Cycling Mikey

[bob_summers]

I’m a cyclist, I used to ride outdoors a lot, but a friend of mine got knocked off his bike and killed just over a year ago, by a driver looking at Facebook on her mobile phone. I don’t really go out any more as that accident really put me off. I’ve now got a nice indoor set up with a Wattbike and Zwift (basically gaming/racing other people in a virtual world) - there’s no road rage, animosity between different road users, bad weather, punctures etc. More importantly there’s no morons stuck to their phone screens driving vehicles. You only have to watch a few cars/vans/lorries etc passing by and you’ll see “eyes down” from someone in no time. It’s getting ridiculous now.
However……this Mikey chap is just making things worse in my opinion. He is looking for, and finding (easily as I’ve said) drivers behaving badly. He ain’t going to stop that. He’s just feeding the anger towards cyclists. I’ve seen cyclists in London and a lot of them are as badly behaved as some of the car drivers. So there’s always going to be anger.
The police need to start doing something about this mobile phone usage. But they don’t/aren’t. Whilst people can get away with it they will. And they do. Thousands of them everyday. The roads are a dangerous battleground. My friend's family have been devastated by what happened. Married with two young daughters. Ripped apart - for Facebook ffs

Seems trends have shifted. I’d wager that 30 years ago, drunk drivers killed more people than they do now, due to it becoming socially unacceptable. Now, there are other factors: Infotainment, mobiles… The end result is similar.

I hope CM is helping to make the latter distractions socially unacceptable too. That taxi driver on the video is both cringe inducing and lethal in his habits. If anyone watching that thinks “Oh the taxi driver has got a point. I’ll be sure to close-pass cyclists in the future because CM is a cyclist too, and many cyclists jump red lights” it just shows we need to stop pandering to the lowest common denominator. Even the copper at the end says “but they jump red lights and ride four abreast”. Can we not make it socially unacceptable to be a thick t**t?

 

[RodCouncil]

Great post Bob, video evidence certainly helped sentence this thick t**t https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-northern-ireland-63514572

 

[bob_summers]

Great post Bob, video evidence certainly helped sentence this thick t**t https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-northern-ireland-63514572

I remember that case at the time. Chilling. Around the same time, a drug-driver ploughed into a family of cyclists who were riding the Camino de Santiago, and fled the scene, leaving a 12 year old boy to watch his parents die on the road. So to hear that copper say on CM's video, "but yeah cyclists jump red lights and ride four abreast" is utterly grim, and indicative of how anti-cyclist diatribe has got to the very people who are supposed to protect us.
I was a roadie for many years, training about 500km a week relatively incident-free, but it seems like every club has lost a member to selfish driving. Since becoming a dad, I just ride MTB or run - I'd rather take my chances with an angry wild boar than an entitled driver.

 

[Amarillo]

The irony of an unlawfully parked police van on a London street trying to zap motorists exceeding the 20mph speed limit.

When I asked the (police employed but not a policeman) camera operator if he thought parking on the pavement was an appropriate way to catch lawless drivers he seemed to think that it was OK because his van had just two wheels on the pavement. He then added that had he been parked [lawfully] on the road speeding motorists might slow down.

I couldn’t argue with that! Zap away…

 

[GrumpyGranddad]

The irony of an unlawfully parked police van on a London street trying to zap motorists exceeding the 20mph speed limit.

When I asked the (police employed but not a policeman) camera operator if he thought parking on the pavement was an appropriate way to catch lawless drivers he seemed to think that it was OK because his van had just two wheels on the pavement. He then added that had he been parked [lawfully] on the road speeding motorists might slow down.

I couldn’t argue with that! Zap away…

And it looks like he’s parked only a few metres away from a central island AND he’s forcing motorists to venture into a cross hatched area!

 

[RodCouncil]

Seems like the Police do what they want

https://twitter.com/x/status/1589838847642243072

 

[GrumpyGranddad]

Wow! Tiananmen Square yes, Hertfordshire no.

 

[ardm17]

The irony of an unlawfully parked police van on a London street trying to zap motorists exceeding the 20mph speed limit.

When I asked the (police employed but not a policeman) camera operator if he thought parking on the pavement was an appropriate way to catch lawless drivers he seemed to think that it was OK because his van had just two wheels on the pavement. He then added that had he been parked [lawfully] on the road speeding motorists might slow down.

I couldn’t argue with that! Zap away…

But isn't that the response regarding speed cameras - they aren't there to catch and fine people, only to encourage them to slow down and 'behave'??? So parking in the road and saving on film costs would work??

 

[WelshGas]

But isn't that the response regarding speed cameras - they aren't there to catch and fine people, only to encourage them to slow down and 'behave'??? So parking in the road and saving on film costs would work??

An admission that it is not a “Safety Camera “ but a “ CASH Camera “.

 

[GrannyJen]

This video features quite a lot of cycling Mikey ...

It also features a lot of the type of idiot that crashed into me today. Quite nice to see one cyclist that does not believe all cyclists are worthy of beatification.

I found it because I wanted to post a cycling video on a cyclists website suggesting that sometimes "WE" can be w*nkers ourselves.

Now, I have numerous scrapes and bruises, from a cyclist executing an almost 70% blind curve on a narrow shared path at the sort of speed Bradley Wiggins would be proud of in an olympic time trial. Total absolute frigging disregard for any cyclist, pedestrian, Mum with a pushchair, poor old sod on a mobility scooter, that may confront him.

I will still manage to get to the gym tomorrow and the ninja with the black hoodie hopefully still has his ears ringing from the sort of verbal onslaught that sweet demure grannies are not known for.

 

[Amarillo]

This video features quite a lot of cycling Mikey ...

It also features a lot of the type of idiot that crashed into me today. Quite nice to see one cyclist that does not believe all cyclists are worthy of beatification.

I found it because I wanted to post a cycling video on a cyclists website suggesting that sometimes "WE" can be w*nkers ourselves.

Now, I have numerous scrapes and bruises, from a cyclist executing an almost 70% blind curve on a narrow shared path at the sort of speed Bradley Wiggins would be proud of in an olympic time trial. Total absolute frigging disregard for any cyclist, pedestrian, Mum with a pushchair, poor old sod on a mobility scooter, that may confront him.

I will still manage to get to the gym tomorrow and the ninja with the black hoodie hopefully still has his ears ringing from the sort of verbal onslaught that sweet demure grannies are not known for.

I noted that in No5 the HGV driver didn’t bother signalling left until after being undertaken by the cyclist and just 20 yds from their junction.

Undertaking an HGV on a bicycle like that is silly, but had the HGV been signalling left it would have been very silly.

But the HGV driver not signalling was neglectful.

 

[GrannyJen]

I noted that in No5 the HGV driver didn’t bother signalling left until after being undertaken by the cyclist and just 20 yds from their junction.

Undertaking an HGV on a bicycle like that is silly, but had the HGV been signalling left it would have been very silly.

But the HGV driver not signalling was neglectful.

So your only response to syclists behaving badly is to focus on the driver?

Says it all Tom,.

Until we acknowledge the need for some level of cyclist proficiency the we all simply lorry bait.

 

[soulstyledevon]

I’m not sure what the point of the video is…?
Yes there some silly cyclists, yes there’s some silly car drivers. Like the plonker that undertook a load of us on the M6 today using the hard shoulder…

 

[Amarillo]

So your only response to syclists behaving badly is to focus on the driver?

Says it all Tom,.

Until we acknowledge the need for some level of cyclist proficiency the we all simply lorry bait.

#5 was the most dangerous.

Yes, there was some silly cycling but #5 could so easily have been fatal.