9hrs is all it took!

[Finallylostit]

The new highway code to cause anger!

I went for my morning cycle - no issues did nothing different than I normally do.

Home, shower, jump in car to get food shopping. I live down a country road - wide enough for 2 cars to pass with care, wide enough for a car to over take a cyclist sticking to the left of the lane, with the required space at certain points. Locals all know the places to do it safely.

Today 1 cyclist riding down the middle of the lane - now unsafe for car to pull over to other lane and pass - brilliant

Was he considerate of other road users and pulled over- no.

As on the other side were 8 riders riding two abreast high fiving each other and doing the finger to the motorists. Shouting its the law twats!
Were they considerate of other road users no.

Some of the new laws i think are sensible -
but the ride in the middle of the road, even if there is a cycle lane because you don't feel like it - is asinine

2 abreast packs of mamils hunting on weekends as they venture out of London - when they are generally rude enough as it is - gives those cyclists who are arseholes a legal right to now be an arsehole.

Be considerate and pull over to let cars and vans pass -
that is as likely as Downing Street not having another party in a lockdown!

Why do car drivers pretend that they care about anything other than getting to their destination as quickly as possible? Pretending to care about cyclists health and safety? Bollocks, you hate bicycles as they slow you down.

And I’m not a cyclist but a pedestrian who has to avoid moron drivers every single day.

I don't hate cyclists I am one.

Sensible things are there but the lost opportunity for fluorescent clothing and more than one light. One single solitary rear light when cycling behind a car or van often merges into the lights of the vehicle infront. Light up like a bloody beacon at night - should have been in there.

Filtering left and right is just dangerous the car in the middle of the road has a bike on either side - it is being overtaken and undertaken at the same time and there is no way on earth it can give the inside bike 1.5 metres because to do so would mean that the over taking filtering bike gets hit but is it the overtaking bikes responsibility to give the car 1.5 m?!

For those of us who do live in more rural hilly areas the weekend invasion of people who do not use country roads as routine means some of these rule changes are straight out dangerous for everyone and coupled with an attitude that was previously bad but on the basis of today even more objectionable and legal there are going to be problems.

I have been spat at by cyclists when in a car because he rode into my wing mirror, had doors kicked whilst waiting at junctions and water bottles thrown but only ever at the weekend - we are on a number of preferred cycle routes where I live. Some of us do continue to live and work in these areas at weekends but God forbid the mamil tribe are held to account and considerate.

However, the worst sartorial crime is having to drive v slowly looking at the bum crack of a slightly larger person who is bulging out of said lycra for 4-5 miles as you can not pass, they are too unsafe and weaving all over the place!

Is this right?
Car A going into side road has to give way to pedestrian.
But car coming along B doesn't have to because they're not turning into this road, they're on it already.
So pedestrian might not cross because there's cars coming.
Result backed up traffic on main road.

@mids2019 @Joystir59

140 cyclists? presumable most killed by car drivers and you would like to see cyclists banned?

In accidents involving adult cyclists and cars 75% are caused by the vehicle driver.

Car drivers kill 300 children each and every year and approx 1800 in total but your happy not to ban cars? and thats before we get to air quality.

We need far far more people getting their sorry arses out of their cars and cycling walking etc

We have a crumbling NHS and Cv targets the unhealthy, so we need to address this.

Our town centre has cycle lanes. Yesterday the cyclists were ignoring them to cycle two abreast in the middle of the lane. Slowing down all the traffic.
Until, of course, there was a red light. Then one decided to cut across two lanes of stopped traffic, weaving in and out of cars. And the other decided to mount the pavement and weave in and out amongst the pedestrians.
The sooner cycles are registered and can be reported, the better and safer it will be for everyone.

I'm not sure how it's hard to accept there are bad cyclists and bad drivers and bad pedestrians too. There are also safe, considerate versions of all of the above.
I commute in the dark and am so grateful to the cyclists in high vis stuff with lights, it's so frightening to see a cyclist all in dark clothes at the last minute. Frightening for them too, but they had a choice about what to wear.
I'm not a big overtaker but if I'm patiently driving slowly behind a cyclist that is not to say the guy in the car behind me will be - they overtake me and then have nowhere to go because there's a cyclist - that won't end well.

@Tulipvase

Why do car drivers pretend that they care about anything other than getting to their destination as quickly as possible? Pretending to care about cyclists health and safety? Bollocks, you hate bicycles as they slow you down.

And I’m not a cyclist but a pedestrian who has to avoid moron drivers every single day.

Also our arses look great in lycra and they are jealous of that too.

You should only overtake anything - car, tractor, horse, cyclist, giant monster centipede by going fully over the central line into the other carriageway, that has always been the case.

So it Does not matter where the cyclist is in the lane because you are always going fully over the white line to overtake aren’t you?

Cyclist cycling in the middle of their lane forces drivers to actually overtake as they always should have been rather than encouraging them to squeeze past in the same lane as the cyclist

@Alexandra2001 your stats are wrong. The Transport Research Laboratory says most accidents with cyclists under 24 (whether they are hitting children, pedestrians or cars) are caused by the cyclist.

[quote ShinyHappyPoster]@Alexandra2001 your stats are wrong. The Transport Research Laboratory says most accidents with cyclists under 24 (whether they are hitting children, pedestrians or cars) are caused by the cyclist.[/quote]
@ShinyHappyPoster Nope i am not wrong at all.
You can take any demographic to make a point but in adult cyclists of all ages, the car driver is more likely to be the cause.

You just picked out under 24's which includes children

In the case of deaths of cyclists between 40-54, the drivers' share is even higher: 70% drivers alone, 8% jointly at fault and only 23% the sole fault of the cyclist

This a common age group of so called MAMIL cyclists

When it comes to injuries, rather than deaths, the relationship is even more skewed, with responsibility for the vast majority of crashes laid at the drivers' door

80% of all injuries to 25yo + cyclists are, according to the police officer recording the incident, either solely or partly the responsibility of the driver
Put another way, only one in five injuries to a 25-year-old (or older) cyclist is deemed to be his or her fault alone

Going to be a lot more accidents. Cyclists are supposed to be considerately to motorists too. However cyclists are ignoring that part of the guidance.

@ShinyHappyPoster

Our town centre has cycle lanes. Yesterday the cyclists were ignoring them to cycle two abreast in the middle of the lane. Slowing down all the traffic. Until, of course, there was a red light. Then one decided to cut across two lanes of stopped traffic, weaving in and out of cars. And the other decided to mount the pavement and weave in and out amongst the pedestrians. The sooner cycles are registered and can be reported, the better and safer it will be for everyone.

If these changes really were made on the basis of there being a hierarchy of vulnerability, with artics at the top (least vulnerable) & pedestrians at the bottom (most vulnerable), why has no provision been made to register & identify all cyclists? It could be self-funded.

I thought the changes were supposed to operate like this: if there's an accident, the vehicle higher up the hierarchy is automatically assumed to be at fault & will be dealt with accordingly. So e.g. a collision between a car & a pedestrian will now be assumed to be the car driver's fault (though as I would hope there would be an investigation, I don't quite see the purpose of this assumption). Why, then, are cyclists & horse riders not required to be identifiable so that they can be dealt with as the assumed guilty party in any collision they have with a pedestrian?

Why, then, are cyclists & horse riders not required to be identifiable so that they can be dealt with as the assumed guilty party in any collision they have with a pedestrian?

For the same reason that pedestrians aren't. Pedestrians, cyclists, and horse riders all have a legal right to use the roads (excluding motorways, which as their name suggests are for motor vehicles only), whereas if you wish to bring a motor vehicle onto a public road you need to apply for permission in the form of a driving licence. Motor vehicles are there only by licence, pedestrians, cyclists, and riders are there by right.

@mumda this is the kind of thing I am worried about! I keep thinking of various situations and what I should be doing.
Some of the wording isn't very clear - people crossing at a junction, for example. I initially thought this would mean people waiting to cross the side road but it doesn't actually say this.
Why would a cyclist pass me on my right when I am stopped (or moving slowly) waiting to turn right? I feel this is a dangerous rule and it does warn cyclists that they may not be seen by drivers and should use caution, but I can't see why they WOULD pass me on the right.

[quote ShinyHappyPoster]@Alexandra2001 your stats are wrong. The Transport Research Laboratory says most accidents with cyclists under 24 (whether they are hitting children, pedestrians or cars) are caused by the cyclist.[/quote]
I'd be interested to see which report you're using from TRL. The ones that come up on a quick search are a report and newstories about it from 2009.

So many motorists complaining about cyclists and yet they wonder why their children are born with mental defects. Perhaps it could be the enormous levels of pollution you spew out daily just a thought

@Tavelo

So many motorists complaining about cyclists and yet they wonder why their children are born with mental defects. Perhaps it could be the enormous levels of pollution you spew out daily just a thought

Well maybe if cars weren't stuck on residential streets in standstill traffic caused by slow-moving cyclists the pollution levels would be a lot lower.

Road users antagonising each other isn’t a new thing. Any attitudes that may or may not have happened today are not new either. Such a non story.

Can’t stand cyclists, hate that they slow me down but….to be safe, they should take up the room in their lane as much as a car does. To overtake them you should be leaving as much space as you would a car.
Yes some cyclists will cycle to the left and allow you to pass, they obviously feel safe enough to do so but they don’t have to. Cycling safely is more important than the 3 minutes you save if you try and squeeze yourself past.

@Aroundtheworldin80moves

Cycling in the centre of the lane is so cars can only overtake if the other lane is clear. So basically treating them as a car not something that can be squeezed past. Two abreast similar... easy to overtake if the other side is clear.

Its been advised for years, not new.

How does that work when there is only one lane which we have in abundance around here.

@Lockheart You've missed the point about the hierarchy of vulnerability & the assumption of responsibility.

These changes are supposedly built on the bedrock of the relative vulnerabilities of various road users. In which case, with pedestrians being officially more vulnerable road users than both horse riders & pedal cyclists, some means is surely needed to identify & deal with horse riders & pedal cyclists in the event of a collision with a pedestrian - otherwise, how can they be held accountable when they could just go on their way after the collision? It's a nonsense to have only half the necessary provision in place, i.e. only drivers & motorcyclists being identifiable.

Can't believe the amount of hate for cyclists. You might get held up for two minutes behind one

If they are cycling in a group or close to the centre, it would be impossible to overtake them and give them the required amount of space, so would be illegal ? On the roads around here , you could be behind them for 7 miles doing 10-30 mph on a national speed limit road. Some cyclists may notice a large number of vehicles behind them and pull over safely to allow the cars to pass, it isn't something I have ever seen a cyclist do, but some of them must have read the highway code.

[quote ifIwerenotanandroid]@Lockheart You've missed the point about the hierarchy of vulnerability & the assumption of responsibility.

These changes are supposedly built on the bedrock of the relative vulnerabilities of various road users. In which case, with pedestrians being officially more vulnerable road users than both horse riders & pedal cyclists, some means is surely needed to identify & deal with horse riders & pedal cyclists in the event of a collision with a pedestrian - otherwise, how can they be held accountable when they could just go on their way after the collision? It's a nonsense to have only half the necessary provision in place, i.e. only drivers & motorcyclists being identifiable.[/quote]
I'm not talking about hierarchy - you asked why cyclists and horse riders don't have to be identifiable.

The reason is that because they have the right to use the roads, they don't need additional documentation. I could get a horse or a bike (I possess neither) tomorrow and take them out.

But if I want to take out a motorbike / car, I need to get permission; I need a licence. I don't have the right to take out a motor vehicle. No-one does. So those who use motorised vehicles have to be identifiable to make sure they have permission to be there.

Cyclists, pedestrians, and horse riders need no such legal documentation to use roads.

Unless you remove the legal right for riders and cyclists to use the road, the situation is not going to change.

It has been pointed out but it is worth reiterating...cyclists are not a homogeneous blob. It's simply a lazy stereotyping to assume they all behave in the same way. Mind you that seems to be quite popular online...all teachers/GP's Tory voters are xyz....
I cycle, I've never thrown a water bottle at anyone, kicked a door or ridden on a pavement (actually that's not true as we have quite a few shared pedestrian/cycle pavements near me). I also drive and I've never cut someone up, driven aggressively close or beeped my horn in impatience. But then I'm not about to put anyones life at risk to shave 2 minutes of my journey and I'm not an angry entitled dickhead. The changes are there to encourage everyone to slow down, be more considerate, take more care and (hopefully) cause fewer accidents. There are very few journeys that are life and death, allow more time, go slower, accept things will take a bit longer .... It doesn't matter that it takes 10 more minutes now just factor it into your day....

I nearly ran into a cyclist when doing a right hand turn.
I had waited in the middle of the road for the traffic lights to stop oncoming traffic and when the cars stopped I pulled away only for me to slam on my brakes as I saw something moving in the lights of the stationary traffic

It was a cyclist, dressed all in black, no lights on and cycling across the road when the traffic lights had turned red.

If I had hit them it would have been me who was charged with something like reckless driving even though they clearly had a death wish.

If I drove with no lights and went through the lights on red I would have been fined at the very least.

Bikes need to have their own number plates or something that identifies them because it might make them think trice about what they are doing. They obviously don’t care about their own safety