Sharing pavements with cyclists and scooters is frightening

Except the ones you hire which can as far as I know. Otherwise where would you ride them? Because they're usually in pedestrianised places.

viques · Today 19:51

We have a pathetic exhibitionist loser someone in our area who rides around on one of those electric unicycle things.

You're not in North Tyneside, are you? We have one who weaves in and out of pedestrians at high speed. I'm constantly hoping he'll have to do an emergency stop and dent the pavement with his face.

This. Why hasn't this become a thing throughout the whole of Britain. I don't cycle at all because I'm terrified of cycling on the roads. If this was implemented I would buy a bike tomorrow.

YANBU

Every time I have to use those shared spaces in north London I think “this is how I am going to die…”

a lot of shared paths here have no such segregation, and where there is the cyclists keep to their side, and the pedestrians are often totally oblivious to what is going on. Proper segregation such as they have in the Netherlands would be excellent for all.

The highway code has guidance which a lot of cyclists clearly haven't read.

We now have a pavement parking ban in my city, with £100 fine if you're caught. The result is that on narrow roads with wide pavements where pavement parking was sensible, people don't do it any more - instead there are roads that large vehicles can't get down, cars scraping each other as they try to get through, missed bin collections as the bin lorries can't make it. The next stage of course will be double yellows on all these roads.

A shared pathway shouldn’t be the only option. Dedicated pavements should be solely for the use of pedestrians, buggies and wheelchairs and small kids on bikes / scooters and dogs, and not adults on bikes or scooters or anything electric. Or parked cars, or roadwork signs (this one really annoys me. We have roadwork signs blocking the pavement so buggies have to go in the road. I move them every fucking time!).

Shared pathways should be dedicated transport routes, ideally away from anywhere a pedestrian would want to stroll. not something a council slaps some paint on and claims they’ve met their eco targets. That’s just dangerous.

How else are people expected to get their dogs to places if a shared pathway is the only option? Perfectly normal to walk a dog on a pavement!

Walking dogs on shared pathways ought to be banned obviously. It’s such a daft thing to do. Shared routes are transporting bikes and pedestrians.

Elderly people can also be less steady on their feet or have balance issues which make them more likely to fall as well as coming off worse if they do fall. I have balance issues myself and shared pavements are not great.

we walk our dog on a shared pathway with horses and bicycles,
that can be annoying,
they might ring their bell but not everyone can hear them!

a man nearly walked into me today while looking at his phone!
that is Annoying

My DH used to cycle to work 6 months of the year. We cycled every weekend off road. He's done the London to Brighton several times. We don't ride on pavements. We live in a village,SE UK, the main road has cycle lanes, and people still use the pavement. There are no 7 young kids,under 12, probably under 10,who thunder along on electric scooters!

I wush the police would stop drivers using their phones, jumping red lights , turning without indicating, over taking and cutting across, speeding, tail gating etc - just general dangerous driving that kills.

The number of people with headphones on and simultaneously stating at their phone does my head in. I use bone conducting headphones and can hear everything around me.

I HATE bicycles and electric scooters on pavements. All it takes is for them to try and pass and for my 5yo to move a step to the left for him to get hit from behind.

I wish the police would stop people cycling/scootering on pavements.

It’s nearly always teen boys/young men who do this. TBH they are probably the dangerous drivers too.

This really doesn't work when you come up to side roads

Ok , yes, they should be more aware of their surroundings, but I still don’t think that means you should be cycling fast on a pedestrian footpath, despite what the council say!

yes but they are not able to look over their shoulder before deciding to change direction and have made themselves unable to hear a bike bell on purpose.

Why is this? Are you not able to steer?

Yes! You see the 5 year old cycling along but their parent is cycling on the pavement too! Cycle beside the pavement in the road fgs!

And pedestrians on shared use paths with headphones on are just total idiots.

Cyclist, used to commute and cycle really fast on a promenade, because I was trying to get to work and the other option was a dual carriage way that seems to average one cycle commuter death a year. When you complain, the council points to the prom path. So what are you supposed to do? I need to get to work quickly (after dropping off at breakfast club), I need to be able to cycle quickly to work and am using the facilities designated by the council
for this purpose. If you don’t like it there are other pavements you can use (but I can’t).

I loathe pavement cyclists, and think e-bikes should be treated the same as cars. Escooters are still illegal though aren’t they?

Cyclists are very inconsiderate around here, I can see at least 10 every dog walk, the paths are narrow and they just come zooming around blind bends without caring about pedestrians. It's also a path used by lots of small children because it leads to a school.

I have very good hearing and usually hear them coming from quite far away but some of these new bikes are really quiet and you don't hear them until they are virtually on top of you.

Weekend mornings in the summer are the worst because they seem to cycle round at full speed in packs of 6-10 shouting to each other. They never slow to pass people and just expect everyone to jump out of their way.