“Daily threat to me is two-wheeled”: Pedestrians being “terrorised” by “arrogantly dangerous cyclist idiots”, says Lib Dem peer – after claiming “there is no culture war against cycling”; Five star reviews for Vuelta’s hail hotel + more on the live blog
SUMMARY
“Daily threat to me is two-wheeled”: Pedestrians being “terrorised” by “arrogantly dangerous cyclist idiots”, says Lib Dem peer – after claiming “there is no culture war against cycling” in response to viral floating bus stop clip
A Liberal Democrat peer says there is “outrage and anger” that pedestrians are being “terrorised” by “arrogantly dangerous cyclist idiots” on a daily basis – but insists there is “no culture war against cycling”, as social media users accused the former MEP of using Reform-style language against people on bikes.
Sarah Ludford (that’s Baroness Ludford to you) made the comments as part of a debate on X over a clip showing cyclists riding through a floating bus stop in London.
The video was initially posted on the social media platform over a year ago, but was reshared last week by the National Federation of the Blind of the UK, going viral in the process and racking up over 13 million views.
.@cityoflondon these floating are not safe or accessible for blind people… pic.twitter.com/GueglZkF25
— NFBUK (@NFBUK) August 18, 2026
Responding to the video, the pro-active travel page Bob from Accounts wrote: “You will never guess what Floating Bus Stops are called in Europe: Bus Stops. They work fine everywhere else; the real danger is cars. Here in the UK, we have a culture-war bias against people who cycle.”
Baroness Ludford, however, wasn’t having any of that.
“There is no ‘culture war’ against cycling,” she wrote.
“There is outrage and anger that pedestrians are being terrorised on pavements and road crossings, with disabled people trapped at home too frightened to go out, by arrogantly dangerous cyclist idiots. Where’s the social justice in that?”
Ludford, a former Islington councillor, was made a life peer in 1997, before being elected as a Liberal Democrat MEP for London in 1999. During her time in Brussels, she criticised the European Commission’s decision to shelve a proposal on HGV blind spot cameras, after a cyclist was killed by a lorry driver in the capital.
However, her current stance on cycling has attracted criticism from cyclists on social media, who accused her of stealing Reform’s pro-motoring clothes.
“If you were Reform, I’d get your tone and language,” West Yorkshire Cycling said. “If MPs don’t want to be abused, then perhaps you shouldn’t lump all cyclists in with the ‘arrogantly dangerous cycling idiots’.
“If you want people to stop at these crossings, why not spend your time asking for the Highway Code to be updated? The Highway Code claims zebra crossings have flashing beacons.”
In response to West Yorkshire Cycling’s complaints, Ludford said: “I am not an MP. I did not do that. For others knocking me who have failed to read my other replies: I have commented on my experience as a non-driving pedestrian; thoroughly aware of the huge danger of cars and lorries, but the daily threat to me is two-wheeled.”
“You used language your party would be appalled by if a Tory or Reform had used those same words,” the cyclist replied.
After another X user accused her of “stoking a culture war against cyclists”, linking anti-cycling rhetoric to the fatal assault in Leicester this week, Ludford said: “Your slurs are tedious, untrue, and completely unjustified.
“My work on cyclist safety as an MEP is easily findable by googling… Maybe stop the defensiveness and accept that some criticism of modern cyclists’ behaviour is valid.”
“Towel service provided two minutes after 180 cyclists came unannounced”: Vuelta peloton dishes out glowing five star reviews to hotel that provided shelter after horrendous stage-cancelling hailstorm
’Twas in another grand tour, one of toil and blood
I was buried in the hail and the road was full of mud
I came in from the wilderness, a racer void of form
“Come in,” she said, “I’ll give you shelter from the storm”…
(I’ve been told I’m not allowed to do the whole song, but I reckon the ‘In a world of marginal gains and men who are fighting to be warm’ is a goer. Ah, well.)
Yesterday’s hail-induced cancellation at the Vuelta a España did at least result in two positive outcomes: a gallery of brilliant photos and some unexpected five-star reviews for a local hotel.
Stage three of this year’s Vuelta, in case you missed it, was brought to a grinding halt around 15km from the finish in Font-Romeu as large chunks of hail battered the peloton, some of whom, including Felix Gall, had already ducked for cover in a handily located hotel near the top of the Col de Mont-Louis.
As word filtered through that the stage had been suspended, red jersey Tadej Pogačar carried out his patron duties and waved the group to a halt. The rest of the peloton soon joined their colleagues in the old-school environs of the IGESA Village Club Mont-Louis Les Sorbiers, where they were quickly informed that the stage had been abandoned altogether.
The sight of a full grand tour peloton, soaked to the skin and shivering, inside the IGESA Village Club – as some hotel guests looked warily on – invariably resulted, in my opinion, in some of the best photographs of the entire season.
Come on, these two are practically renaissance paintings:
Majestic. Though, I have to say, my personal favourite is of Wout van Aert – who initially sheltered in a roadside van before making his way to the hotel – standing in the lobby as an older couple sit at the side, disapprovingly glaring at these bloomin’ bike riders who’ve interrupted their lovely afternoon in the Pyrenees:
I reckon the IGESA Village Club – whose staff were quick to dish out towels and hot drinks to keep the riders warm – won’t be too displeased with the disturbance, the hotel’s Google reviews piling up glowing five star references in the aftermath of yesterday’s stage.
“Warm and welcoming reception area with friendly staff, and a nice place to be able to shelter from any inclement weather in the area,” the Picnic PostNL team posted yesterday.
“Perfect location in hailstorms, and even towel service provided two minutes after 180 cyclists came unannounced. They deserve every star they can get!” added Uno-X’s Tobias Johannessen.
An account claiming to be Urška Žigart’s boyfriend even got in on the act, but I think we’ll need verification on that one.
It wasn’t long, however, before the peloton’s resident hotel reviewer, Magnus Cort, chipped in, with a rare seven out of seven review from the moustachioed accommodation expert:
The place will be booked up until 2030 at this rate.
“We broke the internet”: Vuelta influencer promises to “keep going” after ‘Pogachita’ backlash
After dominating the cycling airwaves for a few hours on Monday – rightly or wrongly – the Vuelta’s hired influencer, Erola Jons, has vowed to “keep going” despite the widespread backlash to her unique interviewing technique.
28-year-old Jons, known for her provocative social media pranks, attracted the ire of much of the cycling world after clips of her behind-the-scenes content during the race’s opening weekend – commissioned by Vuelta organisers Unipublic – went viral.
One of those clips saw her repeatedly attempt to speak to Tadej Pogačar as he carried out his podium duties in Monaco, before finally asking him: “Why do you hyperventilate every time you see me?”
Following the backlash to Jons’ appointment, which established Spanish cycling journalist Laura Meseguer described as “disrespectful” to the race’s female journalists, the Vuelta announced yesterday that it was restricting Jons’ access to the riders, including in the mixed zone and in the team bus paddock, unless she obtains prior permission from their teams.
But the Catalan content creator will remain on the race for the next three weeks and, in her video from Monday’s stage, took a defiant stance against her critics.
“You were all waiting for me to come back to see the mess I made in the second stage, and don’t worry because we’re going to keep going, of course. Yesterday we broke the internet,” she said.
“The first thing we want to make clear is that we don’t want to encroach on any journalist’s space,” the Vuelta organisers Unipublic said in a statement.
“She’s an influencer who has participated in other sporting events, and what we’re looking for is humour. It’s a very different way of communicating. It’s jokes and entertainment, and you have to understand the context. We must understand her role. Not see it as journalism.”
Riding a different race: Tadej Pogačar pulls off the longest solo grand tour attack of his career to wrap up the 2026 Vuelta… four days in
Alright, pack it up, let’s go. That’s the Vuelta over.
It only took four days (three actually, if you don’t count yesterday’s hail stage) and Tadej Pogačar has already killed off the 2026 Vuelta a España.
Decathlon’s laudable attempt to grab the race by the scruff of the neck in the Pyrenees only served to rile the world champion up. With 50km left, he was gone. After that, the result, and the state of Pogačar’s legs, were never in doubt.
By the finish in Andorra la Vella, after completing his longest ever successful grand tour solo raid (a few kilometres longer than his Tourmalet masterclass at the Tour last month), he was 2.45 clear of all his rivals.
Well, I say rivals. Not for the first this year, this decade, Tadej Pogačar looked like he was taking part in another sport, on another planet.
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His second win of the 2026 Vuelta saw him secure the 37th grand tour stage victory of his career, his 21st win of the season, and his 129th ever. Expect those numbers to pile up over the next two and a half weeks. The aim now, surely, will be to hold the red jersey from start to finish, another box to tick off in the most sensational to-do list cycling has ever seen.
A full pop song later, things at least were interesting, malleable. Decathlon’s destructive tactics may not have succeeded in interrupting Pogačar’s flow, but they sort the podium wheat from the chaff – and almost burnt the legs of their own GC leader, Felix Gall.
The Austrian held firm, however, in the elite group as others, such as Mattias Skjelmose and later Richard Carapaz faltered. Oscar Onley, arguably, looked the strongest of the podium contenders, the young Scottish rider leading over the final climb to sweep up some bonus seconds.
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At the line, Gall was beaten by Lotto’s hotly tipped and very impressive 20-year-old Belgian Jarno Widar, in yet more evidence that the biggest threat to Pogačar’s supremacy will come from the next generation of exciting young talent snapping at his heels.
Ironically, when it comes to the GC, it’s the veteran, and Pogi’s old rival and compatriot Primož Roglič who sits closest to the world champion, 3.21 behind. Another old-hander, Enric Mas, is in third following an encouragingly steady ride, 3.32 down. And that’s just three days of racing into the Vuelta.
For us mere mortals, Pogačar just pulled off what would have been regarded 10 years ago as one of the rides of the year, if not the decade. For the world champion, in this brave new cycling world, it’s just another box ticked off on the way to sporting immortality.
And he didn’t even look that bothered warming down. Riding another race, in another sport, on another planet. Again.
Oi, stop running beside the riders! Oh wait, that’s Adam Yates…
Adam Yates decided to take advantage of a stage on his local Andorran roads to cheer on his good mate Tadej:
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I’ll have to interview Yates now for my ‘why do fans run alongside the riders?’ feature, since he’s experienced both sides of the coin now… ‘Adam, why did you fist bump the Vuelta leader while running with your phone? What if you’d tripped and taken him out? Were you drinking?’
Boom! Tadej Pogačar attacks solo with 50km to go after Decathlon poked the bear – is the Vuelta already over?
Here we go. Decathlon have spent this entire stage poking the bear that is Tadej Pogačar.
By setting such a blistering pace for their leader Felix Gall almost from the start, the French squad may have been focused on jettisoning their rivals for the lower steps of the podium. But they also succeeded in isolating the red jersey, scattering his UAE teammates all over Andorra.
And it seems Pogačar got slightly fed up with that course of events. With 50km to go, as Decathlon ripped the group to shreds on the Collada de Beixalis, the world champion attacked. Gall, to be fair to him, attempted to go with the Slovenian, but dropped off after a few hundred metres.
💥 Ya está aquí el movimiento de Pogacar que va a decidir #LaVuelta26.
Al final va a ser verdad esa teoría de que quiere reventar la carrera en la primera semana. pic.twitter.com/t9FXF4kCvg
— Alberto Marcos Gallego (@albermg) August 25, 2026
Gall – hoping he didn’t fly too close to the sun – is now dropping back to a chasing group which includes Richard Carapaz, Primož Roglič, Oscar Onley and Enric Mas. Pogačar’s lead is already up to a minute. Will the chase group bother, you know, chasing him? Or will they just focus on themselves and the podium battle, effectively ignoring the man up front?
In either case, I reckon the red jersey race could be over in the next 50km.
Drama at the Tour de l’Avenir as Kasper Borremans pulls of sensational, last ditch comeback on Col d’Iseran
The Vuelta may have turned out, unsurprisingly, to be a damp squib, but it was pure drama over at the Tour de l’Avenir this afternoon.
On the epic Col d’Iseran, Bahrain Victorious Devo’s Finnish rider Kasper Borremans pulled off a sensational comeback, overhauling poor Jasper Schoofs (Soudal Quick-Step) in the dying metres for a sensational stage win.
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The scale of Borreman’s last-ditch rescue mission – he wasn’t even on the screen until he suddenly appeared just before the line – has already prompted some fans to speculate that the 20-year-old may have been inadvertently aided by the race motorbikes. I’ll let you make your mind up that one.
With just one stage left of the race commonly regarded as the U23 Tour de France, Red Bull-Bora’s Lorenzo Finn kept hold of the yellow jersey with a confident ride on the Iseran, extending his advantage over Niels Driesen to 2.07.
The Tour de France meets Mastermind
If, like me, you’re a big fan of BBC Two’s Monday quiz night, you’ll have been rubbing your hands in glee at the prospect of the Tour de France being tackled as a specialist subject on Mastermind.
Cycling’s foray onto Clive Myrie’s question cards came courtesy of Akin Ajayi, a copy writer who reckoned he knows more than most about the Tour in the 21st century.
So, while we wait for Pog to complete his latest grand tour annihilation, why not spend the time seeing how you’d have got on in the big black chair? I’ll update this post with the answers at the end of the day.
- Between 2012 and 2018, the British riders Bradley Wiggins, Chris Froome, and Geraint Thomas won six Tours de France while members of which team, later rebranded as Ineos?
- In 2020, which Slovenian rider became the youngest winner of the Tour since Henri Cornet over 100 years earlier?
- Chris Froome’s convincing third Tour win in 2016 included a downhill attack on which mountain pass in the Pyrenees to win stage eight?
- Which rider crashed out of the 2017 Tour when he lost control while descending Mont du Chat in the Jura mountains?
- The first three stages of the 2013 Tour were held on which island, the only region of metropolitan France not previously visited by the race?
- The sprinter Mario Cipollini lost out on the chance to take part in the 2003 Tour when his team wasn’t invited. What was the name of the team?
- The rider Andy Schleck, retroactively awarded the 2010 Tour after Alberto Contador’s positive, is from which country?
- Which Frenchman wore the yellow jersey for 10 stages of the 2004 and 2011 Tours?
- In 2024, in a break from tradition, the Tour finished outside Paris to avoid clashes with preparations for the summer Olympics and instead concluded in which other city?
- After Peter Sagan was disqualified from the 2017 Tour, which rider won the green jersey for the first time?
- In the 2024 Tour, Mark Cavendish surpassed the record jointly held by himself and Eddy Merckx when he reached what number of stage wins?
- What’s the name of the broadcaster and journalist who after the 2006 Tour was appointed to succeed Jean Marie LeBlanc as the Tour’s director?
Watching the show last night, I got 10 out of 12, two more than Akin’s total of eight (though, to be fair, I was sitting on my sofa while he was on the black chair). I rushed and picked the wrong Cipo team and took a total mind blank about Mont du Chat. Which I’m still annoyed about, to be honest.
Vuelta’s hailstorm hotel waives charges
The IGESA Village Club Les Sorbiers – the mountain-top lodgings now known simply as the Vuelta’s hailstorm hotel – decided not to cash in on yesterday’s impromptu peloton check-in, Marca has reported.
According to the Spanish sports newspaper, the Vuelta’s organisers requested the bill, but the hotel’s owners insisted that they would cover all the expenses. I suppose all that free publicity – and those five-star Google reviews – should be able to pay for a 180 towels and cups of tea…
Pain for Cian
It’s been a fast, ferocious start to today’s stage, as a strong 15-rider group – containing Wout van Aert, Paul Double, Ben Tullet, and Eddie Dunbar – was winched clear by a clearly in-form Matthew Brennan on the long, steady, and extremely high Port de Envalira.
Van Aert’s just been dropped from the front, as the break’s gap to the Decathlon-led peloton hovers around 50 seconds. Decathlon’s strong pace has already ditched UAE’s João Almeida, which isn’t great news for the Portuguese rider’s leader Pogačar.
Things are looking even tougher for Movistar’s heavily bandaged Belgian Cian Uijtdebroeks, who revealed this morning that he suffered a broken ankle in Sunday’s crash. The Andorra resident was dropped very early on the opening climb, and looks set for a tough old day on his adopted home roads.
Now, that’s what I call bike parking
The Dutch, once again, showing us how it’s done, courtesy of the frankly insane bike parking facilities at the Formula One in Zandvoort at the weekend:
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Beautiful, just beautiful.
Ethan Hayter’s run of rotten Vuelta luck continues as organisers cancel green jersey points during abandoned stage
Spare a thought for poor Ethan Hayter. If he didn’t have bad luck at this year’s Vuelta, he wouldn’t have any at all.
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First, he was pipped to the prologue win and the red jersey in Monaco by just 0.09 seconds, courtesy of Tadej Pogačar (like he needs any more victories, right?).
Then, on Sunday, the organisers bizarrely gave him an XS green skinsuit, which he was forced to alter mid-stage with a pair of scissors, in order to give his legs some “breathing space”.
And then, his daring plan to steal red from Pogačar by way of getting in the breakaway and nabbing some bonus seconds was dashed when he ran out of juice and missed a crucial split in the finale, robbing him of his virtual lead.
And then, the British rider managed to slip into the breakaway once again, as part of an attempt to earn enough points at the intermediate sprint to leapfrog the world champion at the top of the green jersey standings.
Points raid seemingly complete, Hayter’s efforts came to nought once again when yesterday’s heavy hail shower brought an abrupt end to the proceedings – and the organisers decided to completely cancel the results and scrap any green jersey or KOM points which had already been handed out. Despite Hayter spending over 140km in the break. Through a thunderstorm.
Seriously, what does Unipublic have against Hayter? Surely he’s due some good luck soon, right?
Has Drum and Bass on a Bike finally got some competition?
I’m not sure the Pied Piper of cyclists himself, Dom Whiting, will be too concerned about Sergio Samitier stealing his thunder when it comes to the (admittedly very niche) cycling DJ world:
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Though you never know, Sergio could be aiming to corner the European Drum and Bass on a Bike market after he retires from racing (and it’ll be a fair bit quicker, too). You’ve been warned, Dom…
The Vuelta hits country number three as the peloton heads into the high mountains for a short, sharp, lung-bursting stage in Andorra
The Vuelta, the short attention-spanned grand tour sibling, never takes too long to reach the mountains, and the 2026 edition is no exception.
After yesterday’s climbing amuse-bouche in Font-Romeu was hastily whisked away at the last minute, we’re straight back in for a proper Pyrenean brute, based entirely in Andorra (the third country the Vuelta’s visited this year, and it hasn’t even reached Spain yet).
At just 106km, this stage is going to be relentless, kicking off, almost from the start line, with the Port de Envalira, rising over 23.2km to 2,407m from sea level. Two more tough cat one climbs await, before a short sharp ascent of the Alto de la Comella five kilometres from the finish back in Andorra la Vella.
The tough, from the gun start and progressively easy (in relative terms) nature of the climbs should suit a strong breakaway. It all just depends on whether Tadej Pogačar and UAE Team Emirates are desperate to pull a Rominger and hold onto red for the entire race. Let’s just hope the weather plays ball this time.
“You never know when they are going to crop up and if you are going to hit one, or are they going to fall on you”
When you’ve never been happier to spot a cycling fan with an umbrella
How heavy was yesterday’s hailstorm at the Vuelta? Just ask Mikel Landa, whose sprint to that umbrella and its benevolent holder was faster than anything he’s mustered for a few years now (alright, maybe that’s a bit harsh)…
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It's a shame that the final day neutralisation has distracted from the fact that this was one of the best GTs in quite a while, with all the jerseys in play right up to the penultimate day. It's certainly ridiculous to leave the decision on neutralisation until the evening before the stage but more generally, why not? It's only really a variation on the sprint safety zone, after all, and the final stages have effectively been neutralised (when they are not time trials) for a long time with the GC teams staying in touch until the safety zone and then letting the sprinters go. It was a great finish despite, or maybe because of, the neutralisation and it was rather nice for the winner's team to be able to ride in behind the peloton so that all the fans got a good look at them and could show their appreciation of the winner. If we want the excitement of narrow climbing finishes on the last day (as opposed to the, frankly, tedium of watching the peleton power up and down the Champs eight times) then it makes sense to arrange matters so that those who want the stage win can give us some thrilling racing without being encumbered by all the GC teams being forced to crowd the front. Everyone saying "God almighty, it's disgusting they've just decided not to race" is ignoring the fact that there are many times in a GT when the majority of teams will decide not to race, when they let a breakaway go, when the sprint teams are given free rein et cetera. The only thing I would disagree with was the removal of the final points at the finish, if the green jersey had still been in play that would have been unfair on the second placed rider. However, apart from tweaking that I thought it worked well and quite possibly gave us a more exciting finish than we would've had without the neutralisation.
@mjvande@pacbell.net Mike Vandeman, is that you?! https://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/biking/trial-mike-vandeman/
@No Reply I had the same problem, but it seems to be sorted now.
@No Reply I had the same problem, but it seems to be sorted now.
@JMcWatt This may well be true. Nothing drives me crazy more than cosmetic updates and facelifts that don't really bring any new value about. Maybe they do attract new customers, but also discourage existing ones. I was never a regular customer of CRC, but if I had been, I would surely have been mad seeing confusing changes. If I don't understand the website and have to re-learn the process anyway, why not switch to another shop?
It was such a small things that brought about the ruination of CRC, one decision made by the owners and management. In 2013 the decision was made to redesign the website, this change was the beginning of the end for CRC. They replaced a proven platform that had helped turn a Northern Irish bike shop into the world’s biggest online cycling retailer with a more complex system that never delivered the same growth. Sales momentum stalled, Wiggle overtook them, and within three years CRC was being bought by the rival it had once outperformed. This was very much the strategic mistake that broke the growth engine.
@Smoggysteve "I normally wouldn’t condone buying a cheap Chinese copy..." Actually, I think I'd go with the Seconda strap line here: "Beware of expensive imitations."
The survey is shite. I have got to a point where it will not let me continue because I have done everything correctly so far.
Yes, it uses the same technology that is used to prevent that behaviour by motorists...🙄
@SecretSam yeah, the same one you find in cars
38 thoughts on ““Daily threat to me is two-wheeled”: Pedestrians being “terrorised” by “arrogantly dangerous cyclist idiots”, says Lib Dem peer – after claiming “there is no culture war against cycling”; Five star reviews for Vuelta’s hail hotel + more on the live blog”
Shocking behaviour by so many people on bikes in that vid.
Unshocking behaviour by someone in power lumping all cyclists together.
@lesterama In most cases – whether you like it or not – the cyclists are not to blame. Floating bus stops, courtesy crossings (like you see in supermarket car parks etc) are NOT zebra crossings. They are often hard to see until you are up close in many cases.
This is quite clearly a very busy thoroughfare and as such its a failure of the council to put in suitable infrastructure. A lot of these are not given much thought process as to how it will impact people moving in all directions no matter their mode of travel. Its so easy to blame the cyclists but they didnt install the crossing. If this were a proper Zebra (or even a pelican crossing) it would be much more suitable in this situation.
I tire of cyclists being to blame for poorly designed roads and paths. The ones who created this problem should receive the ire of the public.
@Smoggysteve Nah, thats very easy to see and everyone knows that when you see those lines you give way to pedestrians. A tiny fraction of those cyclists would, if stopped try to claim that “akshually this isn’t a legal zebra crossing therefore…”.
Its just people being dicks. The same people who would be riding through a full zebra crossing because they don’t want to stop. I don’t have any particular issue with cyclists using common sense in certain places to ignore rules but this is just people not caring about others. The same reason people park in bike lanes or walk/stand in them when its busy on the pavements. People are fundamentally selfish and cyclists aren’t exempt from that.
@mctrials23 As is mentioned , and is quite clear to see in the clip, there are at least 2 incidences where one cyclist nearly collides with the one in front. So stopping of the pedestrians could be just as likely to cause in collision than not – POOR INFRASTRUCTURE . Go count how many bikes go by. in the first clip its more than 1 per second. That’s what I would call busy and the crossing isn’t suitable and causes more issues than it solves.
@Smoggysteve I disagree. Would you suggest the same thing for a zebra crossing because its a busy road full of cars? Its very simple, you stop for pedestrians. Sure you can argue that perhaps the infrastructure needs changing but until that happens you can’t excuse bad cycling with “well the infrastructure should be different”. It isn’t at the moment.
Surely you can see the irony of blaming everything but the cyclists here when we as cyclists have to constantly hear about how its not drivers fault when they put our lives/safety at risk.
Its really simple, you see a crossing like that and you prepare to stop. You don’t prepare to stop when the cyclist 2m in front of you stops, you prepare to stop because there is something that might require you to.
Both can be true at once: poorly designed infrastructure AND poor behaviour.
@mdavidford But one is creating the conditions for the other to perpetuate. You could be pedantic and state that – even under the HWC – cars, cyclist etc are under no obligation to stop to allow pedestrians to cross – UNLESS they are already ON the crossing. In most cases here that rule is followed.
I am highlighting that this is a situation where there is a high volume of cycle traffic moving steadily along this route. there is no means to stop it to allow others to cross other than courtesy (which we all know isn’t exactly a common trait among many city folk especially London). So, infrastructure wise, there should be another method of allowing pedestrians to navigate this crossing since this is clearly insufficient
@Smoggysteve Yes – the infrastructure is designed in such a way that it encourages people to speed through and ignore pedestrians. Though that doesn’t absolve those who do so of any blame.
@mdavidford @Smoggysteve the equivalency with a Zebra on the road is false. If I stop at a Zebra in my car or lorry i take up the entire lane. When I do this by a bus stop in Paris (or “floating bus stop” in London) cyclists pass me on either side and across the Zebra.
@mctrials23
Can you see the lines when it’s that busy though? That’s what the flashing beacons at a zebra crossing are for, as would a rumble-strip texture approximately 4m either side of the crossing give adequate alternative indication that there is a potential hazard ahead, with suitable braking distances.
I’m not saying everyone on 2 wheels is a saint and innocent in that clip, far from it, but the design of the infra does encourage problematic behaviour. Just as most road infra fails to protect cyclists from drivers by not setting the expectation of the presence of cyclists, this fails to protect pedestrians by funnelling them to a crossing with the bare minimum of encouragement for cyclists to be prepared for pedestrians at that point.
Most importantly though, none of this discussion excuses the choice of inflammatory language by Baroness Ludford.
@ROOTminus1 I would argue that yes you can. You can unless you are paying zero attention to anything but the person ahead of you. For almost the entire video even if the persons bum you’ve decided to sit on is blocking your direct view ahead, you can see it on the other side of the lane. You should always be checking your surroundings on any mode of transport for hazards.
@ROOTminus1 I can see the valid argument for not requiring beacons (horrifically expensive because they require power).
The solution is do what lots of other countries in Europe do.
Retroreflective warning signs.
If Austrian drivers can reliably give way at a zebra crossing under a couple of inches of snow (seriously, I was wondering why drivers were so nice about letting me cross to my hotel when skiing, until day 5 when the snow melted enough to see the road markings!) then british drivers and cyclists should comfortably cope without needing lit signage and instead just have reflectors.
@Smoggysteve I don’t know where this myth has come from that zebra crossings across cycle tracks are not legal zebra crossings because they don’t have the same markings as a regular one, but it is a myth. The Traffic Sign Regulations and General Directions 2016 state that “Where a crossing is placed across a cycle track, the regulations permit the yellow globes (for zebra crossings) and zig-zag markings to be omitted for the part of the crossing placed on the cycle track, if desired.” Zebra crossings across a cycle track have exactly the same force as a regular road one and the same recommendation to slow and stop for anyone waiting and compulsory obligation to stop for anyone already on the crossing.
Indeed – and there will be “fighting over scraps” (largely dominated by pedestrian complaints because it’s still a very popular mode) and it will be *impossible* to move forward (literally) because for “safety” cyclists will need to slow or indeed stop because we *have* to have formal crossings of a barely 1.5m cycle path…
… until some day the infra has been improved, and cyclists are a common sight, and many people do cycle sometimes.
At which point most people will decide that *obviously* the cycle path is for cycling and it’s antisocial to slow cyclists eg. by waiting for buses in the cycle path. And anyway there’s no need to because cyclists aren’t a “threat” and thus formal crossings aren’t needed. Just wait a couple of seconds and they’re past and you can cross the path in a couple of seconds yourself.
The only reason I know that is because it happens thousands of times per day, a little over 100 miles away from the UK (and people in NL are hardly less argumentative than over here)…
There is a slight question as to whether some people with eg sight impairments have simply been overlooked in NL, just like they normal are here.
That’s because attitudes to cycling are somewhat like people drive here eg. it’s just accepted that cycle paths are *for cycling*.
Still much better than cars though I’d suggest. Ultimately in a car you’re invulnerable and can barely hear the cries of horror and disapproval. Plus the world is still telling you you’re more important than anyone without a car…
No, its very poor behaviour, and what is shocking is that it has clearly become an ingrained habit amongst the vast majority of riders shown in the clip. My own experience if cycling in the City if London matches this experience, its not just a carefully selected sequence. The reason why such infrastructure works in many European countries is because cyclists there are not stupid selfish dicks! I was set to find fault with the peer, and her language might be better chosen but she is absolutely right to be shocked by the behaviour shown. We as cyclists do need to stop denying our faults and excessivly virtue bonbing everyone else.
Well there are certainly selfish humans here.
But I’m curious whenever people use this as an explanation (or positive exceptionalism) – do you think it is something specific in *these* humans in *this* place? Or “UK culture” – but why do people eg. pay taxes and help others in different contexts?
Or … could there be other explanations why eg. ordinarily selfish human beings in eg. Amsterdam don’t seem to be causing these issues, but ones in the UK are?
It’s poor that so many people are ignoring the crossing, and frustrating and inconvenient for the pedestrians. That said, though, in all those clips I only see two incidents where a pedestrian could arguably be said to have been ‘endangered’ (plus two more where someone ran into the back of someone else who’d stopped for the crossing, and an unexplained and seemingly unrelated Lime bike coming-together).
@mdavidford you’re making a similar argument that drivers would make when they close pass cyclists and nothing happens. The people should be stopping. The rate that people are flying through that crossing is silly. We know that plenty of people have zero situational awareness and cannot be trusted to make good decisions without rules telling them to do so.
It shouldn’t be on pedestrians to run a gauntlet every time they want to cross one of these and for them to hope that every cyclist is paying attention and not just flying through. It looks most dangerous when someone has stopped going in one direction as the people in the other direction and people coming from behind seem somewhat oblivious to that.
Except I’m not making that argument. I said exactly the opposite – that it’s poor that people aren’t giving the pedestrians space. 🤷♂️
And I agree that people should be moderating their speed on approach to the crossing and being prepared to stop if necessary.
I was merely saying that the language of people being ‘terrorised’ and ‘endangered’ is, for the most part, hyperbole – they’re being inconvenienced by having to wait a while for an opportunity to cross, but very rarely are they actually being ‘endangered’. In fact, generally, when they do step out on to the crossing, people do slow or stop sufficiently to allow them to cross.
And a number of those clips actually show people negotiating the crossing with no real problem, even while cyclists continue to make progress either side of them – unlike with a motor vehicle it isn’t always necessary for a cyclist to come to a complete stop for both to navigate the crossing safely.
[Edit: in retrospect, posting my comment as a reply to lesterama’s may have been a mistake, as everyone tends to assume that on the internet a reply is always a challenge, so it might have read that I was contesting what they said, but it wasn’t intended that way.]
I agree it’s not a good look and cyclists should be giving way but I think I would be very nervous about an inattentive lime bike rider smacking me up the arse.
Funnily enough this, of course, is exactly what drivers say when not giving way to pedestrians when turning into junctions. I wonder if I head to our high street to film drivers not giving way to pedestrians crossing a side road (I know exactly which junction I’m going to film) and I stuck that on social media what the reaction would be? That’s motornormativity for you.
An attitude shared by many on bicycles, often the ‘my other bicycle is an Audi TT” variety.
Odd isn’t it how (in oversimplified generalisations employed on a daily basis) pedestrians are “endangered” by cyclists, but cyclists are “putting themselves in danger” around drivers, should be responsible for their own safety, and it’s only “the roads” that are dangerous.
No culture war though.
@Clem Fandango yeah, they’re talking utter bollocks. If it wasn’t culture war fuel then the DM wouldn’t love it so much. If you want a pretty good litmus test on what is “culture war” BS, read the daily mail for a few weeks. Immigrants, Labour, cyclists. Thats their bread and butter.
(Immigrants, Labour, cyclists) They must love Deliveroo… turquoise kryptonite.
That there London innit.
Given there is a marked crossing there, I do think the cyclists should be stopping.
That said, there is a reasonable argument that the marked crossing is not necessary. Bicycle Dutch has a good post on the subject (I’m not going to post a link as otherwise this comment may never see the light of day, but just google ‘Bicycle Dutch How hard is it to cross the cycle path’). In essence, forcing cyclists to stop wastes a lot of energy compared to a pedestrian stopping, and it’s generally not hard for a pedestrian to find a suitable gap in which to cross. So not having a marked crossing, and simply expecting pedestrians to cross when it’s sensible to do so, normally works pretty well and keeps everyone moving better.
That aligns with what we see in the video – in all cases, it is only a matter of seconds before the pedestrians are able to cross despite cyclists not stopping. If the pedestrians weren’t expecting cyclists to stop (because there was no marked crossing) then the pedestrians would not feel endangered.
This is the solution – get rid of the silly zebra crossing. Why was this ever deemed necessary in the first place?
Most of the time pedestrians will cross without using the zebra crossing anyway.
Also, the cycle lane will not be that busy for long – a big group of cyclists approaching the crossing is because they’ve bunched up waiting at a traffic light. The video is a compilation of those bunches of cyclists, making it look much busier than it will actually be in reality. In most cases, a pedestrian will have to wait less time than they would at a traffic light controlled crossing for an opportunity to cross.
As an aside, Baroness Ludford’s dramatic sensationalist language is perhaps an illustration of why many of our politicians are so useless.
So much easier to utter eye-catching statements and headline grabbing soundbites, rather than quietly working, getting things done and making a positive difference.
Two car crashes, 12 motorists killed ….. but hey, cyclists are the big danger on our roads.
The Restore of lobby groups…
TBF they pulled off a coup some time back with drumming up opposition around bus stop bypasses, but they have a … particular view on this which speaks more to “concerns” (and not of everyone) than facts and stats.
While the language is extreme, at this point (see campaign above) people are concerned so carefully “addressing concerns” (rather than dismissing) is important.
But doing that the popular way and just blocking measures which are statistically safe won’t move us forward. Particularly while effectively ignoring the motoring elephants in the town – for which buses and bikes are part of the solution.
Though smaller automated buses might be better in a mix in which the private conventional motor car is removed altogether to be replaced by 20mph limited tri and quadricycles.
Tricycles and quadricycles? Have you been on a Belgian beach holiday recently? 😉
For me 20mph is a bit high, unless you’re restricting these to roads (so mostly not on cycle paths).
And not sure if the plan is for them to *mix* with the buses, but if so that would be a bad idea. Very different patterns of movement plus even small buses are quite a bit larger than cars (with attendant visibility problems etc).
Buses are also much better at damaging surfaces. All the local bus stops are identifiable for the waves of tarmac which are then a hazard to cyclists.
Keep the two separate.
For those interested in the “how we could do this (better)” there’s the Bicycle Dutch article and video as OnYerBike notes, and also:
Bicycle Dutch also has “Riding around the bus stop” specifically on that topic in NL.
For the UK context (including the accessibility issue):
Ranty Highwayman has written several times on this (“Floating Bus Stops: Redux” and “Floating Bus Stops”) – along other things pointing out that we have *effectively* had some of these for a long time without anyone shouting about them!
Robert Weetman also has an article on this (mainly looking at the less polished Copenhagen design): “Copenhagen bus stops”
Not condoning the cyclists who failed to stop when it is obvious they should slow on approach to the bus stop and the crossing but…
This entire fiasco was created because cyclists were less safe having to deal with impatient/dangerous drivers when manoeuvring around buses when they were at stops.
And at no point are pedestrians/politicians complaining at comparable levels about the same situation at crossings when faced with drivers who don’t stop.
Almost everyone waits patiently untill it is safe to cross.
Because that is what motor-normativity has done to us.
As a fellow Dylanologist, Ryan, I thought I’d try at least a verse:
In a little hilltop village, we bargained for warm clothes
We wanted cooler weather, God gave us a lethal dose
A breakaway of innocents, they got struck down with scorn
“Come in,” they said, “we’ll give ya, shelter from the storm.”
Or forget about it completely.
Specially for HarrogateSpa, your daily dose of bile from the Telegraph: “The e-bike is the most complete expression of the bullying arrogance of cyclists”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/08/25/e-bike-is-the-most-complete-expression-of-cyclist-bully/
Mainly conflating ebikes with Lime bikes, and complaining that “there is a general problem with bicycles of all kinds … bicycles take up An Awful Lot of Space.” Unlike, say, the big metal boxes that we happily decorate our streets with.
“In one generation, bicyclists have declined from being put-upon herbivores to becoming recklessly entitled, righteous, selfish bullies.” – think they may have confused cyclists with Telegraph writers there.