Sunday 31 July 2011

Montpelier: is our work done?

Youtube referred us to this (nonembeddable) video of an eight year old doing the school run by bicycle from York Road to Colston Primary School.

01:32 P232YEU. Seen them.
03:46 Eagle Coaches coach waiting in the bus lane. Seen them.
04:45 Family walking across the road. Seen them too.

When even independent videos include content that we already have on our web site, we can conclude that our attempts to build a mass-surveillance infrastructure out of google's datacentre facilities and community contributions are successful. At least for Montpelier, Stokes Croft, Cheltenham Road and bits nearby.

Does this mean it is time to retire: Our work is done? Maybe. But first, time to visit some other parts of the city.

Welcome to Clifton Week at Bristol Traffic!

Saturday 30 July 2011

Discussions with the BSM and other Bristol Driving Schools

We always have a special place in our coverage for driving schools, as they have to teach beginners the hard art of driving and parking in a city which, excluding Clifton, is anti-car.

Here, up in Filton. Evolution WM10YHO show that the way to park is up on the pavement.

In front of it, a shared space. This eliminates the pavement entirely, and makes for some fun high-speed chicanes.

Speaking of driving schools, our ongoing discussion with one has had a new comment. The instructor does provide some good insight into what it's like driving a bus in the city, so those commenters slagging off FirstBus drivers should really save their anger for FirstBus management.

He also raises the issue of which laws should be ignored first:
I completely agree with people should not park on double yellow lines or zig zags or to close to junction corners all of which cause a danger to other road users but I do not count parking 2 wheels on the pavement in a very narror street that was never meant for parked cars in the first place as the same level of offence.
We don't bother with making decisions about which action is more defensible than others. We ignore them all, hence save time thinking about which action is more right than others.

We also note that we haven't seen that particular driving school in our database. The driving school that most pops is the British School of Motoring. The BSM may have more market share, but they are to be commended for something else: they are the only driving school that we have documented teaching people how to park in Montpelier. The other schools, they pick you up, then take you somewhere safe to learn to drive. The BSM actually hold their lessons in Montpelier.

In-town, in Richmond Road, Montpelier, we have a heartwarming sight. No, not the cyclist going up the hill with the Sainsbury's bag on the handlebars -it's the BSM instruction car WV60WJF.
We don't think driving and parking in Monty has its own test yet, so we're assuming it's a lesson. As Richmond Road is one of the hardest to drive and park on, we congratulate the BSM for showing their pupils the way forward -or at least the way up on the pavement without damaging your wheels, hitting the wall or paying the wingmirror tax on the way up the road.

So far, nobody from the BSM has got in touch with us. However, we are pleased to have video coverage of a discussion between some under-employed tax-dodger and the BSM car WR60CUY, which can be seen driving into the ASL on the red light: the bicycle doesn't get their green light until Shaldon Road is on red, so the car has had five seconds of red before it comes to a halt.


When queried about what the driver thinks the penalty for driving into an ASL is, the driving instructor comes back with the correct answer: anyone who cares about such things doesn't have a life. We actually think this summarises the entire country's cycling activist groups: they only do it because they don't have real lives.

Congratulations to the BSM for putting this tax dodger in their place!

Thursday 28 July 2011

Artistic Massage

People get in touch. They say "Dear Bristol Traffic, which Stokes Croft establishments do you recommend for your special needs".

Apart from Slix and Rita's for food, there is a whole set of massage parlours. Some of them are being gentrified, what with the free WiFi, the mineral water and copies of French newspapers -ideal for visiting heads of the IMF and similar institutes.

None of those matter to us, but we will draw attention to the recently repainted frontage of "The Massage Club"

Needless to say, our white van is more usually seen by "the back entrance"
Remember: say you came from Bristol Traffic and ask for a discount!

Tuesday 26 July 2011

Cornerish Parking

Now that Aberdeen Cars appears to have the edge in PaveParking, we are going to share another parking secret from Bristol. It's "Cornerish Parking"

We define Cornerish Parking as "to park one's vehicle within sight or walking distance of a corner, but not actually on the corner itself"

Here we see it in Kingsdown, just of St Michael's Hill. It is far enough away from the double yellow lines to be exempt

In Clifton, someone is showing, well, less imagination. That issue with Clifton and it's lack of imagination is something we'll have to get back to,
For now, just note that the further east you head, the more imaginative you have to get.
Even so, not even Kingsdown stands a chance against Montpelier.
Here at the junction of Cobourg Road and Old Ashley Hill, we can see a '205 that's been cornerishly-parked so long the front left tyre has gone flat.

Clifton isn't even a contender here, while Kingsdown, it tries, but doesn't really stand a chance. 

Sunday 24 July 2011

RPZ expansion plans

The Evening Post is terrified that the RPZ zones "the great RPZ failure" as they call it, will be expanded after the people in the area who responded to the six-months-live survey were more in favour of it than at the beginning of the zone.

Some people expect us to come out the newspaper's side. Sorry, we're a data driven project which means we drive out to get the data.


1. The RPZ makes it easier for us to get past bicycles as they now keep closer in to the pavement. Result: time saved, and with less fear of dooring, even the underpeople seem happier.
2. The spaces that were normally used by commuters are now free for delivery vehicles.
  • We don't get held up by vans in our way who don't move until we sound our horn and shout at them.
  • Our vans can park outside their destination without having to walk or double park and get harassed by people trying to get past.
Kingsdown is one of our popular destinations in the sex-trade-supply-chain, especially as some of the massage parlours use our services to give the punters a lift up the hill again "after you get it up -we get you up", the slogan goes. Having easy parking makes this faster and more discreet.

We suspect the Clifton-faction, the "Keep Parking Free" people will be foaming at the mouth at the expansion plans. Already the Clifton Conservatives are complaining that it has made illegal parking worse in other areas. This is not something our dataset shows, and we have data going back three years now.

We actually look forward to the rollout of an RPZ in Clifton, as that's another popular delivery destination for our products and faster journey and parking times will help our business model. They should get out more -we'll give them a ride home!

Saturday 23 July 2011

Plot 6: bus station or parking?

For all those entrants to the Friday Quiz: behind the purple fence with the no skateboard or ball games signage is a temporary car park. Temporary. We need something more permanent.

This is why it's exciting to hear that the infamous plot six, the now defunct post-office-railway-integrated sorting/delivery office may well be turned into a multi-storey long-stay car park, and not, as some troublemakers demanded, a transport hub for buses, trains and bicycles.

Providing an integrated transport hub here would merely encourage people to use train+bus, or train+bike, and not offer the revenue opportunities of, say, a five storey car park.

Two issues
  • We hope the car park is SUV friendly, as Cabot Circus is, and not 1980s-legacy-galleries style.
  • This is going to increase demand for road access to the area, especially as the Portishead railway line is not going ahead. We propose recognising that the Coronation Road cycle path is a waste of space, and turning that entire pavement into another inbound lane. Yes, some trees will have to go, but they will grow back elsewhere. And as Elf-King Ap Rees says, the South Bristol Link road is critical to make commuting by car into Bristol quicker. Anyone who says otherwise is making "mischievous misleading comments"

We praise the Waltham Forest Faction of Bristol council for their plans, and the assistance of North Somerset and S Gloucs councils.

On this topic, we saw an article recently arguing that the suburban dream in Bristol is in trouble. The actions to improve driving options from North Somerset show that this is false. What has changed is this: the important people in the city, rather than live in the fringe suburbs, have moved out of the city altogether, into the picturesque towns and villages outside: Portishead, Clevedon, Wotton-under-edge, etc. While public transport to the fringe of the city is collapsing, those with money still need to come in, and the increasing use of road space by cyclists, resident parking schemes and expanded pavements is anti-capitalist. It is critical that Bristol Council -who would otherwise pander to their electorate- recognise that the true wealth of the city depends on these out-of-city commuters, and meet their needs: fast wide roads, low-cost in-city parking. The Plot Six and South Bristol Link Road are only part of what we need.

Friday 22 July 2011

Friday Competition: Temple Quarter

Over in Temple Quarter there's a big purple wooden fence up with some marketing blurb, including a photo of someone on bike in hi-viz who is "building the future in Bristol"

Where is Temple Quarter. Next to station, where the cyclists dismount stretch of a sustrans route begins.
In the other direction, there's a sign saying "cyclists should dismount for their own safety", specifically, if they don't, they may hit the barriers put to make cyclists dismount for their own safety.
One commuter deftly negotiates the safety feature. One that presumably creates a pedestrian/cycle conflict too.

People might think the area picks on cyclists, and hence note the complete inconsistency between the marketing and reality, but that's unfair.
They pick on all round things, be they cylindrical or spherical.

Now: the competition. What is behind the big purple fence?

Thursday 21 July 2011

Rubbish Parking

There is a fair amount of pavement parking in Redland. We've chronicled a small proportion of it over the years. In roads like Woodstock Road, and Clarendon Road it's rife. 

So it was a shock to see a car (in fact more than one) with all four wheels on the road, parked next to a tree. We suspect that the tree may be the reason, but it's always the exception which proves the rule.

And the Redland Rule is "Park on the Pavement", unlike the Stokes Croft Rule, which is "Park in the Cycle Lane".


If you break the rules, though, you will come in for some flak...

Wednesday 20 July 2011

Keeping Tesco Safe

Here one weekday morning, the police are ensuring that Tesco is safe.

Especially from people on bicycles, who will have to past further out on the road.
This will make the customers feel less threatened -even during the hours that the bike/bus lane is active.

Monday 18 July 2011

Britannia Movers International: Try the lanes of Cornwall instead

There's a lovely piece of advice for anyone naive enough to believe that they'd be welcome cycling up the dedicated contraflow cycle lane or Arley Hill. It says "try the lanes of corwall"

What WA58BVD really means is "dont' try these bike lanes". We thought it was funny.
If there is one criticism -a minor one- the lorry is making it hard to get down the road and hence to the M32 for those of us who have paid for the privilege. A bit of forward planning, like, say, coning/dustbinnining off the front of the house would have let the removals van load up without taking any road space away from us.

More coverage of WA58BVD elsewhere.

Tax-dodgers: we knows who you are

Don't think we aren't building up a list of subversives. Here is "Adam Eff", on the railway path, sporting a Bristol Bike Project T-shirt and pushing one of his children in a fancy bullitt bicycle for a price at which he could have bought a car with a few years left in it.

And what's that at the front? One of those little bike-cams, if we aren't mistaken.

As George Osborne says of these people:we will find you and make you pay

Sunday 17 July 2011

Ambulance Leap: Ashton Court

The MTBers are all happy there's a new all-weather trail being built in Ashton Court, with some EU anti-british money going in to encouraging cycling.

We had hoped "all weather" meant "horribly muddy all year round", but apparently it means "with drainage"

At the end of the newly uprated "blue route" by the quarry-in-the-park that is an odd feature of Ashton Court, we can see a boy perfectly executing the new jump at the end at full speed, and getting airborne in the process.

Apparently earlier in the month someone else trying it out managed to get the logistics of which part of the bicycle should land first (wheels down, head up) wrong, and ended up being ambulanced out due to concussion and/or other injuries. We hope they recover.

For now then, we consider this jump formally christened as "ambulance leap", and will warn the adults going out to enjoy it that it doesn't matter how much you spend on a bicycle, kids who spend time on a BMX park can do things you can't. Money is not a substitute for skill, and skill comes by putting in the hours.

Saturday 16 July 2011

An Apology

Don Vito Corleone, head of the Bristol Traffic Media Group, wishes to issue a public statement:

"In recent weeks, it has become clear that our strategy of holding back embarrassing content on key politicians in order to achieve our strategic goals has failed. Not just through public disclosure of our tactics, but because the politicians themselves turned out not to be that powerful.

Because of the widespread negative coverage our organisation has received, we must regretfully announce today that Frank Corleone will be leaving the organisation forthwith. His brother, Michael Corleone, will take over as Don Corleone, in charge of corruption, bribery and other operations. Frank Corleone has stated that he will co-operate with the police regarding their investigations, which is why in a few days time he will be blown up in a boat in Lake Tahoe.

We now wish to make it clear to those local media outlets that have been critical of our organisation over the past few days that with the departure of Frank Corleone, we consider anyone who continues to discuss this topic to be disloyal -and as such punitive action will be considered. In particular, such people may end up being part of the foundations of the A4174 bus lane.

In order to clear up accusations of blackmail, we shall be releasing on youtube our video of Barbara Janke being both patronising and hypocritical --and that one showing Stephen Williams MP being unable to start or stop a bicycle.

Thank you for your co-operation.

 The Corleone Family -owners of the Bristol Traffic Media Group"

Friday 15 July 2011

Gregor heating - don't compromise on vehicle use!




Gregor Heating and Renewable energy.


We were worried that you were tarnishing the long fought image of the white van man. With your fleet of 35 clearly identifiable vehicles, we feared that they were too small to assert your position on the road and your near tree hugging business was too contentious to make a mark on normal society.


How delighted we are to have been proven wrong, and you are really just plumbers at heart. It is not the size of the van that matters, it is how you drive it that really counts.


Take this example. Posh people in Stoke Bishop don’t want to give up their cars – they want to feel better by installing solar panels to heat their swimming pools. So your driver is quite right to force this tax dodging cyclist out of the way in this quiet residential street on the way to a very important client no doubt.







Maybe the use of your horn could have been better. It was early but these tax dodgers really do need to know their place and it was probably time for Quentin to wake up and get in the 4x4 to school anyway. Transits have better horns, another good reason to consider bigger vans.


But we salute you Gregor Heating. Keep up the good work installing renewable energy for the rich tax payers of Bristol, and well done for treating a carbon free form of transport with the contempt it deserves.















Saturday 9 July 2011

Southwell Street: the consequences

What do the Southwell Street changes mean? It'll be hard to tell until next term. Already, though, it seems to create the (false) impression that people on foot are welcome, and the zebra crossings appear to act as traffic calming too.

The restored pavement is in use. This will reduce car/pedestrian conflict, so actually be beneficial
That said, it also reduces bicycle/pedestrian conflict, while increasing bicycle/car conflict. This puts the blame on us, not them. Of course, put a van in front of these bollards "Only 15 minutes, guv", with another van on the pavement, and the old regime will be restored.
You can also see that the bollards are set up for a hard right turn into the pay and display car park. This makes it important to keep people off that pavement. It also makes us suspicious that the bollard placement was explicitly designed to remove the short-stay parking option on that side of the bollards. You can't park there without blocking the car park. Yes, you may be able to park the other side, but it's a ten minute journey round the block to get there.
Overall then, the bollards, the pavement and that deviously moved row of bollard don't appear to help us much. It's interesting to compare this with the original proposal, which was very much van-friendlier. Drive-in/back out parking spaces instead of pavement, room to park for delivery on both sides of the bollards. Assuming they dont' actually enforce parking in front of the bollards in the spaces currently in use, the physical parking capacity has been reduced by four. That's going to create tension, and making the bollards "opaque" to people on foot or pedals will create more. Now they will be upset if we park there, whereas before we could do it and not feel bad.

The key tactic here will be to set everyone's expectations up now. During the university holiday. We can take over the bollard area for parking, nobody will get used to cycling through it, and when term time begins, it will stay that way.

We look forward to NHS support for this plan.

Friday 8 July 2011

Southwell Street: the changes

As discussed, the changes are happening.

The gate has been removed and replaced by bollards.

Yes, you can still park a van against them, but as they are the people doing the roadworks, that may change.
More shockingly, the "ex-pavement" that was to still have NHS vans echelon-parked over it, has been reinstated as public pavement! This goes against the whole "shared space" theory, or, as we van drivers call it, the "our space" road design. It's all ours, see.
The car exit is as before, except the signs blocking off that pavement have been replaced with less bent ones, and anyone walking down that road gets to get in the way of cars pulling out -as you can just make out here through the windscreen of the beetle.
We think that zebra crossing is new. It's hard to see why they bothered.

Wednesday 6 July 2011

Bristol cyclist critical after crash with car

Interesting they chose the phrase "hit by a car"; in London they tend to describe the bicycle as hitting the car, before going on to discuss whether they had a helmet on.

The location was describe as the junction of St Michael's Hill and Horfield Road. We've noted how this isn't that much fun in a car. This collision happened at 22:22 on a Friday, so congestion would be minimal -and there is more chance of cars driving around fast.

Judging by the signs, the collision wasn't with Park Row, it was further up the hill. There's no further details yet on what happened.
Some possibilities:
  • Car and bicycle heading down the St Michaels Hill, collision.
  • Car and bicycle heading down Horfield Road, collision.
  • Bicycle heading up St Michaels Hill, collides with car also going up St Michaels Hill
Those are the normal two vehicles in the same-direction incidents. This junction adds some more, all of which tend to lead to side-on collisions:
  • Bicycle heading down St Michaels Hill, collides with car going down Horfield Road, or up St Michaels Hil.
  • Bicycle heading down Horfield Road collides with car pulling out St Michaels Hill and heading downhill
  • Bicycle heading up St Michaels Hill towards Horfield Road, gets hit by a car going straight up St Michaels Hill
Nobody rational turns from St Michaels Hill into Horfield Road; its too tight. There are other options further up the hill.
The highest risk actions on a bicycle are probably
  1. Heading down from St Michaels Hill, where you are exposed to vehicles heading in either direction. Gravity works in the bicycle's favour here, it pulls the bicycle forward and minimises the time side-on to traffic.
  2. Heading up towards Horfield Road, where the bicycle rider is curving right and pushing slowly up something steep -any vehicle heading up St Michaels Hill in a hurry may turn over them. It's like a left hook only without the car making the left turn, it just goes straight on (hence faster), even though the road lanes turn rightwards.
On a bicycle, before the building works started, heading up through the BRI car park (the former Terrell Street) was apparently a lower hassle option. Follow the signs to A&E from Park Row, then head out to Horfield Road, or turn right to Marlborough Hill and a final bit of climbing.
 
We have no more details than the BBC article -and wish the cyclist a speedy and full recovery.

Reminiscing about the time before the war began

We see this video of Bristol on a weekday last week.

It looks to us like old market to counterslip lane then down to the St Mary Redcliff roundabout, a loop back towards queen's square, along the harbour front then up Prince Street towards Baldwin Street.

Some people say this is an anti-cycling road design, but the reality is this congestion is a result of the war on motoring. Prince Street bridge was made alternating to cars, hence the congestion on Prince Street and nearby. Queen's square was converted from a dual-carriageway to a so-called-public-square a decade ago, and all those people stuck in the Redcliffe roundabout will be reminiscing about the temporary flyover they took down late last century.

Tuesday 5 July 2011

Eastville Park: will you be my friend?

Word trickles down of a new group "Friends of Eastville Park", who are fighting back against the plans to formalise the pump trail with something in tarmac, and the development of cycle routes through the park. Why the cycling city maps say you can cycle there., and if someone or their dog gets hit by someone on a bicycle, whether the council is legally liable.

For visitors from out of town, Eastville park is the park to the east of the M32 flyover.

At least today. A large chunk of the park was given over to that flyover, with nothing but a Glasgow-style concrete picnic bench underneath as a memory of families coming down there for picnics.
We find it amusing that only now are people complaining about bits of the park being turned over to transport rather than greenery, rather than, say, 40 years ago.
More importantly, we worry that if the Friends of Eastville park have their way, they may not stop at the bicycle access. They may start asking for the bit of parkland that is known as the M32 motorway back. This would not be good. We hope, therefore, that the Friends of Eastville park are regular users of the M32 and can see the tangible benefits of it remaining in-situ. Be believe this is likely, given that they clearly don't cycle. And as nobody takes their dog for a walk on the flyover, the liability issue there isn't important.

Sunday 3 July 2011

Southwell Street #1: I've seen your plan and it sucks

The tax-dodgers are complaining about Shared Streets this week -that they really mean "streets mostly for cars and vans". Exactly. Given a choice between a pedestrian area and a shared street, we'd go for the shared street. Once you get a hang of the chicanes they can be quite fun.

Southwell Street, our unofficial logo, is being "improved". We know that, as the vans to do it are parked there this week. Expect photos soon. But before that, the plans.

As people will recall, the concerns by the non-drivers about this area were
  • uphill pavement turned into NHS parking, possibly illegally.
  • no way for bicycles to get through except on the pavement
  • the pavement was blocked to give priority to staff cars
  • both dead ends were used as short stay parking for vans
Overall then a van-and-staff friendly area, with pedestrians as an afterthought, and one of those deliberately created bike/walker conflict zones to divide the opposition, all on the premier walking route from Gloucester Road to Bristol University, and hence full of students. By creating such conflict we could discourage people from trying to do this.

We were initially worried, then, when this draft plan hit our inbox, "a shared space".

Then we saw some emails from Ben Hamilton-Baillie, who we thought would approve of this fusion of walking and driving. Yet he seemed unimpressed
Most residents in Kingsdown feel, as I do, pretty insulted to be presented with a sketch of such pathetically poor quality for Southwell Street.
If the UHB really believes that Southwell Street and other streets in and around Kingsdown can be treated with such contempt, we should not give them any support. I have seen work experience students aged 16 produce more intelligent work than AECOM’s output for UHB. I only hope the hospital trust is not having to pay them fees as well....
Finally, we saw this video from a tax-dodging pavement cyclist who encounters the designers, and provides some feedback.

At 00:10 the Ginster delivery van does a U-turn without indicating, at which the troublemaker engages in discussion with the driver about, that and the fact that it isn't making any beeping noises. Well, the lorry pays more road tax, and isn't of a size where it needs the beeps. That shuts them. Remember that lorry though.

At 1:02 they execute the highly illegal "pavement bypass" option, so endangering pedestrians.

At 1:16 they meet the a hi-viz'd person planning the traffic calming area -and say to them the plan sucks, because painting a bit of pavement, whether it's in coloured paint or some cobbles down the middle of the road is utterly meaningless. They mutter on a bit, and we think their key point is that taking one pavement off for car parking and closing the other off for safe car park access is somehow wrong.

At 1:38 the cyclist, who is standing in the middle of the "person on the road" lane is actually forced to wheel their bike backwards to let a car out of the staff carpark. This shows to us how the "shared space" design will have no effect on our daily lives, so may as well be permitted. There is a risk of some benefit to people trying to cycle here -as they won't be quite so discouraged by having to hop on and off the pavement, but if we block the bollards with vans often enough, they'll be discouraged differently.

At 1:48 the troublemaker demands some of the pavement back. We'd hoped to have some good news there, but based on the building work it looks like these people have got their way. Somewhat. Wait until tomorrow for the specifics there.

At 2:02 they express concern that the dropoff area in front of the hospital is chaotic, and it will remain so. Well, that's why it's called a dropoff area, isn't it? If people were expected to do dropoffs and pickups on St Michael's hill, there'd be an area there instead.

at 2:20 their rant finishes and they finally head off, presumably to the relief of the site team. They then proceed down a road that clearly has room for parking all down one side, yet lacks it. And there are an oddly large number of pedestrians, given the effort the NHS has gone to here to discourage walking.

At 2:43 you can see some people trying to cross Horfield Road. Notice the wide five-junction crossing here. It's a dangerous exposed crossing and people shouldn't attempt it, not when there is a zebra crossing further up the road, as the video shows at 3:07. If people aren't prepared to cross the road where a crossing has been provided, well, it's like people on bicycles not using the bike lanes.

At the zebra crossing they do a U-turn, and at 3:08 show what is paveparked over yellow lines round the corner: Ginster delivery van HN58LVK. Purely because Southwell Street doesn't support through traffic, that van had to do a 180 degree turn in a narrow drop-off street, turn right up St Michael's Hill, right again on to Myrtle Road, then onto Alfred place. One U-turn and two right turns -not just a philosophy for the coalition government, it's costing the company money. The DfT puts a financial cost on critical business motoring, and its clear that closing this road has tangible costs to that key part of the economy: the white van.

Therefore, although the proposals don't take much away from us, they don't deliver what we need, either -the removal of the gate and the re-instatement of Southwell Street as a van-friendly rat-run!

Saturday 2 July 2011

Crimewatch

Do you remember those riot things in Stokes Croft in April?

It seems the Police and the Main Stream Media do...



We don't care about the non-existant petrol bombs, of course, as we bought the real, value Banksy posters instead and made a killing on eBay.

However... we are hoping Tesco will still be able to supply us with fresh milk next Sunday morning, after the St Paul's Carnival, before we drive around Bristol looking for Gorillas.*

*Bristol Traffic is not affiliated in any way with Bristol Zoo, but we do like Gorillas.

Friday 1 July 2011

Bristol's Most Determined Paveparker




Here at the traffic blog we applaud the British stiff-upper lip and our relentless desire to carry on as normal in difficult circumstances. It's summed up at the end of Carry On Up the Khyber, with Sid James and the gang enjoying a dinner party whilst the natives attack and the building crumbles around them. So when the Bristol Evening Post had their old brick print hall demolished, we naturally thought it might signal the end of their hypocritical rants about pavement cycling whilst casually ignoring the car paveparking (and pavedriving) that went on under their very noses. Apparently in Bristol cycling on the pavement is the most heinous crime a cyclist can commit, and we should all be heavily fined,locked up and subjected to torture (eg having to watch the X Factor endlessly). But, it's okay to squeeze a car or two into any available pavement space.

So we can but admire this determined paveparker in the photo who managed to drive up the pavement without knocking anyone over and reverse their vehicle onto it's little platform. Well done!. The drab grey monolithic print hall may be gone, but paveparking space is still available. Pavement cycling is just evil, but paveparking like this is so cooooool....