Dundee cyclist assaulted by fellow rider he asked to get off pavement and ride on road

IHphoto wrote:

"You have to be aware that the person you make a remark to may be schizophrenic and will take your apparently mild protest as an extreme attack on him or her." That's an awful lot of bad car and van drivers that are schizophrenics then...

I'm not comfortable with the emphasis on 'schizophrenia' in particular. I don't see any reason to single those guys out!

I'd say its more just that many people, particularly in inner city areas, have 'anger management issues' or multiple 'mental health issues' and personality disorders, and its by no means limited to those with official diagnosies. In fact I suspect the formally diagnosed probably consitute a minority of them (and at least those people _know_ they have a problem!).

I would suggest that mental health is a contiuum and also that what gets labelled as such is dependent on social and political issues as much as anything objective.

All I know is areas I have lived in see plenty of unprovoked aggression as it is, and so if you are going to reproach people for bad behaviour you have to be aware it might not go well.

bikeylikey wrote:

Maybe as a mental health professional I tend to be more aware of how many people there are out there suffering from problems of perception. Successive governments have withdrawn funding for support for people with mental health problems, resulting in 'care in the community', aka 'go away and look after yourself, or not, we certainly don't give a sh*t'. You have to be aware that the person you make a remark to may be schizophrenic and will take your apparently mild protest as an extreme attack on him or her. Best to leave it, you just never know.

Seriously? we shouldn't pull people up on irresponsible and illegal behaviour just in case they are schizophenic and have an episode? I agree with your view on 'care in the community'.

Personally I'd be unlikely to call someone on pavement cycling as it's generally not a big deal. It might be different in a busy environment or if they were travelling fast but usually its because of lack of confidence or fear of traffic.

TiNuts wrote:

What a depressing thread. Full of comments that, if you see someone behaving antisocially then just put your head down, swallow it and go on your way. What a pathetic indication of some people's attitude towards those who choose to behave in a **** you manner just because most people won't dare to say anything about it. Such a British problem, I have to say.

Personally, if I come across someone cycling on the pavement I let them experience my disapproval loudly and proudly.

Maybe if more of us expressed our displeasure at some of these scumbags, rather than thinking it's the Po-lice's job (I mean, you are joking, right?), we might actually convey to them that it is a collective response to their disavowal of socially acceptable behaviour rather than expecting some other, largely disinterested, body to do it for us. Which, of course, they never will.

Have we become a nation of "It's not my job" lemmings?

I do wonder.

and get beat up for what is in my eyes, a minor thing.....nah you can do what you like, but if I'm going to get a hiding for shouting at someone, its going to be for something worthwhile

TiNuts wrote:

Have we become a nation of "It's not my job" lemmings?

I do wonder.

Well, its your choice. Perhaps you are good at physical violence. Not everyone is.

As I say, I've sometimes challenged such people, but only when they've annoyed me hugely by nearly crashing into me when I was a pedestrian, and only after making some implicit assessment of whether they were capable of kicking my arse or not.

Even then it has nearly ended up in a fight before we both walked away while angrily posturing just enough to preserve dignity. (I've sometimes thought that if they aren't brave enough to ride on the very road that I regularly ride on myself they surely they won't be brave enough to fight me - but I suspect that might be a dangerously flawed assumption)

Matt eaton wrote:

Schizophrenic signage re: where cyclists should be has a lot to answer for. I see a lot of those little blue signs with the bike flying over the ped's head telling me to pedal along the pavement. I haven't taken the signage too literally and attempted to bunnyhop an old lady but have been tempted to see if I've got the pop to clear a toddler. There's the odd no cycling sign but with the proliferation of 'shared path' signage on otherwise unmarked footways its easy to reach the conclusion (particuaraly if you cycle in mostly urban environs (excepting the big cities)) that our transport planners prefer for us to keep off of the roads wherever possible.

I too feel the urge to point out to some pavement cyclists that they are adults and should behave accordingly but haven't found myself in a fighty enough mood to make comment so far.

The problem with those signs, I find, is the way they appear and disappear at random. You'll be on a marked 'shared use' path, then start to wonder "I haven't seen a sign for ages, am I now breaking the law? Oh, wait there's one now", or you'll slowly realise you are now on the pavement illegally and need to get off of it, despite the absence of any dropped kerb or any sign signifying the ending if the shared use bit.

Or you'll be in the road and the first sign that you _could_ have been on the pavement will be the sign saying the shared use bit has just ended, despite the fact there was never any sign telling you it had started.

Or there'll be a toucan crossing yet no indication that the pavement on either side is legally cycleable.

Or you'll be expected to constantly get on and off of a nasty busy road, as the shared use pavement keeps starting and ending every 20 yards for no logical reason ("how come I can use that bit but not this bit when both the pavement and the road are exactly the same?")

End result being I now never bother with them and just stick to the road or get off and walk. Shared use is mostly a crap box-ticking cop out, I think.

And I have a couple of times (as a pedestrian) gotten into altercations with pavement cyclists but only when I'm in a really bad mood that overcomes my common-sense and risk aversion.

FluffyKittenofTindalos wrote:

Matt eaton wrote:

Schizophrenic signage re: where cyclists should be has a lot to answer for. I see a lot of those little blue signs with the bike flying over the ped's head telling me to pedal along the pavement. I haven't taken the signage too literally and attempted to bunnyhop an old lady but have been tempted to see if I've got the pop to clear a toddler. There's the odd no cycling sign but with the proliferation of 'shared path' signage on otherwise unmarked footways its easy to reach the conclusion (particuaraly if you cycle in mostly urban environs (excepting the big cities)) that our transport planners prefer for us to keep off of the roads wherever possible.

I too feel the urge to point out to some pavement cyclists that they are adults and should behave accordingly but haven't found myself in a fighty enough mood to make comment so far.

The problem with those signs, I find, is the way they appear and disappear at random. You'll be on a marked 'shared use' path, then start to wonder "I haven't seen a sign for ages, am I now breaking the law? Oh, wait there's one now", or you'll slowly realise you are now on the pavement illegally and need to get off of it, despite the absence of any dropped kerb or any sign signifying the ending if the shared use bit.

Or you'll be in the road and the first sign that you _could_ have been on the pavement will be the sign saying the shared use bit has just ended, despite the fact there was never any sign telling you it had started.

Or there'll be a toucan crossing yet no indication that the pavement on either side is legally cycleable.

Or you'll be expected to constantly get on and off of a nasty busy road, as the shared use pavement keeps starting and ending every 20 yards for no logical reason ("how come I can use that bit but not this bit when both the pavement and the road are exactly the same?")

End result being I now never bother with them and just stick to the road or get off and walk. Shared use is mostly a crap box-ticking cop out, I think.

And I have a couple of times (as a pedestrian) gotten into altercations with pavement cyclists but only when I'm in a really bad mood that overcomes my common-sense and risk aversion.

I'm the same as you in that I stick to the roads. Shared use paths of this sort are a recipe for disaster unless you are pootling along at 5mph. I sometimes find them handy if I'm towing the kiddy trailer up a hill but other than that its just not safe enough to progress quickly enough compared to the road. Despite this I can easily see how the decision to stick to the roads (like you and could easily go the other way for a less confident cyclist who might choose to stick to the footway instead.

I think that this sort of shared use path is often an afterthought by the road planners. They invest massive amounts of time and money analysing traffic flow and planning road systems with motor vehicles at the heart of them without any thought for cycle provision only to discover that what they have built is out of bounds for all but the most confident riders. Their solution is to make the footways 'shared use', thereby removing bicycles from the road infrastructure and 'solving' the problem that they created. The A34 through Newbury is a good example of this.

CameronB wrote:

“I was riding on the road but I spotted a man cycling on the pavement and shouted over to him that he should be on the road"

Unfortunately there is more chance of getting a black eye out of this than a response like "Oh, i'm sorry, how foolish of me. Thank you for pointing out the error of my ways"

I don't know I often get a positive response, I don't know if this is because 9/10 I'm with a toddler in tow or that I'm a skinhead with tattoos down to my hands.

You do get some dick like responses same as you do with Red light jumpers but these are mostly the sort that use a bike to shuttle stolen video recorders between pubs not that use a bike for commuting or sport.

I hate the catchall term 'cyclist' some of them nay most pavement riders aren't cyclists they just happen to be a 'person on a bike'

"CameronB" wrote:

Unfortunately there is more chance of getting a black eye out of this than a response like "Oh, i'm sorry, how foolish of me. Thank you for pointing out the error of my ways"

Two lovely black eyes!
Oh! what a surprise!
Only for telling a man he was wrong,
Two lovely black eyes!

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