Seemingly trivial things that intrigue you
Comments
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I'd say the bigger issue is the disconnect between the amount of attention given to collisions where a cyclist kills someone and those where a motor vehicle kills someone. There are a thousand times more people killed in the UK by motorists than by cyclists. I would agree that cyclists killing people riding dangerously should get the same punishment as a motorist killing someone when driving dangerously. The problem is that the motorists often get off with very lenient sentences, there are also relatively few prosecutions for causing death by dangerous driving. The reason I've heard given for lower charges to be brought in many cases is that the CPS find it hard to get convinctions as many jurors will be drivers who realise that it could happen to them. The waters are also being muddied with the amount of illegal motorise bikes, I suspect that if they are involved in fatal collisions the media would label them as cyclists even though they are motorised and using an illegal vehicle.
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The press have always had their pet subjects to rage about. Didn't the governments drug expert get sacked for making statistics for an imaginary drug called equine to illustrate how many more people were killed by horseriding than by ecstacy or something. Every ecstacy related death was front page news for the national press, horseriding deaths were barely reported even in local papers.
The problem with the illegal e-bikes is they are often powerful motors strapped to bicycles with brakes that are barely adequate before you fit a motor. I think this is an area where the police should just seize them on the spot, its pretty obvious with a fair proportion they are illegal.
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The whole article is about strava.
It even gets the blame (in the article) for the poor pedestrian who stepped out in front of a chain gang the other week.
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Bwahahahahahahahaha!
Happy Birthday Young Raver
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Yes, happy birthday young 'un!
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The cat ears is an actual example in a school somewhere in Edinburgh.
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I don't think Stava helps the situation.
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Chris Boardman was on the radio yesterday making the same points. 5 people a day killed on our roads. More people killed annually by cows or lightning than by bicycles. Yet the government choose to spend time on this...
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I read the article this morning. But just to be clear, the 53mph (which I had assumed was a Garmin in a car) is actually on Zwift?
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When people are riding around London on turbos in their sheds at 52mph while doing 20kmh but actually not moving, I don't think that's a problem.
Strava is not "increasingly turning Britain’s roads into death traps."
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Wasn't there a downhill segment in San Francisco where someone died about 15 years ago?
We've got to crack down to stop this from happening so often.
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That's just whataboutism though.
I also think where you live has a huge impact on this. Most cyclists on roads in the countryside are little danger to pedestrians. In London, I think it is arguable that the majority of them are a hazard.
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Do you think Stava encourages people to try to ride quicker? Is that appropriate in much of London?
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That is also whataboutism in this context, but yes and yes. I think it is also inappropriate on a lot of roads in London most of the time.
Before Strava, we still tried to do three laps of the park in under an hour. People just shouldn't be dicks when riding.
I think we all know what is actually "increasingly turning Britain’s roads into death traps", but that would be called whataboutism as well.
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Nah. I ride fastest when I'm racing people/something.
Is it appropriate? I think on a bike what's sensible is obvious. If there's a rider doing 22mph 20m ahead of me and i'm gassing as hard as I can to catch up, that's hardly dangerous is it?
I don't think many people actually race when filtering etc. And you know the rules of SCR - jump the light, immediately lose.
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Surely the statistics would indicate whether there is an increasing problem with dangerous cycling. Particulary in London where so many people cycle.
I assume there just isn't my data to support this.
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It was the suggestion that there was such a thing as subtle cat ears. This is just grown ups being stupid. I'd suggest one school in which one child has been allowed to wear cat ears that is not significant of anything other than one teacher making one decision on enforcement of uniform rules (notwithstanding that I'd be extremely sceptical of the accuracy of reporting on such a story). Call it woke if you want to, but I'd suggest teacher endorsed bullying of children for being different in some way is not something to be nostalgic about. I'd also suggest that zealously policed conformity is not a key goal of education.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
From the staggered ramp/flat profiles of road inclines I've seen on tv from San Fran, that wouldn't surprise me.
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Genuinely, having done the commute for 8 years through parliament square - the standard of cycling around there is absolutely attrocious and I suspect a bunch of MPs have had some very near misses over the years there.
I have had multiple people ride into the back of me because I stopped for the zebra crossing in front of the HoP.
I suspect this has a major bearing on the House's position on 'dangerous cycling'.
The anti-terrorist barriers made it a fair bit worse as it narrowed the road substantially so there was often beef.
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Happy Birthday you old codger!
Lucky you for being so young. 😉
The above may be fact, or fiction, I may be serious, I may be jesting.
I am not sure. You have no chance.Veronese68 wrote:PB is the most sensible person on here.1 -
lol I suspect a number of headteachers would disagree with you on conformity if their policy on school uniform is anything to go by....
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Bloody boomer
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It wasn't, he was just pointing out that there is media uproar when a cyclist causes a death despite it being less frequent than people getting killed by cows or lightening whereas the 5 deaths a day involving motor vehicles generally gets ignored. He accepted that cyclists who kill pedestrians should be dealt with in the same way as if they'd been driving but was highlighting the disproportionate reaction.
I find he speaks very eloquently and sensibly on the subject especially when you consider the way he lost his own mother.
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Hah I remember someone getting really pissy with me because they were too close and I stopped for a zebra crossing.
- Genesis Croix de Fer
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I find the majority of people riding bikes in London are OK, but there's a lot of twats. I wouldn't say that Strava segments cause any substantial amount of the issue, they just don't stop for pedestrians crossing even at traffic lights. In the cycle lanes around Hammersmith, there's some who don't like to stop in a queue of cyclists waiting for a green light and will just ride in the opposite lane to get to the front, then cause trouble.
Of course, those are the ones that you notice, because they are doing something notable. Most just get on with their lives, trying to avoid getting knocked off by cars.
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A guy properly stacked into me at the zebra crossing on the way into Fulham - tore a hole in my bibtights as well as a fair bit of skin. Pair of rozzers wondered over to see what I was kicking off about. Had absolutely no interest other than telling me to leave or they'd nick ME.
For a while I ended up taping a NO DRAFTING sign on my rucksack.
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A degree of conformity makes it easier to teach and gives some sense of a corporate enterprise. It's a tool not an objective. I have a former head of the SHA in the family for what it's worth.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
The max punishment was 2 years though, I believe. In light of the state of our prisons, what we need are longer sentences, so these can be shortened and free up space.
I think this is a compelling argument.
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