This Wiggins incident has brought the numpties out...

[mickle]

It's not about motorists, it's about society. We are perceived as rljing, pavement riding nuisances. Until you change that, no one else will give a damn about cyclists. And if no one gives a damn, there will be no action taken to change motorist attitudes. Sorry but as I said you can jump up and down about motorists but until people care about cyclists nothing will change. And people won't care about cyclists until the general perception of them changes.

My point is that they'll still hate us even if 'we' clean up our act. Therefore cleaning up our act isn't the answer to changing societies' attitude towards cyclists. It needs another approach. I suspect that the solution is education (of drivers) and higher penalties for sh1t driving combined with improved facilities.

I once witnessed a pair of teenagers riding a moped the wrong way down a cycle path in the middle of a pedestrian precinct - and they weren't wearing helmets. No one batted an eylid, in fact, people including old grannies and mums with push chairs happily moved aside. As a Brit familiar with British attitudes it was amazing to watch, but it was The Netherlands, where they have a very much healthier attitude to teenagers for a start off. 'Do what you like as long as it doesn't impact on anyone else'. We're too quick to judge in this country, too quick to vilify and persecute. They (motorists) need to be very much more tolerant of us (cyclists). It's not the best answer to the problem of driver danger, it's the only answer.

 

[EltonFrog]

Taxing, registering, licensing and testing cyclists is not going stop inconsiderate cyclist, impatient car drivers, vindictive van drivers using their vehicles as weapons of cyclist destruction.

 

[ianrauk]

Anything that stops a person from picking up a bike and cycling is a bad thing.
Simple.

 

[Glow worm]

I'm going to have to stop listening to radio phone ins on cycling (mentioned upthread - a show on R5 this morning) for the sake of my blood pressure. All the usual ill-informed claptrap from motorists among which were these two priceless gems from a couple of petrolheaded Einsteins:

- ''Cyclists should get off my road and onto the cycle paths''
- ''No one should be allowed to cycle before they have passed their driving tests''

Genius!

 

[PK99]

Plenty of numpties in the cycling community too I hate to say.

The argument for cycle registration was lost long ago. Why the f*** are we still debating it? And why, when the subject of the danger posed to cyclists by drivers rears it's ugly head, does the conversation turn to cyclists on pavements, cyclist RLJing and cycle registration? None of it is relevant to the discussion in hand.

We must make every effort to avoid falling into this trap and remind people that cyclists, on the whole, and when compared to the mayhem wreaked by the automobile, simply do not pose any danger.

pity you spoilt that by you last point.

"very low" or "minimal" would be correct and unarguable.

"simply do not pose any danger" is simply wrong - you open any discussion to being taken off track on the semantic point.

You are falling into the trap of making an indefensible* absolutist statement instead of an unassailable comparison.

 

[GrumpyGregry]

I honestly think some people do need lessons in how to cross the road, this basic skill learnt as an infant seems to have been completely forgotten in many. What ever happened to 'find a safe place to cross'?

The speed and volume of traffic in most towns and cities made it impossible?

 

[PK99]

The idea that cyclists must clean up their game before motorists will take them seriously simply doesn't add up. (Aside from the fact that motorists pose two thousand times more danger than cyclists) by every measure drivers break more road traffic laws than cyclists. To motorists we are an 'out group'. Motorists hate cyclists and then they use every example of poor cyclist behaviour to justify that hatred. You're looking through the telescope the wrong way. It's not cyclist behaviour which needs to change but motorist attitudes.

you are far too absolutist in you arguments;

by every measure drivers break more road traffic laws than cyclists

Are you really sure you can defend that as fact?

numbers of unlit ninja cyclists vs numbers of unlit ninja ninja motorists?

Numbers of cars driving through pedestrian shopping centres vs numbers of cyclists riding through?

How many of us have reflectors on our clipless pedals?

Your arguments would have much more power if you avoided clearly demonstrably wrong hyperbole.

 

[mickle]

pity you spoilt that by you last point.

"very low" or "minimal" would be correct and unarguable.

"simply do not pose any danger" is simply wrong - you open any discussion to being taken off track on the semantic point.

You are falling into the trap of making an indefensible* absolutist statement instead of an unassailable comparison.

''....... cyclists, on the whole, and when compared to the mayhem wreaked by the automobile, simply do not pose any danger.''

On average fewer than one person is killed in the UK by bicyclists every year. Undeniably less dangerous than rain, step-ladders, bees and peanuts. And probably less dangerous than sausages. How close to no danger can you possibly get? Probably marginally more dangerous than daisies.

 

[PK99]

Do you j

''....... cyclists, on the whole, and when compared to the mayhem wreaked by the automobile, simply do not pose any danger.''

On average fewer than one person is killed in the UK by bicyclists every year. Undeniably less dangerous than rain, step-ladders, bees and peanuts. And probably less dangerous than sausages. How close to no danger can you possibly get? Probably marginally more dangerous than daisies.

Do you not see what you have done? By making an absolutist overstatement instead of sticking with a patently correct comparison you have yourself taken your argument off track and are now making petty points.

I'm on your side on this: Compared to cars cycles pose very low risk. But "on the whole... no danger" is wrong and will be used against you.

 

[GrumpyGregry]

Not only are cyclists viewed as an out group by the whole of society they are a minority out group in a society where car ownership and use is normalised, and where cars are seen as conferring status on their owners, and where riding a bike is seen as infantile at best and subversive and utterly inappropriate at worst.

Car drivers are suckered into the idea of the car as an enabler. Of freedom. Of speed. Of choice. But the car can only rarely deliver on these things and even then with strings of anxiety attached. Freedom... will I be able to park when I get there and how much will it cost? Speed.... what if a speed camera catches me? Choice... should I do a u-turn out of this queue now and see if travelling in the opposite direction helps my journey?

Car drivers ride around in their little chariots, kings of their tiny kingdoms, when they come into conflict with other charioteers they reach a compromise, it's what kings do, and only rarely does it boil over into all out war. When a pleb on a bike gets in the way, or is seen to break a law, they react aggressively simply because it is 'their' territory and they 'must' defend it else why are they in a chariot, a power projection of their own egos. (For most drivers their car is the second most expensive purchase they'll ever make so lets not kid ourselves that ego doesn't come into it.)

Sadly a lot of people cycle with a driver mindset. The bike enables them to act out their desire for freedom speed and choice in ways no car can any more. So they jump red lights, ride too fast on pavements and go the wrong way down one way streets and drivers see them do it and go nuts....

 

[Miquel In De Rain]

It's the car commercials,they enlarge the male ego.

 

[mickle]

you are far too absolutist in you arguments;



Are you really sure you can defend that as fact?

numbers of unlit ninja cyclists vs numbers of unlit ninja ninja motorists?

Numbers of cars driving through pedestrian shopping centres vs numbers of cyclists riding through?

How many of us have reflectors on our clipless pedals?

Your arguments would have much more power if you avoided clearly demonstrably wrong hyperbole.

Absolutist? We're having a conversation about the very real and ever present danger posed by drivers to cyclists. I can't speak for where you live but where I live, and wherever I travel I see drivers exceeding the speed limit, driving on pavements, tailgating, talkng on mobile phones, yadda, yadda, yadda. The minimal danger posed by cyclists to society is as a mouse to an elephant in comparison. If you'd bothered to try and absorb what I'm trying to say instead of jumping down my neck in search of an alleged minor error of exaggeration youd realise that you've fallen into the very trap I was trying to identify. When talking about the danger posed to cyclists by drivers - the question of cyclist behaviour in the context of how it affects driver's attitudes to cyclists is not relevant.

 

[PK99]

Sadly a lot of people cycle with a driver mindset. The bike enables them to act out their desire for freedom speed and choice in ways no car can any more. So they jump red lights, ride too fast on pavements and go the wrong way down one way streets and drivers see them do it and go nuts....

It is not as driver but as pedestrian that those things make me go nuts!

One of these days I really am going to just brace and stand my ground when some twat on a bike heads toward me on a pavement or crossing.

 

[deptfordmarmoset]

Not only are cyclists viewed as an out group by the whole of society they are a minority out group in a society where car ownership and use is normalised, and where cars are seen as conferring status on their owners, and where riding a bike is seen as infantile at best and subversive and utterly inappropriate at worst.

Car drivers are suckered into the idea of the car as an enabler. Of freedom. Of speed. Of choice. But the car can only rarely deliver on these things and even then with strings of anxiety attached. Freedom... will I be able to park when I get there and how much will it cost? Speed.... what if a speed camera catches me? Choice... should I do a u-turn out of this queue now and see if travelling in the opposite direction helps my journey?

Car drivers ride around in their little chariots, kings of their tiny kingdoms, when they come into conflict with other charioteers they reach a compromise, it's what kings do, and only rarely does it boil over into all out war. When a pleb on a bike gets in the way, or is seen to break a law, they react aggressively simply because it is 'their' territory and they 'must' defend it else why are they in a chariot, a power projection of their own egos. (For most drivers their car is the second most expensive purchase they'll ever make so lets not kid ourselves that ego doesn't come into it.)

Sadly a lot of people cycle with a driver mindset. The bike enables them to act out their desire for freedom speed and choice in ways no car can any more. So they jump red lights, ride too fast on pavements and go the wrong way down one way streets and drivers see them do it and go nuts....

I think I agree with all of that. All the insurance, VED, MOT, parking charges, etc are part of driving's necessary evil. Cyclists appear as an unnecessary evil

About your final point: I've wondered about whether the typecasting of cyclists as RLJing, ninja salmonistas, encourages drivers to actually believe that that's simply what cyclists do. And so, when they get on a bike....

 

[PK99]

Absolutist? We're having a conversation about the very real and ever present danger posed by drivers to cyclists. t.

I thought he conversion was about the comparative dangers of both to other road users including pedestrians