"Richmond Park is just horribly dangerous": Drivers stream past child cycling in the park, + calls for more cycling and walking in Lake District; G wins Dauphiné stage...just; Calls for Highway Code change; Snapped Pinarello + more on the live blog

Pyro Tim wrote:

Tow the cars away, and make it eyewateringly expensive, linked to means. I know some wealthy people that don't care if they get a ticket, because they can afford it, so park where they like.

The government tried this about twenty years ago for some offences, but because rich people paid more, it was dropped.  One law for the rich.....

That's why towing is a great idea. One law for all. Equal buggeration for all regardless of income (although I suppose some could send Jeeves, whilst they use another car from the stable). Plus it tackles the problem.

eburtthebike wrote:

Pyro Tim wrote:

Tow the cars away, and make it eyewateringly expensive, linked to means. I know some wealthy people that don't care if they get a ticket, because they can afford it, so park where they like.

The government tried this about twenty years ago for some offences, but because rich people paid more, it was dropped.  One law for the rich.....

the trouble of having an uninterupted Tory government for 42 years (I know red tied Tories were in power for 10 of those)

Pyro Tim wrote:

eburtthebike wrote:

Pyro Tim wrote:

Tow the cars away, and make it eyewateringly expensive, linked to means. I know some wealthy people that don't care if they get a ticket, because they can afford it, so park where they like.

The government tried this about twenty years ago for some offences, but because rich people paid more, it was dropped.  One law for the rich.....

the trouble of having an uninterupted Tory government for 42 years (I know red tied Tories were in power for 10 of those)

Thats the atitude that will keep this current bunch in power for longer, the idea that appealing to the centre ground in the british political landscape makes the party tory results in the labout pary being steered away from an electible position.

I guarantee there is no one in this country who voted conservative at the last election because the labour party wasn't socialist enough. If they are steered further left by zealots calling the modertes in the party tories then the current shambolic government will be handed a larger majority. 

eburtthebike wrote:

"Crews struggle to reach an overturned boat in the Lake District due to an influx of congestion."  BBC report.

Quite the most weasily description possible, at the same time managing to avoid the use of "emergency" crews and neatly deflecting the responsibility from drivers.  Compare this to how it would have been described if it was a cycle lane being used by an ambulance to get past the congestion.  https://road.cc/content/news/cycling-live-blog-10-july-2020-275343

I've said it before and I'll doubtless say it again; the BBC is institutionally biased against cyclists and for drivers.

I think you're being in unfair, the truth is staring us in the face. In London congestion has only influxed since the introduction of cycle lanes as we all know. In the Lake District there are countless miles of bridleways, which are often despicably used by cyclists. Coincidence? I should Coco!

Love it - "An influx of congestion"! Some kind of miasma which visits traffic upon car drivers. Where did it come from?

absolutely I hope he recovers as quickly as possible, but we dont need new rules in the highway code to protect cyclists here, theres nothing that happened in his collision, or the countless similar collisions that cyclists literally bear the brunt of on roundabouts that motorists simply following the first basic rule on roundabouts wouldnt solve..."give way".

Sriracha wrote:

And it seems some of their drivers delight it using the performance to put 'lesser' drivers in their place. There is really no advantage in tearing round a roundabout, beyond giving one the excuse to blast their horn at people they catch out.

A little unfair. Occasionally roundabouts are places it's legal to enjoy driving, nothing to do with 'putting lesser drivers in their place'.

And there is an advantage to carrying speed through roundabouts on fast roads, especially in a car without lots of power to accelerate again. It must be worth, ooh, at least 30 seconds or a minute per 100 miles... More to the point, it has a noticeable impact on fuel economy. What's the expression? Look to go but be prepared to stop? Come in fairly slowly, so you have time to check nothing's coming, or even pick your gap, and you can carry a relatively large amount of speed through the roundabout. Much more fuel efficient than coming in hard and having to stop.

It's the "pick your gap" part where it goes wrong with these 0-60 merchants. You pick a suitable gap, but as you go someone from the approach road to your right accelerates into it from a standing start, because they can do 0-60 in <8 seconds, which used to be "supercar" performance:
https://www.zeroto60times.com/8-second-cars-0-60-mph-times/

This is only going to get worse:
https://uk.motor1.com/reviews/348411/electric-car-acceleration-times-com...

I can see a good bus shuttle system - whether from train stations or car parks - replacing most of the traffic. But it'd be expensive to have enough capacity for the few busy days a year, given that most days there aren't many people there at all.

It isn't exactly the low-hanging fruit, that I can see.

It's worth noting that some proportion of visitors coming by car are there as a stop on a longer journey. That doesn't make sense when doing the same journey by train, IMO. We're so far away from leisure travel being mostly non-car that it isn't funny, but by the same token we're decades away from people arriving at national parks by shared transport. As much as we might like to suggest alternatives, the trips to places like that are one of the few almost unarguable use-cases for cars, as things stand.

From where I live, the only sane way to go to the South Downs is by train - it's quicker and a lot easier than crossing or going round the whole of London. But train to the New Forest instead is 4 hours, where driving is maybe 90 mins with a bit of traffic, or about an hour in clear conditions, driving at normal motorway speeds. 

Your arguement is a good one for a shuttle type bus service as one can direct people to park where it can be sensibly accomodated and then buses run to popular destinations within a national park. Public transport may not be possible for every starting destination as they will start from differing points through the country but the destination point is more focussed with the current situation creating a problem that defeats why most people visit a NP, to gain solitude and be with nature. A shuttle bus service needs to run at peak times when demand creates the problem but with some NP's, Snowdonia, the Lake District and parts of the Peak District this is effectively most of the summer  then it can be continous ie not on and off and should run to a late hour so people do not worry about being caught by being late down from a mountain. In the future autonomous shuttle services may be possible which would reduce costs.

Dave Dave wrote:

I can see a good bus shuttle system - whether from train stations or car parks - replacing most of the traffic. But it'd be expensive to have enough capacity for the few busy days a year, given that most days there aren't many people there at all.

Efficiency can be improved with intelligent routing. i.e. bus stops have a call button that signals the bus system that someone is there (if you are very fancy you can even tell it where you are going) and the bus routes are recalculated dynamically to cope with the flows. You then also have a good estimate for how busy the network is and so have the ability to call in more busses and drivers if you have access to a pool who don't mind being on standby ala Uber.

If numbers are small enough it might make sense to use those mini-busses that are easier to drive. Bigger pool of drivers available and fit down those narrow lanes better. Then you can have some nearly direct bus services if your group is large enough to fill one.

Dave Dave wrote:

It's worth noting that some proportion of visitors coming by car are there as a stop on a longer journey. That doesn't make sense when doing the same journey by train, IMO.

Only because of the bad train system in the UK and we may as well fix that while we are at it There should be no problem with stop overs on longer journeys. There should be no financial penalty for the passenger.

Dave Dave wrote:

We're so far away from leisure travel being mostly non-car that it isn't funny, but by the same token we're decades away from people arriving at national parks by shared transport. As much as we might like to suggest alternatives, the trips to places like that are one of the few almost unarguable use-cases for cars, as things stand.

I think it is arguable and I would argue it. Provide decent public transport links (and cycle and walking routes) then make it less and less convenient to do it by car.

People can't still be driving those journeys in 10 years or so if we are to fix the air pollution/climate change/congestion problems so may as well start now so things can be phased in.

Dave Dave wrote:

But train to the New Forest instead is 4 hours, where driving is maybe 90 mins with a bit of traffic, or about an hour in clear conditions, driving at normal motorway speeds. 

That is terrible but its not beyond our power to fix it with some shift of priorities from private transport to public. We could even give people more holidays if they don't use a car so any extra time taken is allowed for

What a superb european style string of ideas. Ah...

Rendel Harris wrote:

OK, I hate myself for saying this. OK, have a go at me. But...I've been riding in Richmond Park nigh-on forty years and in all that time I've been devoutly wishing that it would be made car free (and have written numerous letters/signed petitions to that effect). However, there is an excellent firm and mainly level trail (the Tamsin Trail) that runs round the periphery of the park, about fifty yards to the left of the road shown here. If I had a child with me of that age/size who couldn't hold a straight line uphill, no way would I expose them to the stupid, selfish drivers using the park as a cutthrough. Yes the kid has a right to use the road, yes the cars shouldn't be there, but for me it's just too high risk, especially when there's a perfectly decent alternative. Sorry.

Understood from a pragmatic perspective. However from a principled perspective, it wouldn't be you exposing them to the risk, it would be teh drivers..

I thought the lad looked a bit too young. I wonder if they had parked up nearby and were unaware of the trail?

hirsute wrote:

I thought the lad looked a bit too young. I wonder if they had parked up nearby and were unaware of the trail?

Maybe they thought, "where would be a nice safe environment for Junior to gain confidence cycling on a road?"
Of course, a nature reserve, that's got to be quieter than the South Circular?

Pretty sure the frame being carbon didn't cause that crash

It was more to do with what's left of it afterwards. Given it's "just" a broken collarbone I'd imagine it wasn't a Froome or Evanpoel-level off and yet the bike is in bits.

kil0ran wrote:

Not exactly a great advert for carbon frames is it?

Curiously little information available - legal reasons? - but according to Velonews his coach said “He was riding at a fairly high speed at the start of a descent. We don’t know what exactly happened, but Tom was hit from the side by a car. Due to the impact, he was catapulted over the car. His bicycle partially absorbed the impact and broke into two pieces.”

Quote:

Read the full story here...*

 

* May not actually contain full story.