This morning's commute and other commuting stories

It goes deeper than that, I don’t have a job and I can’t ride a bike, my whole presence on this forum has been about justifying my bizarre obsession with discarded undies.

Glorious commute this morning. Fresh breeze from the back, sun shining and all the other cunts hiding from Corona at home. Only a single pedelec trying to kill me.

Quiet in the City today - noticeably less pedestrians than normal.

Tailwinds, sunshine, relatively few wankers 5/7 .

Homewards will be less fun though as the wind isn't forecast to shift.

Headwinds are back

Headwinds are back front

.

Funny that I had some sort of thorn puncturing rather nit very puncture resistant Vittoria Control tyre

Sorry lads, you'll have to be a lot quicker than that to catch me...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhbByXVU7G0

Anyone else wonder what was going on around Finsbury Park this eve?

So many police just inside the gates. And two tents had gone up...

I thought it looked more like an event than a crime scene. Found this photo on twitter from 1:40...

Ah, it does. It was still going on at 6.30.

Said no one ever... believe me I grew up near Southend and lived there for a few years... it's the grimmest it's been for a long time

https://twitter.com/MPSRTPC/status/1238210847899615232

It was a crime-fighting event. Pretty successful one by the sounds of it.

Well, one day without massive winds. I'll take it.

@Brun

Top answer on twitter - "Do it more often as it Just goes to show you how many criminals are about." - I can agree with that. 10 car seizures?? Honestly more than I would have expected for a day of checking people.

What's happening in the video you posted?

Anyone know the legality of a completely unmarked/covert police motorcycle blasting through a major junction on a red light?

Southbound at Seven Sisters this morning I was on a green heading from Broad Lane to Seven Sisters Road when 2 unmarked police cars with lights and sirens passed through the junction on a red. Obviously I could see/hear them and gave way before moving off across the junction and turning left but staying in the right hand lane.

Approx 20 metres behind them was a motorbike that I assumed would stop at the lights, but instead opened up the throttle to tail the 2 cars and nearly wiped me out in the process. Rider slowed down, flipped up his visor and informed me he was police.

Absolutely no lights/sirens/marking/uniform/hi-viz/etc

Look for the stinger being deployed from the silver Honda towards the end. Reasons explained in the twitter link above.

@Brun 10-4

Awesome. Police were blocking the sad cycle lane that skips those lights at endymion road so I wondered what was going on.

Training it today but spotted a strong look being rocked by someone at the train station. Woolly hat and a high neck wool cardigan pulled up high, leaving only a very narrow slit for the eyes. Presumably a misguided attempt at virus protection. Not sure why they'd decided to forego shoes and socks and go barefoot though.

Seen them doing something similar at the top of Holloway Road on bonfire night last year with a proper checkpoint, did wonder if I was cycling down into some kind of major incident!

I've posted about this before--there was a very successful trial of this in Haringey about 20 years ago, which was then not continued, except sporadically like this. 'Denying criminals the use of the road network' is by all accounts a successful prevention strategy, but I haven't heard about anything like this for years. I'm sure it goes on all the time, but it is as it always is with successful strategies--those they are aimed at would eventually find ways of getting around them if they are deployed all the time. Good job they didn't catch you with that stinger.

I would have thought that a police motorcyclist on an unmarked bike would likewise have to put on lights and a siren if called upon to get somewhere quickly. Glad you weren't hurt.

A lot, probably most, police surveillance bikes, which seems to be what you saw, won’t have blues and twos fitted, they’re not really necessary - from an operational perspective nor will they wear any visible police kit, however police bikes still don’t have a legal excuse to ride dangerously

Seen them do this a few times, usually get good results, they stop just about everyone that looks suspect not just random hence the high success rate on folks with outstanding convictions or fines etc..