AIBU in thinking that those on bikes should also be banned from using their mobile whilst cycling?

[Saltire]

A teenager today nearly ended up under the wheels of a lorry, he was weaving all over the road, no hands on the handlebars, chatting on his mobile. Another one had only one hand on handlebars, the other she was using to chat on her mobile and she too wasn't paying attention to what was going on around about her

[skidoodle]

5 miles per hour? Really? I find that a little hard to believe. I walk at around that speed.

I often have to travel slowly behind cyclists and if it is not safe for me to pass them on the other side of the road then that is what I do.

I don't think that driving me a car gives me any right to pass other people and I don't think it is up to them to let me past if they don't think it is safe for them to do so. What if the person in question is planning to turn right at the next junction? Do you want them to let you past and them have to move out in front of the car behind?

[talbot]

I have a Pruis with an electronic dash which tells me we are often doing 5mph down said roads. As I say, I cycle on the same roads every day and have no problem riding at a distance 2 -3 feet from the kerb which allows traffic to safely pass. I see no need to hug the line in the middle of the road.

[skidoodle]

Are you regularly stuck behind cyclists going that slowly in the middle of the road?

I can see why it would be annoying if it happened a lot. Is it the same person?

[akhems]

Someguy, I'm not meaning insurance just because of injury/death but also because sometimes they try to squeeze into too small a gap and scrape cars etc - not saying that happens often but it does happen and the cyclist rides off scot free - hardly fair is it?

[talbot]

Well it's the same type of person skidoodle! Nervous female cyclists with big baskets and old fashioned bikes. As I say, I am a cyclist myself but just do not understand why it is neccsary to position yourself in that way.

[SomeGuy]

I suspect that damage has been done: after all the out of towners are there now, as are the very many jobs focussed in them. DH used to work on a similar centre. You can't get people togothere for the weekly shop on bikes andfew places have dece3nt shops left- a better solution would be free buses provided from housing areas etc.

Really? Our last trip to the supermarket-cum-parking-lot was by bicycle. Spent about £80, no problem getting it home.

Can carry 25kg on my rack.

By comparison buses are shite. Big, dirty and irregular, and of course it would be harder to lug shopping from supermarket to bus stop and then from bus stop to my house (which could be a mile's journey)

There's one bus a day to the big shopping centre out-of-town. Who wants to do that?

People are never going to take such a bus in sufficient numbers to justify making it regular enough to be useable.

Society has already uilt itself around the engine and there's no point fighting it- sxhool catchemnts and working loves make car use a necessity for very many people.

Not necessarily. It's quicker for us to go to school by bike than car, no need to find parking on busy residential roads outside school, you can ride up to the door. And to then to go to the train station to get into London to work it would be substantially quicker, because rather than crawling through rush hour traffic, then paying £8 for a day's car parking, you can use the shared footpath (bypassing the crawling traffic), park your bike on the platform for free and get into work.

It's working with the realities of life and finding solutions- school bus routes should be explanded for examle- that we can moderate traffic.

Buses are horrible. I caught one to go to school, I hated it. Full of kids bullying, smoking, throwing fireworks out the window, etc. And of course sometimes it would break down, or you'd miss it by 2 minutes running down the road. Just awful.

Build safe cycle routes to school and children can go that way instead.

30-40 years ago the Netherlands didn't have their cycling infrastructure, but they chose to build it. Planning is a long-term thing. The Dutch manage to do it because they spend thirty times more money on cycling infrastructure than we do. The majority of children get to school by bicycle.

[akhems]

Skidoodle it is quite common in London for cyclists to do that

[SomeGuy]

We've had cars vandalised outside my son's school. The vandals are acting as pedestrians. They is no insurance for that either.

If a cyclist hits your car due to negligence, they are liable for it, just as a car driver would be. My friend went into a taxi on his bicycle, and he paid the £500 to repair it.

[SomeGuy]

What part of London is this akhems? I've never seen it. Not in Central London.

[talbot]

Try back streets in EC1, EC2 and E1 for starters.

[skidoodle]

talbot LOL @ the same kind of person

I was imagining an old man smoking a pipe

akhems is it really? How weird. Whenever I'm in London the cyclists terrify me whizzing past and shouting if I get in their way.

It is great to see so many bikes on the streets of London these days though.

SomeGuy and Riven I wish I had the nerve to cycle more. I have mostly given up because I just felt so unsafe and menaced by drivers and invisible between large vans and so easily crushable. If there were more safe, dedicated cycle routes, preferably away from the road I would cycle all the time.

[Overmydeadbody]

Talbot on A narrow street I will happily cycle in the middle of the lane in order to be safe and in order to stop cars overtaking me, especially if I'm due to turn right.

So the cars have to slow down, so what? Cyclists have just as much right to use the roads as car drivers, and to be able to do so safely.

I see car drivers every day using their phones while driving. Despite the laws. A similar law for cyclistsd won't actually deter the offenders.

[akhems]

Camden and Islington seem to be worst from my experience, especially in the late afternoons, less so in the mornings for some reason - maybe they're tired and grumpy and just want to get home, I dunno

Not much you can do if the cyclist just speeds off tho after doing the damage? I agree that vandalism and damage can occur without a cyclist but as road users they should be insured surely.

[SomeGuy]

Back streets in EC1 and the like are never very long, and if they are nervous cyclists on rusty old bikes I'd try and give them a little space and respect, just as I would if a very slow old lady was crossing the road and couldn't make it before the lights change.

Presumably they are on the back streets because cycling down Goswell Road or City Road would be terrifying for them.

[Overmydeadbody]

cycling in london is increadibly stressful.

However, cycling in Cambridge can also be increadibly stressful, not just because of narrow streets, cars, lorries and busses, but because of the sheer number of other cyclists as well, like here

There are some streets I will absolutely not let DS cycle down, despite his competence.

[skidoodle]

Or if there were more cyclists, so we could form a pack like in Amsterdam (and parts of London).

I guess I'm part of the problem then, by being such a wuss.

[Overmydeadbody]

What annoys me is cyclists going the wrong way down a one-way street, like somehow the rules don't apply to them

[skidoodle]

But sometimes the rules shouldn't apply to them. There are places where contra-flow cycle lanes would make a lot of sense, but I've never seen one. Do they exist?

[PeachyTheRiverParrettHarlot]

Somehuy you are perhaps fortunate, our trip to the shops each week costs £125 9expensive gluten free stuff) and could not have been carried home on a journey of 8 miles by us with the baby.

My parents shop by bike but only have themselves to feed and a journey of a mile or two (and hence no car)

But I think perhaps you live somewhere different to us? Kids travel miles into the village for school, no decent shops (unless yopu count pedlers of twee ) and the clogged roads here lead to accidents- indeed I was hit by a car parked doubly and my little boy shouldhave been killed, it's a massive issue here.

So the solution is to look at different settings in a different way? What works in cities won't really work in villages- and we're not that remote, with a supermarket within 4 miles or shops in 8- i'velived in worse.

I do thinkk well managed busesare an option: the ones we travelled on as a child, indeed into my late twenties, were fine. They're a realistic option for more people- elderly, disabled, people with small children (especially if more than one)- and overall better than rows of cars.

It's perhaps not one size fits all?

Oh and OP I don't yabu, dangerous is dangerous- its not just about how many killed by bikes but injuriestoo. quite possibly to the cyclist as anyone else.

[SomeGuy]

In Holland, they don't.

There's a contraflow cycle lane here too on a one-way street, which is quite handy.

One-way streets are designed to control cars, which are big, wide, and heavy, none of which are attributed of bicycles.

When I was in Bali I was following some friends leading the way on motorbikes, unfortunately it turned out to be a one-way street except for motorbikes. Got lots of people shouting at me and calling me 'crazy white man' as I struggled to get through.

[Upwind]

YABU - obviously reckless, stupid behaviour. But drivers are a much more serious threat to other road users. Resources should be concentrated on their behaviour.

Talbot - I also walk at 5mph, so find it hard to believe that you regularly encounter cyclists at that speed

[Ripeberry]

Bristol is good for cycling but it has too many hills! I used to like using the Bath to Bristol cycle route, but it does go through a very rough part of Bristol and in the evenings (just when commuters are coming home) there are gangs of kids trying to pinch people's bikes and if they see that you're a woman then they target you first .
I used to wait for a big group of men on bikes to come along and pedal like mad to keep up with them and pass safely past the gangs.
So although i did not have to worry about traffic, there are lots of other dangers, especially for women cyclists

[Overmydeadbody]

skidoodle we have quite a few counter-floe cycle lanes and seperate rules for cyclists here, but all clearly signposted and marked. On one-way streets with no counter-flow cycle lane I don't tihnk cyclists should cycl the wrong way down them. It is dangerous, apart form anything else.