“I… I’m personally a cyclist, er, I cycle most places, however… however…” pic.twitter.com/Y5mWJHWuNO
— The Department of Parks & Recreation 🦌 (@ldnparks) November 4, 2021
"As a cyclist..." is normally a red flag when the context is a talkRadio phone-in.
Of course we could all be jumping to conclusions, but this cyclist was particularly against low traffic neighbourhoods, so much so they felt the need to call into Ian Collins' early afternoon show, ready to unload...
Maybe we're reading too much into it, but "I… I’m personally a cyclist, er, I cycle most places, however… however…" sounds like an undercover cop trying to infiltrate an organised crime-loving peloton.
With that out the way, the caller named Ediz gets to the main reason for his call, "There is an agenda to push away congestion and pollution onto others for longer hours, freeing up these, sort of, gated communities to say 'look how wonderful, look what we've done, we've reduced congestion and pollution in here'."
Ediz didn't face much scrutiny from Collins who nodded his head throughout, jumping in with regular points of agreement. The caller then went on to say families living on the borders of LTNs are "suffering more pollution, more congestion for longer hours. How is that good for the climate?", before suggesting councils strategically collect traffic-counting data during school holidays for more favourable lower readings.
A government survey from last November found that 8 out of 10 people support measures to reduce motor traffic, while seperate research at the same time found majority support for the capital's LTNs. Weeks later, traffic counter readings in Hackney showed that the borough's LTNs had not caused a rise in traffic on nearby main roads. While, research from March showed that low traffic neighbourhoods in London are not mainly introduced in more affluent areas.
It’s like pinball but your life is on the line
— kate (@mcmansionhell) November 4, 2021
Tweet of the day right there...come on Pog, show us what you've got...
The bollard clearly says STOP and to be fair to the Audi, it did.#WorldBollardAssociationpic.twitter.com/hdUuQ0FkWn
— World Bollard Association™ (@WorldBollard) October 20, 2021
Cheers to OnYerBike for pointing me in the direction of one of our forum threads, titled 'Car crashes into building - please post your local news stories'. It was inspired by the Audis in houses website (yes, I'll be procrastinating the next 15 minutes over there) and it has turned into a thread of shocking, frightening, hilarious and downright bizarre photos of drivers' crashed vehicles in strange places.
It saves me chucking 'but cyclists...' posts on here every day. Maybe we can save that honour for the best ones...
Drivers on this threat proving once again that they know very little about the law or the Highway Code and only goes to prove how dangerous driving is.
— Cardiffguy (@DavidBa04159034) November 4, 2021
Reaction time...we heard from the people blaming Jeremy Vine for virtually anything and everything earlier, now it's time for your thoughts and comments. For some reason I reckon they might be quite different...
On Facebook, John Edmund Gangy said: "Bus [driver] clearly at fault here. Real easy to slow down a bit and let the cyclist through."
George Ong agreed: "I am in Vine's camp! How could this be right? It is about time motor vehicles drivers treat cyclists as equal road users."
Giles Green commented: "How on earth that could be considered as the cyclists fault is beyond me, who would even come up with that conclusion? Bad driving, bad anticipation by the bus driver."
Graham Black continued the trend: "Bus [driver] is definitely in the wrong here, this is no different to a vehicle overtaking a cyclist then immediately turning left. But I suppose many drivers think that's ok too."
In fact, almost all our readers agreed Jeremy Vine was absolutely not in the wrong, we did get one reply suggesting Vine had made the situation "far worse than it needed to be"...strap yourselves in, it's a long one...
"My no doubt unpopular take on the Vine video was he made his position far worse than it needed to be, by riding into that vanishing gap like he did. Basically if I'm riding that lane, and you can debate for sure whether the bus driver is being considerate of Vine for overtaking and stopping, but we dont know if the bus was already planning to stop or someone pressed the stop button part way through as they passed each other, the bus [driver] can't slam on the brakes.
"All you can then do as a cyclist in that situation is deal with the hand you are being dealt, and as soon as that indicator is on, I know what the bus is going to do, cheers bus driver thanks a bundle, not going on my Christmas card list, but I don't carry on riding as if the bus is going to bail out of what its doing at the last second, I dont want to be trapped on the inside of a bus, I'm going to quick shoulder check behind the bus, maybe apply a bit of brake though I think just easing off pedalling would create enough speed difference to drop in behind the bus and shift around it's right hand side and it's all done in seconds with no aggro at all and we carry on our merry ways."
Anymore thoughts?
MPs are to debate tougher sentences for hit and run drivers who cause death after a petition reached 104,324 signatures. The debate will be held on 15 November 2021 and will question if the maximum penalty for failure to stop after an incident should be increased. Currently the maximum penalty is points and a six-month custodial sentence. Causing death by careless/dangerous driving is between 5 -14 years.
The government's official response to the petition is: "It is wholly irresponsible for drivers to fail to stop and report an incident. However, the offence of failing to stop should not be used to punish an offender for a serious, but not proven, offence."
The debate will be available to watch online on the UK Parliament YouTube channel...
Cyclists in Cardiff have been left waiting more than a year for a promised trial of bike hangars. Wales Online reports Cardiff Council announced the trial in October 2020, but more than a year later, no hangars have been installed. The trial was promised following a petition from Cardiff Cycle City, which gained more than 500 signatures.
A spokesman for Cardiff Cycle City said: "It’s great the council are getting on with building new protected cycle tracks, but lack of infrastructure isn’t the only thing that prevents people from cycling.
"Many people live in terraced houses, flats, or houses of multiple occupation, that have no space for storing bikes, while the roadside space outside their house is filled with parked cars. We think it’s only fair to offer some of this space to people to store their bikes by installing cycle hangars, which make more efficient use of the kerbside as six bikes can be stored in the same space as half a car.
"If the council is serious about the climate emergency, and its ambition of getting people to switch from driving to cycling short journeys, then it is essential that cycle hangars are installed quickly and in large numbers."
Yesterday, Portsmouth City Council announced they had approved an extension to the city's bike hangar scheme.
2022. @alejanvalverde.
Disfruta. Gracias por todo.
Enjoy this one, mate. Thanks for everything.#RodamosJuntos | #LaÚltimaBala🚀💙 pic.twitter.com/IJibPpq1tG
— Movistar Team (@Movistar_Team) November 3, 2021
2022 will be Alejandro Valverde's last dance as a professional cyclist. After 21 years in the pro peloton, spanning back to the 2002 season, next year will be his final one. In that time he's won the World Championship road race, four Liège–Bastogne–Liège, five Flèche Wallonne, the Vuelta, 17 Grand Tour stages and just about every hilly race in between.
The 41-year-old announced the news via a video shared on his team's Twitter, backing up his previous quotes saying it's "with absolute certainty" 2022 will be his final year. The most recent campaign has been quiet by the Spaniard's exceptional standards, only winning three races. Valverde came close to winning a fifth stage of the Tour de France but was bested by Sepp Kuss on the stage finishing in Andorra.
And it's got nothing to do with that bus video...
ProBikeKit and Movember have come together to unite the cycling industry this November, all in the name of raising funds and awareness for men's health. They've created the Movember Cycling Club (MCC) and will be hosting a number of activities and fundraising events throughout the month, including the 150 #MilesForMo Strava Cycling Challenge, an online silent auction and a limited edition merchandise collection including Little James Arnold prints.
More than 80,000 people have already joined the 150 #MilesForMo challenge, with ProBikeKit donating £1 to Movember for each participant who rides 150 miles this month. Completing the challenge will also earn you a ProBikeKit discount code and chance of winning a £500 gift voucher.
WE GOT ANOTHER ONE!!!
Sorry everyone, it’s a Jaguar.#WorldBollardAssociationpic.twitter.com/Kya1WlQrQS— World Bollard Association™ (@WorldBollard) October 31, 2021
Yesterday, I jokingly threatened to make this a regular feature. If pics like this keep rolling in, I'll have no choice.
First, we had the HGV being pulled out of Bristol harbour, then yesterday it was the BMW perched on a Tesco bollard...
Today, it's a Jaguar driver seeking a bit of extra elevation...if only that bollard was wearing hi-vis...
Parents / Guardians / Aunts / Uncles of Twitter - what is the best bike for a two year old? Yes, I am making sure my niece WILL be a cyclist...
— Laura Winter (@lauracwinter) November 2, 2021
Can I point you in the direction of one of our buyer's guides, Laura?
Ooo what’s that, some anodised blue on a Brooks saddle? The new limited edition 2021 Open House version of Brooks’ Cambium saddle features the bicycle saddle manufacturer’s rivets in anodised blue to match the components of Chris King’s seasonal range and this is contrasted against an anthracite-coloured, vulcanised-rubber saddle surface. It’s a bold look.
Available in both the C17 Carved and the slimmer C15 Carved shapes, these Brooks saddles are designed to be the ideal adventure companion thanks to its all-weather performance. Reviewer John described the ‘hammock’ saddle design as “supremely comfortable” and now you can get this all-day comfort to paired up perfectly with Chris King components.
Alex Dowsett ultimately came up short in his bid to reclaim the Hour Record, despite adding 1.618km to his previous best. The 33-year-old hit the 54.555km mark by the end of the hour and his JustGiving page, raising money for The Haemophilia Society, has raised more than £31,000 at the time of writing.
> Alex Dowsett reveals his hour record bike for tomorrow’s attempt
Despite not breaking Victor Campenaerts' record of 55.089km, Dowsett said the event had achieved its biggest goal – raising awareness of haemophilia.
"The biggest failure today would have been to have never tried and that’s the message I want to send out," the Brit said afterwards. "I spent my childhood being told what I couldn’t do. My mum, my dad, and I, we knew what we couldn’t do – football, rugby, boxing – so we set about finding what we could do. We turned a negative into an absolute positive and I’ve been able to carve a massive career out of adversity.
"That should be the message. Life can throw you a bad hand at times but it’s what you make of it. It’s how you deal with it. That’s as far as I can go and I’m proud of that and the distance that I managed to cover today but the most important point today was the awareness that we’ve brought to haemophilia."
Trying to understand how this can happen. The WTAF moment from this morning’s commute, in @LBHF. pic.twitter.com/k0puzVZjnO
— Jeremy Vine (@theJeremyVine) November 3, 2021
We shared this video on yesterday's live blog, but since then the reaction has blown up...mainly with people feeling they've found fault with Jeremy Vine, and not the bus driver cutting him up...
So what happened? Vine was cycling in the cycle lane, the bus driver approached from behind...overtook the cyclist, started indicating and immediately pulled into the stop, forcing Vine to brake and go around. The alternative? The driver waited a few seconds, waited for Vine to pass the bus lane, checked nothing else was coming and then pulled into the bus stop a couple of seconds later than in the real scenario. Is it ridiculous to think that's fairly uncontroversial? Apparently so...
The broadcaster has been inundated with replies from people blaming him for the incident and defending the bus driver. Exhibit A:
He indicated you should have slowed down , don’t see the problem .
— Tony giles (@Antonygiles4) November 3, 2021
And another...
So you want the bus to wait for a bicycle, instead of the cyclist having to alow the bus in. Come on.
— Charlie (@Charlies_CC_) November 3, 2021
And one more...
You're clueless tho
— Jeremy Vine (@theJeremyVine) November 4, 2021
Vine said he was particularly shocked by the driver's response to his use of the horn, explaining: "Not even a waved apology. I can forgive anything when there's an apology."
So in summary, in the replies, we had: cyclists shouldn't expect a non-stop commute, he indicated and you should have slowed down, why should the bus driver wait for a cyclist, both at fault, you should be aware of your surroundings, I would have slowed down quicker, the bus driver shouldn't hold up traffic to wait, cyclists should give way at the end of cycle lanes, you seem to be actively manufacturing these situations to make good videos.
I'll let Graeme King have the final say:
— Jeremy Vine (@theJeremyVine) November 3, 2021
Thoughts?
