http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1351218,00.html
*Interesting* article in the Guardian today.
Cheers, helen s
"My friends, the cycopaths
Like most cyclists I thought traffic lights were for wimps. Then came the
accident
Claire Armitstead
Monday November 15, 2004
The Guardian
Eighteen months ago, when a congestion charge zone was slapped down bang in the
middle of my route to work, I became a cyclist. It's not that I didn't own and
ride a bicycle before, just that suddenly it replaced a car as my principal
form of transport. Morning and evening, five days a week, I found myself part
of a growing crowd of pedal-pushers who zigzagged in and out of the traffic,
shot across red lights and, if necessary, scooted up on to pavements to
leapfrog a queue of smouldering motorists.
At first I was doubtful whether this new enthusiasm would survive the rigours
of a whole winter, but a few miserable waits at bus stops in the driving rain
convinced me that it was by far the most efficient, and least stressful, way to
travel through London. Grudging capitulation to a full set of ghastly
fluorescent waterproofs completed my conversion to an all-weather trouper, who
would stop at nothing short of snowdrifts and blizzards.
And I wasn't alone. Suddenly, the roads were heaving with cyclists of all
speeds and proficiencies. Not just the roads, but the pavements. On the rare
occasions when I took a taxi, I would find myself defending my fellow cyclists
to grumbling cabbies, while becoming increasingly aware that some of their
(our?) behaviour was, frankly, indefensible.
This new road crew expected to be treated as part of the traffic, yet
frequently broke the most basic rules of the Highway Code. I became expert at
enacting a masque of shock and horror, while secretly aware that I did many of
these things myself. Lights? Forget them. Zebra crossings? What the hell.
As so often happens, it took an accident to make me realise just how dangerous
this laxness was. I was not actually on my bicycle but on foot, when I was
knocked flat by a cyclist. He was belting along a pavement to beat a stationary
line of traffic, oblivious that he might meet someone slower than him.
As I shivered in casualty, waiting to be stitched up, I went through a
kaleidoscope of feelings: relief that neither of us was more badly hurt, anger
that he hadn't looked where he was going, but also a guilty realisation that
there were occasions when, if someone had wandered into my path, I might well
have sent them flying too.
Something else struck me - that the blame could not be put on simple
recklessness. My three-mile route to work involves a variety of different
provisions for cyclists. There are two or three stretches of ordinary highway,
one bit of private road, where pedestrians seem surprised and indignant at
meeting cycles, and several lengths of cycle paths, marked out in green and
often obstructed by parked cars, forcing you to bob in and out of the traffic.
There are places where a cycle path suddenly ends for no reason, and several
bits where the green paths take cyclists over pavements to cross traffic lights
at pedestrian crossings, and then back on to roads again. In these places, it's
as if your status changes in an instant from being a road user to being a
pedestrian and back again.
This is confusing and dangerous, licensing cyclists to take all those other
little liberties - like ignoring pedestrian crossings and leaping up on to
pavements to cut corners.
When there are only a few cyclists, the danger posed by this sort of behaviour
is minimal, but the more there are on the roads, the more hazardous it becomes.
In a traffic system designed to be predictable and regular, it introduces an
element of unpredictability. Different cyclists behave differently, and even
the same cyclists stop at some lights and sail through others.
So what can be done about it? One answer would be to massively increase the
number of cycle lanes, so that bikes become a separate body of traffic with
their own routes and rules. I'm not sure that is desirable, let alone likely,
and until it happens there has to be some sort of reconciliation of the needs
of motorists, cyclists and pedestrians.
Part of this is a matter of acknowledging that cyclists have a legitimate place
on the roads - by, say, making sure that cycle lanes are clear and continuous.
Part of it is insisting that drivers respect the right of cyclists to exist
(some seem to exult in cutting bikes up). But it is equally important to
convince the cycling community itself that the Highway Code exists to help all
of us to protect ourselves. Like inoculation, it's not something that works if
it is observed by only some road-users.
As a cyclist, I have to confess that I still take liberties on the roads. The
fact is, though, that if I were to collide with a car, I'm the one who would
end up dead. A friend was recently taken to hospital in an ambulance after an
accident caused by a harassed rush-hour driver who didn't notice a cycle lane.
"You wouldn't catch me cycling in London," said the ambulance man. "I spend too
much of my life clearing up the bits."
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