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?

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.

This! The vast majority of people don't fit these extreme-hard-case examples (three children under 5, people who are too old and decrepit to walk absolutely anywhere or even manage a mobility scooter BUT just happen to be mysteriously still completely safe to drive).

As a parent and a woman, I find it immensely freeing that I don't have to spend my life doing "school runs" and taxi-ing older kids, enormous teenagers and elderly relatives around. Kids walk themselves to school here, older kids and teens can be largely independent and get themselves to their sports and activities, and my elderly MIL keeps herself fit and strong by walking herself to the station and the bus stop. Living densely without a car does have its downsides, but the upsides are also huge.

How's a blind person supposed to drive a car!? Car-free, walkable streets, services and shops within easy reach, and good public transport are a huge boon to the visually impaired.

@DdraigGoch @user1477391263 you are also both confusing "or" with "and."
Of course those with severe visual impairments aren't driving. You do realize that those with certain disabilities qualify for taxi funding to / from work? Or that buses can be really helpful for this population? Vehicular transport is not feasibly replaceable for all. The changes in central London recently (which I mentioned on the other cycling thread this week) have restricted buses and taxis significantly (eg removing bus lanes, forcing buses and cyclists into a single lane where previously there were two lanes - more dangerous for cyclists, slower for buses).

As technology evolves, lives evolve to take advantage of it. Those with large families pre car were presumably not trying to get 3 kids to nursery and do a grocery run pre 9am walking at toddler speed. Possibly because it was generally less common than it is now for both parents to work full time.

@Q2C4

I don't think that having both parents working full time is sustainable even now. We work far too many hours in this country and for what? A better car to get to work and childcare in?

@DatumTarum I wouldn't give up work if you paid me! My job is intellectually challenging, I like the social side and it gives me financial independence. I'm not alone in feeling like this. Why should I stop working - so I can waste time walking everywhere slowly?!

I didn't suggest that you should. I have an intellectually demanding job (two in fact) and neither add up to full time. DH does 0.8.

It's a vast improvement.

Not forgetting how flat it is!

Erm, I think you've missed the point!

It was in response to a poster suggesting that cyclists could just do their hobby somewhere other than the roads. A person apparently so uneducated in the world that they think that is what cyclists are doing - indulging in a hobby rather than actually using their bikes to work or commute to work thereby contributing to the UK economy. Seems there's more than one of these posters! Who knew!

No we aren't.

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

Cycling is worth 5.5 billion to the UK economy.

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

6000? thats a town, no where being small enough to called a village... and i doubt very much there is nothing there, a similar sized town nr me has a full set of facilities, inc pubs restaurants, tyre smith, comp/primary school, GP, pharma, 3 supermarkets... Yes quite a bit has closed down but its still doing ok.

If true, you must live in an extremely deprived area.

@DatumTarum part time might work for you, wouldn't work or be an improvement for everyone & certainly not me.

@DdraigGoch where in my post did I mention a scenario where someone was visually impaired AND had 3 kids?

As a society as a whole and most people, it definitely would be.

They'll need to transport a fridge next

Ha ha! That was one of the scenarios posited by opponents to LTNs in our London suburb. "But what if a residend needs to unload a large electrical item!"

@DatumTarum it's great that you can work part time and yet maintain your current and future lifestyle with no financial support from others. Even if they wanted to not everyone can do this (and it may affect entitlement to retirement benefits). If everyone worked part time who would pick up the tax shortfall?

@DatumTarum your attitude to the needs of the disabled is starting to sound quite unpleasant.

They just bring in the van or car and unload it. Pedestrianised streets in towns usually allow deliveries and often buses and blue badge holders - LTNs are the same.

As for the Netherlands being flat, e-bikes are the solution to hills.

Where did I say that you did?

Nope, Parliament regards a settlement with under 7,500 inhabitants as a village! The council tax bill says "village of xxxxx" as do lots of other official signs/documents, such as electoral boundaries/seats, etc.

As for your other point, I'll ignore you inferring I'm a liar, but all there is in the centre of the village is a chain pub/restaurant which isn't used by locals, and is a typical "country" pub where people come by car for meals from nearby towns. The neighbour I was talking about can't buy a pint of milk, a loaf of bread, pick up a prescription or send a parcel from there, so it's useless to her!

There's a huge Tesco two miles away which is where all the villagers with cars go to buy their shopping. Useless for my neighbour now she no longer drives as the road doesn't have a pavement so she'd have to walk 2 miles in the road on a main A road!

Such places exist. I've lived in one for 25 years. Just because you don't recognise places like this, doesn't mean they don't exist. Perhaps you need to get out more and open your eyes!

My point was that she DID think about her old age, likelihood of giving up her car, etc., and "did the right thing" as people have suggested, in moving closer to amenities. What she didn't expect was that all those amenities would close down! What's she expected to do now? Move again? What happens if she goes through all that to move to somewhere with amenities, and they close down too! My entire point is that things change and even with the best planning in the World, you can't foresee what the future holds!

Kazzy - i can quite believe places like that exist. there are 14k residents in our town, no secondary school, very few buses, only 2 pubs. Until recently only one supermarket and one convenience store.

In theory not a deprived area, but we are in the SW so get ignored

Yes, indeed, my village isn't the only large one that's been ruined by the two-pronged approach.

One is the supermarket chain who builds a new big store within a couple of miles which virtually immediately causes the smaller shops to close down, of course there's a huge car park, but neither the chain nor the council do anything about people who need to go there without a car, i.e. never any improved footpaths, cycle paths, bus services etc. The councils are as much to blame as the supermarkets for not insisting on better provision for non motorists as part of the planning approval!

The other is the public service centralisation, i.e. GP surgeries, schools, libraries, etc being shut down and centralised in nearby towns, again, causing people to have to go to nearby towns for those, which, if the Tesco hasn't forced all the shops to close, the lack of local amenities means people are no longer in and about the village to use the local shops, meaning they close.

It's a double whammy of big business and public sector centralisation of services!