[Hirsute]

At the in laws and when shopping by car (yeah, I know). Drove over walton bridge to find myself held up by cyclists !
The thing is the bridge is quite new and the shared pavement is not only very wide but also very smooth.
There seems no reason not to use it apart from ‘I don’t have to’ which is not very compelling in this situation.
I just thought it was an interesting perspective that I rarely get.

Topic

[Jitensha Oni]

Good details that I, as

Good details that I, as another frequent user, can agree with. A few additional points:

1. Traffic. I used to commute that way. Can confirm how it gets backed up all around there at peak. Spending periods stationary is of course just accepted as part and parcel of being a motorist – whereas get someone riding a bike in front of you, a few kph less than you want to go, but too fast for shared use, and oh how the whinging takes off!

2. Navigation. The track starts just north of Marshall’s roundabout. If you use it to get to New Zealand Avenue in Walton from there i.e. along the A244, you have 9 give ways to contend with, plus the lights, while going away from Walton, the same, including the busy, hazardous junction with Walton Lane as described by others. On the carriageway by contrast, you just have to sweep round the roundabouts having good sight lines (unlike the cycling give ways), giving way twice at the roundabout entrances and nowhere else.

The track disappears at Gaston Bridge Road and New Zealand Avenue, so is, at best 1 km long, i.e. 5 minutes of cycling at a 20kph potter. This is a small distance/time for a recreational ride, and with no other infra for miles, the sum of the potential breaks of pace/hazard points and it’s short distance make it simply not worthwhile for many to use.  Locals do use it with their handlebars laden with shopping bags from Walton Centre though.

3. Cyclists unwelcome everywhere! I have used it to get onto Walton Lane from the Shepperton side and been told by a pedestrian to use the road, when I was going slowly. So you can’t win.

[qwerty360]

From the traffic lights

From the traffic lights heading east it is easy to join as the dropped kerb is marked on the road and far enough that you are joining separately to navigating the junction, but the crossing of Walton Lane is lethal (sweeping bend, so cars come around at speed, but the dropped kerb for the crossing is far enough around that you can’t see them reliably past the railings and they don’t have to give way (given it is a minor road it should be continuous pavement with clear priority for cyclists/pedestrians…) Traffic across the bridge is fairly continuous and you have to wait for a gap in all traffic because you can’t guarantee who is turning, so it can be a long wait…

Heading west, joining from the roundabout usually means dealing with the petrol station exit traffic (as the rest of that cycle lane is aweful or knowing it has a dropped kerb just after the roundabout on the roundabout, which given it is on a curve on the exit isn’t visible on approach.

Unless you want Walton Lane (where there is a dedicated path underneath) you are then trying to squeeze along the path past the traffic lights (maybe 50cm wide gap… My road bike will just fit, though I stopped and scooted through the only time I tried it given it was so narrow…) or try to rejoin the traffic at the lights, so crossing the filter turn in the length of the the ASL… Try crossing 3 wide lanes to get into position to turn right onto Oatlands Drive when the lights could change at any time.

In practice a cyclist here won’t significantly slow traffic… I go through this 3-4 times a week (a long ride has 4 options, Hampton Court, Walton, Chertsey or Staines bridge) and even when quiet traffic is usually queuing at the lights (so a far bigger delay than following a cyclist across the bridge causes).

At peak times it queues back past all 4 arms of Marshall’s Roundabout (at which point I often do use the poor cycle path, even though the facility to join it their is aweful as going along that at 5-10mph is still quicker than waiting for the cars).

If they fixed the section from the bridge to Marshalls Roundabout it would be far more usable. (Priority over the side roads (all driveways or service roads),  cutting back the overgrowth and enforcement against parking on the cycle track (actually, just enforcing against the illegal parking would make it 10x more usable). Deal with the Walton Lane crossing and how you continue on the mini roundabout and at Marshalls roundabout (plenty of space to fix this properly) and that direction would then be excellent. In the other direction put in a dedicated lights phase for cyclists. I don’t think there is space for anything else…

[jh2727]

Simon E wrote:

hirsute wrote:

Hmmmm Is there any cycle path that will satisfy the posters of roadcc ?

Yes, it’s called THE ROAD.

These are the roads that we all pay for out of our taxes, including many people who don’t even drive. Roads don’t belong to car drivers.

Basically that. Cycle lanes and shared use paths are built (in theory) for the benefit of cyclists. There is never going to be, nor should there ever be, a cycle lane or shared use path created for the benefit of motorists.

If there’s a cycle path and a cyclist isn’t using it, it will almost certainly be because it isn’t fit for purpose or fit for that particular cyclists purpose (e.g. some shared use paths I’ll use with my daughter but not on my own). This particular path has giveway lines at every junction, including at the roundabout which would be very difficult to cross safely – much safer and more convenient to ride on the road for many cyclists.

I have zero concern for delays or inconvenience that my cycling may cause to motorists. Motor vehicle journeys are responsible for a lot more congestion (and many are entirely unnecessary), and regardless, driving is a supremely convenient form of transport – no amount of cyclists or cycle lanes are likely to change that (they may slightly exacerbate the problems caused by motorists, but that is far from the same thing). Likewise, when I drive it does not bother me at all when I am being inconvenienced or delayed by a cyclist (certainly no more than traffic lights or traffic or the work necessary to maintain the road or 10,001 other things that I might experience on a journey).

[Judge dreadful]

I know that bridge well.

I know that bridge well. Using the cycle path / shared path, is suicidally stupid on a  road bike. Dog walkers, people on those stupid bloody scooter things, skate boards, and ( wierdly ) geese, are all things that make the road far preferable.

[Jetmans Dad]

AlsoSomniloquism wrote:

I thought it was 15mph. It is what I use as maximum if on shared. 

I don’t think there is a hard and fast rule, I think the guidance is just that you should ride on the road if you want to ride “fast”. 

I have twice been asked by police officers to ride on the road as Humberside Police consider anything more than 12mph to be “fast” in the context of a shared use path. 

And said path goes mostly across an industrial estate where you are extremely unlikely to meet a pedestrian. 

[wycombewheeler]

AlsoSomniloquism wrote:

It is suprising actually how smooth they get roads compared to pavements and shared use although the latter is only noticable when riding a non-suspension bike. 

Especially true here where they have assesed the parapet wall on a flyover is being too weak, and placed a barrier to prevent motor vehicles using the left lane, and rebadged this as a cycle lane (so it looks like road space has been taken away for cyclists) the barrier was installed when the road was resurfaced, but they did not properly resurface the cycle lane, in fact it appears they put the barrier in first, then resurfaced to protect car tyres from the edge of the barrier, (even though they would already be a third of a lane outside where they should be).

and then of course there are the times you come round the left hand bend to find a car has still hit the barrier on their left (oversteer? BMW?) and shunted it into the cycle lane.

[wycombewheeler]

I’ve never used that cycle

I’ve never used that cycle lane going east, but I did once try to use the one heading west, which then went round a bend before crossing walton lane. Why does the cycle lane not go straight? the road is not required to have a chicane at side roads. Nor do people turning in or out of side roads have priority of those on the roads.

On going round the unnecesary bend, I came upon a man standing there with a push chair. So when riding on the cycle path speed must be moderated because you never know what pedestrians will be doing. 

In other words cyclists must slow down, so drivers are not ‘held up’ despite the fact we all know that 99% of the time that drivers are held up, the cause is other drivers.

Looking at the cycle lane going east I see that it is diverted on to a second paralell bridge (probably the original bridge) before coming to an abrupt stop (as far as I can tell) at the ridgeway. (unless the really thin pavement beyond the ridgeway is still shared use.

Good luck rejoining the carriageway at this point with all the drivers who have been liberated from the delays caused by cyclists in order to join the queue at the lights.

In short for cycle lanes to be usable they need to be more than half a mile before spitting you back into the road with no priority and they should not yield to cars entering or existing side roads.

[boatdrinks]

This is local (~ish) to me.

This is local (~ish) to me. As others have suggested, it’s an everyday example of good intent rendered useless by poor design, almost as if it was approved by someone with no cycling experience …imagine! On the southern approach there’s a miserly snippet of dropped kerb with zero advance warning that’s so easy to miss it may as well not be there (in the most recent streetview image it’s completely obscured from view – and access – by the police car), with a painted arrow right alongside that’s invisible through the big metal lump that’s usually over it, and a lollipop-sized shared use roundel set discreetly back from the carriageway so as not to spoil the view. And even if you do pick up these subliminal cues, at the other end the only option to rejoin the road is an equally compact dropped kerb that looks for all the world like a crossing point for pedestrians. Because it is. And it’s pretty much the same tune in a different key going back the other way. If the bits either side of a road look like they’re just for the people doing the walking about stuff, other road-users will tend to leave them to it.

[Simon E]

hirsute wrote:

hirsute wrote:

Next time I visit, I will put the bike on the roof and do some tests.

What do you expect to find? If you go with different expectations to those law-abiding people you saw what will it demonstrate?

Perhaps you would like to visit Shrewsbury. We have some really bitty, token stop-start infrastructure I can show you (i.e. mostly stretches of pavements that have been converted to shared paths) . During the lockdown the nicest stretch, which still forces the rider to stop/slow for several side roads, was busy with peds and a few cyclists and I resorted to riding on the road. Despite being a really nice surface, the bike ‘lane’ part is only wide enough for one cyclist and the ped ‘lane’ is just wide enough for 2 people walking (provided they remain alert and aware that bikes may approach from in front or behind, although many are not). All the new/born-again cyclists seem to have gone back into hibernation now.

In Autumn one section accumulates deep piles of beech leaves, which can be a death trap when wet and also hazardous if it freezes overnight. In windy weather there are often fallen branches that can flick up into the spokes and are difficut to spot in the dark.

This shared path also stops abruptly beside a 4-way junction. It’s on NCR 81, which is the other side of the junction (at your own risk, no lights or priority for the rider, and IME only 1 of the 5 sets of lights will react to cycles approaching on the road).

On the fork I use frequently the cyclist is pushed onto the busy A-road for a mile to reach our estate (unless you want to ride illegally on the pavement).

And that is probably the least rubbish bit of paved cycle path in the whole area.

Perhaps we can ride along the narrow pavement on Smithfield Road with uneven slabs, lamp posts & signs and some huge trees that take up all but 4′ of the whole thing. It’s a nightmare to ride a bike there unless you have it to yourself. But there are 3 lanes of road beside it.

Shit infrastructure is a waste of money but what might seem to drivers as ‘good’ infrastructure is not much better.

[OnTheRopes]

I rarely use cycle paths for

I rarely use cycle paths for the obvious reasons, that bit of path over the bridge though I would use, it looks great, but as mentioned, only if you know it is there. Approaching from the Esso station you probably won’t be on the path because of poor design, onto the roundabout and there are no signs, just a very very short length of dropped curb, miss it and i has gone.

 

[wtjs]

Based on the first photo, I

Based on the first photo, I would probably use that cycleway unless there were ‘too many’ pedestrians. The question is how many is too many, which I can’t answer as I am unlikely to ever use it- 10 would be too many in that view and I would be stepping on the gas, on the road. Someone below referred to the moron motorists who imagine they have a right to shout rubbish at cyclists out of the window. There are a lot of moron motorists about, so I was shouted at a couple of times recently on the Skipton N Bypass- where the innermost line denotes only the edge of the carriageway and there is no cycle lane at all. Occasionally it’s almost wide enough to be one, but it isn’t. Thickheads are the bane of our lives, or the ending of them!

[Simon E]

hirsute wrote:

hirsute wrote:

Did you actually read the OP? You seem to respond (again) based on what you imagine I wrote rather than what I actually wrote. You claim I was bothered yet I didn’t say that.

So what was the purpose of your posts in this thread?

People riding bicycles on the road. I don’t understand why it was worth remarking on but obviously you were looking for a reaction.

[Hirsute]

Thanks to those which wrote
Thanks to those which wrote considered replies.
Next time I visit, I will put the bike on the roof and do some tests.

[Hirsute]

Did you bother the read the
Did you bother to read the last sentence of the OP?

[Hirsute]

Did you actually read the OP?
Did you actually read the OP?
You seem to respond (again) based on what you imagine I wrote rather than what I actually wrote.
You claim I was bothered yet I didn’t say that.

[Author]

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