neds - get off the pavement!

[WeeE]

Coasting happily back from Ikea on my granny-bike with a Lersta lamp strapped across the stern, breezy, sunshiney, lovely...and just passing the shipyard at Govan, suddenly sense something odd behind me - a wee lad about ten or twelve tailgating me! Where the hell did he come from? Then I saw his slightly older pal and big brother who's all of thirteen or so, fifty yards behind us - on the wrong side of the road! They had to have come out of the park and onto the road between the cars parked there. This is generally a quiet road, but lined with parked cars, and used by people coming off the motorway for a shortcut to the city centre. (It's a longer distance, but people like quiet roads to speed along, even if they don't get there any quicker.)

The two other boys - all in black chavwear, riding MTBs with their knees up around their ears - were actually sprinting to catch us up - crossing the oncoming lane at a long, shallow angle. From my side, I could see a car coming from about "one o'clock" around the slight curve of the park, driving far too calmly to have seen them. Have you ever just wanted to shut your eyes and not look? All I could think to do was basically wave at the oncoming car, kind of half a stop-sign and half a slowing-down sign. He saw it quickly, though.

I had opened my mouth to call to them to get into the left - they were still about fifty yards behind me - but now there's a (big, expensive) car accelerating off the wee roundabout back there. And the wee boy was having to work very hard to keep up with my pootling pace, too. There's no way this driver could not have seen what was happening, but did he back off to let these kids get across the road? No. In no time the car was looming up right behind the wee boy's back wheel. The top of this wee boy's head, as low-set on his bike as he was, it was hardly the height of the bonnet. I couldn't see how he could be visible to the driver. I didn't really know what to do other than hold my hand up and give the driver the hard stare over my shoulder: he was busy glaring at the other kids off to his right. He had a really pissed-off look on his face now, and he drove right up to the wee lad's back wheel - within about a foot. He called out to his friends to "watch out for the car", sounding really scared; they were just about abreast of it, and the driver wasn't going to let them in! At least the bloke coming towards us was smoothly slowing down.

The other two boys joined us by sprinting ahead, coming in from my right, between me and the car coming the other way. I think the older one was, in a mixed-up way, trying to take care of the smallest: it probably scared him bout as much as it scared me to see this car looming over his brother, and so he didn't want to fall in behind the car with his brother in front of it. It nearly did my heart in to see them belting up the wrong lane, intent on overtaking. Actually, now that I think about it, it probably sprinting ahead was the safest thing for them to do to get out of the fix they were in, since the oncoming bloke had slowed (not that they noticed!) and the fancy car was being held up by me and the wee lad.

I'm not an experienced cyclist at all, and was a bit at a loss for what to do: all I could think of was to move out almost to the middle line of the road and slow a bit so that the wee boy was on my inside but out of the door-zone. Before the two boys were even in place in front of myself and the wee lad, the b@stard in the fancy car was actually edging rightwards as if he would overtake. The left lane was still choked with parked cars, the road was narrowing ahead, and for a fair stretch there wasn't really anything to do but carry on. It was a bit surreal. As we went along, I said as kindly as I could to the wee boy - he looked so scared - that he needed to learn how to ride in the traffic, then he'd be confident on the road. The oldest boy looked round (quite upset) and said, "Everyone shouts at us, we've nae right to be on the pavement."

The bugger behind couldn't wait another twenty seconds to let the boys find a space (at the end of the unofficial free-parking lane) to get off the road. He finally overtook, right where the road narrows on the approach to the next mini-roundabout, scaring the kids again by peeping his horn as he passed us. (Maybe he assumed I was in charge of them, or he didn't approve of us riding two abreast, but he must have known it would startle them.)

Imagine someone who'll drive right up a wee kid's arse to intimidate him and overtake four bicyles at a pinch-point just to show how angry he is! It makes me really furious. If the smallest boy had lost his wind - which at first he was doing - or lost his nerve or hit a bump, he'd have been under the wheels in a blink. And overtaking on the way into a pinch-point! The look that fancy-car gave as he passed, maybe he thought I was in charge of these kids, but there was no excuse for making them jump like that.

Kids who live here, wherever they walk, and if they cycle at all (on the road or pavement) they must deal with a lot of impatient, shortcutting commuters, a lot of LGVs and buses and a fair few lorries. And they clearly had no idea how to be on the road. But the area, their home patch, is completely hemmed in by the river (no bridges for miles) and a ring of motorways. A ten-minute cycle one way - the city centre. Ten minutes the other way - big shopping and indoor ski/rock-climbing. Ten-fifteen minutes south, a park with mountain-bike trails. Interesting stuff is so close, and they're cut off from it to a shocking degree. These kids have no gardens to play in (if they were still that age) and no money for buses, no family cars to ferry them - and anyway, don't they deserve to ride along in the sunshine getting the wind-in-the-hair high I had just been enjoying? They've frankly got eff-all else. So I suppose it really struck a chord with me, the lad's face when he said "we've nae right to be on the pavement" - because he clearly thought I was telling them they had no right on the road either, and given what had just happened, he believed that was true as well.

So anyway, before I carried on my way, I told them to get on a bikeability scheme, and they'd know what to do in the traffic, and feel much more confident. (How ironic, this coming from a clueless newbie who hasn't been on one.) They'd never heard of bikeability, so all I could say was to get onto their teacher about it, and they could learn to understand the traffic, and become confident on the road. I wish now that I had got off my bike and talked to them properly, told them more explicitly that (once they know what to do) they do have every right to the road, especially the streets they live on.

People are really dismissive of neds, chavs, whatever you want to call them - but kids like this have incredibly restricted lives: no family car for a day out, no holidays away, and the most expensive local transport in Europe. They hardly ever leave the square mile they live in. They just wanted to ride around in a tiny scruffy park with nothing in it -- except a shared-use path -- and they're getting all this grief for just trying to get there and back.

They were doing what they thought they were supposed to because idiots yell at them every day to get off the pavement, without thinking that quite small kids might take it at face value. What struck me most was that even the two still in primary school did believe they have no right to be on the pavement (which definitely has its hazards in a zone like this) and the glare and the car-horn was telling them they had no right to be on the road, either -- and you could see they felt they'd just experienced the truth of that. It kinda made me angry that they weren't angry about not having the right to live in their own front yard; just an air of vague defensiveness muted by the scare. And kind of sad.

 

[Jane Smart]

What you did for those kids, was wonderful and I thank you for doing that, even though I don't know you or the kids.

For someone to take the time to do what you did, is fantastic

My son could be mistaken for a ned/chav he really could. Long hair, wears a hoodie ( hood down though ) and is 6'2" and age 16. He is the nicest guy though ( even if I say so myself ) anyone could hope to meet, so again, thanks on behalf of the nice ones ( 99% are )

As for some car drivers

 

[Arch]

Wee, that's a wonderful, if sad, essay. Well done for taking the trouble to do anything and not do what I suspect many of us would do, ride off and leave them to it. Let's hope your advice will help them, maybe with a bit of training they'll go on to be really good cyclists, and maybe more important, good ambassadors.

Your description of the area as hemmed in is so sad. I bet most of us live in places so far removed from that that it's hard to imagine. Slums with shared privvies were far from good, but we didn't always do a great job of replacing them, did we?

 

[Mr Pig]

Where I live even the police ride on the pavement, saw another one today. Kids ride on the pavement all the time and, as far as I know, never get pulled up for it.

 

[WeeE]

Where I live even the police ride on the pavement, saw another one today. Kids ride on the pavement all the time and, as far as I know, never get pulled up for it.

There's no doubt the boys were sincere about having been chased off the pavement. (I've been yelled at for pavement cycling...on the mixed-use path at Braehead.) The oldest one was tallish for his age, I suppose, could be mistaken from behind for 18-19. Maybe it's because there's a lot of commercial and industrial activity here, mixed right in with quite dense housing: and a lot of pavement where the houses and shops are is cramped.
People in Govan probably walk more than in most places these days, because not many own cars.
The side streets get filled with these dumped-all-day cars too. (Same at Pacific Quay: empty car-parks, two rows of cars all along the road, half-on-half off the pavement.) Govan's wee moribund shopping centre has a giant planter put right at the entrance that channels people into two narrow footways - shop doorway or roadside - I think it's actually designed to stop people "loitering" (ie using a plaza/piazza area as a plaza/piazza: social space is only a good thing in nice areas(!)).

It feels even more cramped because, although the rate of car ownership here is really low, on weekdays Govan Road is just a linear car park for people who don't want to pay park & ride.

It could be gorgeous, in fact - if only the city decided not to allow the road to be used as a free car park, but as a road for bikes instead. The road is mostly actually four lanes wide, but of course only two lanes of cars move.
That is actually room for great huge roomy separated cycle paths on both sides of the road, which if they just ran that otherwise empty mile, could take these kids - and all the old biddies, and the pram-pushing, bored mums - right into the city centre. The Pearce Institute have a nice wee cafe that puts tables outside in summer - but it's huddled in a corner behind a row of cars, when it could in fact be under a couple of trees instead.

If only the suburbanites who dump their cars here were actually made to use the pay-parking, the roads would be clear, because there's plenty of proper parking spaces. They even ignore the free parking behind the Co-op; an extra 200 yards to walk. (I'm getting annoyed again, can you tell?) There's something galls me about the greediness of it. People who can afford to choose to live in nice suburbs in Renfrewshire or the West End, then they shoot through Govan, often just to avoid the main roads, and dump their cars literally on other folks' doorsteps to save a couple of quid on park & ride. From a child's perspective (which I share, being the height of the average 11-year-old) you're always walking in a channel between the buildings and the cars; what could be a fantastic boulevard is quite claustrophobic

 

[Arch]

I heard something on the radio the other day that made me stop and think - it was a report from Scotland on the labour/SNP divide, and as an indication of the poverty of the area talked about, the reporter mentioned how low the rate of car ownership was. Hence, lack of a car signals deprivation. It could, of course, if our society hadn't become dependent on out of town this and edge of town that, signal freedom from a needless financial millstone, better health and fitness, better air quality. But no, because the way things are you need (or are made to think you need) a car to do anything.

I'm lucky in York that I can shop in a supermarket within 5 minutes of where I live, and in fact most areas are probably within a 10 minute bike ride of a not-too expensive grocery shop or supermarket. But to go to a big multiscreen cinema, or bowling, or any of the shops at Clifton Moor or Monks Cross (edge of town shopping centres), I have to be willing to ride 3 or 4 miles and negociate some less than friendly roads and junctions - and York's pretty good for cycle routes. And we all know that once you get cycling it gets easier and easier. But it takes a lot to get most people to understand that.

Sounds to me Wee, like you should be in the council planning department...

 

[gaz]

I see this thing quite a lot on my commute through london, people thinking they own the road and pushing past people. Like you say i think the best thing to do is take a central role. and stop them having the ability to overtake. And what i often do is slow slightly, look at them for a few seconds, and then gun it.

But this action taken on kids! Disgusting behaviour. and i applaud you for what you did.

 

[JiMBR]

I applaud you for your actions with the kids WeeE...very well handled m8.

Some of the areas around here are not cycling friendly to say the least, and troublesome car drivers make it even more of a nightmare on occasion.

Well done for handling the situation the way you did.

 

[WeeE]

Thanks, folks. Till I saw your comments, I still wasn't too sure that I did do the right thing by staying quiet and just letting the boys do what they were doing. I was just afraid that trying to call out instructions to them would do more harm than good - either by confusing them or by being the wrong advice!

I really wanted to yell at the man behind us to get off the kid's wheel , but again, the wee one was scared enough by then, he didn't need to hear that he really was in danger. Besides which, I am not a very skilled rider, and keeping my eyes on a load of stuff going on in front and behind with a wobbly wean beside me, while yelling over my shoulder would just be one more task than I could've multi'd.

 

[snorri]

Your story reminds me of a meeting addressed by Rosie Kane where she talked about her entry into local politics. You might not agree with RKs politics, but she told a heartbreaking tale of the way people in one part of Glasgow were going to have motor traffic diverted in to their area because the Council knew that people there did not have the money or negotiating skills to mount a campaign to oppose the proposals...until RK came on the scene.

 

[WeeE]

Your story reminds me of a meeting addressed by Rosie Kane where she talked about her entry into local politics. You might not agree with RKs politics, but she told a heartbreaking tale of the way people in one part of Glasgow were going to have motor traffic diverted in to their area because the Council knew that people there did not have the money or negotiating skills to mount a campaign to oppose the proposals...until RK came on the scene.

You just reminded me - the park I mentioned, Elder Park, which is about the size of a field. Like most of what's public property here, it was given to the locals in recognition by shipyard owners that their workers were living in a shitty place (because poor, because...er...not paid much...)

Just last year, a bunch of architects who've been making a rep for themselves as wonderful people doing great social good with their designs for the council & housing associations about here, because they have wonderful vison and social loveliness: you can still read on their website how their marvellous plans for the park were rejected.

(It's not much of a park any more, because it gets nothing like the sort of care that (for example) the park outside the BBC gets, but it does have grass to lie on, a wee tiny boating pond that the old boys like, a couple of swans, a hedged, if slightly tired wee flower-garden...and paths lined with really lovely huge old trees. If you don't have a garden, it's a lifesaver; somehwere you can actually go and sit in the sun/shade in the summer without getting on a bus to do it.)

Their plan for it was to build four "business units" in it.

As if there aren't are half a dozen brownfield sites and bits of demolition wasteland within spitting distance.

How ungrateful we are: High-end business people could have held bonding sessions under their very own instant spreading oaks, and the locals could have had an economic powerhouse mini business park amongst these gorgeous mature oaks and plane trees. (It could have employed, oh, two or three local people for cleaning and security guards.)

What really makes me sick is the hypocrisy, the way these attempts to appropriate the last remaining places that people to have to relax in and get together in (like the social institute and the town hall, both the subject of grabs for executive flatting) and turn them into gated enclaves that exclude the locals completely - and pretend that it's actually for the benefit of the community it's ripping off.

They may as well title their proposal "How to get awards by grabbing the last sweet fruits from the stupid plebs and saying it's good for them."

 

[Mr Pig]

Not much cop is it, Glasgow?

 

[WeeE]

Not much cop is it, Glasgow?

Like all cities, it's a curate's egg. I just live in one of the materially bleaker, friendlier parts. It's also got fabulous cycling potential, as mentioned earlier.
Actually, it's similar in size geographically and population-wise to Copenhagen. There's a thought...

 

[Arch]

You just reminded me - the park I mentioned, Elder Park, which is about the size of a field. Like most of what's public property here, it was given to the locals in recognition by shipyard owners that their workers were living in a shitty place (because poor, because...er...not paid much...)

We need a few more Rowntrees and Salts and who were the Port Sunlight people, was it Lever Brothers? Ok, life in their factories was probably hard, by today's standards, and ok, some of their motives might be overly religious for modern liking, but they had the wit to see that people need half decent homes and a bit of green and things like libraries and so on.

 

[Headgardener]

Don't forget the Cadbury family Arch. Thier village of Bourneville built for the workers at Cadburys was ahead of it time when it was built. Lots of open space and a park with a boating lake (starting to bring back memories this is) and the Carillion on the green. No pubs though the Cadbury family were strict quackers.