A camera cyclist and councillor has called for car drivers to be required to retake their theory test every five years, after he filmed a motorist driving along a seemingly protected cycle lane in Dorset and stopping on the pavement to adjust his sat nav.
Adrian Chapmanlaw, a member of Bournemouth, Christchurch, and Poole Council, was riding along Wallisdown Road’s two-way bike lane on Wednesday when a driver in a blue Ford Fiesta pulled out of a junction and began travelling in the right-hand lane of the cycling infrastructure.
In the video, posted on Chapmanlaw’s ‘Dorset Safer Roads’ YouTube page, the cyclist grinds to a halt, as the driver pulls over onto the adjacent footpath and stops, blocking the entire pavement.
Chapmanlaw, who in recent years has become a regular fixture in the Daily Mail for his often-controversial bike camera videos, then knocks on the driver’s window. The motorist appears to claim that he “saw” the cyclist and was simply adjusting his TomTom navigation system.
“You’re not on the road!” Chapmanlaw, in disbelief as he later noted, shouts. “This is a cycle lane!”
The motorist then reverses before driving across the pavement and cycle lane, blocking the infrastructure once again as he attempts to pull out onto the road.
Speaking to road.cc after the incident, Chapmanlaw said he was left “speechless” by the driver’s actions.
“Occasionally I come across a driver whose incompetence exceeds levels of belief,” he said. “He said he was setting up his TomTom. I have no idea how that’s relevant!”
Chapmanlaw told road.cc that he contemplated reporting the incident to Dorset Police’s Operation Snap portal for road offences, but later decided against it.
“I think they would just see it as ‘driving on a cycle lane’ which is a non-endorsable offence. They stopped prosecuting those other than school zig zags over a year ago,” he said.
> Row over Dorset cycle lane that drivers claim is “too wide”
Nevertheless, the camera cyclist argued that the incident is evidence of the need for more thorough and regular testing for motorists on the UK’s roads (or cycle lanes).
“This is why we need a theory test every five years,” he said. “I’m fed up with bad drivers risking safety. They want us to use the cycle lanes then do this rubbish.
“If anyone knows this driver, get him to seek extra driver training now. He is totally unfit to drive as he is. There is no excuse for this.”
The A3049 Wallisdown Road cycle lane used by our Ford Fiesta driver first made national headlines back in 2021, when some local motorists claimed (incorrectly) that the infrastructure’s width now meant that people on bikes had more space than those in cars on the road.
In 2023, it was also reported that the cost of building the two-way cycle lane had spiralled to over £3.5m, over £500,000 more than originally budgeted.
Chapmanlaw, for his part, is no stranger to stories in the press. In recent years, the Daily Mail has dubbed him the “new Cycling Mikey”, despite his ‘Dorset Safer Roads’ YouTube channel documenting his encounters with poor drivers boasting around 600 subscribers (compared to Mikey’s 121,000 followers).
He’s also been variously described in the press as a “snide, aggressive, and vindictive cycling vigilante, “a self-appointed busybody”, and an “angrier, swearier version of Cycling Mikey”.
Earlier this month, the councillor was criticised in the Mail for posting a video of himself filtering past motorists who had pulled over to allow an emergency vehicle to pass.
“A cycling vigilante has been slammed for taking advantage of a police car on a 999 call by following directly behind it after traffic had cleared a path,” the Mail’s article said.
“Rather than wait his turn to rejoin the traffic he filmed himself overtaking and undertaking the stationary cars ahead of him and catch up with the emergency vehicle.”
And last week, the same newspaper reported that Chapmanlaw has been suspended as a member of the Liberal Democrat group in BCP Council, after he shared a video of a taxi parked on zig-zag lines outside a school.
The school asked the councillor to remove the video, arguing it raised safeguarding concerns. Chapmanlaw refused to take the clip down, claiming no-one could be identified, leading to his suspension by the Lib Dems. He remains a member of the council.
Chapmanlaw tells road.cc that he is simply the subject of a “standard” ongoing complaint, which he says should not have been made public.
“I’m very angry about the whole thing,” he says. “The video was blurred. I believe it to be another attempt by a member of the local motorists [Facebook] group to get me to stop reporting.
“Somebody did a similar complaint about safeguarding to the Walk Wheel Cycle trust last year when I was doing Dr Bike sessions with them. They found that I had done nothing wrong.”
Last year, the camera cyclist was the subject of a long-running saga that erupted within BCP Council, involving his filming of motorists committing traffic offences outside schools.
Chapmanlaw’s actions were described by a number of his Conservative counterparts as inappropriate, amid suggestions that his behaviour raised “legitimate safeguarding concerns”.
One Tory councillor was also reported for making “potentially libellous accusations”, a development Chapmanlaw says was “strange, disappointing, and depressing”.
During an appearance on the road.cc Podcast earlier this year, Chapmanlaw insisted that he can carry out his duties as a councillor while posting videos on YouTube of drivers breaking the law.
“I believe I have the support of my colleagues,” he said. “And, you know, it is what it is. I’m going to carry on doing what I’m doing for the right reasons.
“If people don’t like that, then that’s their problem, not mine. If that loses my seat, so what? That’s the people have made their choice.
“I’m doing what I believe is right. And if people don’t agree with me and don’t want to elect me for that, then so be it.”
