Yesterday visiting a friend on Gt King St. Left the bike chained to the railings, came back out an hour later to find a scribbled note on an envelope: "Do not park bike on railing - the council will remove the bike if it is parked here again". I'm inclined to call their bluff next time - I'm sure the council would be entirely unsympathetic - but they're probably nasty enough to let down my tires or some such.
CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » General Edinburgh
Bike-hater in the New Town
(29 posts)-
Posted 11 years ago #
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Oh such "home is my castle" types are probably the same as the man across the road from me who came out of his house to tell me off when I briefly put my foot on his low garden wall to assist in the tying of my laces.
You can bet it's not just bikes that makes them go all passive aggressive.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Did anyone see Timothy west on canal boat with Sybil? Timmy and pru very keen on revival of canals. Only just tolerant of the explosion of cycling on towpaths that came after.
I guess people have chained their bikes to sturdy new town railings for over a century and for over a century have come back to find scribbled notes. Well maybe 96 years if the railings were taken for iron in WWI?
People living in the new town world heritage site need to be aware that the money to build their fine houses came from slavery and servitude in Jamaica and India. The crime of chaining a bike to a railing is slight compared with the gruesome history of monied wealth in Scotland.
You would hope the council response was so slow that the cyclist had gone by the time the team arrived. That would make sense and fits with recent response in heavy rain to sewer emptying into my neighbour's front yard (think the workers were under pressure that day, they arrived several hours after Scottish water cleared things up - flushed baby wipes being the culprit) If anyone would like some unused sandbags?
Posted 11 years ago # -
Reminds me of the little note I found on my windscreen when I parked in Barnton - this is not a car park - go park somewhere else. The sense of ownership extends to the roads.
Plenty of street lights and thin poles to chain up to.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Probably worth avoiding cast iron railings for security purposes too - there have been many bikes stolen by simple application of a hammer to the railing... Some are so loose that a hammer isn't even required!
If you have to use them, make sure the bike is still locked against riding/rolling should the rail magically disappear.
Robert
Posted 11 years ago # -
TBH I can understand these people. Esp when your street does become a car park. The streets to the east of King's Buildings are pretty much a car park for those that don't have permits for KB or for those using it as a park & ride. And not many obey the 20mph limit either.
Posted 11 years ago # -
I can see why property owners might get shirty when they pay for the upkeep of their railings and a badly chained bike can strip the paint off, loosen or otherwise damage them. I doubt the Council would do much about it though.
I use sheffield stands, bike hoops, Council clutter, and pedestrian crush barriers in preference to privately-owned railing wherever possible.
Posted 11 years ago # -
I got a note once when I parked my mother's campervan in the Grange, because I was trying to sell it for her.
Something like:
"We are suffering terrible devastation and blight to our area caused by campervans and commercial vehicles parked on the narrow streets, blocking the sightlines, obstructing the pavements, spoiling the look of the street... blah blah..."
Only, the van was parked perfectly legally, next to a 12ft high stone wall (so hardly in front of someone's garden), and away from any junctions, for only a few days. I bet had it been a Range Rover or BMW X5 (which are the same size as our Transit based camper!) there would've been no complaints.
Posted 11 years ago # -
If you wish to call bluff, write your own note inviting meeting!
So long as you lock to horizontals rather than verticals, they won't be victim to any theft attempt railing damage.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Probably best to lock it up in the stairwell you are visiting or to something more solid - bikes *have* been stolen in the vicinity and railings damaged in the attempt. I've had occasion to drop the odd note to visiting bikes myself (though in fairness I have explained the reasoning & suggested the alternative), and I'm not a bike-hater...
Posted 11 years ago # -
Not sure the guy referred to in the original posting is a bike-hater either.
Posted 11 years ago # -
oh, but there are some bike haters in the New Town. I was at a meeting where a chap from one of their residents association nearly had a conniption at the idea of a cycle lane on George Street. The very idea of a cyclist in the new town offended him.
Posted 11 years ago # -
@srd - how odd. I would have thought many new town residents interested in history and I would have thought George street has seen many bicycles over the centuries.
People love their cars and their houses very much and a few vocal people punch above their weight. The trouble with the ranters of the new town or grange is that they have connections. However as Tony BENN would have said if he hadn't just died, Unity is Strength, so if we stick together and behave reasonably the ranters will be seen as the ones who are more than two standard deviations from the mean, not the cyclists.
Conniption I like. have you had carsnapcious, a favourite of my father's both to use as a word and infact to be - a kind of crabby, one line put down type of an adjective.
Posted 11 years ago # -
nearly had a conniption at the idea of a cycle lane on George Street
I wonder if he was making the old equation of bicycles with lower class status, or with poverty? Either way he clearly doesn't get out much. All the smartest most chic cities have bicycles all over the place these days.
Posted 11 years ago # -
The New Town had some DIY pavement-vandalising non-standard NO BICYCLES stencilling a couple of years back, too, though you'd think the sort of person who would start frothing at the idea of bicycles going past would start actually brandishing their cane at anyone considering painting on the pavement.
Posted 11 years ago # -
The New Town had some DIY pavement-vandalising non-standard NO BICYCLES stencilling a couple of years back,
I thought they were Council-derived, as they appeared at the Dublin St crossroads just as the diversion of motorised traffic along Albany St/Abercrombie Pl was starting.
There are certainly a number of duffers in the New Town who don't like being told what to do (admittedly not a trait exclusive to that geographical or societal area), and I saw one comment in the chipwrapper that New Town residents were concerned that changing George St's traffic-accessibility might lead to heavier traffic through the New Town (not sure they'd noticed Queen St in between the two).
However, there's also a fair number of New Town residents who walk and cycle and would welcome improved human-scale accessibility around the centre of town. I'm one of them.
Posted 11 years ago # -
"I thought they were Council-derived"
Me too.
Not everyone living in the New Town owns a large vehicle and green wellies.
But it's a great stereotype!
I think the Scottish household survey shows that New Town residents are above average walkers to work.
"New Town residents were concerned that changing George St's traffic-accessibility might lead to heavier traffic through the New Town (not sure they'd noticed Queen St in between the two)"
The New Town was one of the first parts of Edinburgh 'traffic calmed' with road closures - no doubt due to 'local pressure'.
Queen Street is both an anomaly and a disgrace.
It doesn't need to have that many traffic lanes- which encourage volume and speed - and inevitable danger (to peds and cyclists - not helped by road surface.)
Segregated cycle lanes on George Street will be a useful 'statement', but for a proper through route Queen Street would be better - though compromised by the positioning of the trams in York Place.
A serious two way cycle route on the Gardens side would also reduce the chances of QS collapsing into the Gardens one day!
Posted 11 years ago # -
All good points, chdot. At the moment, Queen Street goes from two/threee lanes down to (effectively) one in York Place.
I'd like to see speed along there discouraged through segregated cyclelanes and maybe more buses stops from bus services diverted off Princes St and George St. Of course, as a residential/shopping street I'm sure it will be a well-enforced 20mph limit shortly...
Posted 11 years ago # -
I thought those New Town signs were sprayed there by some local vigilante. There was one on the useful corner cutoff from Heriot Row to Wemyss Place. I ignored it. It wore off some time ago. In a rational world that corner would have a properly marked bike shortcut, to avoid the awkward cobbled tight uphill turn with impatient drivers behind.
Posted 11 years ago # -
I thought it had been concluded that the no cycling graffiti was, hypocritically, the work of the police?
http://www.theedinburghreporter.co.uk/2012/05/leith-walk-cyclists-must-stay-off-the-pavements/
Posted 11 years ago # -
@gembo
Are you seriously suggesting that you think it's ok to lock your bike against someone's railing in 2014 because in your view events of approx 250 years ago are relevant ?
Posted 11 years ago # -
re the stencils. some also appeared on the north side of george square. i was annoyed at the time, and certaonly think it could have been done differently, but, it is very noticeable that far fewer cyclists use the pavement there now.
the stencils are fading. i do wonder if cyclists will revert.
Posted 11 years ago # -
It'd not surprising some cyclists use the pavement on George Square - the roadway must have some of the most uneven cobbles in the city. They'll jar the fillings out of your teeth.
Posted 11 years ago # -
@SRD they could make a great start by providing a cyclable surface in George Square and banning cars. As it is the road round the square is used as a car and van dump, and all the crowds of people on foot are herded on to a pavement which is clearly far too narrow for them. It'd be idyllic there if the whole road was pedestrianised with a cycle path through it.
Posted 11 years ago # -
@cc exactly my thinking
what drives me crazy is that most of the time the square is basically empty of cars. including the parking spaces. only times it gets full is George watsons collection time and Fridays with mosque overflow.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Dangerous - Don't worry, it's just Gembo.
Posted 11 years ago # -
it's not just me, Tony Benn agrees. Oh wait, it is just me tant pis
Someone should post a link (I will have a shuftie) on the rapaciousness of the scots in the expansion of the British empire. Our willingness to loot, plunder and kill was second to none. Our lack of compassion when it came to slavery extended even to Rabbie Burns who was genuinely considering going to Jamaica to run a plantation. Glasgow's Tobacco Barons never let anything get in the way of a profit.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Do you realise that the past, starting from yesterday, has actually been abolished? If it survives anywhere, it's in a few solid objects with no words attached to them..
- Winston Smith, 1984
Posted 11 years ago # -
Our willingness to loot, plunder and kill was second to none.
At last! Scotland wins at something! ;o)
Posted 11 years ago #
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