This morning's commute and other commuting stories

Haha! Good to know.
Even though it's a bit of a rat it's one of my favourite bikes. I often think I need to smarten it up but the whole point is that's it stays undesirable and not expensive.

Pulled up at the lights at the bottom of Clapham High Street. They were amber, going red. A car and a roadie had slightly RLJ'd ahead of me.

Driver rolls down his window and yells, "You don't have to stop, you know. You don't get points."

Um, yes I do have do stop. It's sort of the law...

Pretty obvious admission that the driver only stops because they might otherwise get points on their licence. Sort of not giving a flying fuck about the law.

At the time I thought he meant points as in the things that make prizes. Points as in "well done you for stopping, have some points". Didn't occur to me that he could have meant licence points until I reread this.

ya. not gonna catch him either!

Bike back on the road already though :)

No CCTV, no witness in stationary traffic ?
Glad you're ok.

Seems you can't win: You rlj and cyclists get a bad name, you stop and somebody also complains ;)

Punctured tire, unraveling bar tap and being drafted by a guy on expensive looking carbon bike. Bit rubbish all in all.

G4S amberlamps driver using phone while dithering down the A23... 'i'm not using it as a phone, i'm using it as a satnav'

I almost got run off the road in Bermondsey by a Home Office Immigration Enforcement van.

I considered doing a bit of finger-waving at them but didn't fancy being deported back to Wales.

Snakebite puncture on the way home yesterday, as I slammed into a cunningly disguised pothole. Why is it that these things always happen when you're in a hurry to get somewhere (in this case to pick my kids up from nursery)

Managed to swap out the tube in 7 minutes, according to the guy who was watching me from his seat outside a café.

Got to nursery on time, got a top 10 in a Strava segment, and got compliment from café guy on the speed of my repair, so I'd still rate the journey an 8/10, despite everything.

Short interval session yesterday, felt like superman this morning. 10/10 would do short sharp sessions again.

Far too much manoeuvre-mirror-signal this morning.

I have similar - got any pics? Was in St Georges. Tooting. All Ok now though - and with my new Pacemaker I'm stronger and faster than ever! Big up the NHS!

Witnessed a guy on a motorbike go the wrong way around a little traffic island on City Road in stationary traffic and shortly thereafter T-bone a fat chav on a mountain bike who shot out from in front of a lorry without looking.

Both went down, both seemed unhurt but with broken bikes. Gave my number to both as a witness and then went on my way.

A couple of years ago I got a double flat smashing a pothole on Oxford street.
I emailed City of Westminster council to let them know where it was. It wasn't there the day before so I gave them the heads up as it was pretty dangerous.
I was emailed back within a couple of hours saying they were sending someone to fill the pothole and gave me a compensation form to fill out to get the money back for two new inners.
I have never been so impressed with a local council. I was surprised to even hear back from them, let alone them to offer me compensation. I didn't ask for anything in my email as it was just a polite notice of the pothole.
And they had indeed filled the hole with actual tarmac by the time I rode home.

10/10 would email City of Westminster again.

Please report it and save someone a hospital visit:
http://www.fillthathole.org.uk/

VeeVee told us AGES ago, hippy, that if we report hazards via the tfl version of fill that hole, then councils are notified by tfl, and are obliged to report back to tfl about how it was resolved. Or something like that.

Unlike Ealing who take shit like that to court and then lose and have to pay the original compensation (a wheel) and the court costs. Fuckwits.

So the TFL one is better than fillthathole?

Speaking from experience I take it?!
I think City of Westminster is an anomaly, but as I understand it they are rolling in cash.

No, I'm currently awaiting compensation from another council.

The Ealing comment was related to: http://www.bikeradar.com/us/news/article/ealing-council-panned-over-pothole-case-13839/

Well after years of commuting I finally had my first accident with a car. Driver pulled out and I hit the brakes. Managed to avoid major catastrophe and ended up being very slow contact. Driver decided to keep driving (their car into me) and then drove off.

Luckily pretty minor however annoyed the driver made no effort to stop. I called the police but they didn't sound too interested.

Happy to hear you avoided a major collision.
It's disgusting that the driver didn't even stop to acknowledge you.
I'm always torn in moments like this whether to report to the police or catch up with the car and just go apeshit and smash as much of their car as possible before fleeing.

Yeah