Cyclists must know their place

Clearly motorists are more important and must take priority on the road, regardless of the right of way of inferior pedestrians or cyclists. It is concerning to us then that so many of these "alternative" travel modes seem to think that they can be considered as a legitimate form of transport.

Consider this next case. Imagine you are almost 30 seconds away from your destination and you want to turn right into Stanton road from PenPark road, Southmead after a long morning doing something important. A cyclist decides to turn in front of you, thinking that they have right of way as another car might have in his same situation. It will not do at all and is likely to add several seconds to your journey.

It is important to make a point about this impudence! P198HWK takes such action and attempts to force cyclist onto the pavement where he would normally belong. Disappearing around the corner there is an inspired one finger salute just in case there was any doubt by the cyclist that he had done something wrong.





The trouble is that we cannot condone this sort of action. Imagine the engine and tyre wear that vehicles would suffer from this revving and squealing and if this was the norm then it will only add to the large expense that us poor motorists already suffer. Let's hope at least that this one cyclist has learned his lesson.

Oxford 3: bike/bus lane

Here in another street in Oxford, we see evidence that it is possible for bikes and buses to co-exist, a wonderful example showing how buses on the Bristol-Bath railway path would improve the lives of all path users.

Here a bus is just managing to squeeze down a bike lane.

If all bike lanes in Bristol were opened up to buses, and if they were allowed to use the Advanced Stop Lanes, then bus timetables would be more reliable and the experience of bus passengers greatly enhanced. FirstBus are already in meetings with Bristol Council on this topic, and will be rolling such a program out during the summer months.

Oxford 2: bike lane

Here's an interesting bike lane in Oxford, a city famed for its cycling. It directs cyclists off the pavement to somewhere where they can be run over by cars.

The path begins by curving you off the pavement. Note the ambulance in the distance -that will be visited later.

After it skirts round some parked cars, the path runs you alongside traffic, with a double yellow line to discourage parking. There's also a "no bikes" sign on the pavement, to discourage any cyclists who were a bit scared of what is to come from trying to avoid it by going on the pavement.


And what is to come?Well, the bike lane is simply too narrow and covered in three strips of paint to make it extra slippery in the wet. Here we see someone with a trailer just skirting past this transit van, a van which doesn't have any option but to drive down the lane.

To survive, the cyclist has to get past the van and then pull out into traffic, which they manage to do safely.

This is a classic example of a bike lane that provides no benefit to anyone, except to add to the statable quota of number of bike lanes in a town or city.