To think the vitriol against cycling has gotten a bit much?

[BuggersMuddle]

Obviously I'm a cyclist. I'm also a car driver, motorcyclist and pedestrian, so I can genuinely see all sides of the debate.

I've cycled to work on and off for years. In the past I could recount many tales of cars pulling too close, but very few real 'incidents'. Nowadays I could recount probably a couple a week easily (none on my weekend or non-peak time training cycles ).

My cycling ability has if anything got better not worse. I have more money, so my gear is certainly better and I have more hi-vis, better lights etc. the latter of which which you would think is good but apparently a cause for complaint as well

I do commute in Edinburgh, which does have transport issues since the tram debacle, so I don't know if this is colouring my view. All I know is I used to cover 10 miles by road a day and rarely had an issue. I now cover 12 miles (usually), of which half is on cycle path and seem to be open to all kinds of a abuse & general intolerance.

Not confined to me though, more friends have started wearing cameras in the event of incidents and the online abuse on Facebook groups / local papers in the event of cycling incidents or (god forbid) cyclists complaining just beggars belief.

AIBU? Am I just unlucky, or does the general public really seem to hate cyclists as a group? Or is it just where I live?

I live in a busy city centre. I experience cycling offence all day long. Commuters whizzing through pedestrian crossings, ducking in front of busses & shaving past traffic. City Bike riders ambling all over the place, mounting foot paths, no helmets or hi-vis. I ride a bike myself, but I think these bad riders are ruining it for the rest of us.
Granted there's bad drivers & bad pedestrians (the amount of people who dash across the street with their kids / buggy is shocking). But I know why I get bad vibes from motorists... Even if I'm good on my bike.

Cycling offences.
I do agree that folk sound off a lot more about cyclists on FB etc. It's usually those with Range Rovers who wouldn't know a bike from their elbow. But I still think bad cyclists bring it upon themselves...

Oh I see them too AlleyCat (and am very careful not to be too quick off the mark at lights personally), but I'm not sure I see more of them than I did 10 years ago.

I definitely do see more obvious backlash against 'bad' cyclists and those who are perceived to be bad. (I draw a distinction because some folks don't seem to know the difference. Like 'cyclist not so close to kerb they are in gutter = bad cyclist' to a lot of people, iME).

Bad vibes though is one thing. I expect a lot of cyclists to be bad and many live up to that expectation. Being called a cunt for not pulling in to the back of a parked vehicle when I'm about to turn right anyway though, that's a more recent peeve.

Good point about FB though - maybe it's just that social networking is so much more pervasive so I am more aware of it outwith my commute...

I had to step away from a recent local newspaper debate, because it had degenerated into 'I hope you all get run over by a bus, you lycra clad morons' and 'Work harder then you can buy a car' type nonsense.

It depends on what type of cyclist you've recently encountered. There's a shared cycle path that goes past the rear of our back garden, that I frequently walk our dog on. The majority of cyclists don't treat it as a race track, or expect pedestrians to have bat-like hearing and immediately jump out of their way without them ringing their bells, but those who do tend to linger longer in my memory, unfortunately.

Gotten? Try living in Cambridge, the cyclist bashing in the local press is shocking. There would be gridlock if all the cyclists got into cars!

There's certainly a lot less tolerance than there used to be

MyNeighbour See this is my argument too. Well specifically my argument was there's more room for you whingeing bastards in cars and on the local buses if the cyclists keep up their environmentally friendly transportation, but I may have been channelling goady fucker at the time

shadowfax That's one I've heard a lot on our common shared use path. I do get that and I have seen crazy cyclists. On ours though I've noticed something else, which is if you 'look' like a roadie (drop bars, lycra), the threshold for acceptable cycling is much, much higher than if you're dressed casually and riding an MTB / hybrid. This may be peculiar to my area - there seems to be a particular hatred of the 'MAMAL'

Cycling has boomed in popularity since the 2012 Olympics, therefore there are more poor cyclists winding car drivers up. Most cyclists are fine but it just takes a few inconsiderate ones to give cycling a bad name. Same with horse riders.
And yesterday I was out on a horse and had 2 potential 'incidents':

1. Bin bag blowing around in the middle of narrow country lane was freaking horse out - he started running backwards into the other horse & rider I was out with. Car approaching at speed...

Put hand up to ask driver to stop - he did so and waited patiently for the few seconds it took for us to negotiate the scary flapping bag. Thanked him nicely and we all went on our way.

1. Ten mins later cyclist coming fast towards us with crazily bright flashing light - could feel horse tensing when it was 100 yards away. Cyclist slowed and reached forward to turn light off. We kept horses tight into the edge of the lane and stopped while the cyclist passed. Again - smiles and thanks all round.

Conclusion: Everyone showing consideration for other legitimate road users - everyone happy and safe. Wouldn't it be great if it was always like that?

By the way I ride a bike and drive a car too. I stop if I see someone waiting to cross the road, especially if it's raining. The other day it was chucking down with rain and I could see a teenage lad hunched in the rain waiting to cross, yet no one was stopping for him even though it was slow-moving traffic. Consideration costs nothing.

Britain has some of the safest roads in the world, they are far safer than they were 20 years ago, despite there being more cars. I think this has made cyclists feel safer, they can whizz in and out of traffic and narrowly miss pedestrians at crossings.
I cycled long before I drove, I was hit, twice. I didn't take crazy risks and I obeyed the rules of the road. In the places I lived there were a fewer cyclists (with the exception of Cambridge) than there are today. So with more people doing something it is bound to have more incidences and problems.
I live in South America, if most of the cyclists I encountered in London, attempted the same idiocy here, that I witnessed there, most would be dead, brain damaged or missing limbs by the end of the week. I don't hate cyclists, I just think some cyclists have a death wish.

Oh I really dislike cyclists.

They scare the shit out of me because I always have this fear that they are going to wobble and fall directly under my wheels.

Nothing to do with the cyclists, just my own fears!

I always follow the rules about treating them like a car and will never overtake unless I can give them a wide berth. That means I get irate drivers behind me who can't understand why I don't whip past them close enough to feel their leg hairs. I suffer for you bloody cyclists as I get road raged by the twats who don't give you the same consideration.

So I have a totally unreasonable dislike of cyclists based on my own fear of accidentally killing them and other driver's twatty behaviour.

I cycle, drive and walk a lot too, so I see it from all sides. I get pissed off by all the cyclists I see jumping red lights/driving straight through green men etc, because I know it brings us all more ill will from drivers and pedestrians. As a driver I get pissed off by the amount of cyclists on dark wet nights wearing dark clothes and no lights whatsoever. I also hate it when they block the road when there's a perfectly good cycle path they're not bothering with.

As a cyclist though, I have had some downright aggressive drivers invading my space on the road, turn out from smaller roads without looking properly and nearly creaming me, turning left without checking and nearly creaming me etc. the amount of times I've had to jam on the brakes to avoid being killed by ignorant drivers is countless.
My dd sometimes cycles a few miles to school, but has been put off recently by a driver that opened his door into her as she cycled past, badly bruising her leg and her belly it was an accident, but she was wearing a big high vis and he obviously didn't check properly.

I think drivers need to be a LOT more careful of cyclists, they need to realise bikes are vehicles too and have a right to be there, and how physically vulnerable cyclists are. I think drivers need more education about cyclists and how to safely share the road with them.

Also, I think cyclists should follow the rules of the road if they're going to use it.

OP, my dog is always on lead on that path (it's an old railway line and most of it parallels a road), and if I see or hear a cyclist approaching, he will be made to sit on the verge close to my leg - he's a friendly dog and would probably jump up at a cyclist to make friends! Otherwise he's normally on a long, loose lead and, being a spaniel, his instinct and nose tells him to 'quarter' the ground, in this case moving from one side of the path to the other and back again, so that he can appreciate the maximum number of smells. A bike coming silently towards us at a rate of knots scares the crap out of me, tbh, we are as much of a danger to the cyclist as we are to him, but if I know they are coming, I can do something about it. There are horses regularly ridden on this path too, so the inconsiderate cyclists really do take their life into their own hands, I used to ride and have been kicked, and I know how much it hurts.

To be honest, I haven't noticed that the kitted out cyclists round here are considered worse than others, in fact one of the nicer encounters was with an organised ride of about 20 or so club cyclists, all in Lycra. The dog was made to sit on the verge as they went past and all of them thanked me. If only all encounters were so nice and civilised! We also have a fuckwit who thinks it's acceptable to regularly ride a trials motorbike on the cycle path, though. You don't want to know what fate I want to befall him.

The problem I have as a pedestrian is with cyclists who do not stop at red lights, especially at pedestrian crossings, because they do not want to lose momentum. Ringing your bell is not the answer, dickheads, if the light is red for you and green for me bloody well stop while I walk across!

The problem isn't cyclists, motorists or pedestrians. The problem is the infrastructure in this country isn't built for all three. Nowhere in the rest of Europe would you find a painted line down the side of the path or road and it called a cycle lane. They have separate, quite clearly distinguishable dedicated cycle lanes and classed as a different form of travel. Not just tacked onto the inside lane of the high speed motorists.

Unfortunately cycle lanes are the responsibility of the local council, so some will have the money to spend on cleverly designed infrastructure which accommodates all three modes of travel. Other councils think this is a really good idea.

YABU. There is not enough vitriol against bad cyclists who seem to increase in numbers every day. Aggressive, pedestrian hating gits.

YANBU because law abiding cyclsts get flack because of the stupid ones.

Cyclists terrify me!

I think I just have a lot of bad cyclists in my area, just so unpredictable. One camels shooting out of a side road and ended up over my mums car (she was parked) and the amount if times I've nearly been hit by one using the oath (non cycle path)

Or maybe not? Could anyone tell me if there would be a reason to cycle up a hill, two abreast, and blocking off pretty much the entire road for cars?

Well obviously a cyclist on a camel would be very bad.

The cyclist 'came shooting out'

Most cyclists are OK but a significant minority are not and that puts me on edge when cyclists are about because the ones that aren't OK are freaking dangerous. I used to work in Edinburgh and had some bad experiences as a pedestrian- e.g. The underpass at Standard Life House is a pedestrian path but the number of couriers on bike who go flying through it as a shortcut is incredible and I was nearly knocked down on a number of occasions. I was also nearly knocked down by a cyclist outside Haymarket as I was stepping on a bus- the cyclist cycled in between the pavement and the bus with its open door.

Where I live, cyclists rarely use their bells to warn that they are approaching. On the school run, there is one in particular who doesn't seem to understand that he is sharing the path with children and goes flying by within inches. There's a certain part of the path that I can't relax on (I also have an on lead dog) until the three daily cyclists have gone by.

I'm a cyclist too, but I completely understand why they get so much flack!

Absolutely samesizetoes. I'm a rider, cyclist and motorist. I don't ride or cycle on the roads nowadays as I don't believe it is safe to do so. The infrastructure is geared towards motorists, not other road users. I worry about the safety of cyclists on the roads and it infuriates me to see wide verges that could (relatively) cheaply accommodate basic cycle paths.

I also think the law should change to allow cyclists to use pavements when they are clear - I often find myself stuck behind cyclists going uphill slowly and I'm unable to pass safely so I'm crawling behind for up to a mile (on a particular stretch of road), not the fault of the cyclist but can be frustrating. It's semi-rural and there is a pavement that is almost always completely empty, and it seems that it would be a better use of the existing infrastructure if the cyclists were able to move onto this stretch of pavement, or any unused stretch of pavement.

As for riders - I gave up riding on the roads a few years ago after witnessing a serious accident. It was the fault of nobody, the horse being ridden on the verge spooked into the path of a lorry who was passing slowly and carefully. Rider lost a limb, horse destroyed at scene, lorry driver devastated. I don't care that horses were on the roads before cars, or any of the other bollox that I often hear - horses and vehicles are not a good mix, modern roads are not designed for live animals to use, they are designed for increasingly large and powerful vehicles and horses have no place there any more.

I think part of the backlash against cyclists is that there are a lot of 'bad' ones about - who cycle in the dark without light, don't move across on wider roads when it's safe to do so to let a massive tail back go past, run lights etc and the bad are more memorable than the good. Personally I think that as with cars there should be a test cyclists have to pass before being allowed to ride on the road and adults shouldn't be allowed to ride on pavements. If cyclists needed to pass a test and pay insurance like other road going vehicles it would help weed out the bad (obviously not all as you do get bad car drivers!) and everyone would be happier.

Every day I have to cross a v busy road at a pedestrian crossing, and every time I am on the look out for bikes not stopping despite me having the green light and them the red. If there is a bus at the front of the traffic queue it's russian roullette trying to peer round the bus for cyclists to cross the road in the few seconds allowed....

And it's NOT just a few that don't stop at red - I see it every day.

The ones that worry me are the ones going hell for leather who mount the pavement at red lights so they don't have to stop or just come off the pavement onto the road wherever they feel like it without even checking what is around.

There are twatty cyclists just like bikers, car drivers etc they are just more vulnerable.

I'm glad this hasn't descended into a cyclist bashing thread. I had to leave one on Fb yesterday as the vitriol towards cyclists was alarming. There was no reasoning with the motorists who were firmly of the opinion that Cyclists were basically scum of the earth and deserved to be run over.

As a cyclist myself I found it quite unnerving that I daily risk my life cycling along folk with appalling attitudes like that.

This is the same as any situation where the few make it more difficult for the majority. Cyclists can be very selfish on the road and they can tend to behave as if they are all that matters.

I think your point that lost if cyclists have started wearing cameras is telling. They have started wearing cameras to protect themselves, but have they all started getting insurance to protect other road users when they do something wrong? Or will they just continue to do things like scratch other people's cars and then ride of unidentifiably into the distance? It's things like that that irritate other road users and end up with cyclists getting less understanding from them.