Whatever the rights and wrongs of the specific case, the anti-cyclists will be out in force.
Blind man badly hurt in bicycle hit and run
http://edinburghnews.scotsman.com/topstories/Blind-man-badly-hurt-in.6636017.jp
CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » General Edinburgh
I don't think I'll be reading the comments...
(38 posts)-
Posted 14 years ago #
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Regardless of the who ran into who or got in whos way, that's a bad show for anyone to leave another person behind who they've had some sort of accident with (particularly a blind pensioner).
It just gives the anti-cyclists needless sparks on which to pour their explosive vitriol.
I saw a
cyclistdreadlocked, BMX-helmeted, no-lighted idiot on a buckaroo bike last night - I had already administered a stern tutting as I passed on Slateford Road - appear on the pavement opposite Digger's pub to try and use the pavement as a shortcut onto Dundee Terrace (rather than going up and round, past the exit for the West Approach and then right at Victor Paris) only to run right into a rightfully rather angry looking chap coming round the corner. No stop, no sorry, just pushed his way through. Eeejit.Posted 14 years ago # -
We should carry tazers...
Posted 14 years ago # -
I take it for the purposes of dispensing mob justice to the unlit and those who cycle on pavements?
Posted 14 years ago # -
On topic: I think the offender should own up to the collision, (if they are even aware they have badly hurt someone!)
Slightly sideways on topic: Now I'm on nightshift, I'm amazed that there aren't more 'collisions' of any type on our dearly loved city roads and cyclepaths. A considerable number of 'studenti' types in the Kings Buildings to Bristo ghetto areas seem to think they are immune to buying lights and batteries, but still want to use the roads!
The area around George Square/Nicholson St is especially bad for infringers.
If I get a Tazer can I use it effectively on their ankles?Posted 14 years ago # -
"dispensing mob justice"
Surely you need pitchforks and torches for that
Posted 14 years ago # -
At least another cyclist stopped to help him. Pretty bad show though!
Posted 14 years ago # -
Scurrilous hooligan. Gives the rest of the cyclists a very bad name. Shockingly bad form, running an elderly, blind man down. Hit and run effectively. The youth of today, they have no respect. In too much of a hurry. Probably late for lectures.
Posted 14 years ago # -
"The youth of today"
I don't think there is any evidence that he was a youth. Or a student.
Posted 14 years ago # -
"I don't think there is any evidence that he was a youth. Or a student."
A very good point. I see a wide range of people, of different ages and genders, abusing the pavement on their bikes. Granted a lot of them seem to be students/kids, but I've also seen examples of bearded commuters, middle aged ladies and a top end roadie cycling on the pavement (in the latter example, to avoid the cobbled trenches of Drummond Place).
To be fair, very few of them pedal at a pace that would cause any risk to peds. However, seeing one guy pavement-abusing last night, I was struck by the thought that it seemed a very childish thing to do.
Do I think that because I feel pretty comfortable on the road and, to use an abbreviated form of what seems to be the phrase du jour, these other folk should just "man up"?
Posted 14 years ago # -
@PS I don't think it is a fear of the road rather a fear of being slowed down by red lights/junctions
Posted 14 years ago # -
"However, seeing one guy pavement-abusing last night, I was struck by the thought that it seemed a very childish thing to do."
Standard line is "Awwww! Does your mummy not let you ride on the road?" Not that I've managed to use that one myself yet.
Posted 14 years ago # -
Speaking of retorts, I passed a pair of boys side by side on bikes last week on the cycle path, dinged to warn them I was coming and they could not make their minds up about who should move to what side or if I should just nip through the middle, in the end boy on left pulls over to the right almost too late (I have slowed down to give him time) he yells "Duck Sake!" or words to that effect.
I won't repeat the retort I used, while swear word free it leaves little to the imagination...
The non shouty mate laughed at him, quality burnPosted 14 years ago # -
Standard line is "Awwww! Does your mummy not let you ride on the road?"
I've put that on file to be tested on the next offender that I spy!
Posted 14 years ago # -
It's certainly usually harder to legally catch footpath-cyclists to berate them over the shoulder after catching them up and overtaking than it is to catch up and pass red-light-jumpers.
There's a subset who seem to think that it's perfectly OK to ride the last portion of any journey on the footway as long as they're on the road most of the time, such as when their destination is on the other side of the road and there's a convenient pedestrian crossing a block upride of their goal that they can ride across to the opposite pavement, proceeding thereupon. It more often seems borne of laziness seeing as it's perfectly possible to stop and cross pedestrianically if you don't fancy making a right turn across traffic.
Posted 14 years ago # -
"Awwww! Does your mummy not let you ride on the road?"
I'll bear that in mind for next time I'm buzzed by a pavement-abuser :) (which I think will be the first time - I must lead a very sheltered life).
"I don't think it is a fear of the road rather a fear of being slowed down by red lights/junctions"
Not the ones I see round my way - they'd be able to go a lot quicker on the road (except one guy who seems to have a pathological fear of roundabouts and tries to cut the corner across the pavement. This strikes me as actually more dangerous for him, as it increases the number of times where he is in potential conflict with road users).
Posted 14 years ago # -
"There's a subset who seem to think that it's perfectly OK to ride the last portion of any journey on the footway as long as they're on the road most of the time"
Yes! I see this a lot and it's exactly as you say, down to laziness, given getting off and walking would lose all of about 5 seconds.
Posted 14 years ago # -
Is it "allowed" to coast the last couple of feet up to the front door of the flat on the pavement? Or how about mount the pavement to roll up to the bike rack?
Personally I have to admit that I do often do this type of thing - my self-justification being it's no different than a car that has to cross pavement to get into the car park / into the driveway. Naturally I'm very careful, slow and generally not even pedalling.
Is it laziness? Yes a large part of it probably is. I know I have to get off the bike to get in the door / lock the bike. But if I can do it over *there* rather than over *here* it will be quicker for me. But some of it is about not wanting to stop on a main or busy road, dismount, then find a convenient place (usually between parked cars) to get on the pavement and push the bike up to my destination.
Either way I have to move the bike (pushed or pedalled) across the pavement and so long as I'm equally slow, careful and considerate to other users then I don't find it so morally reprehensible.
I'm willing to be "corrected".
Posted 14 years ago # -
It's an odd area. The police in Cambridge at the start of term targeted cyclists who were riding up the pavement to bike parking. Up a dropped kerb put in specifically to access the bike parking.
In terms fo the Roads (S) Act driving 'over' or 'across' a pavement to access where you are allowed to legally park is okay, hence driving over the pavement onto my driveway at home is legal.
But I did some research (for yet another article) and this does only seem to apply to motorised traffic. Technically my other half could drive into our driveway, with me cycling behind, and I'd be committing an offence. It's an odd situation really.
Especially when the same right to ride across a pavement to access an off road cyclepath is conferred on the cyclist.
I work on Melville Street and stop and dismount in the parking area down the middle of the street, then walk across to my office.
Posted 14 years ago # -
I get off my bike at the lights/ped crossing at the end of Dalry Road and then push my bike along the short section of pavement to the bike racks. If a train has recently unloaded at Haymarket then there can be a real squeeze of people coming the other away along the pavement.
It would probably be more convenient for everyone if I cycled (at walking speed) along the pavement as I'd take up less room and would be less likely to clobber someone with a handlebar/pedal.
But if I did this I'm sure people would be generally unimpressed, so I will keep pushing the bike.
Posted 14 years ago # -
So it's a grey area then.
I could maybe unclip one shoe and "punt" myself along, rather than pedalling?
Or perhaps unclip both and walk the bike along without fully dismounting - although that usually ends in the nose of the saddle giving a sharp reminder to parts of the body where noses of saddles weren't meant to go.
Either way, I wouldn't be "cycling" as such. I'd be "walking" a bike.
Posted 14 years ago # -
Unclipping and 'punting' would, I suspect, still be classed as 'riding' even if not 'pedalling' (much like coasting on the bike). Saw someone do that this morning (was going to start a thread on it!) - waiting at red lights, ped phase came on so she swung one leg off and 'punted' across - if anything she looked less stable and in control of the bike!
And no, it's not a grey area as such, technically you 'aint allowed to ride to that bike parking, but it would take one hell of a bored copper to stop you I reckon...
Posted 14 years ago # -
So it's a grey area then.
More morally than legally :)
Posted 14 years ago # -
Years ago I briefly did a wee bit of pavement when leaving the flat and a wee bit of pavement-leading-to-cut-through upon arriving at work (back when I was starting work before 07:00) but stopped after the only occasion on which there was a pedestrian using the pavement at the work end (who tutted) in order to be able to maintain the moral high ground with respect to all aspects of pavement-cycling.
Posted 14 years ago # -
I have to say we are complete road saftey facistis in this country, Ive seen a few very relaxed pavement riders in town, but ive never seen the type of riding that everone in the media and the general driving world is refering too when they talk of law-breaking cyclists. I know becuase I have been that rider. I have broken every single rule of the road at whim and done so day in day out for months at a time. Ive cruised through pedestrian areas at 30mph, I would never stop for a red light and a pavement is just another way to turn right. I was a cycle courier.
Fortunatly this was in Melbourne, where the courier culture was firmly established and drivers expected a cyclist to do anything at any time. Odly the amount of outrage was the same. They had cycle cops, but frankly, they were
fatslow.What produced this culture, easy, couriers are payed by the delivery, not by the hour, the more deliveries you make the more you make. Whats more the priority runs earned 3X more, and were given to the fastest riders.
Whats my point? That pavement riding and general lawlessness is not such a big thing in Edinburgh, and we would do well not to exaggerate the scale of the problem.
I dont ride like that anymore, Im no longer 21 for a start and with the drivers in this country it would be suicide. I still believe you should pay attention first to the traffic and then to the colour of the light. If anyone wants an experience of the opposite of British traffic they should take a motorino trip through Rome one day. Easily twice as much traffic flowing much better with very few rules. But scary to a Britisher.
Posted 14 years ago # -
Both those examples very much imply that the behaviour to be expected is expected; if it is widely seen that couriers will flout rules I expect people grow up knowing that and coping with it. There are less couriers around here but they can generally be relied upon to skip a red light or ignore a one-way sign if you watch them for more than a couple of minutes, unless they've stopped to eat their lunch in Charlotte Square.
The fact that the injured party in the linked story was blind emphasises that it's the person taking the risk who should be alert to the risk they present to others, not looking down at their legs.
Posted 14 years ago # -
So I'm slowly unlearning the habits of an adult lifetime of obedient adherence to the rules of the road – because if you stop for a red light on a bike here, people just think you're weird, or French, or something.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/bike-blog/2010/nov/24/newyork-cycling-bike
Posted 14 years ago # -
@wingpig yah its very clear where the fault is here.
Posted 14 years ago # -
My problem with RLJing and so on isn't the harm that it can cause (despite this latest case the chance of harm is a lot less than being hit by, well, a car - personally I see the big issue in this incident being that he rode off afterwards and just left the guy, whether he's a cyclist or not is neither here nor there). My problem with it is giving other people a big stick to hit us with - or at least those of us actively involved in trying to promote cycling.
For many others it is likely water of a duck's back, but when you are, day-to-day, trying to convince people that cycling is a good thing it's handy to be able to do that from a moral high point.
Drivers do it as well, if not more (if you think about speeding or mobile phone use) and cause more deaths and injuries and chaos. But two wrongs, no matter how unequal, still don't make a right.
It's an interesting point though about paying attention to the traffic first, then light colour - I can see the theory much more for a cyclist due to the possibility of harm to the cyclist himself, but I personally find that paying attention to the lights actually helps me pay attention to the traffic...
Posted 14 years ago # -
Lights are indeed part of traffic, and I dont mean you shouldn't obey them, but you should defiantly not trust them to tell you if its safe to go or not, for that you need to be looking and thinking. Too many drivers blindly follow what the light says, and this culture encourages that.
Posted 14 years ago #
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