Safe Speed Forums

I could show you how to bunny hop over one. My party piece used to be popping a wheelie to get up on a park bench and riding across it off the other side and doing controlled slides down the steep sides of hills with me bum hangin' over the back wheel.

Puts you in good stead on the roads sometimes; certainly helped me out of a brown-trouser moment on occasions.

_________________
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.

Interesting, so the 0.6m at which Clare is happy to be passed, for which she is derided, is greater than the distance you give pedestrians. What separation, in similar units of measurement, do you give to other road-users when you are passing them?

_________________
Regulation without education merely creates more criminals.

Duh! Who said anything about pedestrians? Your strategy is virtually always to ask a question, wait for an answer, then change the parameters retrospectively and create a strawman out of the resulting bullshit. Sorry, this thread of discussion with you is at an end.

_________________
"That which is asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without argument.” - Julian Assange

Seemed like a reasonable question; do you give other road-users the same berth you expect them to give you? Dodging such questions, whatever your rationale for it, is very telling.

_________________
Regulation without education merely creates more criminals.

I must admit, Mr GC that both yours and Claire's explaination of what happened sounds plausible.

Maybe the BMW driver hadn't used that road before and when following the van, didn't observe that the road arrows encouraged people to veer left at that point (it is a badly marked junction) maybe the van left his signalling late and the BMW driver was going too fast (making him a pillock) to stop behind the van without veering left past him and you. (If you had been in PP you could have been flattened if that was the case).
However as it is a road that you seem to travel regularly, I would have thought that you would have been aware of the problems that this road layout posed and ridden defensively, in the event that this might happen one day.

Personally, I think that expect one metre clearance, all the time, in this sort of situation, would be a luxury or a miracle.

_________________
My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.

Have to say I tried riding along inside the yellow lines today, and I'd STRONGLY recommend nobody cycles like this.

You're in danger of catching pedestrians on the pavement with your handlebar, a REAL danger in London.

You're riding over drains grates and covers, and if you go around them you'd be continually swerving out in the traffic, and this is not predictable behaviour.

You're often riding on a sharp camber as the road surface dips to the gutter.

You're in real danger of catching your left pedal on the kerb and chucking yourself out into the road.

You're less visible to people looking down the road to cross.

You're not as steady as your wheels ride around on the lumpy paint.

You'd ride into primary position to go round a drain grate (or a hole where there should be one)?

Tone mate, primary position is the middle of the lane you're using. Secondary position is riding up the side of the lane (but far enough out not to be riding over drains in the gutter).

That picture of where I've placed the bike I was riding a bit further back up the thread, that's secondary position. I'd not recommend using primary position to go round dodgy drain grates if there are other road users around.

There's no name for the position you ride in, cos frankly, you shouldn't be there. If I could give it a name it'd be "don't ride there position".

Have to say, that's a London Cycle Hire Bike (Boris Bike, Go BoJo, or a myriad of other names).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barclays_Cycle_Hire

Riding one is like riding an exercise bike from the gym that's been unbolted from the floor.

This is my usual steed:

Does the lack of pedals make riding it difficult?

_________________
Regulation without education merely creates more criminals.

Ride it?!?!

I never ride that, I've got it up on the wall to look at it, why do you think I'm riding a hire bike!

Well that makes alot of sense to me too, hang your "dream" bike on a wall then hire one to ride daily...why didn't I think of that?

I think I should park my "dream" lambo in the garage and hire a micra. Take the steering wheel off first though..stops people peddling away on it.....

_________________
My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.

How wide are your handlebars?
How many people walk on the kerbstones?


And? That's what I do!


"sharp camber" WHAT? Are you being serious? That must be at most 5 degrees? And you argued about my "middle"!


How large are your pedals? Mine end 20cm from the centre of the bike, so a 1ft wheel clearance leaves a minimum of 10cm (the second yellow lines begins at 1ft from the kerb [diagram 1018.1]).





Why can other people manage to do exactly that without any problem at all? I don't even notice it when I'm riding.
How do you ever cope with yellow box junctions!

None of that justifies being 1m from the kerb (however that distance is defined).

_________________
Views expressed are personal opinions and are not necessarily shared by the Safe Speed campaign

All of it justifies riding far enough out for none of this to be a problem.

Yeah, usually no more than 1.5ft (wheel to kerb); certainly within 2ft. 1m is totally unnecessary and is a waste of road space.

_________________
Views expressed are personal opinions and are not necessarily shared by the Safe Speed campaign

Hmm....

A bike built for speed and you believe speed kills. Interesting

Maybe you took the basket off the front which you use to get your groceries, or maybe we have more in common than you have ever admitted to...

Perhaps there should be a speed limit which is enforceable for cyclists and then we would have even more in common?

There’s more, but I’ll leave it at that for now because I think you are digging a hole...

_________________
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.

Ah, but he doesn't ride it, so it's OK

_________________
Views expressed are personal opinions and are not necessarily shared by the Safe Speed campaign

Ride along within 1.5 to 2ft of the kerb, inside painted lines, on the camber of the gutter over drains?

I seriously hope nobody takes a blind bit of notice of that advice, it's utterly crazy.

Next you will telling us that you swerve round every puddle when driving your car!

_________________
My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.

Speed does kill. If I hit you at 30mph on that it's highly likely that one or both of us would find that's the case, as opposed to me bumping into your at 10mph.

I'm very careful around puddles. I certainly won't hit larger puddles at speed in the car, you don't know what's in them, it''s illegal to splash pedestrians and they can easily cause loss of control.