• This is an absolutely lovely picture. If the full segregation was going to look like this, I would happily support it. But lets take a quick look at what the artist hasn't included that we know will happen.

    There isn't a young child weaving all over the place having lots of fun while their parent calls out that maybe they want to stay on the left hand side of the bike lane. Or maybe their racing ahead and pulling skids and U-turns without really looking as to who else is about.

    There isnt' a large group of cyclists riding along in an ever bulging, slow moving peleton because they really want to ride together. They also isn't a cheery died in the wool socialist who interprets your bell ring or polite request to get past as a reason to tell you that there's no reason to rush because you're on a bicycle and tries to engage you in a long spiel as to why you should join them.

    There isn't a cyclist stopped right in the middle of the lane checking their satnav, GPS unit, text messages, setting up an assault on a strava segment.

    There isn't a parent riding along slowly as their kids tool along the footpath. They don't want their kids in the cycle lane because lat week someone came blasting past, probably trying to win a srtava segment.

    The roots of the plane trees haven't cause the path to bulge up into a rutted uncomfortable ride, even at about 3mph. The council haven't promised to definitely look at the issue as soon as possible but can't prioritise it at the moment because the path is still technically rideable.

    The council streetsweepers haven't used the lane as a good place to push all the fallen leaves and the snow so that people can walk along the Embankment safely.

    It was sub-zero over night but the spray of the road gritters doesn't reach the cycle lane.
    The pavement gritters haven't touched the cycle lane because that's definitely part of the roadway and is the responsibility of the TfL. It's an arterial route you see. TfL haven't gritted it because they're too busy gritting the roads to keep traffic flowing but they reckon they might get to it in time for the commute home. They didn't get to it for the commute home because the Mayor's office ordered them to grit certain non-arterial routes because they're really dangerous. The council still don't think they're responsible for the gritting and haven't got the budget for it. The cycle lane has been a sheet of ice all day that no one can use.

    There's no cyclists dismount sign where the lane traverses a road.
    There's no cyclists dismount sign because there's an important monument, pop-up exhibition, excavation, flim crew doing a piece about the cycle lanes. There isn't a gaggle of PCSO's who have been ordered down there to make sure there is dismounting because a mate of the local police Borough Commander had a bit of a whinge.

    There aren't any pedestrians in the cycle path. They aren't merrily walking along the uni-directional different coloured strip that they've gravitated to.
    There aren't any skaters in the cycle path on their way to the Undercroft. There aren't any skaters who have discovered the cycle lane is a great runway up to a fantastic grind.
    There isn't a walking tour of London parked up in the cycle lane so as they don't block the pavement.
    There isn't a pedestrian rushing across because they've just spotted an available taxi.
    There isn't a pedestrian slowly stepping backwards into the lane while they try to photograph every landmark in London all at once.
    There isn't a pedestrain who's.... Actually WTF are you doing you massive weapon?

    The driver of one of the coaches hasn't started unloading luggage out onto the cycle lane. The passengers from the coach aren't all swarming about the cycle lane looking for their luggage.
    There isn't an ambulance at the end of the cycle lane cause all of those parked up coaches obscure the view and a driver in a hurry didn't see, therefore didn't think about the cyclists in the cycle lane. It looked alright because the rest of the road junction was clear. The cyclist didn't see the car nudging just a smidge over the speed limit because their view was obscured by coaches. There isn't an extra coach parked up closer to the junction because they were told they absolutely must drop everyone off here. There isn't a driver standing over an injured cyclist saying "sorry mate, I didn't see you".

    The bike racks aren't full up with abandoned bikes. The bike racks hasn't been stripped of bikes by a gang with a transit and a high powered angle grinder.

    There isn't a Royal Mail van parked in the cycle lane.

    There isn't a police officer, councillor, council officer, PCSO or indeed anyone else there to stop all this inevitable nonsense from happening and help ingrain the function of segregated cycle lanes because they don't have the resources.

    There isn't a member of Hackney PoB there watching it all fall to shit and the brief spike in rider numbers fade into the distance because it isn't the utopia that they felt they needed to promise in order to get the project in place. There isn't a tattered spreadsheet of budgetary reallocations that mean the cycle lane won't get maintained properly. There aren't any infrastructure changes on the roadway because the cycling money got spaffed on a white elephant. There aren't the shattered dreams of a cycling heaven because it all got fucked up when this project wasn't done properly and now this, and a lot of other things will never happen again.

    There isn't a little crowd of Taxpayers Alliance, Keith Peat and UKIP MPs laughing at the bikewankers who got it all wrong while Petronella Whatsherface from the Daily Mail lauding the demise of the cycle lanes because they caused her grandmother to break her legs several times.

    It probably sounds rather negative that. It is, but except the last couple, they've all been based on real occurences. But each one of these things will slowly erode at the desirability of cycle lanes and a lot of "new" cyclists will stop cycling because it just doesn't feel as safe as promised. If you don't address all of these things and make sure that they get future-proofed full-segregation is doomed to a shitty failure. This isn't a build it and they will come type of deal. So go on, how are you going to address all of these problems?

  • The council streetsweepers haven't used the lane as a good place to push all the fallen leaves and the snow so that people can walk along the Embankment safely.

    This is the major beef I had with council.

    They build cycle lane, but spend almost next to nothing maintaining it, resulting in lots of cracked tarmac, broken glasses, overground weeds, etc.

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