An attempt to cycle down the Mound at the weekend was prevented by its road closure. Ended up being diverted along market street instead with the rest of the traffic.
Route shown here: https://ibb.co/fYyvQQ
However, at the bit where traffic turned left onto Princes St (before the right turn onto South St David Street) the road has 2 lanes, the right of the two has tram tracks embedded in it. In order to block off progress along Princes Street, the road closure folk had decided to force people to merge from the left of those lanes into the right with a string of cones. Which is fine for cars, but if you're a cyclist hitting it for the first time, the whole setup is designed to *increase* the risk that you get caught in the tram tracks!
I'm not sure if I'm doing a very good job of describing the closure setup I faced, but if you can imagine two lanes going straight, you're in the left as a cyclist, and you're forced to merge into the right lane with its tram tracks in order to take a sharp right up to South St David St.
It's exactly the sort of setup that has been called into question in the death of the Edinburgh medical student cyclist in May, the lady who was injured on the tram tracks a few weeks ago when there was the bus collision, and is exactly what led to all the Haymarket accidents.
Another cyclist ahead of me managed to swerve left between the cones in order to make a curved squiggle and turn into the right lane/up South St David's street at more like a 90 degree turn (much like the Haymarket cycle lane changes)... but I wasn't well enough prepared to slot into the "closed" lane.. and even if I had been, there was a car at my back right which I'd have ended up clashing with if I'd attempted to do something similar to improve the angle I crossed the track at.
As it stands, I ended up having to weigh up just pitching to the left and stopping in the "closed" lane at the last minute (bailing, basically) or just hope for the best when crossing the track at almost a parallel angle. I did the latter, but it was only luck that meant my wheel didn't get caught.
So.. a few days later to cool off about the matter.. and I'm still frustrated about the lack of care or thought for cyclists encountering the road diversion along this city centre part of Edinburgh - it really is a good example of either malicious road diversions or sheer incompetence, and similar things can be prevented in future.
Who can I report concerns to? Is there some road closure diversion email address for the Council who are meant to see that these things are done safely for *all* traffic users?
thanks.
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