Londoners on Bikes

wulfhound

Hi all,

Wanted to drop you a line about the Londoners On Bikes campaign. Some of you will probably already be aware of us via the blogosphere / social media or will have seen our flyering crews out & about by major junctions around the city.

http://www.londonersonbikes.org.uk/

Londoners On Bikes is a volunteer-run campaign focused 100% on the Mayoral election - unlike the LCC, who are a charity part-funded by TfL, we're free to make electoral recommendations & advise people to vote for the candidates who'll do the most to make cycling safer and more enjoyable (on an absolute scale, you can argue that it's already both, but we still think there is much more that could be done!) .

The opinion polls show Boris & Ken neck-and-neck in the race, so a relatively small voting bloc can have a huge influence & win some sizeable concessions. That's our goal, and if we can get well on the way to 10,000 sign ups in the next couple of weeks, we think we'll acheive it. We're just past 3100 as I write this.

We are not (for the most part) traffic engineers, medics or even cycling instructors, so we don't make engineering recommendations or take sides in the infrastructure debate - the campaign exists purely to build political will to put some proper money on the table (£35m on cycle superhighways sounds great until you realise that Ken Livingstone's modest 7% bus/tube fare cut is costed at £250m A YEAR & motorways cost around £30m PER MILE), and commit to making things better for cycling at the expense of other road traffic where necessary.

Anyway, we need people to sign up, spread the word, and volunteer. Any feedback you have would be gladly (probably) taken on board.

Cheers,
WH (LoB volunteer)

rick_chasey

So which candidate is best for cyclists?

wulfhound

We're not making a judgement call on that yet. The LOB steering group is a real mix of people, tory/labour/lib dem/green, it's not a pressure group on behalf of a single candidate. The idea is to show them there's votes to be won, get all the candidates to put more on the table, and vote for whoever is offering most on May 3rd.

They have all published initial cycling manifestos here, courtesy of The Times' #cyclesafe campaign:-

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/public/cy ... 363526.ece

We think there's scope for improvement in all four, interested to hear what people here make of their declared plans. From the above, who do you think is best/worst so far?

greg66_tri_v2.0

Boris bikes are too elitist, according to Ken Livingstone, who has released the cycling section of his manifesto for London exclusively to The Times.

Labour’s mayoral candidate said that the blue bicycles were predominantly used by young, wealthy City workers, and added that if voted in, he would make it more widely accessible.

Idiot.

notsoblue

Greg66 wrote:

Boris bikes are too elitist, according to Ken Livingstone, who has released the cycling section of his manifesto for London exclusively to The Times.

Labour’s mayoral candidate said that the blue bicycles were predominantly used by young, wealthy City workers, and added that if voted in, he would make it more widely accessible.

Idiot.

Ignoring for a moment the "wealthy" there, its true though isn't it? Its just a cack handed way of saying that he wants to widen the area covered by the scheme.

SteppenHerring

I would vote for whichever candidate will bring in Right of Way.

rick_chasey

Greg66 wrote:

Boris bikes are too elitist, according to Ken Livingstone, who has released the cycling section of his manifesto for London exclusively to The Times.

Labour’s mayoral candidate said that the blue bicycles were predominantly used by young, wealthy City workers, and added that if voted in, he would make it more widely accessible.

Idiot.

You're minted right?

Go have dinner Boris, and speak your mind.

You're very persuasive and all that.

Koncordski

I wish you well with the campaign but simply lobbying for money on the table doesn't really help anyone, the blue paint proves that point. I prefer the lobbying approach by LCC (your slightly snide comment about TFL funding aside), especially in the case of Blackfriars redesigns etc. And as a cyclist in london that reads newspapers and watches the news I'm pretty sure which candidate is going to help cycling gain mass adoption, it sure as hell isn't Ken.

wulfhound

Right, that settles it - next time I go out on the pull, I'm leaving the Beemer at home and riding a Boris Bike. The laydeez will all think I is minted and works for Goldman, innit?

disclaimer: happily married and don't own a beemer.

Koncordoski - I'll respectfully beg to differ. Speaking for myself and not LOB.. firstly the "blue paint" money wasn't very much in the grand scheme of things (all four CS to date have cost around the same as redesigning Trafalgar Square or Exhibition Road... ONE SINGLE ROAD). Crossrail, a single train line, is costing at least 8 BILLION. A London-wide, high quality cycle network would likely be used by as many people as Crossrail, and so it's not unreasonable to expect it would cost ten or a hundred times more than has been put on the table so far.

Secondly, part of the problem with the blue paint is that, due to lack of political will, they didn't dare inconvenience other traffic, so as a result there's too little space for all the bikes, the infrastructure is in places not up to scratch, and the paint often runs out in the places where you need it most.

I (& most LOBers) have every respect for LCC, am a paid up member. They are a registered charity & so cannot make voting recommendations; they are in it for the long haul, have quite a few full-time permanent staff, and as such have to be somewhat wary of biting the hand that feeds. We are none of those things - we're volunteers with very limited funding that comes from private donations & our own pockets. We have no ambition to replace or compete with LCC - indeed, we recommend them as a source of advice & expertise for politicians who actually want to make things better. We're just there to make some noise & prove there's some votes in it.

EKE_38BPM

SteppenHerring wrote:

I would vote for whichever candidate will bring in Right of Way.

What do you mean by Right Of Way?
This is the same question that was asked of whoever set up that Facebook page a few weeks back to campaign but never actually answered the question. The thread got locked and the OP banned.

I think that more money and effort, a lot more money and effort, should be put into driver training and police enforcement of the existing traffic laws. If every driver actually did what is written in the Highway Code, there wouldn't be much need for a change in infrastructure.
I know that I seem to be moving from NLondon to Cloud Cuckoo Land if I think that will ever happen.

rick_chasey

EKE_38BPM wrote:

I know that I seem to be moving from NLondon to Cloud Cuckoo Land if I think that will ever happen.

You should move there.

I love it here.

wulfhound

... and this is why Londoners on Bikes distances itself from the engineering debate. We believe that with sufficient political will - and cold hard cash - on the table, either philosophy represents a big improvement on what we have today.

notsoblue

wulfhound wrote:

Secondly, part of the problem with the blue paint is that, due to lack of political will, they didn't dare inconvenience other traffic, so as a result there's too little space for all the bikes, the infrastructure is in places not up to scratch, and the paint often runs out in the places where you need it most.

I think this is the most important issue to be honest. The best mayoral candidate for cyclists imo will be the one that promises to continue investing in cycling in London but without the crippling compromises that have made some of the recently infrastructure worse than ineffectual. They need to build cycle lanes that people want to use.

Jay dubbleU

Perhaps they should consider preventing vehicles parking in cycle lanes - if properly managed this could actually generate income from fines

Koncordski

wulfhound wrote:

... and this is why Londoners on Bikes distances itself from the engineering debate. We believe that with sufficient political will - and cold hard cash - on the table, either philosophy represents a big improvement on what we have today.

This is what i was referring to in my initial response. If you just campaign for money without getting involved on behalf of cyclists then you're just wasting time, all we end up with is more badly designed 'infrastructure'. Why you think not being involved in the engineering is a positive thing is beyond me.

wulfhound

We don't get involved in engineering because we are in no way qualified to do so, and because there are existing organisations (LCC & Sustrans being the obvious ones, but even TfL's oft-maligned traffic engineers can do a good job IF instructed to do so by their political masters) who we feel have the expertise to get it right given sufficient money and political will. "Love London, Go Dutch" is, in my view, a wonderful vision of what could be - but it's going to take far more of both than is currently being offered to make it happen. Schemes as ambitious as their Parliament and Blackfriars proposals could cost many millions per junction, and there are probably 50 such sites across the city. That kind of puts the £15m Boris won from the Chancellor in this year's Budget in perspective.

A three-month pressure campaign is not well placed to get heavily involved in a debate that's been going on within the cycling community and indeed within cycling organisations themselves for decades. We would like to see cyclists on all sides of the debate speak with a united voice, and demand more from the politicians. Get them to take us seriously first - the details can be agreed later, and if there's a strong enough commitment on the table, I feel like all but the fundamentalists on both sides will get a result to their liking.

notsoblue

wulfhound wrote:

We would like to see cyclists on all sides of the debate speak with a united voice, and demand more from the politicians.

Good luck with that!

EKE_38BPM

notsoblue wrote:

wulfhound wrote:

We would like to see cyclists on all sides of the debate speak with a united voice, and demand more from the politicians.

Good luck with that!

You'll need it.

Something like cycle lanes isn't really going to unite cyclists.
On one side you get the SCR possee who like to cycle quickly on the road rather than pootling on cycle lanes.
On the other side you get the pootlers and families who want to stay away from traffic.

Many drivers already feel that cyclists should stick to cycle lanes and if there are more then that feeling will probably grow stronger and could lead to more verbals (or worse) between cyclists on the road and drivers, so the SCR types may not agree with more cycle lanes but the pootlers will love them.

The idea of doing a 15 mile commute across London in segregated cycle lanes, full of glass because they don't get cleaned enough and too narrow to overtake the pootler in front of me, sounds like hell.

notsoblue

Also, going by the content of threads that have appeared here in the last 6 months or so, theres a significant proportion of cyclists that don't really feel that there is a great deal wrong with cycling in London. In fact many of them think that the worst thing about cycling in London is other cyclists :P

rick_chasey

notsoblue wrote:

Also, going by the content of threads that have appeared here in the last 6 months or so, theres a significant proportion of cyclists that don't really feel that there is a great deal wrong with cycling in London. In fact many of them think that the worst thing about cycling in London is other cyclists :P

EKE_38BPM

I just want everyone on the road to stick to the Highway Code.
Trucks, Vans, Cars, Motorbikes, Scooters (scum), Cyclists and Peds.

It appears too much to ask people to do what they are supposed to!

rick_chasey

The lanes in London could be worse.

They could be like they are in Bulgaria.
http://en.fishki.net/comment.php?id=110145

notsoblue

Rick Chasey wrote:

notsoblue wrote:

Also, going by the content of threads that have appeared here in the last 6 months or so, theres a significant proportion of cyclists that don't really feel that there is a great deal wrong with cycling in London. In fact many of them think that the worst thing about cycling in London is other cyclists :P

I'm wrong?

rick_chasey

notsoblue wrote:

Rick Chasey wrote:

notsoblue wrote:

Also, going by the content of threads that have appeared here in the last 6 months or so, theres a significant proportion of cyclists that don't really feel that there is a great deal wrong with cycling in London. In fact many of them think that the worst thing about cycling in London is other cyclists :P

I'm wrong?

Ha, no, but that's full on bait and you know it .

anonymousblackfg

I had been quite sceptical of this, but in fairness I'm not a fan of either so am happy to chuck them my vote. everyone here makes very vailid points that we need political will/enforcement/money/the LCC but a scheme such as this starts making listening to us worthwhile.

UndercoverElephant

Rick Chasey wrote:

The lanes in London could be worse.

They could be like they are in Bulgaria.
http://en.fishki.net/comment.php?id=110145

I think we can hold our heads up high with the crapness of the facilities in the UK:

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/pete.meg/w ... /index.htm

Headhuunter

EKE_38BPM wrote:

notsoblue wrote:

wulfhound wrote:

We would like to see cyclists on all sides of the debate speak with a united voice, and demand more from the politicians.

Good luck with that!

You'll need it.

Something like cycle lanes isn't really going to unite cyclists.
On one side you get the SCR possee who like to cycle quickly on the road rather than pootling on cycle lanes.
On the other side you get the pootlers and families who want to stay away from traffic.

Many drivers already feel that cyclists should stick to cycle lanes and if there are more then that feeling will probably grow stronger and could lead to more verbals (or worse) between cyclists on the road and drivers, so the SCR types may not agree with more cycle lanes but the pootlers will love them.

The idea of doing a 15 mile commute across London in segregated cycle lanes, full of glass because they don't get cleaned enough and too narrow to overtake the pootler in front of me, sounds like hell.

Yes I have to say, I would not want to be restricted to segregated cycle routes jammed with slow moving traffic and as you point out, probably full of litter or peds having a chat. I expect that if segregated cycle lanes were built, motorists would feel even more right to the road over cyclists than currently, they would expect you to be in the cycle lane behind the woman on the Pashley rather than on the road... I'm not a fan...

wulfhound

Well, I'll happily re-run the entire debate here, if only because it will go on for hundreds of pages and keep LOB on the first page of this board 'til election day

But seriously...

I'm a daily commuter & do the occasional bit of club riding. Logged some respectable albeit far from record breaking times on the College Rd Challenge a year or so ago (before Baby 2.0 came along and wrecked my sleep &, by implication, whatever fitness I had managed to build up). I'm not as quick as some of you on the Embankment, but happily spin along just short of 20mph & am pretty useful on hills. So, yes, I can fully understand how the idea of being stuck in a mandatory segregated lane behind a load of nodders doesn't exactly appeal. But nobody is suggesting that anyway, and the threat of mandatory segregation has receded for now in London (let's face it, they couldn't build them wide enough). On a road bike, especially out of the rush hour, I feel reasonably safe on most of the roads I have to ride. If I thought my life were in immediate danger, as a responsible father of 2 & employer of 20, I wouldn't do it.

At the same time though. There are lots of journeys I'd like to make on a bike with other people - family members who are nothing like as quick, take the kids across town to the museums on a Nihola trike, visit parts of outer London where the roads are both busy and very fast - which I wouldn't touch with a barge pole. I've paid my way to use the roads, and cannot do so the way they are now.

I don't see any fundamental inconsistency or incompatibility between those two styles of riding. Any more than I see an incompatibility between wanting to ride a bike 95% of the time and drive the other 5%.

FWIW, I don't entirely disagree with notsoblue - on the surface, the worst thing about CS7 & CS8 may well be the other cyclists (at least riding among cars you can see over the top of the buggers), but the truth is it's just too narrow and badly designed for the sheer number of people that want to use it (more down to lack of will than lack of money - they don't dare slow the cars down ever, even if it means cyclists in the door zone and weaving about all over the damn place).

What we can all agree on is that we don't want crap infrastructure - and even if we get decent infrastructure, it should not be at the expense of the civility of the rest of the road (segregated, curbed bike lane + 40mph for cars "it's OK because the bikes are segregated" => a deeply crappy experience for pedestrians). Much as the Embankment SCRway is a blast, can we not all agree that a liveable, fair, civilised city for everyone to enjoy is more important? Those who really want to prove themselves as Ubermensch of Lycra can always head for the Surrey Hills. I'll probably see you there

wulfhound

We just made a video

http://vimeo.com/39326868

which I think explains very nicely what Londoners On Bikes is all about!

notsoblue

wulfhound wrote:

FWIW, I don't entirely disagree with notsoblue - on the surface, the worst thing about CS7 & CS8 may well be the other cyclists (at least riding among cars you can see over the top of the buggers), but the truth is it's just too narrow and badly designed for the sheer number of people that want to use it (more down to lack of will than lack of money - they don't dare slow the cars down ever, even if it means cyclists in the door zone and weaving about all over the damn place).

For the record, I was playing devil's advocate before, just raising what has been a common view on this forum and elsewhere amongst commuting cyclists. Totally agree about it being more lack of will than lack of money.

Nice video, but I'm still not sure what the position is of the mayoral candidates towards cycling in London!

wulfhound

They have each posted a 7-8 point cycling manifesto so far, it's at the end of this article:-

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/public/cy ... 363526.ece

... and I'd be really interested to hear all your takes on the points they raise.

There are one or two additional commitments some have made beyond that (Ken Livingstone has said he will appointing Jenny Jones as a "Walking/Cycling Czar" but hasn't said what powers he'd actually give her) but the above will give you the gist of it.

We're not calling any winners until right before the election - as we build support, the hope is that we can get further commitments from some - especially Boris and Ken, they are neck & neck in the opinion polls & we want to make them fight hard for the cycling vote; looking at the above manifestos, there's considerable scope for improvement. Which is why it's vital that we get the word out & sign people up on the web site - the more voters we represent, the more they'll listen.