Boardman on BBC Breakfast...

[bianchi1]

I found it very easy, and couldn't wait, to get out of Lourdes, I was going south.

So was I, to Argelez Gasost. Did you end up on the old disused railway line?

 

[glenn forger]

Nope, don't remember that, I've still got the map somewhere.

Lourdes was bloody awful, unless your idea of shopping paradise is buying a Madonna snow globe. I mean Mary, the Mother of God, not THE Madonna.

 

[glenn forger]

Found the map, forget what I said, I swung east to Bagneres, I see the railway line - I met up with it again at Argeles-Gazost.

 

[mjr]

That's my point, I have never come across such a road in the UK but have in some European countries that have the argued for 'Dutch system'.

If we establish one do we get the other....and to what extent?

I've visited quite a few countries and feel that the tendency to ban cycling on roads isn't very strongly linked to whether there's a cycleway nearby. Also, I have heard councillors here call for such bans already, even today, with the narrow/discontinuous utter rubbish built to date.

It's daft to think preventing cycleways being built will prevent the calls to ban cycles from roads. If there is a shared path nearby, it does change the question from "can we ban cycles from ..." to "can we make cycles use the path..." but Councillor Mr Toad will still ask the question anyway. Really our top solution is to get cycle-friendly politicians that will both provide decent cycleways and defend our right to the road, by asking relevant cycling/road-safety questions when they stand for election and/or inviting them out on bike rides, by joining cycle clubs or groups and coordinating our actions so that we have maximum effect. Being careful with words to try to avoid putting ideas into the minds of dafter politicians is not a great plan but it's better than carelessly sloshing the S-word around.

Oh and I will always call to develop a cycle-friendly English system. Even if we tried a revolution of importing someone else's system, I'm sure we'd screw it up in translation somehow. ;-)

 

[deptfordmarmoset]

Today's BBC contribution to cycling was centred on wearing headphones (Thanks a lot, Boris) and, would you guess it, helmets, and featured Roger Geffen riding a tandem. Tomorrow, they'll be off to New York to look at the cycling turnaround over there. For a change, they'll also be discussing helmets.

@Scoosh I'm no longer sure how this series of news features can be discussed on here without getting into the helmet mire. That's where the programme is fixated. As a forum, we've been through all of this in tedious detail but this is where the programme is leading the public debate. Apart from saying that the emphasis has been clearly on what cyclists ought to do to cope with road safety and not what ought to be done about road safety itself, what else is there to say?

 

[GrumpyGregry]

my first post mentioned helmets and applauded CB for wearing street and not having a lid.

This thread is intrinsically about helmets amongst other things. If we stay focused on the BBC coverage, CB, and what the public actors that chip in to the debate have to say I'd be a happy OP-er.

 

[mjr]

[QUOTE 3362731, member: 45"]Yeah and remember Daniel Cadden.[/QUOTE]
The Cadden case ended up as a good ruling establishing that cyclists do not have to use cycle tracks just because they exist. It does not prevent councils imposing Traffic Orders that ban cycling or MPs from trying to change the law... so be careful who you vote for.

 

[Inertia]

Today's BBC contribution to cycling was centred on wearing headphones

Very poor reporting though, all they seemed to prove was that listening to music takes up 10% of your attention.

 

[Dan B]

Very poor reporting though, all they seemed to prove was that listening to music takes up 10% of your attention.

I suppose that listening to BBC Breakfast imposes no such cognitive load

 

[GrumpyGregry]

The Cadden case ended up as a good ruling establishing that cyclists do not have to use cycle tracks just because they exist. It does not prevent councils imposing Traffic Orders that ban cycling or MPs from trying to change the law... so be careful who you vote for.

[QUOTE 3363360, member: 45"]The Cadden case showed that it's not difficult for a bunch of cyclists to get together, do something (rather than wittering endlessly on an internet forum) and get a precedent set. If we've done it once, we can do it again.

To be honest, these threads are full of fake-fear threats of what we have to do because if we don't then that's wot'll 'appen. It's wasted energy. [/QUOTE]
As I understood it nothing about the Cadden case set a precedent in law or established a ruling that can be cited in other cases. It was simply a particular response to a piece of very heavy-handed policing by some plod who took exception to their advice (orders) being disregarded by a member of the public (on a bike). Goodness only knows how the prosecution ever got past first base.

 

[GrumpyGregry]

Very poor reporting though, all they seemed to prove was that listening to music takes up 10% of your attention.

Yeah. In car radios and CD/mp3 players should be forcibly ripped out forthwith. Folk have an antipathy to people who wear headphones in the public space and it is a widespread one.

 

[glenn forger]

Very poor reporting though, all they seemed to prove was that listening to music takes up 10% of your attention.

It was breathtakingly stupid. If they wanted to "prove" that listening to music is distracting, then why did they not once mention drivers who listen to music? The drivers that kill two thousand people a year. It was a crappy segment, reinforcing the myth that road safety is down to cyclists and nobody else, implying cyclists are at fault in accidents, nasty victim-blaming crap. Rubbish. Dreadful reporting.

 

[LCpl Boiled Egg]

It was breathtakingly stupid. If they wanted to "prove" that listening to music is distracting, then why did they not once mention drivers who listen to music? The drivers that kill two thousand people a year. It was a crappy segment, reinforcing the myth that road safety is down to cyclists and nobody else, implying cyclists are at fault in accidents, nasty victim-blaming crap. Rubbish. Dreadful reporting.

That's hardly surprising. This is the program that used to be called Breakfast News until they decided to forget about reporting the news and instead fill the space with fluff like what's happening on the X Factor. The only reason i have it on in the mornings is to catch the local news and make sure my train is running. Any item that mentions cycling is generally a waste of time, even when it has someone like Chris Boardman being interviewed by a keen cyclist such as Louise Minchin.

 

[GrumpyGregry]

It wasn't a binding precedent, as it wasn't a decision of a court of record. It could, however, be used as a persuasive precedent (and has been IIRC).

My understanding is that the arguments used, which are long-established in case law, have been re-used successfully in a couple of broadly similar subsequent cases of equal idiocy (I suspect plod reads the Daily Heil who never ever print the fail story) - but that doesn't establish it as a precedent does it? ianal.

 

[growingvegetables]

Made me smile

https://www.flickr.com/photos/carltonreid/15532400338/

OK - it was a smile crooked with resignation