Cyclists who act like they own the road should pay towards it

[dreamingofsun]

So cyclists get priority on the roads, and are happy to ride two abreast so they hold all the car traffic up. Shouldnt they at least pay towards the upkeep of the road?

You're lucky! Our village (well more of a small town with around 6,000 people) gets just one bus per hour in each direction and it's one every two hours in the evenings and Sundays!

The school kids have to get the 7.30 to arrive at school before 9am, and school is only 5 miles away! If they miss it and have to get the 8.30, they'll miss registration and part of the first lesson! Same with commuters for office and shop work starting at 9am. As you can imagine, the 7.30 bus is packed, standing room only, etc.

Then people wonder why most people in the village go to work/school by car!

I think there is always going to be a need for some private car use. But the fact that not all people can use public transport or travel actively all the time does not mean we can't encourage more people to do so more of the time. It doesn't have to be all or nothing.

There are plenty of car journeys undertaken which could easily be replaced by walking/cycling/buses or whatever.

Some can't, obviously, but we all know that one lazy fucker parent who drives 200m to drop their kid off at school and back home again.

I agree, but it depends on the method of encouragement though. If the method of encouragement is building cycle lanes, improving public transport etc totally support it. If it is diverting all of the local traffic down our road for my kids to breathe increased levels of air pollution, then that is totally unacceptable.

The other route (four buses an hour from the stop on the main road a 10 minute walk away) does have quite long hours. I've already said that I work shifts so cycling is convenient. This is coastal Wales, mind. There's no reason that most people in cities need a car.

If you're concerned about people with disabilities then remember that many of them can't drive anyway, so benefit from better provision of alternatives.

I’ve acknowledged sometimes people are just being lazy but it’s very simplistic to say journeys under a mile should be done without a car, and ridiculous to say it about 5 miles.

Never mind villages though, it was urban areas I was proposing to restrict. They've generally got adequate public transport - if buses are slow then it's usually because of the sheer number of cars. Fewer cars means better public transport.

Some of those 1 mile journeys will be necessary. They make up 25% of all journeys though so clearly there are loads that are not.

Unless there is a good reason e.g. carrying a heavy load or mobility reasons, I would say that driving under a mile is pretty much always completely unnecessary. People need to stop using the car when just popping to the corner shop for a pint of milk, it's fucking absurd.

How many of that 25% are done by people going to the supermarket for a big shop. By people with mobility issues? By people with children who can’t walk that far? By people who are making multiple stops while out eg in home careers? I love walking but a) when my hip flares up I can’t manage a mile and b) I’ve been raped and I am scared to walk on my own at night however short the journey.

I am not supporting driving 300m to the local shop. It’s appallingly lazy. But I don’t know where the evidence is of how many journeys done in a car for less than a mile are for what reason.

Home carers not careers!

Cargo bikes take kids, big shop etc.

Sorry about your hip (cycling improves my arthritis massively) and the rape. Been there too.

On the subject of home carers in urban areas (I recognise that the carers who saw to my grandparents in rural County Mayo would have struggled without a car), they'd benefit from using bicycles. Paramedics in cities have been using bicycles for years, they can carry everything an ambulance would except for the actual stretcher. Gets them around congested streets quicker than even blue lights would.

There are not "plenty" of off-road courses because they are overrun by dog walkers.

Also a lot of cyclists use their bikes as a mode of transport. Not as a leisure pursuit. Yes, the MAMILs do and they should pull over and let people pass periodically when on their Sunday morning rides but you can also work out where they are likely to be and take other routes, as I said above.

I agree. I am embarrassed by some of the journeys I used to make by car!

Taking my son to a football match less than a mile away.

Having a car park season ticket for a station 10 minutes' walk away. It used to take me that long to get out of the car park. What an idiot I was.

Once I moved house, driving to another station 25 minutes away - admittedly that was because you had to get out of a housing estate through a narrow tunnel that was for cars as well. Once they built a pedestrian tunnel next to it (which was well lit and safe) I walked.

I have to say high car park charges at railway stations are a good thing as I live 22 minutes walk away now and would very rarely drive because I am too tight-fisted to pay £10 a day, only eg if I know I will be late home.

Driving to and from a friend's house when it takes 15 minutes to walk.

It's just a mindset shift that is needed.

And you expect an oap to get on a bike or walk a mile along a road to their local shop and carry heavy bags back?

You live in cloud cuckoo land.

Agree with all this

To add - some motorists take the absolute piss too.

I've never been treated so aggressively as I have by those behind a wheel. I've seen them go through red lights and drive dangerously. I'd much rather a slow cyclist than a speeding motorist.

@Brumbies

OAP's make up a big chunk of cyclists in many places. They don't amputate your legs when you retire.

It's also a lot easier to transport shopping on a bike than to carry bags in your hands.

Signed, an arthritic old bag (on a bike)

Loads of OAPs around my way (suburban area in the north west) carry shopping on their bikes, as do many families with 2/3 kids that I know of.

My dad is an OAP and walks miles and miles every day. My grandad was the same well in to his early nineties. Walking is good low impact exercise as you get older. Helps with balance too.

It's good to be active when you are older. Also, if you are retired, you probably don't need to do one big shop, as you have the time to shop more frequently.

I don't have a car and manage our weekly big shop for 2 on foot and the bus

There are plenty of motorways and dual carriageways in this country for car drivers to play their hobby on, so they could just leave the rest of the smaller roads to those modes of transport that predate the motor car. Job done.

Well you need to use the "smaller" roads to get to the motorways. And lots of people on motorways are actually either working or commuting to work, so actually contributing to the UK economy rather than just tootling around for fun contributing nothing.

I literally, literally said that in my post.

Can you not read?