Cambridge Tour de France road closures a "nightmare" says councillor

'its a bit like a seaside tourist attraction town.'

Nothing of the sort. You live near a beach or a football ground, you expect tourists/ pissed-up neanderthals on a regular basis.
You live in/near Cambridge, you expect students cycling like prats, and expensive train journeys to London, but not road closures for sporting events. Sure, people who don't want to watch the event can make other plans, and yes, it's their 'fault' if they don't. But they still have an absolute right to be pissed off about it.

is it a nighmare when a city closes its roads all day for a marathon?

'Why? I live near a football ground, and have to deal with the traffic that brings upwards of 30 times a year. Should I, and everyone else in my neighbourhood, get compensation?'

Presumably you had some kind of say in where you lived?

@3cylinder, good post.

Why can so many of 'us' cyclists not understand locals being upset about disruption to business, trade, travel and access?

To simply brand them 'NIMBY's' is uncompromising and shows complete lack of empathy or understanding of another view.

Sure, I'd be delighted if it went past my house or work, but I completely understand people not being happy with extensive and lengthy closures throughout a busy weekday.we can't all take the day off to watch it!

I'm looking forward to the stage passing the place where I work, I expected that the center of Cambridge would be 'down' for a good chunk of time, but even I was surprised by the timing of the road closures that cover the semi-busy route south of Cambridge. http://www.cambridgeshire.gov.uk/info/20020/cycling/470/tour_de_france_2.... There are a bunch of businesses on that route that won't be accessible from 7am onwards, so effectively most probably have to close for the day, and you can't expect them to be happy about that. (unlike me!)

I'm a cyclist, I'm aware of the tour caravan that precedes the race and the way the race takes over places in France, but explaining to someone who isn't aware of this history/significance that the roads are closed from 7am for a race that will zip past in seconds more than five hours later is a toughie

So a road closure for a day is a 'nightmare'.
I am sure that the victims of the various tsunamis, hurricanes, tornadoes and earthquakes etc that completely devastate their lives will no doubt have great sympathy for the people of Cambridge who are inconvenienced for a whole 24 hours.

Perhaps we could gather together a bunch of d-list celebs and hold some kind of fundraising event to help the impoverished of Cambridge get back on their feet after such monumental devastation?

Surely this just goes to show that you will always, without fail, find somebody who will complain about something. It doesn't mean they're right or wrong - it's just human nature. I'm sure there are things that people on here would complain about too.

It feels like a classic 'media taking one comment to blow something out of proportion on a slow news day' issue. "Regional road closures of up to 24 hours" suggests most of Cambridgeshire will be closed, whereas what's meant is that some but not all roads near the start line will be closed for 24 hours.

Is someone after a job at the Daily Mail/Express?

I love football, but the amount of public harm that 'fans' routinely commit in town centres and on public transport every weekend - that goes completely unreported, and costs the state a fortune in policing, healthcare etc - stands in stark contrast to this (non-) story.

Where cycling is concerned you can always find a hard-right crank to condemn anything to do with it. Pride marches and parades used to (and sometimes still do) have to deal with similar attitudes (although of course pro-cycling easily out-camps any LGBT pride activities).

Mind you, there were always a few bores in the village I grew up in who would moan about the annual road closure for the school gala or the Christmas carol singing. Best bet is to just ignore/pity these people and get on with enjoying something rare and extraordinary.

It happens in Paris every year and as I can talk from experience of being there on numerous occasions and talking to the locals.....they love it !

This is just the usual of the Brits loving having a moan

Yet every year this happens in towns in France all over the country and they look like they love it!

Scotsdales turns over £14M a year... http://www.hortweek.com/Retail/article/1158292/retail-outlet-3m-turnover... My similarly seasonal and weekend-biased shop turns over roughly a tenth of that (selling bikes) and we reckon shutting on a Monday in summer for stock take costs us about £1K of revenue which won't just come a different day. So £10K would be a much more reasonable maximum estimate of revenue lost for this outlet. Some labour cost will be saved but many fixed costs still incurred so the effect on the bottom line will be perhaps a couple of grand, very roughly.

Of course, a venue that popular, with a cafe, extensive parking, community rooms etc. just might be able to think of some ways to capitalise on the vastly increased numbers of people in the area?

Can't imagine what a business with a large car park and access to loads of (garden) furniture might do when a sporting event passes by........

I wondered when the hot air moaning would start... less than 24 hours?

Don't worry, the 364 and a bit days will still be available motorists to terrorise the public highways.

Maybe they could hold a flower show on some cycle paths the week after, in the interests of balance........

There'll be somebody unhappy about any large event wherever it's staged. I accept they have a right to be unhappy, but I'd like to think that as a society we like to have the odd big event, and that will always mean that someone somewhere is going to have to suck it up.

I suspect he reads The Daily Mail and votes UKIP.

Miserable f*cker.

Fine let them moan at le Tour,

I'd like to complain about how Leeds is
Full of gormless people wandering around slowly holding me up.
Gummed up every other week when some people kick a bit of leather around.
Gummed up when 100s of thousand of drug addled music hippies cover the whole place in mud as they leave a trail of devestation after a so called music festival every bloody Aug bank holiday.
The fact the roads in Leeds are regulary closed for so called fun runs, what's the fun in running, bah humbug.
Oh and not forgetting the distruption cause by the bloody torch the other year. I mean to close the road so that someone can carry a fag lighter, come one!

And don't get me started on the distruption to my cycling caused by the various pony club meetings, country fairs and the Great Yorkshire Show at Harrogate, mud, mud and animal dung all over the place. Might as well take up mountain biking again. I stopped that because the forest always seemed to have some nutters driving cars as fast as they could into trees.

I'd also like to complain about the distruption caused by buses always stopping in front of me and refuse trucks. Someone really should do something about all the red lights that disrupt my journeys and get rid of other road users. Closed roads for me to cycle on is the way to go. No-one in sight, peace and quiet.

Hve I missed anyone out? Live and let live I say!

Bollocks, I was going down to the stage by bus and hoping to stock up on bedding plants at the same time!

That's my plans ruined

Dont blame the tour, blame the govt they wanted a stage to end in London so its tough, you just have to live with it.

Businesses that benefit do pay a levy. Corporation tax at 20% on any profit. OK, goes to central government, not local, but since local government is 70% centrally funded it makes little difference.

Not really impressed with some of the comments here, not everybody is interested in this (or indeed any) sport. I think a 24 hour closure is pretty excessive. I'm guessing that's how long they think they'll need (worst case) to tow away all the cars parked on the route.

"This is predicted to cost the business around £50,000"

Only if you do voodoo maths.

My suspicion is that this figure is the gross revenue for one day's trading. It's not the net profit on a day's trading. And there is also a question as to whether the trading has been lost or merely displaced ie I was going to buy a lawnmower on Monday 7th July but the shop is closed because of the TdF so I'll pop down on Tuesday 8th and buy it instead.

There may be a certain amount of loss from this which would be a subtle calculation of the net profit from the actual lost sales rather than the time shited sales adjusted by the reduced operating costs from one days's trading.

And that's not taking into account the marketing opportunity provided by having so many TdF spectators view whatever offers you put in front of them in your Yellow Jersey sale.

Voodoo maths is the type that calculates if you make supermarkets close on a Sunday then weekly food sales will go down 14.28% rather than resulting in slightly higher than previous trading figures for Friday, Saturday and Monday.