Please don't jump on me - I come from a militant cycling family, was brought up on secret cycle campaign meetings, rode to and from school every day (6 mile round trip) and hate cars/pollution etc etc...apart from a fascination and love for old landrovers, 1960s Rovers and British bikes.
BUT over the last few years I have been driving almost daily due to where we live and the school run and so on, and it is getting more and more obvious to me how dangerous it is sharing the road with cyclists.
Don't get me wrong - there's nothing I'd like more than to see hardly any cars and loads of bikes, but the facts seem to be that millions of people want or need to use their cars, and there are more cars than bicycles on most routes.
The things I hate are, as a cyclist, being followed up a road by a legion of impatient (or even patient) cars which are belting out fumes and wasting time/petrol while they wait for me, as it's too narrow to pass. The danger aspect or course. And a lot of pissed off drivers taking out their frustrations on cyclists as a genre.
As a motorist I hate following a line of cars up a hill while said cyclist (it could be me) tries to go as fast as they can but obviously is not as fast as a car, therefore causes probably more pollution than they are saving - not sure about that, but ti seems ridiculous to me.
And particularly, I hate having to overtake cyclists which means going across the central line in order to give the cyclist safe room, and being caught up and overtaken by cyclists on each and evry side of the car, very fast, giving me little if ANY chance to see them in time to react and therefore having my heart in my mouth frequently as I have yet another near miss with someone who assumes I have 360 degree vision and can predict what they are about to do.
i hate seeing cyclists putting themselves in danger on busy roundabouts.
I would like to see the following:
Millions of proper cycle lanes, and cyclists allowed to ride slowly on pavements if and where necessary - dismounting for pedestrians/children etc probably, as a pedestrian I don't aprticularly like pavements being used but prefer it to seeing riders in danger on roads.
And a part of the driving test being to ride a bicycle out on the roads, so you get a perspective from both sides. I can see that if you drive and have never biked, you would assume they were idiots - and if you've ridden but never driven, you'd hate all car drivers!
So people ought to try both.
Any thoughts?
AIBU?
to think cyclists and roads are a really bad mix
FlightAttendant · 17/10/2009 14:22
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