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Live blog: Active travel campaigners slam Budget, Italian ex-pro dies in plane crash, £330 Bournemouth prom cycling fine + more
All the news from the site and beyond as we start a new week
Mon, Oct 29, 2018 16:00
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Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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Latest Comments
kil0ran 1 hour ago
I was a few bikes away from the fatal collision during Ride London a few years ago, I barely avoided the victim's dog which was running loose. Definitely one of those slo-mo adrenaline fuelled moments and I was only doing about 40kph. At lead out speeds it really doesn't bear thinking about.
open_roads 1 hour ago
@Xenophon2 "That’s a lot of batteries to keep track of, to the point that I have a dedicated charger with 3 m USB-C cable in my office, another one at home. Can’t imagine having to deal with another battery such as on the Flight Attendant." Top tip: In reality most of the SRAM stuff lasts a month or two even with pretty heavy usage. I just charge all the batteries on the last Sunday of every month and have yet to be caught out. The SRAM batteries are so cheap / small / light it's also worth keeping a spare in a saddle bag or similar.
ajuk.uk@gmail.com 2 hours ago
@chrisonabike There does seem to be evidence that 20 mph limits work on roads that already lend themselves to such low speeds, and I do think the lack of a 25 mph limit option is an issue for some roads. Speed limits should especially not be set very low in the hope that many or most drivers will only exceed them by a set amount because, not only is it not true that many people drive like that, the opposite can happen. Instead of targeting the drivers most likely to cause harm, you're putting the prohibition onto the behaviour of more sensible drivers and forcing the police to target them. The DfT guidance used to have a paragraph calling out this presumption. The extent to which road design and conditions at the time dictate traffic speeds is too stark to ignore. I've seen urban roads with signed 40 mph limits have lower average speeds than some roads with posted 20 mph limits. And yes, that road in Gloucester has signs openly inviting drivers to go faster, and almost none of them do: the non-compliance was about 2%. Compare that to over 99% non-compliance on some roads in Wales. What I'm mainly talking about is the increasing imposition of 20 mph limits on much higher-standard main roads. That's where you see extreme levels of non-compliance. In some cases, the average speed has even been known to go up after the limit has gone down. Showing such contempt just brings speed limits into disrepute and my contention is that drivers should take speed limits seriously.
ajuk.uk@gmail.com 2 hours ago
@chrisonabike There does seem to be evidence that 20 mph limits work on roads that already lend themselves to such low speeds, and I do think the lack of a 25 mph limit option is an issue for some roads. Speed limits should especially not be set very low in the hope that many or most drivers will only exceed them by a set amount because, not only is it not true that many people drive like that, the opposite can happen. Instead of targeting the drivers most likely to cause harm, you're putting the prohibition onto the behaviour of more sensible drivers and forcing the police to target them. The DfT guidance used to have a paragraph calling out this presumption. The extent to which road design and conditions at the time dictate traffic speeds is too stark to ignore. I've seen urban roads with signed 40 mph limits have lower average speeds than some roads with posted 20 mph limits. And yes, that road in Gloucester has signs openly inviting drivers to go faster, and almost none of them do: the non-compliance was about 2%. Compare that to over 99% non-compliance on some roads in Wales. So no, when speed limits match the road, compliance is much higher, but speeds are not. What I'm mainly talking about is the increasing imposition of 20 mph limits on much higher-standard main roads. That's where you see extreme levels of non-compliance. In some cases, the average speed has even been known to go up after the limit has gone down. Showing such contempt just brings speed limits into disrepute and my contention is that drivers should take speed limits seriously.
Rendel Harris 2 hours ago
@jaymack Yes...to an extent, and I'm happy at the moment with my twelve-year-old Dura Ace mechanical, but I must admit when I had Ultegra Di2 I did notice not so much the ease of shifting but the perfect trimming of the gears after every shift so that the chainline was always absolutely perfect and that did enhance the simple pleasure of being outside, for me anyway. At least until that day I forgot to charge the battery which died at the turnaround on an eighty-mile ride and had to ride a very lumpy forty miles home stuck in 50x14...
Rendel Harris 3 hours ago
@Daclu Trelub Well no, given that I object to the use of derogatory slurs against people with mental health issues I think I'll "bother" the person who's using derogatory slurs against people with mental health issues. Have a little think, if capable: if your mother or someone else close to you had dementia or mental health issues, would you be happy for people to be pointing at them mockingly saying, "Looks like she's a few chips short of a fish supper"? Stop it.
Daclu Trelub 3 hours ago
@Rendel Harris Go and bother somebody else with your opinion.
jaymack 3 hours ago
I'm sure electronic gears, pedals, seat posts etc. are each a modern marvel but they all seem to solve a problem I've never encountered. However I have encountered others faffing while searching for batteries, cables and even a firmware update. All of which just gets in the way of cycling's simple pleasure - being outside
Rendel Harris 3 hours ago
@Daclu Trelub Yeah...that sort of expression is OK when being jocular about someone who's a bit dense or slow on the uptake, is it really appropriate for someone who quite obviously has mental health/dementia issues?
21 thoughts on “Live blog: Active travel campaigners slam Budget, Italian ex-pro dies in plane crash, £330 Bournemouth prom cycling fine + more”
Ermm – they do understand
Ermm – they do understand that “£420m for potholes in today’s Budget” is total and utter f-ing peanuts, right??
Same old shit, different day.
Same old shit, different day. So you can beat someone up, attack with your killing weapon of choice and get no charges but a cyclist on the prom gets a bigger slap than someone distracted driving or speeding.
Fucking ridiculous!
£330! Totally
£330! Totally disproportionate. This driver was under the influence of drugs, put other road users at risk but was fined about the same, even if he did have to do some community service https://www.bournemouthecho.co.uk/news/17001272.drug-swipe-on-driver-in-boscombe-gave-positive-result-for-cannabis/?ref=ar
Mind you, they did the right thing with this idiot https://www.bournemouthecho.co.uk/news/16986349.mitchell-stuart-drove-his-porsche-at-55mph-near-lilliput-c-of-e-infant-school/?ref=ar “He is one of those start-up child prodigies.” I think they meant one of those upstart children.
£330 fine is rediculous when
£330 fine is rediculous when compared with what drivers get for more dangerous offences, however, the cyclist was stupid to get back on his bike after being informed of the ban. When taking into account the situation and that he was let off and then decided to try and take advantage he probably deserved a good chunk of what he got.
ClubSmed wrote:
Fixed that
ClubSmed wrote:
Such as running over an elederly man who’d fallen into the road, despite the car 100m ahead managing to swerve around him, while driving your car with a defective headlamp, on the (handsfree) phone to your boyfriend arranging to meet up (presumably for some rumpy pumpy), failing to stop, turning around, coming back, and then skulking away when spotting it was in fact a person she’d hit (as she suspected, despite having said she thought it was rubbinh but suspected it was a person – go figure that out).
Depriving a family of a family member and she’s fined 500 for leaving the scene, not for the intial accident, or the defective lights.
Random thought in response to
Random thought in response to the Bournemouth article; does dabbing count as cycling? That somewhat archaic practice of having one foot on a pedal and using the other to scoot along like a scooter user?
kil0ran wrote:
Given that even pushing a bike down the pavement is technically illegal – you should carry it – I would imagine “dabbing” would also fall foul of this.
vonhelmet wrote:
I don’t believe that pushing a bike is technically illegal – got any references for that?
From this article http://www.bikehub.co.uk/featured-articles/cycling-and-the-law/ :
Scooting on a bike (I’m pretty sure that dabbing is something entirely different in modern vernacular) would thus be considered to be riding it.
vonhelmet wrote:
Not true https://www.cyclinguk.org/cycle/scooting-cycling
kil0ran wrote:
Scooting, or dabbing as you call it, is as far as I know, technically legal as you aren’t riding the bike. I’m sue I’ve read legal opinion about this, but perhaps someone with more knowledge than me could elucidate?
Found this, https://www.cyclinguk.org/cycle/scooting-cycling which makes it clear that pushing your bike with both feet on the ground is definitely legal.
Cycling back towards
Cycling back towards Greenwich from Bethnal Green the other night, 11.30pm, going through Greenwich foot-tunnel I got an earful from a drunk woman walking the opposite way to me because I was cycling through. She stepped out in front of me to stop me, shouting at me to get off my bike. OK, strictly speaking, the rules say don’t cycle (they also state you’re meant to walk on the left, and she wasn’t, but I digress). There needs to be some kind of proportion (as I tried to explain to her). It was an empty tunnel, apart from her. At 11.30pm I’m not causing anyone any harm by cycling. “What about small children walking in here” she ranted. I looked up and down the deserted tunnel and looked bemused. At busy times, during the day I’ll always get off the bike and walk. That evening I’d come across so much agressive driving on the streets of east london, I couldn’t help thinking, as this angry woman ranted at me, we have our perspectives all messed up.
£330 is too lenient.
£330 is too lenient.
People who think they are above the law should, and will, be made to pay, entitled cyclists are no exception.
A440 wrote:
I’d be happy to agree if the same standards were applied to motorists as well.
A440 wrote:
Ooh, Charles Bronson! Go on, baby, make me pay! Make me pay ’til I beg for more! Wear your superhero mask for me, big boy!
The full Herald on Sunday
The full Herald on Sunday piece is truly appalling. (They don’t appear to have made it available online.)
“…cyclists are allowed to run riot on our roads, never signalling, rarely obeying traffic lights or pedestrian crossings, and often exceeding 20mph speed limits in towns or wobbling along on 60mph country roads, causing drivers on blind bends to have heart attacks.”
“They cause cars to overtake into oncoming traffic, but don’t give a damn as long as they get to practise their smug hobby and display their disturblingly distended calf muscles.”
“Humour” indeed…
PS – sad farwell to Norman Sheil – Class rider – brilliant coach – nice guy who had little time for the UK “blazer brigade”
JohnnyRemo wrote:
Oh how I love this one: a clear confession that the driver is not in control of their car and hence had no way of preventing it from swerving into the oncoming traffic.
rkemb wrote:
It’s the sense of entitlement that does it. “The speed limit is 30mph, therefore I am entitled to travel at 30mph no matter what.” Well, no, that’s not how it works.
rkemb wrote:
I think we’d always assumed motor vehicles were like bicycles (short of a mechanical failure, the rider is completely in control of them) when clearly they’re actually more like horses (and horsists are constantly reminding us that they have very little control over their two tonnes of very nervous and jumpy still-almost-wild animal).
Cycling UK and Sustrans are
Cycling UK and Sustrans are right, and this budget is yet another disaster for active travel and sustainable travel. £30bn for roads and £650m for alternatives to driving, which is exactly the inverse of what it should have been. This government has gone way beyond hopeless, hurtled past totally incompetent and is currently at abysmal.
I stand corrected – I was
I stand corrected – I was misinformed.