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?

Lots of people commute to work by bike.

Lots of people in cars are not going to work but are tootling around for fun.

HTH.

Why would they need to carry bags? What are those tartan trolley things for? If they're too frail to walk a mile then I'd question whether they would be safe drivers.

The whole point of a 15 minute neighbourhood is that all main facilities (doctors, shops, public transport stops etc.) should easily be within walking distance of one's home.

So if my friend (who lives 30 miles away) and I decide to have a catch up, we can't both cycle to a midway point to meet up, whilst at the same time getting some nice fresh air and exercise?! Is it better to put our cars on the road for two short journeys just in case one of us mildly inconveniences a motorist for 20 seconds because cycling "isn't a proper method of transport"?!

Bonkers!

Lots of people are perfectly capable of driving, but incapable of walking a mile - huge numbers of people will fall into that category. No idea why you think mobility has any link to mental capacity! Even for the most disabled, you can get adapted cars that don't have foot pedals!

As for 15 minute neighbourhoods, it's exactly what we had until the 70s/80s, but unfortunately, both successive governments and people themselves threw it all away with centralisation. Tens of thousands of small shops have closed down over the past 30/40 years, smaller schools, hospitals, GP surgeries etc have merged into larger ones miles away. Thousands of miles of local/regional railway lines were ripped up and scrapped. Thousands of bus routes have been abolished or watered down to be practically useless. It took decades to get us where we are and it will take decades to get us back to "15 minute neighbourhoods" if at all (I suspect it will never happen for the majority of people). If people had wanted 15 minute neighbourhoods in the 70s and 80s, they'd have continued to use the local facilities they had and would have tried to stop the march of centralisation - they didn't, they embraced it!

So many people totally unprepared for living in old age, living in the country.

Sad - no compassion for the elderly, they forget they hope to be elderly at some future time.

If they're too frail to walk a mile then I'd question whether they would be safe drivers
That's unfair. There are lots of people who struggle with mobility for all kinds of reasons who are perfectly safe drivers, either with or without adaptations.
It is as unrealistic to believe that nobody needs to drive as it is to think that everyone does.

Too many people seem to think it is a good idea to retire to the country, not realising it requires mobility.

City and town centre living is better for older people - walkable shops, free or subsidised public transport.

@Frabbits

I'm getting some exercise and having fun.

The exercise bit I get. What's fun about drivers constantly trying to run you off the road and trying to kill you, people spitting at you, hurling abuse, throwing things or making you feel threatened and uncomfortable? All of these have been reported by cyclists on this thread, many as regular occurrences. Unless these things don't happen anywhere near as often as some would like us to believe, then certainly not my idea of fun.
I enjoy cycling but off road!

Obviously there are some people who are too disabled to do this, but “OAP” is a pretty expansive term, Brumbies.

In Tokyo where I live, it’s usual for the elderly to ride trikes with their shopping if they no longer feel safe on bikes. It really helps with keeping elderly Japanese people on their feet and mobile and getting exercise for as long as possible, and means that adult children (=adult daughters, most of the time) do not have to spend their lives taxiing elderly parents around everywhere.

For the hard cases, when people really and truly are too disabled to walk anywhere, there are mobility scooters and the like, but by the time people get to that stage, it’s unlikely they will be fit to drive safely anyway, so designing societies around car dependency is merely going to result (as societies age) in ever-growing numbers of elderly people trapped at home, and middle-aged women spending more and more of their lives driving their elderly parents around from place to place.

People, including the elderly, need to walk and move for as long as they can possibly manage it - the average British over-60 gets nowhere near enough exercise.

We're about a mile from our village centre. One of our neighbours sold her house and moved to the centre of the village as she wanted to be prepared for old age issues, such as mobility, getting to the GP surgery and pharmacy, being close enough to walk to the local shops, post office, etc if her walking deteriorated etc.

That was 15 years ago. Now she's screwed as the shops and post office have all closed down, the GP surgery and pharmacy have closed and the bus route through the village has gone, the nearest bus route is now half a mile away! She may as well have stayed where she was as there's nothing within walking distance for her anymore! In fact, she's worse off because there's at least a garage with a convenience store near where she used to live as it was close to a main road!

That's not a tiny hamlet on a hillside. It's a large village of around 6,000 people which is more of a small town than a village (or it used to be). She thought she was doing the right thing and preparing for old age by moving closer to the amenities!

The fact that so many people couldn't walk a mile with a bit of shopping is incredibly sad - but also likely a symptom of our reliance on the car

It's quite possible to be able to walk a mile with shopping well into your 80s

( and yes I know sone people can't walk - although then electric scooters are great then because they can use them in the shop as well as getting there )

Most of the time it's absolutely fine. Far more fun cycling down back roads/ cutting through parks etc to get to work than it is to sit in traffic for an hour. On the way home I go the long way round and still get home earlier than i would in the car.

It's not constant, it's too frequent, but it's not constant. Even on days where bad shit happens the rest of it can be just fine. 5 minutes of bad journey doesn't ruin my day

No idea why you think mobility has any link to mental capacity!

Where did I mention mental capacity?

With old age, many of our abilities will decline. Eyesight, reaction times etc. Someone whose mobility is declining would be well advised to get everything else checked too. Even if you feel fine, it's worth checking - a friend of mine (a retired bus driver, so someone who was as good a driver as anyone) had a session with an instructor to check that he was still a competent driver. This reassured him for a few more years that he could still drive safely, though he has now surrendered his licence.

If we weren't so car-centric fewer older people would be afraid of the consequences of losing their licence and will be more prepared to give up driving when they are no longer safe. There won't be many people who can't manage a journey of a mile, so long as they have access to a mobility aid of some description.

regardless of weather and infrastructure, the main difference between the UK and The Netherlands is attitude to cyclists

Try doing that if you're visually impaired or have 3 kids under 5...

My 4 y/o walks a mile and back from the shop quite easily, so if that's the upper range for your 3 under 5, all you need is a buggy+buggy board or double buggy? I used to have a Joovy Caboose+sling arrangement for long journeys with all 3.

@LuvSmallDogs that's great! Mine would stop & look at every pebble, twig, leaf & berry. I do have a double buggy and it's fine for downhill trips but it weighs over 40kg fully loaded so is nigh impossible (actually dangerous in places) uphill as it can tip. Not everyone could push it at all. I can get a bus if there is a buggy space available but there often isn't and there is only one bus every 20 mins max so if you miss one you're stuffed.

I was a child before cars were widespread

People with three under five walked to the shops and just got on with it

I find the idea that someone is visually impaired so much that handling 3 young children is too much unless they are strapped to a car seat - whilst still being able to drive - hard to process

So they routinely had 1 hour to get to and from nursery (1 mile in each direction) inc a grocery run pre or post the 9-5 working day and did this journey at toddler speed? Did they also turn water into wine whilst on this magical nursery run?!

Ps @kelsaycobbles I think you're confusing "or" with "and." Obviously people with severe visual impairments would not be driving!

@Q2C4

Just as well people didn't have big families before cars were invented, isn't it?

All of these “ah but actually” edge cases are oily hands clawing at tenuous arguments. We can build a society where we rely less on cars. We’ve had it before and we should have it again. If every planning decision, every transport decision, every public service decision took this into account as a priority we could get there.

Where I live it’s rural but close to a city. Roads out of the village are 60mph blind corner nightmares for cycling. We want a cycle route, and it’s almost feasible except one nimby property owner who owns about 150m of the proposed route says no due to fear of “antisocial behaviour”. In the middle of a cycle route. In the middle of nowhere.

We don’t do ourselves any favours in the UK and those attitudes are visible here in the thread. Always a reason why we’re extra special and can’t have the nice things better countries than ours enjoy.

Indeed. At all levels from government to individual.

If someone is visually impaired then surely they wouldn't be driving anyway, so they must be managing now. Taxis/delivery/whatever.