CityCyclingEdinburgh was launched on the 27th of October 2009 as "an experiment".
IT’S TRUE!
CCE is 15years old!
Well done to ALL posters
It soon became useful and entertaining. There are regular posters, people who add useful info occasionally and plenty more who drop by to watch. That's fine. If you want to add news/comments it's easy to register and become a member.
RULES No personal insults. No swearing.
sticky"Failure to control vehicle after tyre blowout most likely due to driver not holding on to steering wheel with both hands and/or being alert.
How many drivers do you know check their tyre pressures weekly"
And also have a look to see how many drivers hold the steering wheel with both hands (like you're supposed to). 5% if you're lucky?
I wonder how fast the lorry that mounted the central reservation was going? Limit for that vehicle on that road is 50mph.
Limit for that vehicle on that road is 50mph
I'm confident the diligence of the Polis will mean the tacho is inspected, maintenance and mobile phone records checked and any thing found untoward will be suitably dealt with...
</sarcasm>
I was in a taxi the other day. After the usual rants about Uber and trams, the driver started talking about the condition of the roads.
He said some very positive things about cyclists, particularly how he respected them for cycling on poor condition roads (I think he was referring to both potholes and actual road planning / infrastructure). I was surprised as I was under the impression that all taxi drivers hated cyclists.
Certainly my experience when cycling is that all taxi drivers are impatient-cyclist-hating-idiots.
While I can understand the cynicism above, it remains 'possible' that the incident was caused by a blow out, that it was severe enough to cause the incident despite the driver having two hands on the wheel, that the tyre had been correctly inflated, that he had been travelling at the correct speed, and that the police will investigate fully.
There seems to be an awful lot of tar-brushing and virtually defamatory conclusion-jumping in the thread today.
I think I might go away for a few days and just enjoy the zen-inducing sunny weather and ride my bike.
The crashing lorry appears to have been caught on at least one or two dashcams, so if the blowout story isn't true it might be blown out of the water by the footage from fellow drivers.
Stating facts* about how any driver can lose control of a vehicle is hardly "defamatory"
conclusion-jumping
Pots & kettles
*May or may not be correct facts - you decide
Lorry tyres are inflated to between 6 and 9 bar (ie road bike tyre pressures up to well above) and obviously a MUCH bigger volume of air so a genuine blowout would be a hell of a bang.
I'm not clear why control of a multi axle vehicle would be lost from a single blowout, unless it was a front tyre (which should, ceteris paribus, be under less load on a laden vehicle).
Lorry tyre blowouts used to be very common, very much less so now I believe due to better tyre construction.
One of the best hours of my life was recently spent in a tyre place, getting a car tyre repaired. It was mainly lorry tyres they worked on, it was remarkable seeing (a) how they got lorry tyres off and on rims & (b) how many lorry tyres needed fixing in a small rural place. #saddo
Erm. If something is not correct then it's not a fact.
But yes, you're right, there's a story about a crash, followed by multiple posts about the things a driver can do wrong to cause such a crash, and nothing at all about how things can happen that don't have the driver in the wrong, and you were indeed just stating 'facts', true or untrue.
I'll leave you to it, it's all a bit EEN comments for me, and life's too short.
+1 in the "all cabbies hate cyclists" group.
If ever I hear aggressive revving behind me and feel the impending close pass then I assume that it's one of Edinburgh's Black Cab "Professional" drivers. Unfortunately, I'm right more often than not.
In my experience, taxi drivers in Edinburgh are the worst culprits for disregard to other road users, with particular emphasis to cyclists.
I wonder what the video-posting-person's conversion rate from angry/swerving/shouting-cabbie to stopping/alighting/fist-swinging-cabbie is? I've probably experienced twenty or so angry/swerving/shouting black-cab-cabbies in the past six years' near-daily cycling but have never had one resort to actually stepping out of their cab to lumber at me on foot. The driver of minibus PN03 CWJ (which possibly performed taxi-like services) came closest, opening his door after swerving to block my path and stopping but didn't relinquish his vehicle.
"
Traffic was queued as far back as Livingston as traffic into the city became crippled by the collision.
Interesting use of language.
The super weird thing about Taxi drivers (especially black cabs) being in a rush, especially if they have a passenger, is that they're just burning fuel for no reason. When on a meter they really don't need to speed as they're paid for a mix of time and distance.
I guess the only thing is they might feel that their fare is so expensive that they need to make it feel worthwhile for the customer and therefore be in a rush. Although the utilisation of most black cab companies is so low that maybe the fuel they're burning doesn't touch the sides in the grand scheme of things (that is to say they sit idle for 30+mins per hour on average)
2 incidents to report.
1) bin lorry trying to flatten my fiance as it turned out of russel road onto Roseburn Street to catch the lights. She owned it and accelerated out of trouble like I'd taught her. So proud (but obviously disturbed that this was necessary)
2) Drove to work last Friday as I was heading south to a gravel ride thing, Spotted no less than 3 fender benders on the M8 heading into Edinburgh as I headed the other way.
The worst thing was that as we passed a huge queue of traffic, a white van chose to undertake me at about 90mph in order to slam his brakes on to join a queue I'd been rolling up to about 300 yards ahead. Horrifying!
I have had a couple of civil interactions with taxi drivers recently, waiting for each other, letting each other out, or do their u-turn thing they pull, or them hanging back.
So I do not consider all taxi drivers to be the same. And they do not consider all cyclists to be the same tho of course they will give such an opinion without too much bother any time they see us jump a red. Just as we seem to be doing on this thread.
I let a guy in a big four by four come out of the side street at goldbergs last night, he then sped straight through the red to get across Lothian road. I felt I shouldn't have let him out. The car behind you could sense was thinking about doing it too but the first guy was so late the second would have been in a crash.
The all taxi drivers are... seems a bit like confirmation bias to me. Yes there may be a reasonable number of numpties driving taxis in this city but have you ever stopped to count just how many taxis there are? Is there a higher percentage of numpties driving them than say Audis, BMWs or even Prius?
I saw a Think Bike sticker in a taxi the other day, which was nice.
This morning, obese driver of licenced taxi 219 lurched left from the queue of traffic waiting to turn out of Chambers Street into the bridges, utterly oblivious of the fact that (a) I was about to occupy the space he was lurching into and (b) there was not room for two lanes of vehicles in any case. I turned back to point out his error, and he peeped his horn at me like the stupid, impotent fat twat he was.
The driver of the 4x4 outside Tesco in Linlithgow, who crept inexorably forward towards the pedestrian crossing despite the small child on bike crossing the road (green man). The driver had no idea where the small child was below the end of his vehicle's bonnet but he kept rolling forward anyway.
Nothing happened but it was a close run thing. It makes me a bit ill and quite angry to think about.
Not rubbish driving but there was a huge tailback along Russell Road this morning, presumably a knock on from something on the A8.
Loads of cyclists on this beautiful day.
I saw a lady zoom-zooming very close past a cyclist only to join that queue on Russell Road seconds later.
BBC now reporting Taxigate:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-36091485
City Cabs supporting the driver - quelle surprise
'Les McVay, City Cabs company secretary' quoted in the beeb article:
"The full unedited version shows the cyclist kicking Brian's door and banging on his window."
Should that be "...as the moving taxi passes within leg-and-arm-reach of the moving cyclist as they passed over the tram tracks?"
I'd be interested to know how a camera mounted on the head of the cyclist could show the cyclist kicking anything.
He'd have to be looking down at some absurd angle (unlikely when trying to ride and defend yourself from a close pass)
Indeed
I've viewed the video again and I doubt it's been edited in any way
Rather poor that the cabbie was only admonished for a premeditated assault on a cyclist, no?
He was given 9 points on his licence, which is quite a lot.
"He was given 9 points on his licence, which is quite a lot."
I agree but, according to another recent post, points on the licence, and revoking a licence (driving ban) aren't really part of the punishment. It's the sentence to community service, the fine, or the jail term that's the punishment. I might have misunderstood this. If so, the fine imposed on this cabbie is derisory.
Would appreciate any of m'learned friends clarifying whether points and/or ban are part of the punishment.
"The full unedited version shows the cyclist kicking Brian's door and banging on his window"
Clearly the taxi was just a tad too close??
I swung at and missed a passing car window on Slateford Road last week.
It was close enough to hit, just too fast for me (if that makes sense).
I am fairly confident the law is not on my side here, but would have happily chatted through the rights and wrongs of the incident with said motorist.
Most space I've ever had was riding back from the LBS with a broken chainset in my right hand, give me cycle space or I mess you up...
@Steve. I caused a similar effect by riding through the village with a child's bike lose attached to my rucksack.
I go for revolving scythes on my wheels, like Boadicea.
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