Decided to move from my home town because the cyclists are so bad

[Pavementworrier]

I know this sounds absurd and overdramatic but I can't handle it any more - they speed along the pavement with no thought for anyone else and in the dark it has just become terrifying. I'm really sick of walks being stressful. I can't walk along a pavement listening to music any more. At narrow parts by a busy A road they pass each OTHER on the pavement and seem to just expect pedestrians to get into traffic.

I hate it and them and I am off. Please tell me where has no cyclists.

Are you serious? You’d be a brave soul to stand in the path of a cyclist. DP and I had an altercation with a cyclist a few years back. He came flying up behind us. Didn’t ring a bell. Just got very close, then shouted. We panicked. DP went one way and I went the other and the cyclist careered into DP. He had the cheek to tell us off. It was a towpath with pedestrian right of way. DP had a massive bleeding gouge in his ankle and had some very interesting shades of purple bruises from his toes right to his knee over the next couple of weeks. If he had been a child rather than a than a 6ft adult, he probably would have ended up in hospital. So I ain’t playing chicken with any cyclist thank you very much.

I have nothing against cyclists by the way. Some people are dickheads. Some cyclists are therefore dickheads.

Enough people are dickheads that nobody should be allowed to operate heavy machinery at speed in the same space as pedestrians.

OP, I could NOT agree more, cyclists around me are a nightmare. They act like they own the roads, ignore the rules, go through red lights and green men and get angry the second they see a car anywhere near them. I almost ended up in an argument with one the other day. She had four children with her on their bikes and was clearly stressed out of her mind (understandably, but still, choosing to cycle with four kids through a busy city is… a choice). I was turning into a street and approaching a road on my left when two of the kids suddenly appeared out of nowhere, without their mum. I stopped to let them all go and hung well back so I wouldn’t stress them by being right behind them. Apparently that wasn’t good enough, the mum started shouting and screaming at me to just go past them! Honestly, with cyclists it feels like you’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t, they’re so mad all the time!!

"Stand your ground"

Are you serious??!!

Are you serious? You’d be a brave soul to stand in the path of a cyclist.

Of course I’m serious. If I’m walking along the pavement, as a pedestrian I have right of way and it’s illegal for the cyclist to be cycling on the pavement. If it’s a designated shared used cycle path, as a pedestrian I have priority. So no I’m not jumping into the road or some bushes because a cyclist is coming.

Obviously if it’s dark you need to make sure you’re visible whether you’re a pedestrian or cyclist.

We panicked. DP went one way and I went the other and the cyclist careered into DP.

This is where you went wrong. It’s important that your movements are predictable. Cyclists will be anticipating where you’ll be when they get to you. If you decide to dive in different directions at the last minute, it’s hardly surprising that one of you got hit. As I said in my original post, stand your ground and just keep walking as you were. If you’ve ever crossed a road as pedestrian in Hanoi you’ll know what I mean.

Darlington. Struggling to remember ever seeing anything other than kids doing wheelies to show off to their mates during the day time in the town centre.

However, it feels extreme! Is there no way to protect yourself with fluroscent clothing, or maybe those trainers that flash when you walk, or anything else like that?

I am also against people who let their dog wreak havoc rather than yank the lead lightly. Yank the lead!

Yes I am fucking serious. What’s wrong with you people?!

I live in central London and there are cyclists, pedestrians, cars everywhere (it’s bedlam) and often in shared spaces. Let’s not even get into what the canal towpaths are like here. 🙄Keep a cool head and make steady predictable movements and you won’t have a problem.

Um, I do? Given that you're being strangely belligerent here, maybe it's a you problem?

Whats your hometown? 😄😄

I honestly don’t know where to start with this nonsense. We went wrong by panicking? We didn’t PLAN to panic. It just - you know - happened in the moment. I’ll remember not to panic next time I hear a cyclist when he suddenly appears at speed just a few feet BEHIND me. Also, you can have all the legality and priority you want. It won’t help much if you end up in hospital with a bicycle wheel stuck up your arse. The whole point is that some of these eejits have no interest in following the rules.

Oh and no, funny enough I haven’t crossed a road in Hanoi🤣

Surrey is fine.

Except on Sundays and bank holidays. Then, I believe, it is the law that one million cyclists have to converge in large amorphous groups on every single road. Drivers and passengers are then forced to stare at their sweaty arses for hours on end until they turn off at some random junction (through the red lights, obviously), and you pray to get half a mile of road before meeting the next group of migratory cyclists. It’s all very Attenborough.

But it’s ok the rest of the week, OP.

Bizarrely, NL. We have the law that cars are always responsible if they hit bicycle so none have to be on the pavement. Beware heaps of orphaned bicycles though

OP I am with you 100%

My city, among other things, is blighted in my opinion by cyclists, electric bikes and electric scooters on the pavements. It is truly scary.

In the city centre, I literally had to jump out of the way on the pedestrianised area and the cunt laughed at me. Obviously half his face was hidden by a scarf and he had a hood on but he was definitely laughing.
I sent an email to the council but received no response.

The police are not interested at all. The bikes and scooters whizz along the pavements with no care of pedestrians at all.

I'm moving too as soon as family circumstances allow - I had intended to move in summer this year but various factors changed.

I think the people deriding you probably live in naice leafy areas who have no clue what many towns and cities are like. It is very scary.

I really wonder how I would manage if I had any form of disability or was even slightly deaf.

I'm not sure what's going down with the Edinburgh chat, but I would have suggested same, or Glasgow. Lived in both, both good homes to be a pedestrian or a cyclist.

hill are your friend, except Bristol, lots of cyclists though mostly on roads to be fair (electric scooters are the bigger problem). I’d head to a smaller town, where I am you generally walk or drive as a tad hilly

I just stand out of their way to allow them to pass, its not an easy job

Op wants to get away from the cyclists

We do indeed need more separation of heavy machinery from pedestrians. 'Vision Zero' is a worldwide scheme with the aim of one day eliminating all road deaths, a main principle of which is separation of cars from pedestrians, given that motor vehicles cause 99% of deaths.

Yes I knew someone would trot that out. Cars aren't what makes my city scary to walk around.

I'm a cyclist and I won't use shared paths - they're unsafe for pedestrians and unsafe for cyclists.

not sure where you live - do tell
us

but have some wearable led lights and then they can dodge you ?

I moved to a hilly place and a big part of the attraction was to get away from crazy cyclists. DD is deaf and there is just no way she would have survived. I had so many near misses - the roads were chaotic and frequently flooded so the cyclists moved to the pavements and pedestrians had nowhere to go. They would hurtle around corners without a care for any pedestrians, speed up behind you and get angry because they couldn't get around the pushchair on a narrow pavement. If they had to stop pedalling it was the end of the flipping world. We didn't have a car at the time and it was unnecessarily difficult to walk anywhere because of the cyclists. If you haven't lived somewhere like that, I just don't think you can fully appreciate how unpleasant it is.

Very often they are. Cars mount the pavement round here and continue to move along as if they are still on a road. If you "must" mount the pavement then you should be stopping immediately.

Same issue with people driving around a car park as though it's a road.