Is it time to start calling out bad cyclists?

fuck.. Hope I don't feature..

haha that's what i was thinking! the guy who kicks into sprint mode to pass that left turning coach on the left is an complete tool.

More idiots this morning.

Again, I'm waiting behind a bus at the lights.

Just as the bus starts pulling away (and I do), a guy cuts me up, dives down the inside of the bus, realises he has nowhere to go, goes up the curb, and cycles off down the pavement.

I'm just happily waiting behind the bus, and overtake it when safe...

The lack of awareness and the inability to spot potential risks always amazes me.

Was cyclign over Putney bridge last week when a nodder (on a road bike and who had all the kit - so who appeared to know what they might be doing) decided to swerve across the road to cut me up - and was oblivious to my warnign shout and of course didn't look. That I can deal with - I was in no rush and I'll be careful at 'bunch starts' as you expect that type of wankery.

It was the next bit that worried me.

They were ahead of me in the bus lane with slow moving traffic to the right in the otuside lane and a bus and taxi in front when they went to over take the indicating taxi that was already pullign out. This person had to put on the brakes and wobbled and had to unclip to avoid a collision. Why they couldn't see what was goign to happen was beyond me.

Not too bad so far but then not being able to anticipate the same sodding taxi pullign back into the bus land once it had gone by the stationary bus was a monumental error. Instead of leaving space and anticpating the move this person went up the inside on the taxi as it was pulling in and got knocked off!

Fortunately the rider had a few scrapes and maybe a bruise or two the next day but were essentially unharmed.

I'm not absolving the taxi of any blame (twat didn't check mirrors or blind spot) but part of the not gettign twatted by vehicles is reading the road and anticipating this type of thing.

The rider got up and apologised to the taxi (!) and I checked to see if they were OK (nice to see none of the nodders near the incident stopped to help). I don't think the person on the recievign end of the taxi was too impressed when I asked why they did what they did and why they felt the taxi wasn't going to do exactly the same thign again! I think I was a tad annoyed that they'd risked theiir life in such a stupid way to cut 5 or 6 seconds off their journey. If you want to get there faster just pedal harder on the long straight safe bits.

rant over

This morning.. Lady nodder in dayglo, helmet hanging off the back of her head.. Me sat behind bus.. She decided to squeeze along the inside of it.. Then just sit there literally wedged between it and the curb.. I thought it was going to be horror show.. Thankfully bus pulled away from her rather that grind her into the curb.

I give up trying to give advice now..

More idiots this morning.

Again, I'm waiting behind a bus at the lights.

Just as the bus starts pulling away (and I do), a guy cuts me up, dives down the inside of the bus, realises he has nowhere to go, goes up the curb, and cycles off down the pavement.

I'm just happily waiting behind the bus, and overtake it when safe...

Faux fixie twatter (ss one brake) did exactly the same to me today.

yah. I almost never head for the ASL box, as usually the vehicle at the front will accelerate from the lights faster than me, and if they don't, it's hardly gonna hold me up.

Having the cognitive ability to consider this fact appears to be beyond many.

Perhaps there was more of a case for getting to the front (when you're certain there's loads of time before the lights change) when the volume of cyclists was less (when EC1 was all fields, etc, etc), but even then I always thought it would have to be accompanied by 100% ability and commitment to accelerate from the lights more quickly than anything behind you, at least for the first 30m or so.

So many London road users have their heads up their arses at the moment, it's pathetic*.

*and dangerous

I'd much rather that any traffic remains ahead of me, for the most part. There's little more disconcerting on a commute than a stream of angry automobiles rattling past.

+1 Friday. Most of the time I can't be arsed to struggle to get in an ASL.. There really is no point, or value, aggravating other road users (cars, vans etc).

The problem with the ASL's is that they are full of cyclists.

Another fine reason to steer clear

If you had one grenade, that's where you'd throw it

*looksintospacedreamyeyed

but dammit just think of the potholes...

Just saw a guy on a black cannondale MTB with chopped down bars almost get himself minced at the lights by Southwark bridge - he'd stopped at the pedestrian crossing to turn right, and when a big green coach in the left hand lane slowed down at the lights, he assumed that meant that the lights had changed and cycled merrily over the crossing. He very nearly got wiped out by the cab that was coming down the right hand lane at speed because the lights were actually still green.

A courier initially copied this presumptive move further up the road at the junction but luckily thought better of it once the cab had piled in, horn blaring.

One thing that puzzles me slightly is why you would want to have teeny tiny narrow chopped bars on a MTB?

If you had one grenade, that's where you'd throw it

*looksintospacedreamyeyed

but dammit just think of the potholes...

I am in inner conflict

that one you fell in on the way back from bodeans looked like it could have been made by a grenade.

If you had one grenade, that's where you'd throw it

Claymore mine would prob be safer for those who hang back and for potholes...

^That was a fucking outrageous pothole.. Almost knocked my teeth out.

As Hippy said #withsuncomesfuckwits, never a truer word spoken, some of the things I've scene over the last 2 days are just mad, Brompton riders racing like they're on crack through red lights, wobbling to shite once their legs give out etc plus the one for pushing to the front, round cars but going so far forward you can't see the traffic light's anymore so traffic moves off and they're still there.

My moto is 'if I wouldn't do it my car, then I'm not doing on my bike' plus waiting your turn at traffic at lights has it benefits, drafting cars for that little extra ease when pulling away far out weighs push to the front syndrome, plus doing 40-50 miles a day commuting, you soon learn what benefit's your ride and what doesn't.

@Brave Where is this by the way?

outside Shaftesbury Theatre. I believe said pothole is visible from space

you can probably see it on google maps without zooming in.

People have been riding like cocks all winter. It's not just the fairweather brigade who are fucking useless.

waits for sad cunt to ftfy by deleting 'like'

...*almost exclusively young girls on shopper bikes, or older women on shopper bikes.
...

Anecdotal at best.

...anyways, /rant over, the guy probably survived and probably won't learn the error of his ways, and the bus driver woman will probably have a stern telling off and be sent home for a few days, despite doing nothing wrong.

Nearly all buses are fitted with cameras so I imagine the driver will be fine from a disciplinary p.o.v and will probably be pretty angry once they've watched the footage as he/she will have gone through the emotional wringer only to see it was the result of someone else's epic stupidity.

/rant

Dunno if this is the right place for this but I stopped at a zebra crossing today and some twat on a baby blue bike went right into me and destroyed my rear mech which I discovered only after he trotted off... Argh fucker! The worrying thing is if he hadn't been stopped by me he would have been stopped by the mother and childern's faces crossing in front of us...

/rant off

Maybe worth checking what is over your shoulder to see what/who is there and tell them you're going to be stopping (either verbally or with jesticulation)?