(No) Cycling and the Olympics!

[Origamist]

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/stand...+routes+'will+cause+traffic+chaos'/article.do

 

[thomas]

pfft. Just take a good primary position and stuff them

 

[jimboalee]

Did the ordinary Londoner ( Stratford, Barking, Ilford ) want the Olympic games?

 

[hackbike 666]

I know I didn't.(Leyton)

I haven't been convinced yet any pluses.

That site should be used for houses.

 

[trsleigh]

I've never been on a critical mass before, nor do I much approve of them, but there's always a first time.

 

[jay clock]

Why don't they all cycle from Park Lane to the event? Good warm up

 

[John Ponting]

might work if they were competitors but these are VIPs in blazers.

 

[jay clock]

Lots of London's office workers succeed in cycling and wearing office clothes on arrival. After all, these officials are presumably keen on supporting sport, so I would have thought a spot of exercise would be right up their street!

 

[Eat MY Dust]

"• Cyclists being banned from miles of express routes designed to transport officials and athletes through London in high-speed convoys."

So I'll be allowed to drive along the route, but not cycle. That makes perfect sense!!!

 

[summerdays]

I am thinking about cycling to the rowing ... from my parents house... although I could imagine some of the roads around there being absolutely solid given the roads that serve that area.

 

[JamesAC]

Did the ordinary Londoner ( Stratford, Barking, Ilford ) want the Olympic games?

I didn't.
I live in Forest Gate, east of Stratford.
When the Olympics start, it will be chaos. Ordinary Londoners will have their lives in turmoil.
And how dare they assume that 1000's of Londoners will be away on their hols in order to free up road space? We Londoners have paid for the fecking games: we're entitled to be there!!!

 

[tdr1nka]

Did the ordinary Londoner ( Stratford, Barking, Ilford ) want the Olympic games?

+1 With Hackbike.

I live on the other side of the river in New Cross Gate which will be one of the 'Olympic Corridors' once the East London Line extension is complete.

IMO holding the Olympics has very little to do with actual sport and more about exploiting and redeveloping land which in the years after the event will continue to make money for the owners & contractors who bought or were given the land for peanuts.

Since the 'economic downturn' of the last 6 months, in my part of the world alone, 3 estates have been pulled down and land owned by a large local business purchased, only to be left as boarded off piles of rubble. Contractors and development companies have now fled the area leaving it in bits.

Oh yes, and their reason for chopping pieces out of our community?
'Every one will want to move here to be close to the Olympics.'

There were serious questions raised about the overrun on the London Olympic budget before this recession was spotted, now we'll get to see how they go from here.

Angry of New Cross.

 

[JamesAC]

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/stand...+routes+'will+cause+traffic+chaos'/article.do

I checked out the DfT web site (http://www.dft.gov.uk/consultations/open/olympicroutenetwork/). In all 99 pages of "consultation" the word cycle occurs once , embedded in recycle, and cycling occurs twice - London Cycling and Cycling/Walking.

So keen are they that the Olympians, or rather the hangers-on, the paparazzi, the glitterazzi and so on, can have unimpeded journeys from their Park Lane hotels (what's wrong with the Ibis hotel in Stratford? (£59.00 for a double room)) to the Olympic Venue that the rest of us peasants will just have to scuttle out of the way.

Even Thames Water and London Electricity will need to get Special Permission before they dig up the road to fix a broken pipe or a failed cable. I rather hope that a sewer collapses up the Mile End Road - then they'd be in the shoot!!

The ODA will have almost feudal powers over London's road network for weeks in the summer of 2012; neither Local Authorities nor TfL will get a look in.

 

[DJ]

Why is it all the authority's seem to forget that the Olympics will only be on for two weeks?

How can we jstify the cost to Londoner's, when the ordinary man in the street is only going to watch it on telly, just the same as if it were being held in Australia!!!

The Government always presume that their subject's have endless pots of money to throw at their hair brained schemes!!!

 

[rob7222]

Why is it all the authority's seem to forget that the Olympics will only be on for two weeks?

It's on for roughly 4 weeks if you include the paralympic games.
It's also an opportunity to have huge numbers of people come from around the world to spend their money in london and overhaul one of the poorest areas in the country in one go.