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"Slow down or else! Sustrans warns cyclists"

(48 posts)
  • Started 12 years ago by chdot
  • Latest reply from tammytroot

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  1. Dave
    Member

    I'm not sure whether maybe there was a cross-edit but I actually missed all of WC's first post until today;

    "I'm afraid I think your comment, "Again we see the stark difference between attitudes to motoring and cycling provision in the UK" is completely wrong. I live in an area where every road is 20mph, where there are speed bumps, and road narrowings. All done because a few (and yes, it's a few) break the speed limit to such an extent that it's necessary."

    But surely this isn't in any way comparable, because road narrowings and speed bumps cause little delay (versus the posted speed limit) and certainly don't restrict access entirely. I also live in a 20mph zone with speed bumps, and I basically don't notice.

    I submit this is not the same as forcing people to repeatedly dismount, unhitch their child trailer, get the kids out, lift it over a barrier, get the kids back inside and re-hitch it (all in the pouring rain? Family fun!)

    Similarly, if there are problems with a few cyclists cycling in such a ridiculous manner to cause people concern ... then I actually think it's right and proportionate to try and put things in place that slow those cyclists down.

    Agreed, the key word being proportionate... so for instance, there are those staggered slalom gates on the canal - fine provided that they accommodate wheelchairs, tandems, families with trailers and so on.

    But that's not what was being suggested in the OP (I appreciate you are perhaps speaking to the wider point).

    If you're cycling (or driving) reasonably then the 'barriers' are actually of no consequence. If I drive at 20 in a 20 then the speed bumps are easy - only people who are somewhat faster than that have a cause to complain. Similarly, the likes of the chicane barriers on the canal path are dead easy at 12mph and don't slow you down, it's only if you're going faster that it's an issue.

    Yes, and this is why a chicane that all users can negotiate isn't really a problem, in the same way that speed bumps or road narrowings aren't a problem to drivers i.e. again "of no consequence" is the key point.

    Only if there were so many chicanes that ordinary people stopped bothering with the route and drove instead would I really argue against those.

    Posted 12 years ago #

  2. Min
    Member

    I agree with Dave. So many of these chicanes are so awful that even having panniers on your almost-acceptable non-deviant bike prohibits getting through unless you are strong enough to lift the whole lot or want to take the panniers off and back on again or risks trashing your panniers.

    Speed bumps are not a problem at all for me when driving as I am already going at 20mph or less anyway.

    All done because a few (and yes, it's a few) break the speed limit to such an extent that it's necessary."

    Well actually it's not really only a few. The new 20mph zone has 40% of drivers breaking the limit and it is only that low because the police are very generous as to what 20mph actually means (25mph is fine)

    Posted 12 years ago #

  3. SRD
    Moderator

    I can do all the chicanes on the canal within Edinburgh with tandem and trailer.

    Further out, there are some dodgy ones.

    Posted 12 years ago #

  4. Min
    Member

    Yes, the canal ones in town are fine. I do wonder if they cause conflict with peds and cyclists trying to get through at the same time a la drivers trying to race through a pinch point at the same time as a cyclist. If this is the case, then they are still not the answer IMO.

    Posted 12 years ago #

  5. tammytroot
    Member

    Maybe we should compile a list of "anti-disability" barriers and see if we can get them improved?
    The ones at the ends of the bridge at the mouth of the Esk. The North end of Hope Lane. And beside the travellers camp on the innocent are just a few on my commute that I would not like to negotiate in a motability scooter or non-standard bike.

    Posted 12 years ago #

  6. Coxy
    Member

    There's a pretty tight chicane at the Portobello end of the bridge over the East Coast railway line and the Harry Lauder bypass. Although, I think it's to stop people missing the sharp left and cycling/tumbling down the steps.

    Posted 12 years ago #

  7. kaputnik
    Moderator

    Maybe we should compile a list of "anti-disability" barriers and see if we can get them improved?

    End of Balgreen / Corstorphine path at Paddockholm.
    Cut-through on the H2EP route betwixt Broomhall and Ladywell.

    Posted 12 years ago #

  8. Coxy
    Member

    remove double-post

    Posted 12 years ago #

  9. bdellar
    Member

    Hmmm. I like the idea of designing enforcing limits. For example, I saw city streets in Germany last week that deliberately twisted and were narrow in order to slow traffic down. Yes, you could make the road straight and wide, and then use cameras or officers to enforce the speed limit, but designing in lower speeds is just more efficient, and, well, nicer.

    London Road past Meadowbank is a good example of the other style. I've seen cars do 50 or faster up there. The road is wide, straight, and its easy to floor it.

    So I like the idea of well designed structures enforcing behaviour.

    Having said that, barriers on paths which are unusable are no good. Witness the ones outside the primary school on Leith Links - they're horrible to get through with panniers, so everyone goes round them. If they were easier to use and were further apart, people would slow down and use them.

    Posted 12 years ago #

  10. kaputnik
    Moderator

    If you look at a lot of 1980s and later housing estates, they avoid "traditional" street design and have a pretty organic, branching structure with lots of wiggly roads and only one entrance/exit to the estate. I was told that the idea was that it prevents the housing being used as a rat run and naturally slows speeds down. I think they also found that it pushed house prices up as it seemed more "exclusive" than a traditional row design.

    Complete pest to cycle through though! (I'm thinking the likes of the NCN around Gilberstoun, Mucklets, Musselburgh)

    Posted 12 years ago #

  11. lionfish
    Member

    @bdellar - good point about designing-in. I sketched out at the 'consultation' for Leith Walk how I thought maybe the road could 'weave' from side to side. This would give space for bus stops and parking on each side of the road in turn - if that makes sense? :)

    Posted 12 years ago #

  12. neddie
    Member

    You could design a chicane by using a rough or rocky surface as the 'barrier'. No one will want to wreck their wheels cycling over the rocks, yet a trailer could still pass over them, albeit slowly.

    Posted 12 years ago #

  13. slowcoach
    Member

    The big problem with relying on designing streets to discourage speeding and other bad driving is that most of our streets won't be designed - they've already been built. Similarly using new design or traffic calming type measures to discourage bad cycling annoying or endangering pedestrians would mean going a lot of work to change facilities that already there.

    Posted 12 years ago #

  14. Arellcat
    Moderator

    You could design a chicane by using a rough or rocky surface as the 'barrier'. No one will want to wreck their wheels cycling over the rocks, yet a trailer could still pass over them, albeit slowly.

    But that's the problem: it's too easy to assume that all non-motorised vehicles are two dimensional.

    Elsewhere recently was discussion about why such barriers are put in place. It stems from the desire to prevent motorised access—cars, motorbikes, mopeds and the like—but they are almost always designed around the notional 2-D cyclist. You end up with the triangular barriers so beloved of Sustrans that even bicycles have trouble getting their handlebars through. Yet the Roseburn path access from Wester Coates Terrace (for example) has no barriers at all! For that reason it happens to be the only access point at the south end of the path for this velonaut.

    Ideally a "no motor vehicles" sign ought to achieve the same effect as gates and barriers, but it doesn't because a small number of people will try to beat the system, thereby spoiling it for everyone else.

    Posted 12 years ago #

  15. Min
    Member

    The scene in Craigmillar Castle Park this lunchtime.

    Edit - didn't really work. I'll try and upload again later. It three neds on two motorbikes anyway.

    Posted 12 years ago #

  16. kaputnik
    Moderator

    but it doesn't because a small number of people will try to beat the system, thereby spoiling it for everyone else.

    Or a large number of people if you take the bit of road at Edinburgh Park station.

    Posted 12 years ago #

  17. neddie
    Member

    design a chicane by using a rough or rocky surface

    Sorry, forget that idea. Full sus 29ers would just sail over it full speed anyway

    Posted 12 years ago #

  18. tammytroot
    Member

    @Min The motorbike neds are being more than a nuisance and have taken to bombing through the grounds of the RIE as well. Not good when patients with limited mobility are around.

    Posted 12 years ago #

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