the roundabout. Brakes and tyres don't get much action. I have noticed on my last few visits that there do seem to be an increasing number of people who seem to drive up to the roundabouts, stop and then look, rather than even try to merge on

Many years ago, I did once try to rush through the city from Bletchley to Cranfield. By the end, the brakes had gone very spongy and scary so I've not tried that again since. Just try to coast and flow, man.

I've never been to MK but it does seem a strange problem they have there. Even if people have never cycled on roads or driven a motor vehicle, it should soon become obvious to cycle on the left if you want a relatively uninterupted journey with fewer near misses. .

It's got an average amount of cycling spread across a much-larger-than-average route network, so you don't usually pass as many people as you might think, in my (mostly 1990s) experience, and so people get away with doing a lot more mad things than almost anywhere I've seen (and I was guilty of a few of them, back in the day, but I was young and allowed to roam the redways )

 

[Lonestar]

I dont think the MK cycle lanes differ too much from the CS 2 and CS 3....On the CS 2 left hooks increased ten fold for me but I just realised recently it's dropped because I use the CS 3 more.The CS 3 has it's problems with being 2 way and pedestrians.Not the pedestrians fault,though..Cars also invade the CS 3 at times as do joggers on the Victoria Embankment...I also had a very close call with a pedestrian near Shadwell a few weeks back where her change of direction was so sudden I had no time for the brakes.Luckily I managed to do an instinctive swerve at the last second.I really couldn't blame the pedestrian for that though.

People on here are right,these cycle lanes are awful.I was hoping it was going to be ok but the poor layout has exceeded my expectations.

 

[mjr]

The MK ones differ from CS2 and 3 in being wider, further away from carriageways and the grid redways cross maybe one or two side roads per kilometre, with maybe half of the major road crossings being grade separated (bridges or underpasses).

CS2 is particularly poor in junction design, while CS3's cycleable width east of Leman Street is much less than a redway, forcing people to slow/stop at the first sign of conflict... but as I've written before, building redway-style routes isn't an option in most towns and cities without extensive road closures, outside of large green/brown field developments. They could learn more from Cambridge, Oxford, York and Bristol than MK.

 

[dellzeqq]

I saw it built. It looked like the future. Now it's just a behemoth swallowing countryside for no good reason.

I had to go back there a dozen or so times in 2013 and 2014. I don't drive, but being driven was unpleasant - it was a bit like being in a perpetual state of nowhereness. The bus service is poor - although any bus service is poor compared to South London's. Cycling, on the Brompton, was eerie. It was a bit like that Will Smith movie - the one where he's the only survivor of some catastrophe. In three or four cycling visits - going from the station to the Theatre District - I never saw another cyclist. I'd lock my bike to the rack and it would be the only one there. Then again..............there were no pedestrians.

I had to prepare the design and access statement for a planning application for a hotel. The art of these documents is to quote the rhetoric of the planners back at them - in one's own words. This was so easypeasy lemonsqueezy that I couldn't resist jazzing the document up a bit with quotes on dual carriageways from Leon Battista Alberti and pictures of gyrocopters. The planners thought this was very sexy. The whole exercise decayed in to absurdity - the more absurd the document became, the more they loved it. I realised that MK had developed in to a sinkhole in which truth didn't hit the sides.

In the end you can choose whether to make some faltering grasp for reality, or give up. Milton Keynes has given up. It's a laboratory experiment that has been abandoned by the people who designed it and runs on, purposelessly, like the Borg, assimilating all it comes in contact with.

Oh - and if you ever wind up in a 130 bed hotel clad in pre-rusted Corten steel and decide you don't like it....I don't care.

 

[Tenacious Sloth]

I understand where the OP is coming from completely having recently cycled around Rutland Water using the cycle tracks.

I've covered about 6000 miles so far this year on the roads with absolutely no problems whatsoever, however my recent ride around RW was terrifying! Other cyclists appearing at speed around blind bends on the wrong side of the road was the biggest problem, I just had no idea where to position myself to stay safe. Do these people have no fear?

For an earlier poster to suggest that these kind of riders are car drivers on bikes is ludicrous as most of us fall into this category. It's a simple fact that there is a similar percentage of Dickwads across all categories of society, whether car drivers, cyclists, hot air balloonists, or whatever.

I can't really offer any suggestions to the OP's dilemma apart from using very bright lights and possibly experimenting with your commute times to avoid most of these idiots.

Graham.

 

[dellzeqq]

In a genuine spirit of enquiry your humble servant went down a short section of the Boris Johnson Expressway - the two way cycle lane running along the north side of Byward Street and Tower Hill. A half mile or so was all I needed to convince me to get back on to the road - not only was there no way of getting on to East Smithfield shy of a bunny hop across kerbs, but having folk come toward you at a meeting speed of over thirty miles an hour is a good deal more worrying than mixing it with the white vans.

I went over and alongside the BJE this weekend. The motorised traffic was jammed up. The cycleway had a distinct MK feel about it.

 

[mjr]

Other cyclists appearing at speed around blind bends on the wrong side of the road was the biggest problem, I just had no idea where to position myself to stay safe. Do these people have no fear?

Why would they have fear? They'll probably only hit another bike and every fule knos that it's motor vehicles that kill bikes

Here's how I position myself... plus I take blind bends wide-ish and fairly slowly to try to see further around them, left thumb ready on the bell to try to wake up any nobbers coming the other way.

I think I've shared the trick I use before, but here it is again: I put my left hand, open, palm forwards and fingers to the left, above the left top corner of my handlebars (so above hoods on drop bars, or above the bend on swept bars). I'm not sure why it works, but it does well over 95% of the time

 

[mjr]

not only was there no way of getting on to East Smithfield shy of a bunny hop across kerbs

Yes, apart from joining the carriageway at the Tower Hill crossing or making a right turn at the west end of Royal Mint Street, or onto Dock Street, there's no way of getting onto East Smithfield on a bike any more.

 

[dellzeqq]

in happier news...
https://www.theguardian.com/football/2016/oct/09/afc-wimbledon-above-mk-dons-league-one

 

[toffee]

It's amazing the view people have of a place that they don't really know. Basing their views of a whole town on cycle rides of 1.5 miles is a bit limited. Milton Keynes is not just the bit of tarmac from the station to the centre . There are not many places where most houses are within a few hundred metres of park land. Areas where families can walk and cycle, even if it is not up to your commuting standards, in safety.

It's certainly not perfect and there are estate's that most of us would not want to live on, the same as most other towns and cities. However given the queues of traffic trying to get into Milton Keynes in the morning I am sure they appreciate the place.

Derek

 

[mjr]

the place was originally conceived with a tram netweok running up the deliberately wide central reservations, with the main terminus under the flyover outside Burger King at CMK. Alas, the real estate was set aside but the money to actually install the network itself ran out, which is a real shame. To this day the site intended for the terminus remains unused, nearly 40 years after the centre opened.

The vast expanse of gravel outside Deer Walk? It's the first time I've heard of it, I used to have a pretty good store of masterplan promotional materials and I've looked through some of the historical documents over the years, so was it abandoned long before it got anywhere near being published, let alone built? I've relatives who used to work for the development corporation, so I'll ask them some time.