Good and bad sides of cycle paths

cntl

First, the good one:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bid3Iw_tjXE

now the bad one :shock: :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UAK42TBDKX0

Shortly after this bit there's a nice stretch: between trees, very calming and relaxing, very rarely anybody there.

Clever Pun

isn't the 'bad side' just a pavement?

cntl

>>isn't the 'bad side' just a pavement?

It's a marked shared cycle path.

tomfoolery

Tell me you don't use that second one every day?! :shock:

(You'd have to be Max Moseley to choose that over the road).

sc999cs

I was expecting David Attenborough to leap out of the trees at any moment during the second clip...

Steve C

Yorkshireman

We've a few reasonable ones (drivers even have to give way to cyclists in two places)


This is what the driver sees

Further back on the same path

cyclists have to stop for cars, but if the car pulls up to the stop line it's possible to ride around the back of the car (unless the next car is too close - which is often the case. This is a similar idea in that the mixed use path turns along the side road to cross it, and then turns back to follow alongside the main road

However the path was widened (to six feet) when the footpath was designated mixed use

The grassy bit at the side is a drain and it's a drop of 5'-6' to the bottom (though there's only water in there in the winter months but nettles, brambles and bits of rubbish in the rest of the time. The drain eventually goes underground, but the path narrows gradually untill it becomes about 4' wide just before the level crossing

This section of road is a 40mph limit with traffic doing anything up to 60mph (some 'sporty' drivers get a bit faster than that). Once the 30mph zone is reached the path becomes split into cycling and pedestrian lanes

and (apart from wandering peds) is quite good, unlike the path on the opposite side of the road


The path is a feeder route to two big comprehensive schools ... and those kids (in the main) ain't taking prisoners when coming and going, though a few launch themselves (and their mates) into the drainage ditch from time to time. So around our way we have good, reasonable and crap ... just like anywhere else really

cntl

>> Tell me you don't use that second one every day?!

Depends on which bike I am on and I how feel on any given day. To be honest, the path from Chertsey to Woking is not that bad IMHO (except the narrow overgrown bit shown on video) and it allows me to escape the aggrevation of fast moving traffic (a lot of it HGVs) and chiil out.

Colin: thanks for sharing the photos

dondare

They're all bad.

downfader

Good side - riding down them at 7am and not a sight of most traffic

Bad side - when parked cars on the left fling their doors open, or they are next to pedestrian ways and pedestrians walk on the cycle lanes (as happens in our southampton city center around by staples, halfords and borders)

Regards the overgrown vegetation - report it! Our council will clear up a mess like that in around 2 weeks on average if there is a risk to road users or pedestrians - so big marks to Southampton City Council on that front. From my councils own website they have a number of internet forms you can fill in (most anonymously if need be ), so check your own council's website to see if you have anything like "actionline" or "report it" style pages.