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news
M25 traffic queue (CC licensed by Timo Newton-Syms on Flickr)Cyclist doing something legal in Scunthorpe makes the local paper
We’re struggling to see what the story is - but in Scunthorpe a slow-moving cyclist pedalling up a long hill has made the papers after he allegedly held up 100 vehicles.
According to the Scunthorpe Telegraph, the rider “left the Tata Steel works at the Anchor exit and then, perfectly legally, began the long haul up the hill - in the middle of the only available lane,” due to the council closing off the second lane with cones.
Councillor Nigel Sherwood (Brigg & Wolds), said: "It has already been flagged up," he said. "A cyclist in one lane biked all the way up Mortal Ash in the 'live' lane and there was no room for cars - 100 vehicles being behind him.
"It's something we need to look at and try and address."
He did stress that the cyclist had done nothing wrong and wondered whether he might have used the footpath instead.
"We need give and take on both sides. Help each other if you can," he suggested.
“A considerate early morning cyclist - holding up traffic between Forest Pines roundabout and the top of Mortal Ash Hill on his way towards Scunthorpe - pulled over to the right, into the coned off area, to let traffic go by."
Would a tractor or milk float have made the morning papers? You decide.
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57 comments
Pet peeve it may well be, but....
A) The rule uses the advisory wording "Do not" and then conditions it with "if necessary, pull in where it is safe...."
B) A safe place to pull over would not include an area coned off (see rule 288 "Do not drive through an area marked off by traffic cones" - also using the advisory wording). If it would not be safe to pull off and then rejoin then clearly the cyclist, chain-gang or tractor should not pull over.
C) The footpath rule 64 is really clear and legally enforceable "You MUST NOT cycle on a pavement" so the pavement was not an option.
So the rider in this case did exactly the correct thing.
I don't like it when people criticise people on bikes for doing the right thing.
Sorry, pet peeve!
Rules for cyclists? Damned if you follow them, damned if you don't!
Further, rule 169 specifies driving. Cars, Vans, Lorries etc... are driven. Horses, Motorbikes, Mopeds and Bicycles are ridden not driven so 169 does not apply.
Thanks - a good point and even more justification that the rider was correct.
I completely agree, which is why I didn't criticise him. If there was nowhere for him to pull over then he did exactly the right thing to continue to take the primary position and ride up the hill as is his right. I was simply pointing out that if there was somewhere for him to pull over safely then the highway code advises he should do so.
Someone else has suggested that 169 doesn't apply to cyclists, in which case I stand corrected, although I still think it's a pretty good rule for anything on the road to adhere to; my dislike of people causing massive tailbacks is not because of the delays they cause, it's because of the idiocy they seem to trigger in some drivers. I'm sure we've all followed a tractor and seen cars overtaking on blind corners etc. because they simply 'can't' wait any longer.
As someone else very rightly said, traffic management for road works often completely fails to take account of cyclists and other slow moving vehicles and that needs to be corrected. That goes for the timings on traffic lights at roadworks too which are often much to short to allow average cyclists to clear the area under traffic control.
I commend Councillor Nigel Sherwood for taking the first steps in suggesting that we get 100 cars off the road and onto bikes.
I cycled across a toucan crossing yesterday and was told off by a pedestrian (middle aged man).
I was riding considerately, very slowly, towing my daughter and a load of shopping. But for some reason he was upset.
Strange that the little green bicycle light didn't mean anything to him.
I think often a lot of the problem is that people just have no idea about bikes, or cycling, or (as in this case) the Highway Code.
This is as good a place as any to tell this one.
I once pulled up at a set of lights opposite a pub, and a very angry and possibly slightly drunk woman stepped out into the road and gave me a stream of abuse about how the stop line applies to cyclists as well as cars.
If you hadn't guessed, we were both in the ASL box, she was actually standing right on top of the bike symbol. I wished both her and her slightly embarrassed husband well before riding on.
This poor fella - probably just done a shift at the steelworks (which is probably the shittiest job in Britain since Thatcher closed all the coal mines) and has to lug his poor tired body up this God forsaken bypass every day. Probably on a crappy old hybrid - in full overalls and heavy boots with a rucsac on.
Im sure we have all taken great pleasure in overtaking fellas like this on our carbon machines clad in our Rapha and ever so perfect socks trying to smash a Strava target.
Its people like him, however, that make this country great.
Scunthorpe - notable only for its noteworthy addition to most corporate internet name filters...
The comments section at the end of that story is a very depressing demonstration of the mindset of the majority.
Up until now I always used to ponder the question; If Ty-phoo put the T in britain who put the **** in S****horpe ? but now thanks to Nigel F I think I know the answer.
Usual depressing selection of comments on the newspaper's website there!
Trouble is, you pull in ... and then you can never get back out again into the endless stream of traffic.
Footpath is only on one side of the road. If your heading South East the path is on your left. Hope that helps.
Perhaps I'm not looking hard enough but I see no footpath - and the lane could have been blocked with construction vehicles - I smell a wind up.
http://bit.ly/1jrTjmi
What a load of utter bullshit...........100 motorists held themselves up by their poor choice of transport.
Nothing happened, it's a a complete non story / pathetic whinge.
it's 2.7 miles of gentle drag up. So cars would be up there in 10 mins instead of 3 (assuming they could drive at the speed limit, which they couldn't because it's rush hour busy anyway...).
7 minute traffic delay shocker? My heart bleeds for em.
Couldn't care less about the story, but the comments section is brilliant.
This one's going in the scrap book!
Needless to say "#bloodycyclists"
Road lanes are not the widest I've ever seen.
Could a cyclist and a car be accommodated side-by-side in the lane without the cyclist being endangered? No.
Has the cyclist adopted the correct position on the road? Yes.
Is there a footpath? Yes but it's the usual rural, tokenistic, piddling, poor surfaced excuse of a footpath.
Would it be legal for the cyclist to use the footpath? No.
Could a cyclist and a pedestrian be accommodated side-by-side on the path?No it is only one person wide.
Has the cyclist done anything wrong? No.
Was he the cause of the slow traffic? No, the road works were.
Would this be news if it was a horse-drawn vehicle, ambulance travelling slowly with a spinal casualty on board or an electric vehicle? Of course it wouldn't.
What can be done? How about something radical like, I don't know, possible a properly designed, installed and maintained cycle track running parallel to the dual-carriageway.
Or is that too much logic for a town that doesn't even exist? 
Note: Scunthorpe is under the steelworks. The town is actually Crosby and Frodingham.
I don't know the width of the road but I would have ridden in secondary not primary whilst clinning the hill.
If you don't know the width of the road.. or the traffic conditions.. how on earth can you even start to make a judgement?
If there's not enough space to let a car past.. then they have to wait. And better to prevent them even trying (by riding primary).
Come on, he was just being awkward. . I'd have let the cars pass out of courtesy!! Treat others how I wish to be treated? I have driven tractors and when a queue builds and if I can i pull over and show respect if possible to the other road users, and I do the same on my bike. It is easier to do on a bike as well. . .
But - as the article asks: would it have made the news if it was a tractor? From the sounds of it a tractor going through that section wouldn't have had anywhere to pull in. Even if it did, but the driver was an asshole and didn't bother pulling in, would that have made the news? I highly doubt it.
Assuming said roadworks aren't a mile long, the fact that "a hundred" cars were involved in the tailback just confirms one thing as far as I'm concerned: there are too many cars on the road.
Typical local rag anti-cyclist dogwhistle "reporting".
'Roadworks hold up traffic' is obviously not newsworthy enough?
Sounds very much like the local Councillor is condoning illegal riding on the pavement. Wonder if he would be quite so keen if residents complained about pavement cyclists.
If the coned off lane was clear, then I would have ducked into it BUT, there is nothing wrong with the cyclist's actions. He was within the law as people want
These links are to recent stories in the Scunthtope Telegraph on the issue of cyclists using pavements.
http://www.scunthorpetelegraph.co.uk/Pensioner-slams-cyclists-riding-Scu...
This link in particular is what councilor Sherwood said about the issue in February this year, when he called for more action from the police to stop “pavement cycling”
http://www.scunthorpetelegraph.co.uk/Action-cycle-hits-boy/story-2061771...
I live across the Humber near Hull and not Scunthorpe but it is the same Police Force and in Hull in recent months there have been a few dozen cyclists that weren’t given a FPN for “pavement cycling” but taken to court and fined £200 plus costs of £85.
Why aren't the local police following the advice reiterated by Home Office and ACPO in January of this year?
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/bike-blog/2014/jan/20/police-cycl...
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