This morning's commute and other commuting stories

I’ve had a heron

the urge takes us all once in a while

Standard ornithologists’ word for spotting, especially funny when they

had a shag

Bird is the word

Boobies hehehehehehe.

I prefer a great tit

A heron flew over the Million People march on Saturday.
Outer north west London's best heronry

There’s a colony of herons nesting on the island in the lake in Kelsey Park, so you see them all around the wider Beckenham area.

I saw a fox chasing a rat on Waterlink Way once, on my way to a forum drinks. #csb

Tell me more, does it avoid the horrible industrial estate?

I ran over an enormous rat on the towpath in Enfield a few weeks ago. Big bump, but rat appeared unbothered by the impact.

Also, there is a heron that all but lives on the towpath in tottenham. The people living in the most proximal flat feed it scraps, and have named it Percy.

If I can tap your stupid van while you cut me off, you're a cunt end of line. Didn't feel like discussing it with him anymore so just rode on but realised I need to relax more. Last 5/6k's are country roads with little to no traffic so thankfully the bastard didn't follow me.

No. Amey just wasn't following the signs!

From Lennard Road, you go down the bike path where the roots are pushing up the path by a little stream, come out onto the horrible industrial estate, then turn right and Lower Sydenham Station is right in front of you and then turn left along that little pathway alongside the tracks. You come out by that pub (can't remember it's name) and cross the busy road on Bell Green. Then you are on Waterlink Way.

I'm sure that you would have cycled that way before.

Heron chat - I took this photo out of our back bedroom window, the day before yesterday:

1 Attachment

It's amazing how some people don't get this - if a cyclist's hand or arm can make contact with your vehicle as you pass, you are far too close - no exceptions. Relaxing and forgetting is key though!

Spending 99% of my time commuting on a Croix de fer with a rack bag and panniers, I’d almost forgotten the simple pleasure of commuting on a track bike.

Felt ten years younger this morning.

If only this policeman were always there...

1 Attachment

Yeah, I couldn't wrap my head around it. Extra funny: I was on a separate bike lane but the cars that need to get to the side streets need to cross it when they leave the main road. I already saw him looking around so was able to slow down but goddamn. So it wasn't even overtaking/cutting me off/ just plain ignoring me while making a turn.

I cycled it on Sunday with my daughters. Was hoping for some secret, idyllic route as the eldest loathes cycling through the industrial estate as she is scared a truck is going to squish her. :-(

Thanks for replying though.

Not sure if this has been posted anywhere yet... interesting.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/27/all-new-uk-cars-to-have-speed-limiters-by-2022-under-eu-plans

It's an interesting proposal but, in reality, will fail miserably.

My car has road sign speed limit detection and i'd say it's around 40% accurate and is completely screwed by roadwork sections, busy town centres (arguably where speed limiting would be most successful) and long sections with no signs.

Implementing a GPS solution wouldn't work in cities and manufacturers would be less than keen to be on the hook for making sure their navigation systems were up to date with speed limit changes etc.

Also, whilst speeding is definitely a cause of accidents and road fatalities (i still do it on motorways all the time...) being able to be slightly faster than other traffic is a safety feature when merging, overtaking etc. For my police bike safe course, i was encouraged to use the power of my motorbike to make overtakes quick and safe. If that means doing 10mph over the limit to get past another vehicle, that's fine.

It's also likely that this would tank the new car market (in the short term at least) as people avoid cars with the feature.

I'd rather see the industry focus on automatic collision avoidance and autonomous driving features, where possible, rather than limiting the speed that people can drive at.

All cars to be pedal powered (no, not accelerator pedals) would work.

I read the story on the BBC too and I'm thinking the headlines a bit misleading (possibly deliberately). Both articles do state that the driver can override the systems temporarily by pushing the accelerator or can be totally disabled for the duration of the trip. So it's not so much a speed limiter as a strong suggestion to stay within the speed limit. The key for me is that the data will be recorded and, as the driver has to make a conscious decision to disable the system, should an accident occur there is less recourse to the "momentary lapse of attention" defence that plays so well in court.

Yep, the actual big story here is the plan to fit "black boxes" in all new cars (and exactly how much data they may be gathering given that a lot of cars are likely to have interior/exterior cameras, etc)

On the point of making swift overtakes, was driving through the peaks a few days ago, stuck behind someone who was overtaking a group of cyclists one by one because the driver refused to accelerate to overtake them all as a group... The cyclist were looking deservedly pissed off, especially when the person bailed out of overtakes and just tried to merge back into the middle of the group every time another car appeared comingthe opposite way, half a mile down the road

I just sat back and watched the whole thing unfold, convinced that someone was going to die... People who aren’t confident drivers are more dangerous than the rest

People who aren’t confident drivers are more dangerous than the rest

I've seen enough over confident driving to call bullshit on that.

double-post