Is it time to start calling out bad cyclists?

Cunt.

Yes, the time has come to.

Can I be the first to say, we're *all *shit and our clothes are retarded?

Cunt.

You called?

One issue I have with this thread is that complaints are constantly levied against a homogenised mass of so called 'Boris-biking, fluoro-clad, Cat 5 nodders'. The reality is that there are poor cyclists across the style spectrum, irrespective of the type of bicycle, clothing or sundry equipment an individual happens to sport. Heck, if you think Cat 5s are bad, you should see some of the dick moves pulled by Cat 3/4 riders in crit races.

I think this thread serves a useful purpose for identifying poor cycling and suggesting ways to tackle it, but I have come to the view that leaving out some of the name calling associated with it would be beneficial.
I don't call out jerks (red light jumpers, undertakers, etc). They're always either much faster than I am or not likely to take advise from a jumped up helmet, googles and gore-tex wearing nerd like me. It's the cautious newbies and genuinely clueless nodders going up the inside of busses and indicating vans that make me want to yell out. Fortunately that kind of event is rare on my route, but it's the only case that makes me want to intervene.

I was waiting in a queue of traffic at the lights today, southbound on Gower St, intending to turn left into Torrington Place; just like the van, car, and 2 cabs in front of me, all of them with indicators on.

Being somewhere between secondary and primary, I kept glancing behind me, waiting for the inevitable 2-wheeled kerb squeezer to roll up, which they did - they always do. The lights were due to change imminently, so I did a pre-emptive left turn signal, mainly to block the rider from fulfilling their mission of selfishness / unawareness / potential injury.

All of my rationale was implicit in the signal. My raised arm 'called out' to the cyclist, a plaintive cry into the combined blindspot and cul de sac of hubris.

So... it's definitely time to call out a plaintive cry into the combined blindspot and cul de sac of hubris. Well at least that's resolved because I was about to start a whole nutha thread.

No, it's time to *imply *a calling out through gestures.

Back to giving people the finger then, I suppose.

Nah man - imply away. (I iz pazzive aggrezzive alzo).

I'm waiting for Clever Pun to post on here shortly...

Gotta call myself out today. I recently moved my brakes to bar-ends because the bmx position was pissing me off. Today was going towards a crossroads and realised a van was about to cross the other way ahead of me, who had priority (the road markings were very faded), so I eased up, reached for the brakes, felt nothing, and my hands simply locked up onto the handlebars. I rolled over the junction, around the front of the van, around some bollards, onto the pavement and rolled to a halt before I could prise my hands off. I wanted to apologise to the driver, but he was gone and no doubt now thinks that all cyclists are cunts. I feel like a bit f a cunt, to be honest.

I think I may get a coaster brake installed. In addition to, not instead of, my other brakes.

You are not serious are you festus?

Damn right. I didn't say that cyclists are more dangerous but that I have more close shaves at the hands of other cyclists at the moment. (I understand the unquestionable stakes to my health if a motorised vehicle screws up with me). In a traffic jam it's simply not possible to have issue with drivers (barring car doors) however those that choose not look while swerving in and out of lanes around high sided vehicles pose a much greater risk. Also those that choose to undertake me with a few cm between them and the curb.

I don't have that much issue with light jumping per se; after all we can all navigate ourselves across a road on foot minus the help of the green man. Same goes for being on a bike. Yet yesterday I had a green on Farringdon Rd passing Ludgate/Fleet st and almost t-boned two cyclists that were incredibly inattentive to the traffic they were cutting across on a red. Could have been so messy.

I'm sure all of my posts here outline what could be done better and are not just elitist rants about fcuking: fixies skidders/ nodders/ fashionistas etc.

Again I'm not perfect. I make mistakes, I occasionally drift off, I'm sometimes in a rush and will do stuff that could attract a fine. I just wanted this thread to be a resource. A place that you could read about other people's mistakes rather than learning the hard way.

...

I think this thread serves a useful purpose for identifying poor cycling and suggesting ways to tackle it, but I have come to the view that leaving out some of the name calling associated with it would be beneficial.

this

It's just confirmation bias. When somebody sees crap cycling from a type they don't like (nodder, hipster, raphian, whatever), they remember it and mention it here as a significant detail. Otherwise, they just call out the riding but don't add it to their mental tally.

After nodding around Berlin today, I think I have a much greater appreciation for cycling in London. The same problems brought up time and again in this thread are also ubiquitous in Berlin - RLJers, people going too slowly, people RLJing and then going too slowly, getting undertaken at lights, watching people go up the inside of right-turning vehicles that are too big to see them. Plus some problems that are even worse here, like people cycling the wrong way up cycle lanes and not even really watching where they're going.
There really are some things that actually make me pretty grateful for being in London most of the time. The bike lanes in Berlin, that you don't have to use but are strongly encouraged to, both by general consensus and more openly by drivers, can be really narrow, very rutted, and most worringly, narrow and rutted and on a busy pavement. Cycling along them at speeds I'm used to riding at feels like I'm posing a much greater risk to others than I would be by going with the traffic. But when I did that, I had a load of vans and cars do that thing where they come too close behind, and then don't give you enough room when overtaking, to make the point. I also had a horrible woman in a Mercedes pull alongside me, wind down the window and shout 'there's a bike lane just there' in that really fucking annoying sing-song voice a lot of Germans tend to use when they are agitated.
It seems that German cyclist and town planners are slowly coming round to the idea that shared lanes are better and safer than segregation - in fact this was the leading article in the Berlin section of the Berliner Morgenpost when I arrived - but it actually made me appreciate London more.

tl;dr

It could be worse. There's not a place in the world where you're not going to come across dickhead cyclists. London isn't the worst place, neither is Berlin, and in every city I've been in, cycling is the healthiest, cheapest and most fun way to get around.

(This was much better, more concise, and more fluent in my head, and it also had a point).

So your point is: people are dickheads.

Nah, point is, I'm looking forward to coming back to London, cycling there isn't really so bad after all

I cycled in Berlin and Bavaria, lots of cycle provision, but if you do a cheeky little manoeuvre here and there - like using the road instead of the pavement cyclepath - the motorists go ape shit. In my brief experience.

I get frustrated with other road users who don't follow the rules of the road, but the level of risk posed by steel boxes is much higher than other cyclists. Though I have had a few close calls with dangerous cyclists.

My favourite recent one was the middle aged lady who was weaving all over the road, so I went to overtake her widely. She then swerved towards me and punched her arm out to signal (with no check behind) as she suddenly started a right turn.

Yes it was close but if that had been a car it could potentially have been a lot worse.

After nodding around Berlin today, I think I have a much greater appreciation for cycling in London. The same problems brought up time and again in this thread are also ubiquitous in Berlin - RLJers, people going too slowly, people RLJing and then going too slowly, getting undertaken at lights, watching people go up the inside of right-turning vehicles that are too big to see them. Plus some problems that are even worse here, like people cycling the wrong way up cycle lanes and not even really watching where they're going.
There really are some things that actually make me pretty grateful for being in London most of the time. The bike lanes in Berlin, that you don't have to use but are strongly encouraged to, both by general consensus and more openly by drivers, can be really narrow, very rutted, and most worringly, narrow and rutted and on a busy pavement. Cycling along them at speeds I'm used to riding at feels like I'm posing a much greater risk to others than I would be by going with the traffic. But when I did that, I had a load of vans and cars do that thing where they come too close behind, and then don't give you enough room when overtaking, to make the point. I also had a horrible woman in a Mercedes pull alongside me, wind down the window and shout 'there's a bike lane just there' in that really fucking annoying sing-song voice a lot of Germans tend to use when they are agitated.
It seems that German cyclist and town planners are slowly coming round to the idea that shared lanes are better and safer than segregation - in fact this was the leading article in the Berlin section of the Berliner Morgenpost when I arrived - but it actually made me appreciate London more.

tl;dr

It could be worse. There's not a place in the world where you're not going to come across dickhead cyclists. London isn't the worst place, neither is Berlin, and in every city I've been in, cycling is the healthiest, cheapest and most fun way to get around.

(This was much better, more concise, and more fluent in my head, and it also had a point).

Tom, read this:

http://www.adfc.de/news/2011---1-quartal/grundsatzurteil-zur-radwegebenutzungspflicht-veroeffentlicht

Hit them with their ignorance of the law--hard. The highest administrative court in the country has spoken. :)

Tom, read this:

http://www.adfc.de/news/2011---1-quartal/grundsatzurteil-zur-radwegebenutzungspflicht-veroeffentlicht

Hit them with their ignorance of the law--hard. The highest administrative court in the country has spoken. :)

tg;dr

The reason bad cyclists pose a risk to the rest of us is this.

The way you behave tells people how you see yourself, and thereby how you expect to be treated.

Every time a cyclist jumps a red light or rides on a pavement, he's implicitly buying into the idea that bikes are closer to toys than grown up transport. By deciding the rules of the road don't apply to him, he is sending a message that cyclists are not legitimate users of the roads.

The reason bad cyclists pose a risk to the rest of us is this.

The way you behave tells people how you see yourself, and thereby how you expect to be treated.

Every time a cyclist jumps a red light or rides on a pavement, he's implicitly buying into the idea that bikes are closer to toys than grown up transport. By deciding the rules of the road don't apply to him, he is sending a message that cyclists are not legitimate users of the roads.

Do wimminz not ride bikes?

^to be fair the vast majority of RLJs I see are male.

^to be fair the vast majority of RLJs I see are male.

And female

there tend to be a higher proportion of males to females cycling, but i have a feeling the RLJ figures would show a similar proportion of men and women RLJ, though this is supposition on my behalf.