Motorcycle campaigners postpone Cycle Superhighway demo ahead of talks with Westminster Council

I have and ride several motorbikes and I dissociate myself totally from the views of this MAG group. They are basically morons.

I have common cause with motorcyclists we face the same kind of dangers so this protest group does itself no good with this kind of daft points

Just awesome. MAG's position seems to be 'We sympathize with cyclists, but if creating a cycle super highway takes any road space away from us, or slows us down at all, then it's a non-starter. And, add to that, we care for cyclists so much that we think they should stop cycling incase it causes prostate cancer ... And women don't ride bicycles, but even if they did, they'd probably become a carrier for whatever it is on bicycles that causes prostate cancer, and then pass it on to motor cyclists'.

So essentially, MAG's propose building the cycling superhighway, but not in London (or maybe even in the uk), and banning men from cycling on it. Perhaps it could be built in the middle of the ocean?

Living in London for a while, I got buzzed by so many motorbikes nailing it along in the combined bus/bicycle/motorbike lanes. They'd think nothing of doing twice the speed limit and passing within a foot or two of me. Bring on the congestion charge for motorbikes!!!

I'm not sure what a “major breakthrough” with Westminster Council would mean as both schemes (Cycle Superhighway and Ultra Low Emission Zone) are TfLs?

The cycle superhighway will affect motorbike less as they can filter, and with the solid central reservation removed they won't get stuck so often.

"the justification for turning over such large areas of road space seems disproportionate and likely to cause severe congestion that will ironically prejudice efforts to enhance London’s air quality.”

Quite a lot of the new route on the Embankment will use what is currently coach parking, so not really used by motorbikes.

As background this group has an interesting history: http://www.visordown.com/motorcycle-news--general-news/mag-uk-wound-down...

One way to test the prostate cancer claim would be to stop killing us unnecessarily.

I am keen motorcycle rider, but their arguments are weak and jealousy oozes from their comments.

The prostate thing made me chuckle.

Motorcycling of course has by far the highest KSI rate of any mode of transport, but without any health benefits from exercise to compensate.

I love motorcycles, and would use one myself if I lived further out from London. I don't think this group is very representative, not of the bikers I know anyway.

Dr Leon Mannings
@ CrossrdsRider
London

Freelance writer/researcher, biker & dad with PhD in transport politics. Seeking better ways to go & reasons to be cheerful in face of puritans & doom-mongers
crossroadsrider.com

Bunch of pricks.

I ride big motorcycles Honda SuperBlackbird and Triumph Sprint 1050 and I have never heard of this seemingly twatish organisation MAG. I also cycle to work as well 3-4 days a week, motorbike the other 2. I have no problems with the infrastructure being created for cyclists in London as a motorcyclist. MAG seems to be a right wing group claiming to represent a lot more of a type of road user i.e. motorcyclists than it actually does.

'Sympathetic' does not mean in favour, or anything else that translates into action.

They're like the City of London, who was 'in principle' in favour of protected space, but in the first round seemed to be wholly against it in practice.

Creating better road space for all users benefit everyone in major ways. This has been shown true again and again... but of course evidence isn't welcome when principles and convictions carry the day.

The fact they got a hearing from Westminster also says a lot, worst roads in London for everyone, but particularly pedestrians and cyclists, in that order.

Meh, it's just standard selfish pageantry instead of thinking of the more vulnerable.

So these 'representatives' of motorcyclists are 'sympathetic' towards cyclists, but object to the reallocation of road space to vulnerable road users?

Maybe they are concerned that it will be harder to 'share' the new, largely-segregated facilities than is currently the case (albeit completely illegally) with Advance Stopping Lines, which frequently seem to have a biker or two parked in them alongside the cyclists for whom they are intended.

"the justification for turning over such large areas of road space seems disproportionate and likely to cause severe congestion that will ironically prejudice efforts to enhance London’s air quality.”

So it's 'likely', but if they're going to make such claims they really need to provide solid evidence that this indeed is the case, rather than make vague and unsubstantiated inferences and insinuations.

From what I understand of proper protected space for cycling that has been installed elsewhere, their claims have no foundation.

I don't know if she was quoted out of context, but the mooted congestion charge for motorbikes will only be for bikes manufactured before 2007 and will only come into effect in 2020. So only motorbikes more than 13 years old in 2020 will affected. And from the amount of crud some of these things spew out, this can't be a bad thing.

I'm a motorbiker and I have never heard of MAG. It seems they are a small group of uninformed t**ts who are trying to forward their own agendas...

Dicks

Quote:

He added that insufficient consideration had been given to a potential link between cycling and prostate cancer in men as part of the cost-benefit analysis of the scheme,

If that's the reasoning then you should be calling for a ban on all motor vehicles because of the pollutions proven effects on breathing disorders et al.

If he has a doctorate and that's the best he can come up with .... What a twat.