Damnation! Tower Bridge To Be Shut

Pufftmw

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-36427337

That will be a real pain in the backside :evil:

Will now have to fight my way to London Bridge and struggle over with all the other hordes My nice simple, empty of cyclists, moderately free from traffic and more importantly traffic lights route will be denied for 3 months. It will probably add 10 mins at least to my journey and why they do it in the run up to winter as the nights are drawing in and the weather more inclement as opposed to summer, I don't know :roll:




PS - Swear filter took c0ck and made it fool! LOL

keyser__soze

It'll be open to peds, does it take > 10 mins to cross on foot? Here's hoping they're sensible and allow cycling tho.

smokey_bacon

Pufftmw wrote:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-36427337

That will be a real pain in the backside :evil:

Will now have to fight my way to London Bridge and struggle over with all the other hordes My nice simple, empty of cyclists, moderately free from traffic and more importantly traffic lights route will be denied for 3 months. It will probably add 10 mins at least to my journey and why they do it in the run up to winter as the nights are drawing in and the weather more inclement as opposed to summer, I don't know :roll:




PS - Swear filter took c0ck and made it fool! LOL

Welcome to the Thunderdome! :twisted:

bompington

Surely it would be worse if Tower Bridge were to be opened?

dodgy

Keyser__Soze wrote:

It'll be open to peds, does it take > 10 mins to cross on foot? Here's hoping they're sensible and allow cycling tho.

From http://www.londontraffic.org/towerbridge/

Tower Bridge will close to all vehicles and cyclist traffic for up to three months, from Saturday 1 October to Friday 30 December 2016, so that essential structural maintenance can be undertaken

keyser__soze

http://www.cityoflondon.gov.uk/services ... ridge.aspx - more authoritative source, but same bad news

veronese68

bompington wrote:

Surely it would be worse if Tower Bridge were to be opened?

Well it made me chuckle.

keyser__soze

Wonder what speed you'd need to get up to? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XcfkKtZd8tc

Pufftmw

I see that Tooley Street will be part closed at the same time!!

I thought it was funny too

itboffin

London bridge blows big time and the GPS signal is shite so no one can set real times, very annoying.

You're going to love the motorbikes and mopeds in the bus and cycle lane its a hoot.

ayjaycee

Sounds like a cry for sympathy to me - if you look in the dictionary, you can find that particular word somewhere in between 'sh1t' and 'syphilis'.

redvee

Detailed surveyors video on why it needs to be shut ;-)

https://youtu.be/0-Y7Qi3fMs0?t=10s

inbike

Keyser__Soze wrote:

It'll be open to peds, does it take > 10 mins to cross on foot? Here's hoping they're sensible and allow cycling tho.

Depends on the time of day, but at peak tourist hour it takes much more than 10 minutes to walk over and theres no space to push a bike.

London Bridge approach is also rather bad because it gets jammed with traffic at the lights by the station - Southwark bridge isn't much further and probably faster unless one has a relaxed attitude to being squashed between a bus and a taxi.

Pufftmw

Few more details turned up in my email today

https://tfl.gov.uk/status-updates/major ... his-page-2

I notice that the "alternative" suggested cycle route pushes a cyclist over to Southwark Bridge if coming from the south/east? Whilst I notice the suggested routes run opposite to that of cars, I can only imagine that not a lot of people are actually going to trek over to Southwark Bridge rather than use London Bridge - probably an extra mile/10 mins to your journey.

mtb-idle

if you head to Southwark bridge from the Elephant following CS7 rather than heading down New Kent road towards Tower or straight on over London bridge it's really not that much longer.

fat daddy

look at it as 10 mins more exercise

if you do that twice a day 25 days a month for 3 months .. that's an extra 1500 minutes of cycling .. or 25 hours extra in the saddle

if you were to get out the saddle and go for it amoungst the traffic and could average errr .. lets say 20mph, you would have cycled 500 miles more, at effort

that is training !

it also seems a lot ... are my numbers right

edit: no they are wrong .. for the milage anyway .. I don't know the milage, I was assuming 20mph for 10 mins ..... I guess though 10mins extra is about 5mph in London

edit 2: ... ok .. that's 25hours of trackstand practice

mtb-idle

looking at my Strava feed it's less than 1,500 metres longer to go over Southwark or London Bridge than it is across Tower Bridge although I'm always turning right and heading out to Canary Wharf

Pufftmw

MTB-Idle wrote:

if you head to Southwark bridge from the Elephant following CS7 rather than heading down New Kent road towards Tower or straight on over London bridge it's really not that much longer.

I was approaching it literally as if I got to the point the road is blocked and then had to turn off. But its the extra over London Bridge to use Southwark Bridge if approaching from Jamaica Road, which a lot of SE people do. Roughly 1 mile extra for London Bridge vs 1.9 if using Southwark

Whatever, its a cr@p suggestion for people coming from SE of Tower Bridge

mtb-idle

there's always the joys of the Greenwich Foot Tunnel for you guys :twisted:

kingstonian

Veronese68 wrote:

bompington wrote:

Surely it would be worse if Tower Bridge were to be opened?

Well it made me chuckle.

Me too !

curium

Hi

Initially didn't find this thread after a search :?

I originally posted this in Commuting General:

The City of London Corporation is planning major essential maintenance works to Tower Bridge from Saturday 1 October to Friday 30 December 2016. This means that cyclists will not be able to cycle across the bridge in either direction during this time. The bridge will be open for pedestrians except for on three weekends. Theoretically cycle commuters could just dismount and push their bikes across the bridge as pedestrians.

TFL has advised a diversion route for cyclists and this is what I want to discuss and get some feedback about.

Here is a link to the map illustrating the diversion for cyclists: http://content.tfl.gov.uk/tower-bridge- ... ersion.pdf

The diversion for northbound cyclists sends them over Southwark Bridge and then back east along what the map claims is Cycle Super-Highway 3 (CS3). TFL's site claims that CS3 runs from Barking and ends at Tower Gateway (http://content.tfl.gov.uk/cs3-barking-tower-gateway.pdf)which contradicts the diversion maps claims that CS3 runs as far as Southwark Bridge.

Is anybody, who travels along this stretch of Upper Thames St, able to confirm if CS3 does in fact run as far as Southwark Bridge?

My second concern is over the diversion for southbound cyclists. The map directs cyclists from Tower Gateway, westbound, along Lower Thames Street. It then requires the cyclists to turn right across a lane of traffic, northbound, towards the Monument in order to cross London Bridge in a southbound direction.

Is anyone able to confirm if there are a set of traffic lights at this point to facilitate the safe crossing of cyclists at this point on Lower Thames Street.

My final concern is over the extra distance northbound cyclists are expected to cover compared to motorists. While northbound cyclists are expected to travel westbound as far as Southwark Bridge before crossing, motorists are directed northbound across London Bridge. Given the physical nature of cycling I can see plenty of people (including myself) opting to ignore the diversion signs and crossing north and south via London Bridge. I'm not sure why TFL have not taken the physical nature of cycling into account when devising the diversions.

Does anybody know the best way to feedback to TFL specifically about these diversion for the Tower Bridge closure?

Thanks

mtb-idle

Questions, questions.

Is anybody, who travels along this stretch of Upper Thames St, able to confirm if CS3 does in fact run as far as Southwark Bridge?

Yes it does. this is the much vaunted revamped superhighway that goes on all the way along embankment, past parliament square etc. However, watch out for city workers/texters who will saunter out in front of you without a care in the world

Is anyone able to confirm if there are a set of traffic lights at this point to facilitate the safe crossing of cyclists at this point on Lower Thames Street.

I can't recall exactly as there are literally dozens of sets of lights along that stretch but the superhighway is on the right hand side of the road anyway so you are only crossing other cyclists and not the main traffic. My personal preference is to turn right earlier than that at the Hung, Drawn & Quartered pub and head along Great Tower Street that runs into Eastcheap and approach London Bridge from that way. Much easier.

Does anybody know the best way to feedback to TFL specifically about these diversion for the Tower Bridge closure?

I'm a frayed knot.

Take a few test rides and try it out dude.

curium

Cheers for that. Google streetview obviously needs updating as it doesn't show the CS3 on Upper Thames Street.

Wrath Rob

MTB-Idle wrote:

there's always the joys of the Greenwich Foot Tunnel for you guys :twisted:

This will probably be my route, though the worst bit will probably be Cable St

curium

Is the Greenwich Foot Tunnel lift more reliable than it used to be?

Carrying my bike down the stairs, having to walk it through the tunnel and then carry it up the stairs at the other end would probably add a big time penalty to my commute. It would likely be quicker to head over London Bridge instead.

May give it a try on one occasion for comparision.

keyser__soze

Open once again

mtb-idle

whoop, whoop! Good news, if only to reduce the hellish traffic going over London Bridge.

May give it a go this evening just for old times sake.