Worried for your safety

I've been in London for the last four days and it's been a bit of an eye-opener. I'd never seen it close up before, having only passed through at a rate of knots - train, tube, office...that sort of thing. Anyway, there was a chance to look around this week, so I thought about taking a bike with me. When it turned out that I would have to leave my wheels chained up outside, I decided not to bother. That turned out to be a blessing, I reckon.

I've never seen so many cars, driven so aggressively and at such speed. I mean, I thought I was traffic-hardened, but Glasgow's roads are a cycling paradise compared to London. How do you manage to cope in that free-for-all?

I felt like a total peasant - a complete country bumpkin. On Wednesday morning I was standing on a traffic island on New Bridge Street when some courier dude went by on a dark blue fixed wheel beastie. He had Sidis and no brakes. That was about all I took in, cos I was standing there wondering how far this guy was going to get. There were evil-looking hackney cabs everywhere and his imminent death seemed pretty invitable. Well, to me at any rate. I had plenty of time to watch the courier ride into the distance, cos it took me about ten minutes to get off that bloody traffic island. I wish that was a joke, but it's not.

How do you manage to cope with that every day, folks? It's such a shame there are so many cars, cos the roads all seem so flat and so wide. I dunno. It just shocked me. I thought there would be quiet bits in amongst all the mania. I was still looking for them when I left this morning.

When I got to my accommodation on Monday, I shut the door behind me and put on the kettle. I was pretty sure I was safe from the traffic, but then I discovered that I could make my hanky go black by blowing my nose... Now that can't be good, can it?

I'm tipping my Euskaltel cap to you, ladies and gents, just try and help me make some sense of it, eh? And be careful out there.

survival of the fittest. keep your eyes and ears open and expect every other road user to do something stupid.

london is easy. everything is Stop but the bike.

everything but the girl.

sorry, what was the question again?

I love it.

Whenever i get out into the open, I quickly lose interest. It's boring when there're no vehicles to play with.

5:30pm.. give me Park Lane over a country lane, anyday.

it's not that bad. would drive you up the wall if you let it get to ya. people normally know their place and pretty much look for each other. applies to every road user with the exception of some fkheads...

driving and cycling in central london is just like walking along a busy pedestrianised high street on a xmas shopping weekend. you dont run into people cos you watch everyone else around you...and hopefully most are doin the same....now speed that up to about 10-30mph

It ain't that bad,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=agI5za_gHHU

lpg I love it.

Whenever i get out into the open, I quickly lose interest. It's boring when there're no vehicles to play with.

5:30pm.. give me Park Lane over a country lane, anyday.

learn to TT mate.

..but yeah, playing in traffic is pretty fun, in IMO less dangerous.
i'm less scared of the taxi going 15mph than i am of the soccer-mom with an oxycoton addiction speeding around suburban corners blindly at 60mph in her hummer while talking on her cellphone to her husband who's probably having an affair with the secretary as they speak.

It's not so bad - there's some aggro from time to time, and I think most people have had a minor accident or two, but you learn when you can push it and when to just go with the flow. It's more about the rhythm than anything else.

kilgore_trout [quote]lpg I love it.

Whenever i get out into the open, I quickly lose interest. It's boring when there're no vehicles to play with.

5:30pm.. give me Park Lane over a country lane, anyday.

learn to TT mate.

..but yeah, playing in traffic is pretty fun, in IMO less dangerous.
i'm less scared of the taxi going 15mph than i am of the soccer-mom with an oxycoton addiction speeding around suburban corners blindly at 60mph in her hummer while talking on her cellphone to her husband who's probably having an affair with the secretary as they speak.[/quote]

i see what you mean, and totally agree, i find its even more fun if you have a good soundtrack to ride with, normally some DnB or some ratm, i dont mind.

sorry i forgot to add, what is oxycotton?

danger joel sorry i forgot to add, what is oxycotton?

i dont know if you're joking because i misspelled it or not...
but it's a highly addictive pain killer that some rich people take like candy. i'm fairly certain it also sedates the hell out of you.
rush limbaugh was addicted to it

London drivers may hate us almost as much as we hate them, but at least they know we are there. They may give us only 2 inches of space, but more often than not they are at least aware of your presence. That's the key to London survival - on the rare occasions that they can build up enough speed to try to go past you, make them go past you by occupying the road...

or just take some oxycotton stuff and forget about the busy roads ;)

i wasnt taking the piss, i miss saw what you wrote and thought that was how it was spelt

is it weired to enjoy riding really fast at peds crossing the road when its green for me?? cos i do! i especially like it when i do that and they don't see me....and i shout LOOK WHERE YOUR GOING!!! and the girl jumps out of her skin...its fun!

welcome Soweto

proper gent you are

taking your time to tip your hat to your fellow Londoners

tell you what me old china it ain't all that dangerous once you find your feet

start slowly, take your time, always ride at least an arms length from the parked cars

obey the rules to start with, keep your mouth shut and your wits about you

in no time at all you will find your rhythm

once you have found your feet you can start taking liberties

when I was a courier it took the new lads roughly three weeks

Y'know what you said about the hanky going black? That's the tube for you. it's why we're on bikes in the first place!

Actually its a little weird, i remember that happening when i first got to London, but it never happens anymore... Maybe that black stuff is actually the burned out ashes of your soul....

as for london traffic, its like anything that you experience for the first time - it seems a lot more scary than it is! I bet you had the same sort of fear when you started riding fixed. (well i did.) Its just the fact that you're not used to it and you don;t know how it would work... sort of thing.

Hm... Some of that makes sense. I can definitely get behind asm's theory about the tube being to blame for the black stuff in my hankies. Although to be honest, I don't want to think about that too much. If I'm blowing crystal clear snot when I step out from under the shower tomorrow morning, I'll be quite happy to forget all about it.

Not quite a "fellow Londoner" yet, Mr Buddha. I'm safely tucked up back in Glasgow, innit? :-P Maybe the traffic doesn't look quite as scary when you're actually part of it. Perhaps it seems worse from the pavement. Some of the stuff I saw was totally crazy, but I also saw lots of patient drivers waiting behind bikes, and lots of sensible cyclists taking the whole lane, just like Hutch mentioned.

Maybe I'll give it a shot if I find myself down there again. Then again, I'm not sure if it's something that you could just drop into for a couple of days. Three weeks to build up proficiency sounds like a good breaking-in period to me. It was a novelty to see so many folk riding fixed anyway. Lots of nice geared road bikes too. They were a hell of a lot more interesting than the touristy things that I did see.

I love the traffic, really, I love it.

if you learn to ride or drive in london, you can do it anywhere. On the bike, you find that everywhere else, you're much more aggressive in getting round traffic and demanding drivers pay attention to you, they ain't used to cyclists riding like that elsewhere so consequently you get the horn a bit more, and some strange looks - well I did when i used to ride up in newcastle when i studied there.
Personally I love the challenge of traffic, finding the right route, the quickest route, leaving the muppets behind who won't do anything but resolutely stick to the safety - or not - of the lefthand side, anyone can ride fast when there's no traffic around, riding fast in traffic is what makes riding in london special. that special exhilaration when you do it, and like anything it becomes second nature, and you only realise how fast or ruthless you are being when you ride with someone who doesn't ride like that, and you have to tone it down for their benefit, be slower, wait for bigger gaps, etc.

Soweto888 When I got to my accommodation on Monday, I shut the door behind me and put on the kettle. I was pretty sure I was safe from the traffic, but then I discovered that I could make my hanky go black by blowing my nose... Now that can't be good, can it?

That wasn't the traffic. You went on the tube too didn't you. Northern Line by any chance?

The black snot is the dirt and grime that you breathe in travelling underground, not the stuff that you breathe in when you're on the streets above.

when I was a courier it took the new lads roughly three weeks

Agreed...but for couriers that's nine hours a day, 5 days a week....if you extrapolate that riding time to commuting it would be more like 9 or 10 weeks!

...and if you have had a $hitty day at work, 30 minutes of mixing it up with the traffic means you've forgotten all about it by the time you get home

velocity boy The black snot is the dirt and grime that you breathe in travelling underground, not the stuff that you breathe in when you're on the streets above.

My girlfriend pointed that out to me when she blew her knows and told me to do the same. I'd not used the tube at all because I walked from King's Cross to my hotel with a mate who I met at the station. I shall have to tell her that. She was using it as a reason not to live in London. Pah!