“Fining is one of the few options left”: Council proposes charging cyclists £100 for riding on High Street

Welcome to road.cc - you've come to the right place to discuss some of your interesting observations.  There are lots of people here with experience of different countries, many of whom have for much of their lives been carefully studying the nitty-gritty of roads, rules, cops and culture trying to understand how these all interact.

I'd agree that there needs to be some kinds of feedback to manage people's behaviours e.g. when they are using modes of transport - and in many circumstances this is lacking [1] [2] ...

Meanwhile:

"cyclists" ... speeding racers ... aggressive, impatient, lack social skills ... registration ... insurance ... don't follow rules ... more training ... lack of responsibility...

House!  House!

Keith Newton wrote:

Uk cyclist don't seem to think rules apply to them. The fact the cycles are not registered and insured I feel goes to some of the issue if lack of responsibility. 

Well you are clearly wrong on your own terms there because you just said that cyclists in Europe are much better but there is nowhere in Europe where bicycles have to be registered or insured, so clearly being unregistered/uninsured is not a contributor to irresponsible cycling.

Any other regular readers reminded of the appearance of "Sorry my English not so good" Rakia?

Ah, Domut the delivery cyclist- I seem to remember that was one of Martin Scorsese's less celebrated earlier efforts. 

"Cyclist in the uk are aggressive impatient and lack social skills."

Even a child knows this.

Would that be a failure to doff their caps to every driver ? Or to ride in the gutter even where the driver is on the wrong side of the road ?

Keith Newton wrote:

After living in europe for many years I find that cyclist are more relaxed and considerate  the share the pedestrian spaces with scooters, joggers etc the do not ride fast through the town as if they are on a speed trial there a completely different mentality.  Cyclist in the uk are aggressive impatient and lack social skills. Your reader my disagree but I can only go by the daily experiences and observation. Uk cyclist don't seem to think rules apply to them. The fact the cycles are not registered and insured I feel goes to some of the issue if lack of responsibility.  Its time bicycles scooter e scooters ebike where all registered and people have to have insurance to use. We €1 a month to insure the bike and e scooter. That gives use liability cover incase of an accident.  Before you go on about cycle paths they are few and far between just like the uk. it's the attitude towards others thst different if it says no cycling they get off if it says slow speeds they domut the delivery  cyclist are also very well behaved. As a child we had to do cycle proficiency test before we could cycle to school its time this was brought back and cycle registration and insurance.  If people have responsibility they behave better.

I'm sure in Europe you also have fast dangerous cyclists, but they don't stand out amongst the throngs of reasonable cyclists. In the UK, only the least risk averse will continue cycling.

I am insured on my bike thanks, but insurance does no confer liability, in fact it indemnifies the cyclist against an already existing liability.  Do you think drivers would be more or less careful if they had no insurance and had to pay the costs of their actions themselves?

Bikability exists to train children to cycle, where schools will engage.  

wycombewheeler wrote:

I'm sure in Europe you also have fast dangerous cyclists, but they don't stand out amongst the throngs of reasonable cyclists. In the UK, only the least risk averse will continue cycling.

I am insured on my bike thanks, but insurance does no confer liability, in fact it indemnifies the cyclist against an already existing liability.  Do you think drivers would be more or less careful if they had no insurance and had to pay the costs of their actions themselves?

Bikability exists to train children to cycle, where schools will engage.  

My understanding is that there is also the issue that if you ban riding the lawful/careful obey. The dangerous riders continue riding.

New riders tend to copy what is already happening.

As a result banning riders from wider pedestrianised areas can actually make things worse if you don't provide a good, clear, safe alternative (because the only riders left are either actively dangerous or copying those actively dangerous...)

Belgium and Switzerland abandoned registration for bicycles some time ago on the grounds that it wasted time and effort and achieved nothing. As far as I know, only North Korea still requires bicycle to be registered. As for European cyclists being more relaxed and considerate, you might like to try walking into a cycle lane in Amsterdam (or Munich or Berlin) during rush hour to test out your claim.

Keith Newton wrote:

After living in europe for many years I find that cyclist are more relaxed and considerate  the share the pedestrian spaces with scooters, joggers etc the do not ride fast through the town as if they are on a speed trial there a completely different mentality.  Cyclist in the uk are aggressive impatient and lack social skills.

Keith Newton wrote:

The fact the cycles are not registered and insured I feel goes to some of the issue if lack of responsibility. 

Which countries in Europe did you go to where cycles were registered and insured? 

And, as the answer must be "none", your argument is self-evidently rubbish,

A lot more irritating than mobility scooters though.

How insightful from someone who is telling others to grow up.

Grow up.

BigBear63 wrote:

Much of this lies with particular Local Authorities (LA) and their general attitude towards cyclists. In Richmond Upon Thames and Kingston Upon Thames, cyclists & pedestrians share many thoroughfares including KUT's pedestrianised town centre and market square. Theses LAs take a sensible pro-cycling approach and even with the huge number of tourists visiting both towns I never hear of any complaints. E-scooters are a different matter as they do get alot of bad press. I believe much of stems from the lack of formal training though the same can be said about cycling, too. I'd be interested to hear if LAs and schools still provide cycling proficiency courses for pupils. CPCs should be a legal requirement for LAs & LEAs & schools should insist all pupils on bikes & e-scooters pass the course. Courses would be a better route than ridiculous fines. We need to encourage the use of 2 wheels & not put people off. I can't speak for Southend town centre but it appears to me that some councils are run by people who see cyclists as the "lefty woke" minority and pedestrians and drivers as the blighted conservative majority. Its a wrong headed view. We are all pedestrians. We are all cyclists. Many of us are drivers. With the right attitude, LAs can provide shared spaces where all three groups can come together harmoniously. IMO, LAs need to keep politics out of the issue and allocate more resources to ensure spaces can be shared in a safe way.

The problem with these PSPOs is that they criminalise non-criminal behaviour i.e. cycling carefully. What should happen is that the police are asked to actually do their job and protect the public from any "hooligan" cyclists/e-scooterists etc.

I'd like to see the police set up random days of monitoring the area. They could set up a couple of temporary cameras or drones and keep a watch on the area. When there's a sudden outbreak of dangerous cyclists, they could then swoop in and deal with them.

Maybe the LAs are trying to do something as they know that police have been hobbled by their lack of resources.

hawkinspeter wrote:

...police have been hobbled by their lack of resources.

Or other priorities or just plain lazyness. 

Weren't PCSOs created to tackle low level issues such as this? Why don't they patrol and deal with bad behavour?

As usual the problem is not dealt with. They just piss off law abiding citizens. 

The whole High Street area is, or was last time I visited, a bit of a mess. Pedestrians, already distracted by phones and other things, have to weave in and out of rows of shop advertising boards, bollards, bins, seats, etc. And iirc it has that odd bit in the middle that isn't pedestrianised at all. Not sure a cycle path down the middle would work but probably not an issue for me as I mentally filed it under shopping streets with nothing to draw me back.

I dont know that theres evidence cyclists and pedestrians  mix without problems, most cyclist/pedestrian mixing in places where sensible cyclists wouldnt be riding, generally doesnt get reported as a rule.

for instance just walking into my local town yesterday, I saw multiple riders on bso's and e-bso's riding on pavements where they shouldnt be, riding wrong way up streets, riding through pspo spaces, none of them were giving a flying f about pedestrians who happened to be in their way, did any of them get reported ? or did the people around them just think typical bloody cyclists ?

stonojnr wrote:

I dont know that theres evidence cyclists and pedestrians  mix without problems, most cyclist/pedestrian mixing in places where sensible cyclists wouldnt be riding, generally doesnt get reported as a rule.

About 20 years ago, DfT did a report on it, which said that it generally worked well and they could find no valid reason to oppose sharing.  There is also the overwhelming evidence from abroad, France, Spain, Germany, Holland, Denmark etc, etc, where peds and cyclists mingle 24/7/365.

stonojnr wrote:

for instance just walking into my local town yesterday, I saw multiple riders on bso's and e-bso's riding on pavements where they shouldnt be, riding wrong way up streets, riding through pspo spaces, none of them were giving a flying f about pedestrians who happened to be in their way, did any of them get reported ? or did the people around them just think typical bloody cyclists ?

Do you think those riders will give a flying flamingo about a PSPO?

but its chicken and egg, if no one is documenting all the occurences of pedestrians and those riders in conflict, then any report at a high level is going to be missing data to back up any conclusions it draws, its almost absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

and do those riders give a flying flamingo, no because much like their equivalents in cars, when theres little to no enforcement of it, it becomes normalised as acceptable.

Egg came first

Another side here is normally councils are happy to build in conflict with "shared use".  Even if they make marginally more effort than just sticking up the blue sign on an existing footway, they will funnel people on foot and on bike through the same spaces in multiple places *.

I sometimes imagine council officers must have two "design cyclists" in their heads - a) cute kids up to age 12 wobbling about and b) slavering hordes of Bloody Cyclists - who could be hoodies delivering drugs and abuse or lycra-clad chippy men who only care about their speed.

A special case of Schroedinger's cyclist again?  They're both very slow and wobbly (so where it's not that important just lump them in with pedestrians) and they're like motorcyclists (so keep must keep them from killing pedestrians - and why can't they mix it with the cars and take their chances if they're keen on racing?).

* Because "our streets are too narrow" and "there isn't space for separate routes" - because we allocate almost all the space to motor vehicles first, and only then think about what to do with the scraps that are left (for the unimportant modes).