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What works for me is making
What works for me is making cycling into a habit. If I start thinking about cycling, I find I end up concentrating on the negatives and so the best solution for me is to not think about it as I forget that it’s supposed to be fun. The fun aspect is also the grounding aspect – you notice the wind, greenery, glorious sunshine (NOT) and it’s all physical sensations leading to a sense of well-being and nothing to do with the brain sticking its oar in and worrying.
However, you’ve clearly got a problem making it into a habit, so along with seeking help from a GP and others, I’d repeat MungeCrundle’s advice. Go for a 5 minute ride with no expectations – don’t even necessarily put on all your kit – just pootle around a bit.
On a tangent (nothing to do with bikes) – I wish I could syphon off the energy and enthusiasm that Cliff Stoll has: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-k3mVnRlQLU
For mobile phone use, how about removal of thumbs as a punishment?That’d be unfair – what if they ever need to hitch-hike?
Bristol doesn’t need a quick
Bristol doesn’t need a quick bike to be quicker than other traffic.
(Pic shamelessly stolen from BristolPost)
It was the bike.
It was the bike.
There is a case for actually enforcing existing mobile phone legislation. We all know that a large percentage of those waiting motorists will have their faces buried in a smartphone, and it is very simple, if your engine is on you are driving.I’ve always wondered – not being au fait with mobile technology – whether it would be possible to tell if a driver has made a call or used data on a smartphone, whilst the vehicle’s engine is switched on.
If it does, then that driver should get thirty working days to explain why he was doing so. A suitable explanation would be danger to life or property.
Once that thirty days is past, his licence is suspended for two years, with no possibility of appeal or getting it back for ‘hardship’.
Ah, well. I can dream.
The difficulty is proving that the person driving at the time was also the person using the phone. Generally, this requires a witness or video evidence.
Yeah, that was what I meant. Is it possible to tell that the call did not just come from the interior of the vehicle, but from the driver’s seat?
Probably not.
Even if it came from the driver’s seat, you’d still have to prove that they were holding the phone and not using it via a bluetooth handsfree device.
However, I don’t think you can reliably determine the location of a phone to that level of accuracy.
There is a case for actually enforcing existing mobile phone legislation. We all know that a large percentage of those waiting motorists will have their faces buried in a smartphone, and it is very simple, if your engine is on you are driving.I’ve always wondered – not being au fait with mobile technology – whether it would be possible to tell if a driver has made a call or used data on a smartphone, whilst the vehicle’s engine is switched on.
If it does, then that driver should get thirty working days to explain why he was doing so. A suitable explanation would be danger to life or property.
Once that thirty days is past, his licence is suspended for two years, with no possibility of appeal or getting it back for ‘hardship’.
Ah, well. I can dream.
The difficulty is proving that the person driving at the time was also the person using the phone. Generally, this requires a witness or video evidence.
There’s already a “ban” on idling in the City of London. It is impossible to enforce, so it isn’t.Automated start-stop systems should be legislated by government for all vehicles. They are cheap and would be much more effective at reducing localised pollution hotspots than easily-cheated general emissions standards.
Again – it’s easy to enforce. Either produce a phone app that kids can use to report idling/parked vehicles or give a bit of extra cash to “lollipop” men/women to report repeat offenders.
The thing is that there are lots of people around schools at two specific times of day, so you just need to task some of them to catch the miscreants or send along a copper at the relevant time.
The truth is that politics is a shell-game and they don’t want you to look at what is happening in front of your nose (much better to suck air through your teeth and complain about the Irish backstop).
Here’s another bit of bad
Here’s another bit of bad news about air quality: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/health/air-pollution-smoking-deaths-compare-a8818851.html
To put this into perspective, this means that air pollution causes more extra deaths a year than tobacco smoking, which the World Health Organisation (WHO) estimates was responsible for an extra 7.2 million deaths in 2015
government are brilliant at blaming children, I complained about the school fed ‘gory story’ a few years back. If you don’t wear hi-vis children, prepare to die!Dagnammit!
I just spent way too long trying to get that video to play.
Here’s a proper link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbA6x0FPsJA
My wife’s got a Boardman MTB
My wife’s got a Boardman MTB and is very happy with it despite a few places where the white paint has been chipped (she blames me for that though).
If it were me, I’d definitely consider a Boardman – they always seem to be excellent value even at full price.
Maybe an introduction would
Maybe an introduction would help, here:
Injury Prevention Research Centre, Department of Community Health, and Injury Prevention Research Centre, Department of Community Health, University of Auckland, Auckland, New ZealandAbstract-Pedestrian injuries are a leading cause of childhood mortality. In this paper a case study of a child pedestrian death is presented in order to examine the apportionment of responsibility for child pedestrian injuries. The case presented illustrates how responsibility is located with the child, whilst structural contributors, in particular aspects of the transport system, are ignored. The strength and pervasiveness of the ideology of victim blaming in child pedestrian injuries is explained by the special position that the road transport system holds in relation to dominant economic interests. Victim blaming ideology is a strategy that serves to maintain these interests at the expense and suffering of children. Increased recognition of the political roots of the ideology of victim blaming in child pedestrian injuries, by the sectors of the community who suffer its consequences, will be an important step towards effective preventive action.
It’s a bit old (1994), but still relevant.
BehindTheBikesheds wrote:
How about we go the whole hog, motorvehicles should be banned from being near people in built up areas and restricted to ‘motor’ways. Special dispensation for less able, access to certain areas during special times … let’s call this a ‘Space protection order’ which ensures the safety of everyone outside of a steel cage and who doesn’t have a powered motor over the current pedalec limit. Problem solved, it’s not where motors are to be banned, but banned everywhere except some narrow strips of tarmac they can use and at what times.As much as I’d enjoy that, I suspect that a few people might against such a move – they’d blame lack of replacement infrastructure etc.
‘”…I’m a doctor, I see a figure of 35,000 to 40,000 people each year dying as a result of the harm that is caused by air pollution”‘.Erm, I think you’ll find that it’s the cycle lanes that cause all of that pollution, mate. Here… this bloke can help you to correct your errors:
More seriously, who thinks that this has a chance of happening?
Britain is currently the most right-wing country in Europe, and one of the defining charateristics of that ideology is short-termism. They’re not going to spend money for coppers or council officials to go and fine drivers, because let’s face it, when the real climate damage hits, the tories currently in their fifties and sixties will be long gone.
And for the moment, the increasingly common extreme weather events are fine, because with enough money, they can shield themselves from their effects.
Hmmm, the cynicism is strong with this one.
Sometimes the only way to get a major change is to wait for the old people to die off.
Alternatively, we could stop voting for the twats that maintain the status quo (although if voting could change things, they’d make it illegal).
ha, ha, can’t even stop the school run mums from parking on double yellow lines and stopping on the yellow zig zags so can’t see this being enforced………..It’d be trivially easy to enforce this if there was the political will.
My favourite solution would be to enable kids/teachers to submit photos/videos of poorly parked/idling vehicles to a parking authority and receive some kind of reward for each one that leads to a successful prosecution/fine. It would literally pay for itself.
Also on the BBC: https://www
Also on the BBC: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-47520848
(though the BBC misses out the bit about cycling/walking to school)