Birmingham's bollard bonanza as "forest" of traffic-calming poles installed outside school... to protect cyclists and pedestrians from bad parking; Kid's expletive-laden reaction to not getting a bike for Christmas + more on the live blog

Mrs Jessica Grant, "...Delivery drivers have also been unable to park up and I hear parents have had difficulties too." FFS

Shame, Mrs H was/is a big fan of their stuff and it was definitely of a quality worth paying a premium for (so I was told when complaining that my entire outfit including shoes cost less than her jersey...).

I always worry about doing that in case it gets someone's back up ("You being f-ing patronising?!" "Which finger was that?").

Generally speaking I find supermarket delivery drivers are very careful around me when cycling. Do they get paid a wage rather than per delivery? Do they receive training?

Not convinced on that, when Sainsburys vans overtake through pinchpoints like this.

With Waitrose, Yes and Yes

I'm sure I can find a Waitrose close pass example in the archives too. It's down to the individual driver ultimately, not the company.

Do they receive training?

Stagecoach bus drivers doubtless receive training, but they don't pay any attention to it because there's no possibility that Lancashire Constabulary will pay any attention to reports of close-passing by Stagecoach (or any other bus, lorry or car!) drivers

Rendel Harris wrote:

A couple of things I didn't have space to say on Twitter about the Battersea effort: one is that all the door opening buttons are on the right hand side, so that when you open the door you will be directly in the path of cyclists coming from the other side, and that the crowning glory comes when you get to the hub and find the notice on the door saying that from there onwards you must dismount and walk your bike to your parking space.

Not so different to the Sheffield stands in central Bristol for the main shopping area which are in a BID-controlled private-not-public space, where cycling is banned.

There can be no further doubt that this facility was conceived, designed and constructed by people who hate cyclists.

And how wide were the cycle lanes in the video?  They looked pretty narrow to me.

I certainly think two wide-bar MTBs passing each other might have issues.

with a bit of give and take it will be alright I dont think there are going to streams of cyclists entering and exiting at the same time

the rest of it is just the trade offs of following building regulations with fire doors and disability access, Ive a feeling the access buttons are nearly always placed right hand side,  Im sure there are ways they could do it better, but it looks like the space came before the idea of what to do with it.

Awavey wrote:

with a bit of give and take it will be alright I dont think there are going to streams of cyclists entering and exiting at the same time

There aren't now but there might be in future, there's a huge amount of office and retail space in the development: Apple recently announced that they're opening a 1400 worker office there, that alone should bring in a fair number.

Awavey wrote:

with a bit of give and take it will be alright.......

I don't think that is an excuse for not following best practice and deliberately designing in danger.  It is absolutely guaranteed that there will be times when there is conflict between users because they made it that way, when the briefest consideration of how it will be used would have shown them the folly of their ways.

Perhaps this is like the design of cycle facilities on the road, in that the least qualified, least experienced trainee was considered perfectly able to design stuff for cyclists; because it's only cyclists innit.

I'm sure they'll be reconsidering it once they've had a few collisions.  They'll inevitably blame the cyclists and probably ban them.

mattw wrote:

Why is the street sign positioned to block the flow on the shared pavement as much as possible?

Are you talking about the second photo "across the junction?" It isn't blocking the shared pavement.  That section of area is essentially owned by the building next to it similar to the shop frontages space is owned by them. The shared public pavement is the thin strip in front of the bollards. 

I was referring to the "School Close" sign in the pic at the bottom of the article, which looks perfect for a cycling somersault.

I admit I did not inspect the legal extent of anything.

https://twitter.com/WorldBollard/status/1498244871257300997

hirsute wrote:

https://twitter.com/WorldBollard/status/1498244871257300997

That'll buff right out

I LOVE BOLLARDS

Woohoo! 2 quotes of my comments in the blog, maybe it was a more productive morning than I thought.

The bollards appear to be somewhere around 1.2-1.5m apart so it would be pretty uncommon to find a mobility aid or pushchair that struggled with the spacing. (wheelchair accessibility spacing is 82cm for reference)

The only accessibility issue that I see (and those affected unfortunately may not) is that it is a forest of black bollards on black pavement.