Cities Fit for Cycling - The Times

[AnotherEye]

I'd like some of that money spent on increasing the number of traffic police on our roads enforcing the law.

This is my thinking as well. We see careless driving everyday & some habits (like not indicating) become almost the norm. Prosecutions only happen if there has been a collision (& then only sometimes). There would be very few road deaths if all road users were to abide by the Highway Code. £100M could put 2,000 traffic police on watch for a year. Roadusers would then know that their carelessness would sooner or later be logged & persistent carelessness would lead to prosecution.

 

[deptfordmarmoset]

FYI... Robert Elms 10am 04/02/12 94.9FM (BBC London) will be talking about cycle safety.
Guests include

• The writer from The Times that did the main article about Cities fit for Cycling (forgot his name)
• Someone from the LCC (I don't know who it is)
• Someone from a lorry company (forgot which company)
• And my self

Where waz ya, Gaz? Good to have the issues aired but I thought the programme was a bit inconsequential. Though admittedly, I missed a bit of Charlie Lloyd, the LCC guy. I'll see whether I can catch up on iPlayer later on.

I was very glad that it wasn't a phone-in show. Whenever someone lances a boil, the pus is the first to come out....

 

[gaz]

Where waz ya, Gaz? Good to have the issues aired but I thought the programme was a bit inconsequential. Though admittedly, I missed a bit of Charlie Lloyd, the LCC guy. I'll see whether I can catch up on iPlayer later on.

I was very glad that it wasn't a phone-in show. Whenever someone lances a boil, the pus is the first to come out....

I was on just after 11 (only 10mins ago).

 

[deptfordmarmoset]

I was on just after 11 (only 10mins ago).

Aha, I jumped the gun. The programme moved onto something unconnected with cycling so I went out before it started snowing (which it didn't). I have to say everybody was very civil out on the roads today - I'll put that down to the weather and not the campaign

 

[MrHappyCyclist]

Not all of the articles labelled under the campaign are productive or useful. E.g. http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/public/cyclesafety/article3309134.ece
"Cycling in cities has become a counter-culture and cyclists anarchists of the road who think rules don’t apply to them"
"They have turned the roads into a them-and-us battleground by operating their own system."

 

[MrHappyCyclist]

A good article from John Snow: "The Times Cycling Manifesto is good as far as it goes, but there is a serious dimension missing: human rights. The dominant creature on the urban road is the single-occupancy car. One person in a motorised 60 sq ft metal box. And what are we cyclists — one person on a thin strip of tubing with two wheels. One has the power, the presence and the rights; the other is deprived of all three. Is that equality under the law?"

 

[GrumpyGregry]

A good article from John Snow: "The Times Cycling Manifesto is good as far as it goes, but there is a serious dimension missing: human rights. The dominant creature on the urban road is the single-occupancy car. One person in a motorised 60 sq ft metal box. And what are we cyclists — one person on a thin strip of tubing with two wheels. One has the power, the presence and the rights; the other is deprived of all three. Is that equality under the law?"

We lack rights? I don't think so. We may lack sufficient support and enforcement for those rights but at heart they are ours.

But in a stand-off between my rights and their might, my rights may as well not exist.

 

[MrHappyCyclist]

We lack rights? I don't think so. We may lack sufficient support and enforcement for those rights but at heart they are ours.

I think he is talking about rights in practice rather than just in theory.

 

[MrHappyCyclist]

I did understand that, I just thought that it might be good idea to remind us that we don't need anything new by way of laws etc just the will to uphold the existing ones.

Well, I think we do. When motor vehicles bring most of the risk to the roads, but cyclists and pedestrians bear most of the costs and consequences when it goes wrong, we definitely need a change in the law. Presumed liability is the norm in Europe; there are just five exceptions, of which the UK is one.

[EDIT: Corrected "four exceptions" to "five exceptions".]

 

[MrHappyCyclist]

I wouldn't turn it down but I'd rather have the laws regarding acceptable standards of behavior on our roads enforced properly.

I agree, but we just don't have the money to pay for a police officer to be stationed on every street corner 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

 

[Fab Foodie]

I wouldn't turn it down but I'd rather have the laws regarding acceptable standards of behavior on our roads enforced properly.

I guess this is an ask too far ....

 

[Fab Foodie]

No its not.

But maybe too much to hope for ....

 

[AnotherEye]

For the 3rd day running I've bought the Thymes, I'm bothered by "cyclists: look out for parked cars, they might suddenly open their doors .... Look out for wing mirrors as well as through the back windscreen to see if anyone in the car might be about to open a door" (p6 of today's guide). So they don't want to encourage us to give 3ft clearance (might slow down the traffic flow).

The biggest threat to cyclists is the poor standard of some drivers, I've yet to see that mentioned, we need to get some of them off the road permanently & the rest to fear the possibility.

(same as I just posted to CTC forum).

 

[Fab Foodie]

Yep, like everything in life, we spend too much on cures and not enough effort on the causes ....

 

[mumbo jumbo]

I just went back to The Times campaign page and came across a safe cycling graphic - 12 points around a bike wheel, which you click through to see the issue explained. It was rather good but now I can't find it again! If you find it, can you post a link please?