AIBU to be fucked off at road marathons?

[JesusOnAYamaha]

Once a year in London is one thing but they're bloody everywhere now and it's not like the organisers put diversions in so you can get to where you're going. We had one in our town a couple of months ago and I couldn't leave my (no through) street because they blocked it off so people could spend a day running past it. I mean I couldn't even cross the road at the end of my street, on foot. Now I've just found out that I can't get to where I need to be for a family event later this month because another load of joggers are closing down a bunch of roads into/in this other place.

AIBU to think they could just run round a park? Or a field? Or a racecourse? Or a hill? Or somewhere where they're not in the way of residents and other people who just want to go about their business.

I know I probably am BU. It's probably nice that people get to run around if they like running. They probably enjoy spending a day running past my street and I should be happy for them. But, I am a bit fucked off with it all.

How very narrow minded. Are you really that deluded, or just very dismissive.

Just tell the disabled mobility scooter/wheelchair user to park it 3 streets down

Tell the nurse coming as a carer to the lady at number 5 to park 3 streets down (the extra time won't impact her later visits all that much, she can just make it up by skimping on Mrs Jones visit later or working late)

Tell the guy at number 17 to not have that heart attack today, the ambulance can't get through

Or Mr Barrow should tell the funeral director to organise the funeral of his wife for a different day as the hearse wont be able to come to the door.

Mrs Jenkins, no chemotherapy today!

Tell the builder coming to do yokr kitchen extension to park 3 streets down and heave his kit all the way (or take the day off, who needs to work anyhow? no one needa money)

Many reasons why people need unfetered access to their homes.

OP Included in their post and said there was no way out of their road on foot or via car, yet you mansplain that there simply must be, and suggest some stupid reason they should just get on with it because its saving the NHS money!, the people running usually aren't the most costly to the NHS, and if one of them goes on to develop cancer, or some other non obese related issue then their savings are immediately cancelled out.

OP I'd suggest a complaint to the local council, your MP, the department that hands out the permits for these events, nothing changes (even if it is including your road in the plans for a warden). Good luck.

YABmassivelyU. Events like this bring people into towns and villages and often bring a huge amount of money in, as people stay in hotels, eat in restaurants etc.

Encouraging people to get active also, fairly obviously, has huge benefits.

It's usually 1 day - and in most cases not even a full day and they are always organised well in advance. Suck it up.

Many of your examples don't stack up. These events typically happen on a Sunday morning, often starting before many people have got up.

All races will have to have plans in place for emrgency services access.

Bikes are vehicles. So you could walk out of your cul de sac, just not drive?

Just think how much faster ambulances could get to their destination if there were fewer cars on the road and less traffic jams

People doing local events are not running at the pace of Mo Farrah, the ones I see are definitely jogging.

So much angst here! I live on the route of a half marathon and a 10k, both of which happen once a year. We can't get our car out on that morning. There are road closure signs up for weeks in advance - you'd have to be the most unobservant person every not to know it was happening. You just plan accordingly. If you want to go somewhere, just move your car outside the closure zone, or wait, or take a bus. It's twice a year, for a few hours.

I ran Cardiff half marathon at the weekend. Lots of road closures involved, and the route involved quite a few residential roads. SO MANY people were outside their houses, clapping, playing music, offering jelly babies - they were genuinely having a good time, and their support was very much appreciated. Same with Brighton marathon- a big chunk of that goes through residential parts of Hove, and people were out the front of their houses, in their garden chairs, having street parties and offering amazing support.

Different things inconvenience different people in different ways. We have road closures in town for a big set of concerts each year. They cause a similar level of disruption than the races do. But again, we just plan accordingly and get on with our lives.

@OP - I get that you aren't keen on the road closures for races. But I'd also be willing to bet that there's something in your life somewhere that you 'benefit' from that inconveniences others in some way. It's all part of rubbing along together and living and letting live.

Indeed they are. So why should car users pay road tax then?

Because no one pays road tax, it's vehicle excise duty and is broadly based on how large and polluting your vehicle is.

It is now, but that wasn't the purpose of it's introduction.

But it has been that way for YEARS!

They do monthly road races past my house but they don’t close the roads. It doesn’t have much impact on me that way. We are on a popular jogging route so I’m used to looking out for them when emerging from the drive.

What bothers me more is the cycle races that they don’t close the roads for. The cyclists are trying to get round as fast as they can which means they are emerging onto main roads straight in front of traffic without even looking and expecting the traffic to get out of their way. Easier said than done when there are high hedges with limited visibility. Luckily the cars are going slowly because there are signs out, but this leads to the bikes coming out of the junctions faster than the cars are moving. How there aren’t more accidents I really don’t know.

So long as it's organised properly I've never had an issue with the marathon where I live, or the half marathon nearby, or a couple of 10k runs.

Yes, it can be a bit inconvenient. But there's usually a nice atmosphere and many runners are raising money for charity.

I've done some running - nothing as long as a marathon - and laps of a park is quite dull after a while. The spectators also really motivate you to keep going and make it much more enjoyable than a training run.

Bingo!

I sympathise OP, I really do. It's very frustrating when something impacts on us personally and most of us will have experienced something similar at different times and places and been inconvenienced.

We had a problem at the weekend in Glasgow when the Great North Run was on - a 10k race and a half marathon. We had tickets to see the Matinee performance of the Arena Tour of Les Miserables on the Sunday Afternoon at the Ovo Hydro. Unfortunately, we only discovered on Friday night about the race - and the huge, huge number of road closures and restrictions. All listed out sure, but not being from Glasgow, apart from realising that all the ways into the Hydro, or the hotels surrounding it, were closed, from the East side of the Hydro, most of the roads didn't mean anything to us, so we couldn't see how to find an alternative route. Advice from the Hydro was to come from the 'West' to the multi-story carpark but that was it. Not much use if you were coming from the 'East'.

We were lucky and got a cancellation in the Premier Inn 10 minutes walk from the Hydro for the Saturday night so that we didn't need to worry about the road closures on the Sunday, as we were already in place - but it was annoying ( and much more expensive than we intended the trip to be)

Having said that, I guess the run's are important and do encourage people to take some exercise on the day and in all the preparation before-hand.

We used to live in what was the loop back so we never got leaflets but our street by being within the loop was basically closed.

Just wake up one morning get the in car to go to Morrisons so find road closed oh well we will go Y way. No road closed. Ok X. No closed.. oh I bet S road will be fine. No closed.

Ok we will walk:.. you can’t walk there runners will be coming though… fuck off.

We get blocked in twice a year every year. Once for marathon, once for half marathon. My road is a cul de sac and we have no access to any of the "crossing points". It's pretty limiting.

You mean you cannot leave your cul de sac for the duration of the event? By foot even?

Twice a year is not a regular occurance.

By foot yes, but that wasn't getting my son back to uni last year (we had to park half a mile away the night before and lug all his bags across the road). I also have a son and daughter with chronic illnesses and knowing I won't be able to easily take them to hospital in an emergency does make me jittery.

I can understand that.

Would you rather these events didn't happen? I'm not being snotty, I'm wondering whether the residents whose lives are impacted would rather they didn't happen at all or do most just put up with it?

There are some pretty mean comments on here (not from you).

Of course it is.

Like, you know, New Year's Eve is a regular occurence. And the turn on the century is a regular occurrence. Very, very regular.

What you might mean is that it's not a frequent occurence. And that's a question of perspective. What you consider infrequent, someone else might consider much too bloody frequent.

I'm not bothered either way but I just want to be able to go about my business. If they organised things so us residents could access facilities and services we usually access that would be fine. Eg give us alternative parking places, put diversions in to cover road closures, plan the route so that people can still get out and about. And communicate with us, ask us what we need. A partial list of road closures on a website nobody reads is no good. I couldn't even cross the road to get a pint of milk and a morning paper, never mind get across town to meet the friends I had made arrangements with (and they couldn't get to me either) - maybe there were buses running, but they certainly weren't on the regular routes and none of the people at the barriers knew about diversions. I couldn't find anywhere alternative to park the night before. It's stuff like that, just regular everyday things that probably aren't important to anyone else but they are to us. This one coming up, again it's not life and death but it's my old Pa's 80th birthday and I'd like to see him - it's only going to happen once.

Genuine question to the OP and others who are bitching expressing their negative opinions here.

Have you really never been to any of the following;

• A Christmas Market
• Christmas Lights switch on
• Any kind of Festival (Music / Food / etc)
• A bonfire and/or Firework display
• A Concert that takes place anywhere other than a purpose built concert venue
• A Sports event that takes place anywhere other than a purpose built sports facility
• Pop-up outdoor Theatre
• Any other kind of Pop-up event
• Any kind of travelling attraction such as a fair or the circus
• Any sort of parade
• A Carnival
• An air display
• A beach you don't live close to on a hot day

All of the above will to a greater or lesser degree be a pain in the arse for someone. Someone's road will be closed or route to work blocked or plans have to change or local street parking be overwhelmed or peaceful atmosphere shattered.

The marathon is your inconvenience but someone else's joy (often a great many people's joy, including those who just happen to live on the route and go out to cheer).

I'm a runner and love parkrun and road races - not so much cross country and trail. I'm genuinely interested whether the people who are very anti believe that road races shouldn't exist? Or if we're allowed them where can they be?
I understand it can be annoying but as mentioned theyre usually well advertised in advance and yearly or twice yearly at most . My friends that lived in Reading always went away for the weekend of The Reading Festival cos it got too busy/inconvenient for them. Surely it's a similar thing?