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@Clockwise
The danger of cycling all comes down to going easy on drivers both legally and socially. If you hit a cyclist in most of the places listed up the thread it's not only the law which is going to be weighted against you more than here but it's a shameful thing, your family and friends will have disowned you long before you worry about a court date but here I worry the same person wouldn't need a buy a drink at his local for a month with people congratulating him.
It's not just serious stuff that's different, in france I remember visiting the courts(it's right by notre dame) and it had a huge line outside full of pissed off drivers who are forced to travel into the center of paris to pay minor fines, unlike here where a letter turns up in the post to say you have been bad and you pay it then shrug it off as "cost of motoring" while if it dicked up an entire day it wouldn't have been worth whatever you did to shave 2sec off your drive home.
It isn't that hard to work out, it's accepted/expected to drive badly and then the handful of better drivers are worn down and educated in the ways of the road