That worthless and dangerous cycling infrastructure

[Richard Mann]

You are happy to engage in, or at least promote the idea of, a program of making motorists less used to interacting with cyclists whilst ignoring the risks in a narrow road carrying fast moving traffic. Can you really not see why I would much rather you, and people like you, just stopped trying to make my life more dangerous?

How does marking a cycle lane on say Iffley Road (to quote an example currently in play) have any bearing on a lane in the next county? When I had a look in streetview, the only traffic seemed to be a cyclist (at the western end).

Even if they put cycle lanes in Bicester (which is the nearest town of any size), the most likely effect would be a few more cyclists in Bicester, and more cars aware of sharing roads with bikes. The new perimeter road is probably rather more detrimental, because of the way it gets traffic used to bike-free driving. And as for the M40, that gives people the completely wrong idea. The effect of cycle lanes is trivial by comparison.

 

[Red Light]

B***** Sustrans. We'd have held out against that if they hadn't insisted on connecting up NCN5.

They are an organisation with a lot of popular support behind them. How dare you question their provision!

 

[Richard Mann]

[Sustrans] are an organisation with a lot of popular support behind them. How dare you question their provision!

They were a remote agency needing to do a lot in a hurry. They've got better at working locally since (and better at listening rather than just doing what JG commanded). But that's another topic.

 

[Richard Mann]

Have you seen what happens at the top of Banbury Road?
http://homepage.ntlw.../August2008.htm

(may have changed since I took the picture, but I won't be at all surprised if it hasn't)

They fixed it sharpish

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?hl=en&ll=51.78814,-1.27168&spn=0.000478,0.001164&t=h&z=20&vpsrc=6

 

[jonesy]

They fixed it sharpish

http://maps.google.c...=h&z=20&vpsrc=6

I'm not clear what you are referring to Richard- Streetview shows the same very short and discontinuous lanes on the pavement (and a Cyclists Dismount!) looks like cyclists must give way to every drive...?

 

[mangaman]

You are happy to engage in, or at least promote the idea of, a program of making motorists less used to interacting with cyclists whilst ignoring the risks in a narrow road carrying fast moving traffic. Can you really not see why I would much rather you, and people like you, just stopped trying to make my life more dangerous?

This is the nubbins for me.

Most of us aren't London commuters.

Cycling on rural, twisty, country roads is a nightmare as motorists treat them as racetracks, yet can't see around the corners. Unfortunately that is where I tend to cycle.

Cycle paths are clearly impractical - these are narrow roads already, with farmland on either side.

When driving around a blind corner on a country road, I slow down - my rational is there may be a cyclist 50 metres away, a horse rider, a car crash - but I very rarely see people slowing at corners - there's almost a rural view amongst a lot of drivers that country roads are a bit of a challenge - like a track day - where cornering at speed is a bit of a laugh.

Cycle paths to me are a complete irrelevance (we have some shared paths for dog walkers and families with kids on bikes, but for getting around, however they don't go anywhere useful and the roads aren't too congested and safe in the City in my experience) - driver education on country roads is the only thing I can think of that would change my cycling experience.

 

[Red Light]

That is indeed crap- has it made the website yet? But that's not what is being discussed is it, Richard has made it pretty clear he isn't advocating cycle paths on pavements. Surely the crucial elements of making roads more attractive for mass cycling are traffic speed reduction and re-allocation of roadspace from motor vehicles, and cycle lanes can be one tool, amongst many, for achieving this.

But Richard is Vice Chair of the local cycling campaign, Cyclox, and a Transport Consultant in Oxford for nigh on 20 years, and this is one of the main routes into Oxford. As Richard says on his website "The main roads form the basis for the main cycle routes" and this is one of them so there is no excuse.

Its been the excuse of facility fanatics for decades every time an example of crap facilities is point out that it was somebody else's fault, this time Sustrans, and that they didn't do it properly. Thanks to their efforts we've been getting this sort of crap for decades and I see no reason why that should suddenly change for the coming decades to give us these spangley cycling facilities we keep being promised. Sorry but if we can't get it "right" after eighty years or more of trying its time we started looking at other solutions. "Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it"

 

[Richard Mann]

I'm not clear what you are referring to Richard- Streetview shows the same very short and discontinuous lanes on the pavement (and a Cyclists Dismount!) looks like cyclists must give way to every drive...?

Streetview shows the before situation; the satellite view is more recent - the paint is now continuous and the sequence of give ways have gone (it's on the south side of Sunderland Avenue). It's still a crap detour to avoid delaying traffic at the roundabout, though. The roundabouts are slowly being signalled, generally with adjacent toucans, so hopefully the detour will be removed in due course.

 

[jonesy]

Over a period of months, by virtue of enforced separation, your habitual commuting motorist on the Iffley Road becomes de-sensitised to the needs of cyclists. One weekend he drives out a short distance, albeit over the obstacle that is the county line, into the country. When he then encounters a group of cyclists in their natural free environment he is less sure how best to interact with them. How do you feel about the consequences?

Adrian, I can understand where you are coming from, and that is one of the things I dislike about those horrid shared-use pavements we've been looking at (a similar sort of thing near Bracknell is the bane of my commute) but in general the level of segregation in Oxford simply isn't sufficient to de-sensitise drivers. You can't drive very far at all in Oxford without encountering them in an unsegregated space, and I don't think cycle lanes present anything like the same risk as fully segregated, off carriageway paths.

 

[Richard Mann]

But Richard is Vice Chair of the local cycling campaign, Cyclox, and a Transport Consultant in Oxford for nigh on 20 years, and this is one of the main routes into Oxford. As Richard says on his website "The main roads form the basis for the main cycle routes" and this is one of them so there is no excuse.

Its been the excuse of facility fanatics for decades every time an example of crap facilities is point out that it was somebody else's fault, this time Sustrans, and that they didn't do it properly. Thanks to their efforts we've been getting this sort of crap for decades and I see no reason why that should suddenly change for the coming decades to give us these spangley cycling facilities we keep being promised. Sorry but if we can't get it "right" after eighty years or more of trying its time we started looking at other solutions. "Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it"

Well actually it was only in the mid-nineties that we started understanding why pavement cycle tracks were so crap (they don't serve either fast or nervous cyclists well), and developed the dual network concept. The County have put in very few pavement cycle tracks since (most were done before then). The consequence is that making space for bikes on the roads (regardless of whether a cycle lane is marked) means that either bus lanes have to be taken out, or the road widened, or space for motor vehicles further reduced. Ten years ago, the County wouldn't have conceived of shaving yet more space off cars, so everything was at a standoff for a while. Now they are quite keen on speed reduction on main roads. They have also run out of ideas for promoting buses and are looking at promoting cycling and walking instead (typical; just when the money runs out).

On the way various mistakes have been made. I'm trying to describe the mistake-free version so you can copy it. I don't think the vehicular model has exactly been a great success, but you're welcome to keep trying if you want to. Stop dissing people who are supposed to be on the same side.

 

[Red Light]

Well actually it was only in the mid-nineties that we started understanding why pavement cycle tracks were so crap (they don't serve either fast or nervous cyclists well), and developed the dual network concept.

Careful now, you'll be upsetting Tommi who is convinced they are the bees knees.

The County have put in very few pavement cycle tracks since (most were done before then). The consequence is that making space for bikes on the roads (regardless of whether a cycle lane is marked) means that either bus lanes have to be taken out, or the road widened, or space for motor vehicles further reduced. Ten years ago, the County wouldn't have conceived of shaving yet more space off cars, so everything was at a standoff for a while. Now they are quite keen on speed reduction on main roads. They have also run out of ideas for promoting buses and are looking at promoting cycling and walking instead (typical; just when the money runs out).

I have no need to shave space off cars, even less to squeeze cyclists into the gutter because there's not enough width to do anything else with a cycle lane. I am traffic, I cycle on the road with traffic. The only cycle facilities I want are ones that give routes not available on the roads.

On the way various mistakes have been made. I'm trying to describe the mistake-free version so you can copy it. I don't think the vehicular model has exactly been a great success, but you're welcome to keep trying if you want to. Stop dissing people who are supposed to be on the same side.

Its the last thing I want to copy - its just the default option provided by councils all over the country not something special uniquely designed in Oxford. But I suppose if you've got a City Council with a growth target for cycling of 0% during a cycling boom, you've got to do something to put people off cycling.

 

[Red Light]

Oxford style cycle lanes in a small town which has never heard of Oxfords Dual Network concept and has no cycling campaign.



All Oxford seems to have done is taken this standard provision, give it a fancy name and pretended its a strategy.

 

[Richard Mann]

I have no need to shave space off cars, even less to squeeze cyclists into the gutter because there's not enough width to do anything else with a cycle lane. I am traffic, I cycle on the road with traffic. The only cycle facilities I want are ones that give routes not available on the roads.

As my younger daughter says: "I want" doesn't get.

 

[Richard Mann]

Oxford style cycle lanes in a small town which has never heard of Oxfords Dual Network concept and has no cycling campaign.

[attachment=4780:Screen Shot 2011-08-18 at 00.05.58.png]

All Oxford seems to have done is taken this standard provision, give it a fancy name and pretended its a strategy.

Hmm. Since I suggested looking the other way in a Streetview image, you seem to have switched to screen shots. And you're still hiding behind a pseudonym and dissing other people.

Ah well. It's not the same as an Oxford cycle lane: not painted across the side road and traffic lanes wider than 3m between refuges. Sight lines definitely problematical. Quite possibly not enough traffic to warrant cycle lanes, but hard to tell. No sign of any light-controlled ped crossings. Fig leaf of "SLOW" and the keep left arrows indicate an acknowledged but unaddressed speed problem.

 

[jonesy]

I don't think that's a fair interpretation of Richard's position He advocates taking space from cars and reducing their speed, not putting cyclists out of their way on the pavement.