There is nothing erotic about a naked man on a Brompton

Being as the Bristol Traffic HQ is an open air drinking establishment in Stokes Croft (the wall on Turbo Island), we are used to the sight of nudity.

Even so, our encounter with the Bristol Naked Bike Ride was such that we had to delete our videos for the sake of humanity.

If you find yourself getting excited about the sight of a naked man on a Brompton, well, based on the participants of the local naked bike ride, you've got a bit of an obsession with folding bicycles that you should either get looked at, or at least get in touch with Brompton for a printed catalog.


Can we also observe that this image exposes the lie that "cycling is good for your health". Do these people look healthy? We think not. And as for the claim that Brooks saddles are comfy? There's nothing to say there except look at the expression on some of these people's faces.

For next year's ride, we propose having a review board deciding in advance who gets to ride. We will volunteer our services —provided nobody sends their nude selfies with them wearing nothing but hi-viz and a helmet. You know who you are.

Prewar Bristol

A lot of newcomers ask us: "what was it like before the war began?", or "How was the city centre before it was ruined by the war?"

Well, the War on Motorists began over 25 years ago —and the city is still suffering under it. Before the war, you could drive from temple way over the rickety flyover, straight to the centre, then past the cathedral and out to the A4, with only a couple of traffic lights in your way. Not now.

Some of the history of pre-war Bristol is still there, if you know where to look. Redcliffe Way for example —have you noticed how wide it is? Or why the road from the Jacob's Wells Road roundabout to (what's left of) the Bristol library is wide, yet deserted. All distant memories of a city before the war.

Here, in our historical artifacts, we've found an A-Z map of Bristol from 1985, when the motorists were not yet under attack by a car-hating council.


Look at the subtle differences

1.  Castle Park is as it once was: parking. A large amount of its surface area was dedicated to medium to long stay parking for "Broadmead Shopping Precinct" —one of Britain's premier shopping areas. Now: stolen by greenery. And of course, there's a bike path. And look what happened to Broadmead —its decline is not a coincidence.
2. There's a road, "College Green", where now there is a park: "College Green". Newcomers just don't appreciate how wonderful it was to have a main road going past the cathedral entrance, between it and the council house —showing the council what mattered to Bristol: fast-moving cars. When Anchor Road was reworked in the early 1990s, it was designated the through road, and College Green taken from us; Dean Road becoming a cul-de-sac.  And of course, the park added a bike path. This was one of the first losses in the war —and possibly the greatest strategically. No longer did the council get to see a main road out their windows. And without that, they lost their way: they forgot what mattered.
3. Redcliffe Way goes all the way through to The Centre, via what is now known as "Queen's Square". That got captured by the tree-huggers at the turn of the century —who went out to plant trees to commemorate their victory. And of course, a bike path.
4. The infamous rickety flyover has gone. Nobody who has arrived in the last 15 years will ever appreciate the thrill of driving over that single lane flyover, wondering if today would be the day that it fell down. Stolen, replaced by a lights-controlled gyratory. And of course, a bike path.
5. Templemeads had a motorail terminal. Actually, this was news to us. Apparently you could drive onto a sleeper train and get to Scotland overnight. Of course, being able to drive up the M5, get stuck at Spaghetti Junction, crawl over Wolverhampton on the M6 and then eventually get to the A74 replaced that. And even now, with the M74 and new motorways round Glasgow, the speed enforcement on those motorways have made the journey worse.
6. The railway path doesn't exist. While they didn't steal our roads for that —they could have converted that old railway line into a new road, or at least extra parking. Instead: a route designed to encourage more law-breaking cyclists to come into the city.
7. The M32 ends at the "Allied Carpet and sex shops" junction, rather than the more convoluted "queue for Cabot Circus Parking" junction. Again, the addition of vast amounts of parking has made congestion worse on the M32. And, with more lights, pedestrian and cycle crossings.
8. Nine Tree hill is open to through traffic. This was the great partition of Kingsdown. Before then you could drive down Springfield road, cut through Ninetree Hill and make your way to Jamaica street —allowing you to get all the way from The Downs to the city centre without a traffic light. Not now —and by forcing everyone to drive down Whiteladies Road, St Michael's Hill or Arley Hill+ Cheltenham road, it only makes congestion worse. And again: there's a bike path on the roads they stole.
9. Prince Street Bridge. Two way, Closed to cars —possibly indefinitely.
10. Lots of the other little "P" areas have been taken away by offices and housing. And what have we got in exchange? Nothing but the multi-storey parking of The Galleries, the multi-storey parking of Cabot Circus, the underground parking at @Bristol and the vast amount of parking behind Temple meads. That's it.

You can see, then, the multipronged battles which we've been fighting —and losing— in the war on motorists. Those bits of red paint on the main roads aren't the real war, they are just the victory signs, the equivalent of unionist and nationalist kerb painting. No, the battles fought have been far more strategic

• The closure of the inner ring road, the replacement of College Green and Queen's Square's main roads with parkland and bike paths. And in doing so —increasing congestion on the remaining roads.
• The closure of important rat-runs, closures which partition whole parts of the city. And in doing so —increasing congestion on the remaining roads.
• The replacement of surface parking with multi-storey parking facilities. And in doing so: encouraging congestion.

This is what we are up against. And while it's easy to point to the current mayor and say "20 mph zones! RPZ zones!" and accuse him of conducting a war on motorists, those aren't the real war. Those are details in a conflict going back decades.

Secret Castle Park Paveparking

If Cabot Circus super car-park is a bit full, you can always opt for Castle Park any Saturday afternoon. Hide it under any nearby tree and your vehicle will become invisible.

Just Plain Wrong

What is going on??? Bristol Naked Bike Ride??? Who's idea was that?

I wanted to buy a new Top Gear DVD last Sunday, so I set off in the Range Rover for Cabot Circus, only to be confronted by this...

And this,

and even this.

Mrs Quercus was proper embarrassed, and the children didn't know where to look...

Not only did these filthy tax-dodgers seriously hold me up between traffic lights, but they also offended many, many shoppers and other proper tax-paying car users, who were so incensed by the spectacle that they had to take photos of the event on their mobile phones.

I'll bet it's probably all over Flickr and Youtube by now. Disgusting.

What is the world coming to when these hippy outcasts with their anarchist, lifestyle changing attitudes think they can ride around naked and avoid paying VAT by not even buying clothes? Isn't it illegal to expose yourself in public?

Apparently this whole charade was just to highlight the vulnerability of cyclists on our roads, and, worse still, to campaign for Car-Free Sundays in Bristol city centre. Just plain wrong.

Despite dialling 999, no police turned up. At all*. Not even outside Bristol Cathedral, or our beloved Council House.

I am livid. I'll be contacting the ABD to ensure this doesn't happen again.

(*except, possibly, the guy on the motorbike?)

Castle Park - The clue is in the name

Now that The Horsefair and Penn Street have been made a no-go for through traffic it's becoming all the more important to make full use of the areas we can still drive to. And all the more important to commend those who are seeking out those new and secret places for driving and more importantly parking, that many of us are not yet aware of.


















Bristol Evening Post van WV51 GPO was out doing just that today, Christmas Eve, December 24th 2009 at 12.24pm. A bit like an early Christmas present if you like. No doubt out and about spreading the newsprinted cheer and "good will to all men" that is almost synonymous with the Evening Post newspaper and website. Or as it would seem illogical for an evening newspaper to be delivered this early in the day, maybe just popping in to Wilko's for some last minute tinsel and wrapping paper.

And who better to forge forwards exploring exciting new possibilities of travel and parking than a newspaper that is way ahead of the rest of us in it's expert analysis, in-depth knowledge and balanced exploration of transport options in Bristol.


















So Bristol Evening Post van WV51GPO , we commend you for your vision and forward thinking that lets you see beyond the facade of the "biggest city centre greenspace" label and pedestrianised areas, giving us a glimpse of how the future could be.

Secret Primark Parking

A lot of people come to our sight looking for free Cabot Circus parking, but we haven't mentioned Primark yet, which is apparently so popular that people are selfishly parking at Cabot Circus and walking to Primark. This is wrong. Do these people not know that the Cabot Circus consortium invested a lot of money in that parking area, putting in high clearance parking for bigger vehicles, yet now it turns out that people are shopping elsewhere? Even though the parking spaces are now let out at weekends at discounted rates?

We think that people who wish to shop at Primark should park elsewhere, and so are pleased to receive this photo from Cap'n Bikebeard showing a secret parking space?

Where is it? Castle Park. And how exactly does this car get there? That's the secret.

update: Cllr Jon Rogers has forwarded us a note that went round bits of the council last week:

Claire Adams 22/10/2009 12:37
Hi all,
Just a quick note to say that the area in front of the Vaulted Chambers should not be being used for parking by anyone, including family members, friends etc. Please can you pass this on to anyone who may be parking here. In future any cars found parking here will be towed away.
Thanks very much,
Claire
Claire Adams
Area Park Manager Central (Acting)
Neighbourhoods
Bristol Parks

Secret Cabot Circus Parking in Castle Park

Who remembers when Castle Park was little more than a parking area for the shops, back when the nearest shop was an Argos outlet, not the fancy Cabot Circus stuff? In those days, parking was easy and cheap, now you have to queue behind everyone else to get into the new parking area. Still, for your money you get parking spaces big enough for your landrover discovery with the roofbox, not like the Galleries parking area.

We get lots of visitors looking for secret and free Cabot Circus parking -today Captain Bikebeard is sharing some of the places they've noticed you can still park a car for nothing, right next to the shops.

Where is the place? Where it's always been: Castle Park.

Here a car with the number plate "AE1" is parked. This is apparently for the Lord Mayor, who has been driven down to celebrate the biggest bike ride.

But it is not just for the mayor, here another car BN03VVU has snuck in.

There must be lots of little places in the park you can fit a car, and it's very handy for the shops. Just take care not to run over anyone sunbathing if you have to drive over the grass to get there.

Troy Atkinson memorial walk, 7pm May 5

At 7pm tonight (May 5), there's a memorial walk from where Troy Atkinson was killed last tuesday, at exactly the same time.

The friends and family are walking down to Hartcliffe, and everyone is donating £5 to help cover funeral costs.

At the Lower Castle Street memorial, there's more flowers, more graffiti remembering him, more photographs from family and friends.

There's also a set of markings showing that the car driver came from Penn street. Which raises the question: why are vehicles allowed down here, and why do they have the right of way over all the pedestrian crossings? If the route was made bus-taxi-bike only, except for a delivery period in the mornings -and every crossing was uprated to a zebra "vehicles come second" crossing, there'd be no need to sprint across all these crossings as cars try to force their way through. There's also a lot of disabled parking along Penn Street, but we could retain access there, or improve/expand the disabled parking in the Cabot Circus car park, making it the location of choice for disabled shoppers to stop. That disabled parking provides a lot of temptation to everyone else -especially taxis- to come down here.


7pm, tonight, Cabot Circus to Hartcliffe. That's the "Troy Atkinson" junction, Cabot Circus, to give it its new name -one by which he can be remembered.

Troy Atkinson, 15, killed by a car on April 28, 2009.

Stopping by Cabot Circus this evening was really sad. There's a big tower of flowers growing where Penn Street turns into Lower Castle Street, all remembering Troy Atkinson, a fifteen year old schoolboy from the city.

The flowers are from his friends, his schoolmates, his family.

In the street, traffic and people carry on. Some look at the flowers, but then they get on with their lives. The buses and cars go by as usual.

For the people standing by the memorial or chalking on the ground by it, it is not so easy. These are Troy's friends, and they are showing the world that he will be missed, that he will be remembered. And he will be, but those memories of happiness will be darkened by the pain of his loss - a pain that may fade with time, but never go away.

We in the Bristol Traffic Project -and others in the "cycling and pedestrian transport activist" community- extend our condolences and deepest sympathies to his parents, family and friends. Nobody should die in our streets, and for a fifteen year old to be lost is particularly sad.

This another dark day on Bristol's roads

Not seen on Casualty

As this ambulance was being brought in at 4pm on a Friday, it will probably stay there all weekend before anyone takes a look at it.

Hopefully there is some checklist like "make sure there is no patient in the back before you lock up for the night"