@Dave, sorry I just do not accept your argument at all. If we seek to convert a large number of travellers to cycling, there is no way that pavements have the capacity to permit safe movement for any significant numbers of cyclists and pedestrians.
But if we had a situation where there were large numbers of travellers cycling, they wouldn't need to be on the pavement (even kids). I think/hope we would agree that if proper segregated cycle facilities were ever built here, it would no longer be appropriate for kids to share the pavements with old grannies on zimmers when there is a completely safe, segregated alternative?
In Marchmont, where circa 25% of cycling traffic is on the pavement I feel much less safe on foot than I do cycling on my daily commute.
But 25% of cyclists evidently feel so unsafe on the road that they are too afraid to use it at all. The benefit to them is obviously large since we know that it is far faster and less inconvenient to use the road, which gives us an estimate of the "fear cost" they are avoiding (there must be a proper term for this).
It does come at a cost to you, but who's to say that the cost to you is more than the benefit to them (this is, after all, explicitly the reasoning behind the countless miles of shared use pavements that have been set up).
People are too pragmatic to accept that a fiercely busy shared pavement is OK but use of a near empty non-shared pavement would be immoral, I think. Especially when they perceive a direct threat to themselves which they are avoiding.
Children cycling is nothing like the same issue as commuters on bikes, and it is wrong to pretend that it is and that most cyclists support pavement cycling. Road design needs improved, some drivers need educated, surfaces improved, and enforcement action taken against those who break rules or the law.
To reduce this as much as possible, there is an overlap between the youngest commuters (paper round?) and children who might take a bike to school. So is it nothing like the same issue even when it's the same person doing the cycling?
I constantly see people cycling on the pavement alongside Maybury Rd even though this is not a signed cycle route (full on "maximum bin-man" pro commuters at that). The black and white view is that they should be driving instead.
I don't disagree *at all* with your last sentence BTW. I don't expect to see this transformed in my lifetime, but it would be nice.
posts
