Selfish cyclist blasted for taking up THREE seats on busy train for his bike

So rather than ask for a seat, take a photo and stick it on Facearse. This is how the world ends, people...

My bike is taking up 3 seat spaces as I read this, cos the designated cycle space on the train has three fold up seats in it. Nowhere else to put a bike.

I can actually imagine myself doing this, rightly or wrongly, in certain situations.

I imagine myself making a train journey late in the evening with my bike, feeling very tired and being certain that I will fall asleep when the train gets moving. I either don't have a lock with me or the on-board bike facilities don't allow for bikes to be locked up so I decide that I need to keep the bike in touching distance for reasons of security. The train is quiet with plenty of free seats so I arrive at a solution something like the one pictured. The train fills up as my journey progresses but I'm fast asleep and totally oblivious.

I think I actually recall a time or two when I've positioned my bike such that my feet are resting on it while I'm asleep on the basis that if anyone moved it I would be woken up. Am I paranoid? Putting it right up on the seats as pictured is a bit much I agree but I guess that the bike would have blocked the gangway otherwise.

Based on the fact that the guy is wearing a suit and it was a 10:45 train I would guess this man went out after work, had a few beers, realized he was too pissed to cycle home, and got the train, at which point he fell asleep.

So perhaps the headline should be "Drunk Man Behaves In Inconsiderate Manner On Train". Clearly a very slow news day in the road.cc office

I booked and reserved a cycle space on a train a couple of months back, the train wasn't particularly busy. I boarded with my bike and to my horror found that the cycle space i reserved was in use, not by a bicycle... But by a pram, a dozen shopping bags, and two suitcases, crammed in to above head height. I stood with my bike for about twenty minutes until finally a train manager arrived. She then decided that because the family who owned the luggage were rowdy that it was not worth her time, and also told me that I couldn't stand with my bicycle and that id have to get off at the next stop. I don't condone what this guy has done, but better infrastructure for cyclists on trains is the way to go. If there is a place on every train for bikes then nobody would be complaining!

Or they could have woken him up, asked him to try to site his bike better and only use the one seat. Social networking, the easy solution to a problem you are too gutless to address in person. How many folk facebook (generally) ladies taking up two seats or more with shopping?

Seems an odd way to put your bike on a train.

Two points come to mind:

1. DId anyone on the train ask him to move his bike or did they do the typical London commuter thing of not saying anything, but harshly staring then going on twitter/facebook to moan about it?

2. These trains have bike spaces, but in my experience these spaces are taken my people who want some extra leg room, but won't move to alow you to put a bike in the designated area.

Yes he's a pillock. 

However, what the article doesn't say but I would bet was the case, is that they were all probably too British to actual do anything like just move the bike. The power of tutting and stern glances doesn't work, nor does taking a mobile photo or tweeting. 

Also the comment that "she, her husband and several other passengers " were left standing implies that three wasted spaces wasn't the whole problem - the train would have still been too crowded if he had moved his bike. 

It's nearly as bad as one person on their own driving a car built to carry 4/5 people, it's no less selfish than this. I have to cycle passed hundreds of these people a day. 

In my experience, whenever I've decided to cop-out and get on the train instead of cycling, said train is invariably re-routed, cancelled, massively delayed or swapped for a replacement bus-service that doesn't take bikes, as the Gods choose to punish me for my weakness.

I see your 3 seat take up and raise you a 5. Taken by my mate on the 17:56 Leeds to Skipton.

Umm, mmag1, in the Netherlands bikes are completely banned from the rail system in the morning peak and it costs €6 for a day ticket for your bike the rest of the time. Bikes are not hugely welcome on TGV services in France. Etc. Its not a bikes on trains paradise across the continent.

Bikes and trains ought to be complementary if we planned for a properly integrated multi-modal transport system, but of course there is no incentive for operators to provide cycle space on trains. It works just about everywhere in Europe where transport is seen as a vital public service, but not here where it's simply another cash cow for the kleptocracy.

Bicycles should not displace people on trains, but there's not enough info in that photo to make any judgement. Let's widen the image and see the rest of the carriage, and while we're about it, the adjacent carriages too.

Also, what is the time of day? Is the rail company guilty of limiting capacity by running short carriages?

More and broader data please.

Are you really calling this "news" now road cc? First of all it's a anecdote based on one Facebook photo. It's allegedly a train at 10:45pm and clearly when he got on there were 4 clear seats or he wouldn't have managed to get his bike there and he's now fallen asleep. Has anyone asked him to move and he refused? Has anyone actually proven that the train is really full?  What were the provisions for cycles on the train? And does the train stop at multiple stations with exits on both sides of the carrige thus making standing in the door inconvenient due having to manouvre side to side every few minutes? Why has he brought his bike on the train; perhaps he's been knocked off and now he's trying to get home after a painful and stressful experience? 

Going even further into the story can you even prove the person who posted the photo was even on the train?

Further into the story (as clearly a poorly thane photo isnt enough for more than a paragraph) you then rehash some old story from the bbc over concerns about folding bicycles from 8 years ago and cherry pick the most anticycling  comments on an article that is clearly going to get anticycling comments. You don't even question the obvious inconsistencies within the comments. For instance the extended comment which ends the article about folding seats; in my experience on scotrail folding seats are provided within a space for wheelchairs pram and bicycle storage (and are signed for as such) and when not in use the seats fold down to allow sitting or so you can sit beside your bike so it doesn't fall over.

This story with even its flimsy premise had the potential to then explore the difficulties of transporting bicycles on public transport and the lack of provision of bikes areas on the majority of trains. Unfortunately you decided to go for the low hanging fruit and lowest common denominator reporting and tried to stir up a bit of clickbait and anger over inconsiderate cyclist and drive traffic rather than the harder and more worthy cycling advocacy that I'd have hoped for on a cycling website. And that is a shame.

He's not a cyclist - he's a dickhead who owns a bike.

Doesn't matter what the object is, the bloke is ignorant and selfish.  Suerly someone got him to move it?!

Seems like it's no different from people who put their bag or a rucksack on the seat next to them and don't move it.

That's a dick move that I would be annoyed about. Just shows doesn't matter if they are cyclists or not, dicks will always be dicks.