“It’s too dangerous to cycle on the roads”: Conservative councillor’s call for cycling infrastructure in new housing developments branded “pathetic” by fellow party members

brooksby wrote:

Maybe riding a bike is too dangerous in rural communities but you know what, it's not some natural phenomenon like the weather or wild bears - it's dangerous because of the behaviour of the people who live there or who drive through there.

This is the crux of the matter - there's a fine infrastructure (well, apart from the motor vehicle induced potholes) very fit for cycling, walking, horse riding and even driving a car if the driving is done safely. No extra "cycling infrastructure" (which often isn't any such thing, unless you think murder strips and pedestrian-shared skittle alleys to nowhere count) is needed as the roads are great for cycling about as well as getting from any A to any B.

It's often said that "we" (whoever this imaginary cohesive group is) should accommodate "everyone" in a nice civilised fashion. Cyclists, peds, horse riders, lorry drivers, motorists and even taxi drivers all ought to behave with care and consideration. But the nature of the car and it's century-long culture is such that care and consideration are difficult for many to manage, once they have their foot on the accelerator pedal of their two ton ton-uppers ....... So .....

Those two ton ton-uppers need to be severely restricted via a redesign to reduce their mad speeds, weights and freedumbs to murder & maim through both aggression and inattention.

In short, the car (and many other motorised vehicles) are not fit for purpose because they're inherently dangerous. They need to be greatly changed, reduced in numbers and perhaps banned altogether.

If they were banned, that would solve a vast number of other dangerous issues besides the maiming and murder of some cyclists. So .... spend the money on car reduction, not expensive, useless and actually unneeded "cycling infrastructure".

It might need a few quids to train feeble Conservative councillors in how to ride a bike or walk more than 20 yards without collapsing in a heap of panting pathetic pugglewick with just enough breath to call for a taxi driven over two cats and a toddler by a right-wing loon to service the Toryspiv's call for rescue.

Cugel wrote:

This is the crux of the matter - there's a fine infrastructure (well, apart from the motor vehicle induced potholes) very fit for cycling, walking, horse riding and even driving a car if the driving is done safely. No extra "cycling infrastructure" (which often isn't any such thing, unless you think murder strips and pedestrian-shared skittle alleys to nowhere count) is needed as the roads are great for cycling about as well as getting from any A to any B.

You're much older than I though!  The roads were great for cycling (and all the rest) when they were first given tarmac surfaces.  Before that presumably they were great for the great great ... grandparents of gravel grinders).

Now... they're massive maintenance-heavy asphalt pinball chutes, tiring to the eye, uncomfortable under foot, garlanded with curbs for catching your pedals on and grates for your wheels.  At night their lighting irritates nature, astronomers and probably disturbs our sleep patterns, there are the traffic lights which are unnecessary in the absence of large fast motor vehicles at which cyclists can dutifully wait for a couple of minutes also.

Cars are here to stay though, being almost as lucrative and popular as the drugs which we have failed to win a war against.

We just need to rebalance things.  Reduce the amazing amounts of money and space for driving and use it for walking, cycling, green space etc.  Help protect everyone from people driving, work harder to protect drivers from themselves and keep them in control though infrastructure and enforcement.  Where possible restrict them to somewhere safe where they won't get in the way.  Ideally out of sight and hearing.

When I were a lad, there were few cars. What there was went slow, as they all has enjins of only 5hp and no one could afford petrol. Then that Macmillan insisted that we should have it good and within days the place was infested with lead-footed motorists, who also put lead into the brains of wee bairns; or ran them over.

But I digress.

Out here in The Hinterlands of West Wales there are roads but they're still rather like those 1950s ones of me yoof, since the population density in very low and, anyway, have slow tractors blocking the car loon wanting to speed (all 17 of them albeit spread over thousands of square miles of green) since many of those tractors are Very Ancient and only go at 8.3mph. Also, they stop together so the drivers can have long talks about many Welsh things. I can get me bike through but others must wait .... for ages & ages.

So, two actual solutions to car loonery and provision for safe cycling might be envisaged.

i) Toryspivs rob & rob & rob the rest of us until no one can afford a car, whilst the spivs all go about in helicopters.

ii) Roads are little used as a result and eventually revert to gravel as the potholes join up and their detritus spreads out under the actions of millions of bicycle wheels* and heavy duty weather that grinds nearly everything down to gravel.

Anyroadup (so to speak) ..... Ah've gorra gravel bike, me! And some waterproofs.

* Bicycles will become less expensive as empty-tank cars are melted doon for feedstock to the new Hercules and Raleigh factories, perhaps even a Claude Butler one. 531 once more becomes the best you can get but most settle for gaspipe (its cheap).

All I know is... first if you're cycling about you're happier*.  Yes, you're probably contributing less to us eating / burning / digging up all the useful stuff but individually that only counts for imaginary points. (All those other humans gonna human and some of them have very expensive life habits).

But ... second - if the trains aren't running and the pumps go dry and the sockets don't answer the call, you've got at least one cycle.  And very likely drawers or boxes of spare parts too!

* Except when someone grazes your elbow at 55mph, your crank arm detaches, chain snaps or the pawls on your freewheel give up, or you get a puncture then realise it's a slash in your tyre and you left the spare tube at in the pannier you didn't take...  Actually I never had a crank go but a pedal disassembled itself shortly after what will be my last attempt to service one.

chrisonatrike wrote:

... first if you're cycling about you're happier*.

Preach brother Chris!

If only we could share this with the millions of drivers who don't know what they are missing.

chrisonatrike wrote:

* Except when someone grazes your elbow at 55mph, your crank arm detaches, chain snaps or the pawls on your freewheel give up, or you get a puncture then realise it's a slash in your tyre and you left the spare tube at in the pannier you didn't take...  

Can we let them find out this bit after they discover the happiness?

Hang on there. Was there not a contributor on another thread who enthused that racing round a track in a performance car trumped pootling about on a bicycle?  

giff77 wrote:

Hang on there. Was there not a contributor on another thread who enthused that racing round a track in a performance car trumped pootling about on a bicycle?  

For my 50th Birthday my family managed to find a company that was brave enough let me race a Ferrari round a race track even though I don't have a driving licence. I agree it was incredibly exhilarating and one more tick on my bucket list but a major downside is you never actually go anywhere, you just end up back where you started.

I can't think of anything that combines fun, fitness, utility and value for money better than a bicycle.

Rejoining the rejoining the EU is top of my bucket list - thrilling and exhilerating.

Last Saturday...5km in to the ride 😂

KDee wrote:

Last Saturday...5km in to the ride 😂

Did that just fall off due to not being installed correctly or did part of it snap?

I blame the idiot that likes to regularly strip, clean and reassemble his bike! Note to others, if you have Hollowtech II cranks, and notice a sudden change in front shifting or chain rub, check the cranks before assuming it's the front mech!

KDee wrote:

I blame the idiot that likes to regularly strip, clean and reassemble his bike! Note to others, if you have Hollowtech II cranks, and notice a sudden change in front shifting or chain rub, check the cranks before assuming it's the front mech!

Did you just forget to tighten up the two bolts on the crank?

It's the torque of the town. 

KDee wrote:

Last Saturday...5km in to the ride 😂

Argh! Bad memories return!

OTOH only 5km into the ride. And it's more aero now.

brooksby wrote:

Maybe riding a bike is too dangerous in rural communities but you know what, it's not some natural phenomenon like the weather or wild bears - it's dangerous because of the behaviour of the people who live there or who drive through there.

(I'm sure KYA can add to this - IIRC they are very knowledgeable about the leafy lanes of nearby Essex...).

I have just come back from north wales, there was a national speed limit lane outside where I was staying - I don't think I once saw a single person drive at more than 30mph on it, I felt very safe walking on it and would happily have ridden my bike on it, if I had brought it with me.  Last year a spent a short time in Devon, in a place with a similar road where I rarely saw anyone driving at less than 50mph (admittedly that was in February when there was probably a higher percentage of locals) - I felt extremly unsafe walking on it and likely wouldn't have ridden on it.

The way I see this, there is a very simple solution - the national speed limit needs to be re-defined. Roads where there is zero pedestrian and cycle infrastructure should have a max limit of 20mph. The idea of permitting near motorway speeds, on roads that are far from being motorways is, is clearly ludircrous.

I think David Brazier has a point, it is fairly pointless requiring new build developlers to include cycle infrastructure in their developements without something to connected it too. The solutions isn't to remove the requirement though, the solution is to require them to contribute to the provision of shared use ways that link the new developments to the existing population centres or make the existing infrastructure more equitable by reducing and enforcing the speed limit.  Requiring cycle infrastructure on new build developments, where the only roads in and out are defacto motorways, is just pointless.