Whiteladies Road Cycle Path: not dead, sleeping -says the council

The whiteladies road uphill path, the one covered over by a build-out for a new pedestrian crossing is not apparently, dead, merely sleeping. Instead some paint will go on the road showing cyclists where to go to end up under a bus. This is called "London-style infrastructure".

Adam Semy sends us a "before" link.



He also sticks up a "now" video


Adam thinks that in the video LS07CFM is beeping at the cyclists. We're not sure -they could be beeping at the BMW that was forced to swing out so as to get past the cyclist heading uphill.

This shows how the addition of build-outs actually makes things worse for drivers: we get held up by bicycles, or have to perform dangerous manoeuvres. Same for pinch points: the fact that they create car/cyclist conflict is as inconvenient for drivers as it is dangerous for cyclists.

Apparently the build-out is so that queueing parents with children and push chairs can wait safely for the lights to change. This shows something important: it's not a zebra crossing, where they wouldn't have to wait, but a pelican crossing where they do.

Presumably BCC and FirstBus didn't want a road and a showcase bus route to be help up by school parents -and if more people were walking to the new school, that is exactly what happened. This is why FirstBus also wanted the zebra crossing from the downs to Blackboy Hill removed -a want that got denied on the basis that "the students would cross anyway".

It's interesting to consider if a new zebra crossing lower down would delay traffic -because on a weekday morning it's a line of cars anyway. The fear of traffic flow impact is enough for a zebra crossing to be omitted, and for a cycle time on the lights long enough that even at school run times parents will have to wait. This is important: anything that hindered motor traffic flow at school run times would penalise school-running parents!

As for the cyclists, well, nobody will miss them. It's not as if they can ask for the money spent in the name of "cycling city" back. They'll see that when BRT2 goes over Prince Street Bridge.

What it does show is this: Clifton is the heart of the Bikelash -the part of the city fighting back against bicycles, one TRO at a time.

This is a dead cycle lane. No its not, its a norwegian blue.

One aspect of the Cycling City program was the way they used Showcase Bus Routes as part of the plan







as you can see, it means that on a friday evening people have a cycle lane to follow on whiteladies road

It's not a particularly great cycle lane, but with the bus lane downhill and road widening out further up, this metre or so of paint does say "bicycles can go here". For anyone thinking "why not take the lane", on a friday evening that lane is stationary traffic. On a day when there is moving traffic, most people aren't going to be fit enough to keep with the flow all the way up the hill.

this bike lane, is important.

But not, apparently, as important as a buildout "for pedestrian safety"



This little build-out popped up without any warning, no consultation on the council web site, apparently no discussion in the bike forums, nothing.

Why has it gone up? Part of the "safe routes to school" work to the new St Johns school campus; This is the one where last year Skanska proposed making lower redland road a one-way route and stopping cyclists from contraflowing as their safe-school-run plan.

That plan got killed, but whoever wanted to do it must have been bearing a grudge, as they have effectively managed to knife the Whiteladies road cycle route instead, giving you a whole 50cm of rough tarmac and slippery paint between the pavement and the large buses.

This is not a cycle lane! It is dead!

No doubt the council will argue it is "resting", that it is a "norwegian blue" cycle lane. We know different -this buildout has killed it. The cycle team needs to admit this, and on next year's cycle maps remove the "dedicated cycle lane" from this stretch of whiteladies road. To pretend it is still there is to be the pet-shop owner in the dead parrot sketch.

There's just one little thing we have to ask of whoever designed this. Not: did you know that there was a cycle lane there before you came up with your plan? Not: how did you manage to get this in without the cycle team noticing? Not even "how do manage to bypass the entire council consultation process"?

No its: how does slightly widening the pavement make crossing an A-Road at peak hours a safe route to school?

Uphill and downhill there are pelican crossings, the whiteladies gate one being very popular on the school run. Here, for example, is a video of people waiting to cross it when, as it goes red, a volvo school-running parent goes through it uphill (note the pedestrian to the left of the camera shaking her head in disbelief -she mustn't get out much), while the driver of the car coming downhill is too busy on the phone to do the same.



This shows that you can't safely cross whiteladies road on a weekday morning on a light-controlled or zebra crossing without expecting vehicles to cut you up. That doesn't even include the (sadly not on video) incident involving a school running Volvo dad driving over the wrong side of the oakfield road crossing traffic island. These crossings, despite their white lines and red lights are not safe to cross.

Which is why we stare at these roadworks in disbelief. Not because we care about the cyclists -they are clearly unimportant. But in complete disbelief that whoever built this thought it would make trying to walk two kids across two lanes of rush hour traffic is a safe route to school.

Because all the pinch point is doing is stopping bicycles coming up the hill at 4 mph from hitting the push chair -it does nothing for the cars and buses that are likely to cause more damage to the children.

Which means that it is utterly useless. It is not just a a dead cycle lane, it is a dead pedestrian crossing too

Clifton: some bike parking has snuck in to the village

Before we can declare victory in Clifton in the motorists side of the warn on motorists, we must note that some bicycle parking has been added to the village, and it is -shockingly- in use

On the mall: two stands, three bikes, on a buildout that would easily fit if not a 4x4, a little mini.

By the Thali Cafe, more stands and three bicycles. you can tell this isn't Stokes Croft as the bicycles are newer and still retain their wheels.

Further up Regent Street, two more stands and one bicycle.

It does reinforce that induced demand idea: if you provide bicycle parking, they will come. This is why it is critical that the councillors and aspirants do all they can to encourage driving and parking by car, instead of conceding any more pavement or road space to cycling or cycle parking.

On that topic, can we at least praise Clifton for not having a single bicycle lane anywhere west of Whiteladies Road, apart from that one on the approach to the Suspension bridge that doesn't actually work. Active Transport campaigners would probably push for some integrated route to join up the bridge with Cotham Hill, then to link over to Gloucester Road, then Bishopston and Montpelier, their own version of an Inner City Ring Road. They can dream, but as long as we hold the high ground that is Clifton, we will defeat them.

Clifton's Bike Stands!

We'd thought that the Clifton councillors were strong enough to fight back against the cycle city plans in their own wards, but no, someone broke and conceded four stands

Fortunately, two of them are so close together as to be useless

They're on the junction of Frederick Place and Richmond Hill: back road nowhere near any useful destinations, and there's still plenty of pavement for parking. The fact that they are out of sight will stop anyone feeling threatened, and because they are nowhere near Clifton Village, won't do anything to actually encourage cycling.

Nothing to worry about directly, though its a sign of weakness at the top. Question is: who surrendered?

Clifton Park: one possibility

We borrowed Quercus's Land Rover to drive over to Clifton Park one morning, to see where excessive parking restrictions were endangering people.

Well, it's not by Clifton High, as the excessive restrictions at this end (the zebra crossing zig-zags and the school keep clear zone) are both in use for child dropoff. These restrictions therefore provide an important feature for important school run parents, and so should be retained.

Looking the other way, no, no parking restrictions at all. What were these road safety campaigners going on about?

Then a bit further down we saw it. Can you see here? Where there is enough space for a bicycle to go safely along without fear of being hit by a car. Exactly. Without Fear. We don't want that, as it only encourages them.


Real road safety campaigners would actually push for a zebra crossing here, as that crossing by the school is the only way to cross this wide and busy road. But we don't want that, it will take away more long-stay parking spots. Instead we are going to pretend that it's all about safety, when really it's about convenience.

On this, large double yellow lined road, only the car X411WCG is bold enough to assert their rights to park here, even before the excessive restrictions have been removed.

If people are prepared to park here, even when they will get ticketed and fined (at least on those three days a year when the rule is enforced), then that's enough to justify. As it isn't right next to a school, making it residential parking wouldn't remove any school run parking opportunities. If it makes it more hazardous to cycle round the back streets of Clifton, well, if we cared about that, we wouldn't be pushing for more parking -and the ward wouldn't have voted Barbara and Terry back in, would they?

In a cycling city, this space would be turned into a segregated cycle path, before anyone got used to the idea of parking here.

But while Bristol is a Cycling City, Clifton is not part of the city -it's older- and so exempt from any of these changes.

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.

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.

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.

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!

Brunel Ford -proud to sponsor the Concorde Way

One thing missing from the official opening of the Concorde Way a couple of weeks back was the sponsor. London has Barclays "wealth for the wealthy" sponsoring the bikelanes "a tax-deductible gift for the poor in our society". Nobody was forthcoming in North Bristol, as our main local benefactor prefers to support development in and near Ashton Gate, rather than up here, Bristol Rovers territory.

Hence: no sponsor

This has changed, as J0TCT shows.

The best view is from Dovercourt way, where anyone who avoided a dooring incident gets a lovely view of a better option for the city.

Our tax-dodging troublemaker is here recorded harassing an innocent driver.

Let's review the video and score the discussion

1. The tax-dodger takes the photograph and says this will be the reference "before" photograph: kick-off!
2. The driver rightfully points out, no yellow lines -hence legal. 1-nil!
3. The tax dodger responds: blocking dropped kerbs are illegal as is obstructing a cycle route, and that they could call the police. 1-all!
4. The driver counters with "you are cycling on the pavement". 2-1 to Brunel Ford!
5. The troublemaker tries to respond with "that's because there is a large vehicle blocking my normal access point". Offside!

We hope the troublemaker will see the error of their ways and buy a nice new Ford Focus, especially now that our Chancellor has reduced the cost of filling up the car by 50 pence.

Incidentally, can we say that we agree with all the comments added to the youtube page -our site does not in any way condone walking, cycling or public transport.

Dovercourt Door markings

The new glue-on markings in Dovercourt road "concorde way" are placed in the ideal position to discourage survivors from ever approaching a bicycle again.

Sadly we have been forwarded some email in which the cycling team claim that this was some kind of error and will be corrected.

You are absolutely right about the location of the symbols on Dovercourt Road they have been incorrectly marked due to an error using old plans. We will rectify this.

We agree, anything trying to encourage such subversive actions as not driving in the city needs correction. On that topic, we are pleased to announce the Brunel Ford are now the official sponsors of the Concorde Way, The extension of the Farm Pub Path. More to follow soon.

Breaking news: parking restrictions encourage higher vehicle speeds

The new "neighbourhood funding" schemes are great for us, the drivers, as we can use our money to get what we want: parking, without any city-wide initiative like public transport, sustainability or cycling getting in the way. This is why we are delighted to cover the "DEVOLVED TRANSPORT SCHEMES FOR 2011/12" for Clifton and Cliftonwood, which will be up for discussion on Tuesday at 19:00 above Jack's Brasserie behind the waterfront TSB building.

The important people in Clifton have been successful in adding one-way streets by Clifton-college, so making easier to do Range-Rover and Volvo XC60 dropoff, and held up the provisioning of bicycle parking on the grounds that it degrades the listed buildings. However there still aren't enough places to park our important cars. How to add more parking, without appearing blatantly selfish? The answer is obvious: push for it on road safety grounds.

This is the tactic planned for tomorrow, with the following proposals in the set.

• Lay-by at the bottom of Hope Chapel Hill: Existing parking restrictions encourage higher vehicle speeds
• Pembroke Road (St.Pauls Road end). More on-street parking would reduce vehicle speeds.

These claims are far better than the ones for Clifton Park and Princess Victoria Street, both of which just say "existing parking restrictions are too extensive", by which they mean "the bit by the side of the road where people cycle could be used by important people".

We hope all our local supporters turn up for this, and support the proposals and so make sure that we outnumber any cycling/living street troublemakers who sneak in and start calling us selfish gits who are more concerned about having somewhere to park our third car outside our houses than doing something to fundamentally improve Bristol's liveability. Those people don't realise that having somewhere to park our third Landrover -it's more than just a car- does improve Bristol's Liveability. Certainly it makes it easier to walk from the Landrover to our house, and by saving us driving around, reduces pollution and the CO2 emissions from our 3L V8 engines.

Futhermore, once that parking is in, it will be that much harder to put in bike lanes, so any ideas for adding some segregated route up Pembroke Road -our secret high speed alternative to Whiteladies Road- would be killed forever. It's important to do this now, before alternate transport plans progress.

Yes, those troublemakers will say "if we want parking we should have voted for the RPZ", but they miss the point: that would have restricted the number of vehicles we could own. Furthermore, by reducing the number of vehicles parked on the roads on a weekday, vehicle speeds have increased and Clifton is now a more dangerous place to walk. We have a spreadsheet we've just made up to prove it!

Note also that a large number of the other schemes (Ambrose Road, Cliftonwood Road, Alfred Hill, Westbourne Place and Redcliffe hill) are complaints by people about how parking is interfering with pedestrians. It is important to attend to stop this, otherwise the troublemakers will pick up on the complete hypocrisy of pushing for extra parking to calm roads in some parts of the area, while having to introduce bollards and dropped kerbs in other parts. We want parking everywhere, and no RPZ in our way.

Walthamize the planet, and have a nice day.

Stealing our Roadspace

While the cyclists are still loojking for examples of where the cycle city program stole roadspace from us, we and Cllr Gollop know the truth: even bike parking in the middle of the Centre is stealing space from us.

And that's without even getting us started on the whole roundabout/centre debate, let alone the need to re-instate the dual carriageway through Queen's Square. They took our ring road and gave us greenery. And is that bit up for sale so we can buy it and bring back the road, a group of motivated volunteer Road Builders? Fat chance.

[photo by Martin of Bristol Culture]

Cycling City: pavements and 20 mph zones

Milverton Gardens, off Ashley Hill. Jon R's constituency. Do you think these voters will be supportive of the cycle city plans? we suspect not.

On the far side of the road, there's not much pavement, and someone must have bashed the (defunct) sign. Will the council pay for the damage? we suspect not. On this side, the ford focus CV05WVC has managed to get its entire bodywork off road, so it will be safe from damage provided nobody is walking nearby. This is why we want to ban pushchairs from our pavements unless the parents have third party insurance.

Fortunately, there is no bike parking to take away space from motorists, which as Councillor Gollop points out, is a key reason for the Cycling City program's failure.

What they have done, though, is dropped the speed limit to 20 mph. The goal here, "supposedly" was to make it safer for pedestrians and cyclists. The ABD oppose it because, they claim that it will force drivers to look at their speedometers all the time. This is a bogus argument, because the same rule would apply to 30 and 70 limits, yet they don't complain about that. It's also bogus because the ABD don't realise that busy people are too busy texting to look up at road, let alone the speedo.

No, the real issue with 20 mph zones is this: it slows down people in a hurry just as much as if there was a bicycle in front. It may be designed to make people on the bicycle feel safer, but even there are only one or two bicycles an hour going up or down this road, it slows everyone down all the time, so imposing external costs on the entire city. It may not be explicitly removing road space, but it is removing fast road space, which is the real problem

One or two people are bold enough to fight back. As our van was up on the pavement we caught one who is best appreciated in the sound of this video.



You can hear the motorbike engine revving up as they go past the slow-moving cars, cars forced to slow down by anti-car speed limits. You can also hear the 4x4 revving its diesel engine as it slowly accelerates out of the 20 mph zone, as the 30 mph sign is in sight. And you know the rule of speed signs: if you can see a faster one in the distance you can speed up to it. It's not clear this car is doing over 20, it may just be working overhard in a low gear. This is a steepish hill.

We thought this was one of those videos was going be something we could resell to the Daily Mail "how a 20mph zone forced this motorbike into a head on collision with a 4x4", and so provide a compelling argument against more 20 mph zones in the city. But the motorbike eventually noticed the vehicle coming up the hill and pulled in.

Box Clever

Parking spaces are at a premium in central Bristol.

Even for tax dodging cyclists (ho-ho: serves them right for living in a 'Cycling City'). Notice the problem here? Yep, two bikes chained together due to lack of parking facilities. Poor souls.

So it's nice to see tax-payer funded facilities being made use of by honest traders, instead of freeloading, benefit scrounging anarchists trying to park their 'vehicles'.

Phone 9211942 for further information.

Farm Pub Path -one year on

With the Muller Road to Dovercourt Road Bridge now all mixed up in the sale of the Dovercourt Open Space, what does this mean for the Great North Fringe Cycle Route, the showcase of the Cycling City?

We have no idea. What we can do is check out the key destination of the route to date -the Farm Pub- and see how it's use has changed since we visited it last year, before the path was officially open. Has the opening up of more bicycle access increased the number of people who cycle there?

Well, there are a couple of bikes by the dogs at the entrance.

Two more people lining their wheeled UN/EU-conspiracy vehicles to an empty bench

In the rest of the garden, yes, every bench in use appears to be used by cyclists, many of whom must have nipped over for a pint or four of Doom Bar Beer.

Given the amount of tax you pay on beer, it's probably defensible: money saved from fuel can go towards beer, and at the outrageous tax rate there it evens out. And if they go there on the bike path they aren't taking up road-tax funded roads. But has enough extra beer tax revenue been raised by this single pub been adequate to pay for the path?

The other issue is that with the pub full of these cyclists, why would we, the motorists, drive there? Have they gained customers, or only chased away an equivalent number of motorists? And if so, who spends the most per evening? Us, the wealthy citizens forced by anti-motorist laws to only have 6-8 pints before driving home, or them, the tax-dodging cyclists who aren't harassed by drink driving legislation which the new coalition has failed to roll back, despite their promise to end the war on motorists?

Dovercourt Road -less forgotten?

There's an interesting sentence  in the council proposal to sell off the Dovercourt Open Space

it could be used in conjunction with the redevelopment of adjoining sites if proposed in the future.

Not wanting to do research ourselves, one of our reporters drove their van to the bottom of Dovercourt Road, the cul-de-sac where nothing happens, and waited for a pedestrian to come by, where we doored them (pavement side) and asked them some questions as they recovered. The open space area is to the left of this photo, incidentally.

Apparently the plan is to sell of the Muller Road bus station, knock down the three bungalows you can see behind our white van, and open up a direct link between Dovercourt Road and Muller road, instead of the turn off and traffic lights you have to deal with today. Looking up the road (open space on the right) you can see there is room to put your foot down here.

This finally gives people a reason to drive down this road. Fast. Normally the only visitors are outsiders who don't see the small turnoff that leads to the city and carry on down at speed. We know this as Josh Hart used this road as his sample of "a quiet road" in his comparison of three roads of equal widths and different traffic rates: Dovercourt Road, Filton Avenue and Muller Road. This was the road where people knew their neighbours across the road, where they talked to each other, something so unusual it made the national press, as well as the local magazine.

Josh's survey showed this road only gets 140 vehicles/day, which leaves them out from the vibrant heart of the city.
The opening up of this road to through traffic would let Josh write a followup paper, showing how social relationships change when a road that was a quiet cul-de-sac suddenly becomes busy.

It also has some very interesting implications for the North Fringe route. The cycle path was planned to bridge over the stream, meander through the open space and then the cyclists can turn right onto this dead end road. But if the Muller Road terminal really does go away

1. This won't be a quiet turning any more, it will be turning right over through traffic.
2. The road won't be quiet
3. They may reroute the bike path

Frankly, we think they should just kill the bike route plan now. With direct car access to Muller Road there's no need for it,; the crossing of the former open space just reduces its resale value. And, with a nice fast route all the way to the rugby grounds, why cycle? Why not drive up? Park and walk, or, if we can get that historical access to Abbey Wood sorted out, drive all the way up to the MoD site?

Training for errant cyclists

We hear a rumour. We hear that the council will soon be offering errant cyclists caught cycling on the pavement a choice between the on the spot fine, or some training courses to get rid of their fear of cycling on the road.

We are against this, because (a) everyone should be fined for riding a bicycle, regardless of where it is, and (b) we don't want anything to encourage more cyclists on the road. That's why we drive the way we do, cut them up closely, drive right behind them to intimidate them. Anything else would encourage more of them out there.

We are also worried that if the police/PCSOs start hanging round junctions, like the Cheltenham Road/Bath Buildings junction, they might look at other issues, such as this tax SF51LDU driving into the ASL on a red light.

We do not to be penalised for doing things like that, and if the police start waiting to spot troublemakers, we might be the victims.

Neither we, nor city taxi 623, want that.

Now, some people may just dismiss this as an idle threat, but we've read the real press release, rather than just the EP coverage, which has the bad news

If the scheme is deemed to be successful it will also be rolled out to include motorists who drive or stop in cycle zones (eg parking in cycle lanes or purposely stopping into advanced cycle lanes).
Life Cycle UK will be designing a cycle awareness course for motorists. Again they will have the chance to attend rather than pay the fine.

Scary.  Punishing innocent taxi drivers like SF51LDU by making them sit through some presentation about why cyclists matter, or pay the fine. We'd go for the fine, ourselves.

Bristol's Biggest Bike ride

People are probably expecting us to criticise the council for blocking off the A4 portway on a Sunday on their "Bristol's Biggest Bike Ride" event to let families cycle down it. No need for us to do that, the Evening Post article comments where people point out that "the spattering (I'm not sure that's a very PC description) of cyclists on all the commuter routes, is like having to continually watch out for potholes or missing manhole covers", and the letters page have done that already, while we all praise the fact that the taxi driver who killed a cycling commuter on the A370 -a death now officially described accidental- could have been any of us pulling onto the A370 after negotiating the Barrow Gurney traffic calming mess.

We aren't going to join in because we don't actually mind the cyclists being given one day out of 365 where the whole family can get their helmets and ikea-branded hi-viz stuff out. One day. Some of us even took part.

We aren't even going to complain about the kids cycling on the pavement in the centre, as they are technically allowed to do this. Traffic was held up by marching bands anyway.

No, our main issue is parking. If the council is going to organise a ride for the family, somewhere where everyone can safely cycle round for a Sunday ride, why start and finish it from somewhere where there is no adequate parking? It's not as if the families are going to cycle there -are you mad? No, we have to drive, it's the only safe thing to do, then why is the only place to park your Mercedes the bus lane outside Explore-at-Bristol?

Come on Bristol council, if you are going to organise a bike ride, at least give us some decent parking at it!

Someone is stealing our photographs!

This web site exists to document the way that Bristol oppresses us, the tax paying motorist. That is why we were so pleased to read in both the papers last week, the Mail and the Telegraph, that "the war on the motorist is over": that the new government will push back on anti-car activities like speed cameras and parking tickets.

We particularly like this comment on the Daily Mail page:

When cyclists, horse riders and pedestrians actually pay to use the road they might be considered equals, until then car drivers who do pay to use it and who drive the whole economy, mean the car IS king
Matt Munro, Bristol, UK, 13/5/2010 19:50

That's our kind of Bristolian: one who recognises that pedestrians and horse riders have no more right to OUR ROADS than any of those cyclist scum, and that it is we, THE DRIVERS, who keep this mess of a country afloat.

We are sad to see, therefore, that someone has been using our photographs, our documentation of the one pro-car part of Bristol, the North Fringe, and used them in their response to the cycling city route 10 proposals.

The main point of this tax dodger's commentary appears to be that the continued widening of roundabouts, ring roads, new roads from the A38 to Cribb's Causeway and the like are the real transport plans for South Gloucester, and all proposed cycle routes are simply window dressing on the main plans. To which we have to say "and your point is?" The purpose of the proposed routes 7 and 10 is to keep the students out of our way. Once everyone recognises this the plans make some kind of sense. For one of these transport activists to go back through our North Fringe coverage and rather than celebrate the one council that is holding out against this cycling city movement, the one Avon council where the sustainable transport councillor drives to his meetings with the cyclists, is wrong. We put those photographs up praise that part of the city, not to criticise it.

Our lawyers shall be in touch.