Rant: London Driving - Cyclists

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Alibaba99 said:
It's because of drivers with an attitude like yours that cyclists need to cycle two abreast. What happens if the cyclist has a wobble because they caught in a gust of wind, or have to move to avoid a large drain or debris on the road? Or what happens in the car coming the other way has to move across slightly to avoid something in their lane? The cyclist now has no room.
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I'm sorry, did I say I pass with a hairs width? Cycle lanes are only ~2m wide, use your brain a little because I can't be bothered to explain further than that lol

Alibaba99 said:
As for riding up the inside of a line of stationary traffic, well if the traffic isn't moving there isn't much danger from it.
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But traffic does then move when the light turns green, no? Unless you just go straight through the red light...
 
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Diddums said:
As both a London cyclist and driver, I am all too familiar with both sides of this fence and the very simple truth is that both parties have absolute bell ends representing them. These are also the minority which screw it up for the rest.

The end.
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This.. I've done both and simple summary is that there are idiots everywhere. But these threads always go the same way lol. The same old stories and so on. Just get on with your life and let idiots idiot.
 
We don't tend to get the packs of mass cyclists around here like in London, etc. but it is increasingly getting frustrating during the summer months as you end up with more and more strung out with few good places to pass them, along with a seeming ever increase in motor vehicles on the road, adding 20 odd minutes to a journey and you no sooner get past one than you catch up the next leading to increasing frustration and people doing daft things to overtake them. If it continues like this it isn't really a sustainable situation and has lead to a notable up-tick in the last few months in cyclists being killed on the roads around here. (I suspect partly due to more people taking up cycling with the whole COVID situation).

Other frustrating thing is visibility - some take it seriously but far too many don't seem to have a clue as to how they look from a driver's perspective. High vis really can add seconds to how quickly a driver notices they are there, or notices at all...


A flashing red light does a great job of making the cyclist visible early but without the addition of a constant rear light makes it harder to judge the actual position, heading and speed of the cyclist. Having ankle/shin level bright or better reflective markings do a great job of making the cyclist visible especially as they are constantly in motion but should their rear light fail them for whatever reason the lack of high vis higher up could make a huge difference in being noticed.

Driving a lot at dusk/night I've had a scary number of encounters with cyclists who are only visible at any real distance because a thin line of white sock material was visible going round and around.

EDIT: One from the other day:


From what I could see the front cyclist only had a forward face light, the rear cyclist had a bright coloured top on but I couldn't see any lights on the bike - I'm not sure if the other driver purely made a bad decision on going past them or additionally reacted late due to poor visibility on the part of the cyclists.
 
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Welcome to London OP.
Cyclists like to go through reds round here even with mums walking buggies across the crossings. The way it is sadly.
 
Rroff said:
We don't tend to get the packs of mass cyclists around here like in London, etc. but it is increasingly getting frustrating during the summer months as you end up with more and more strung out with few good places to pass them, along with a seeming ever increase in motor vehicles on the road, adding 20 odd minutes to a journey and you no sooner get past one than you catch up the next leading to increasing frustration and people doing daft things to overtake them. If it continues like this it isn't really a sustainable situation and has lead to a notable up-tick in the last few months in cyclists being killed on the roads around here. (I suspect partly due to more people taking up cycling with the whole COVID situation).

Other frustrating thing is visibility - some take it seriously but far too many don't seem to have a clue as to how they look from a driver's perspective. High vis really can add seconds to how quickly a driver notices they are there, or notices at all...


A flashing red light does a great job of making the cyclist visible early but without the addition of a constant rear light makes it harder to judge the actual position, heading and speed of the cyclist. Having ankle/shin level bright or better reflective markings do a great job of making the cyclist visible especially as they are constantly in motion but should their rear light fail them for whatever reason the lack of high vis higher up could make a huge difference in being noticed.

Driving a lot at dusk/night I've had a scary number of encounters with cyclists who are only visible at any real distance because a thin line of white sock material was visible going round and around.

EDIT: One from the other day:


From what I could see the front cyclist only had a forward face light, the rear cyclist had a bright coloured top on but I couldn't see any lights on the bike - I'm not sure if the other driver purely made a bad decision on going past them or additionally reacted late due to poor visibility on the part of the cyclists.
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Yea on rural roads at night they can be near invisible until you are right on top of them. A tiny bike light is totally drowned out when infront of car lights.

The hi vis some are using just doesnt work either. I dont know if they are buying some knockoff Chinese crap or what. It has the colour but doesnt reflect.
 
why -
The mindset of a majority of car drivers is that they should be able to slip past a bike, even with oncoming traffic, I'm not sure I know any local roads that are wide-enough for that, in that respect, bikes should be handled like overtaking cars.
Usually I see an oncoming car having to adjust it's position to accomodate that slide-past, or braking, an accomodation they should not have to make.
 
Of course if some cyclists didn't act like entitled arrogant pricks and actually pulled over every so often to let traffic past the roads would be far less angry places... But that's not in line with every man for himself society we live in is it.
 
jpaul said:
why -
The mindset of a majority of car drivers is that they should be able to slip past a bike, even with oncoming traffic
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I ride a bicycle for fitness and mental health reasons and I dont believe that to be true at all. On my rides, I would say about 70% of drivers are pretty good, the rest are a variety of iffy to down right dangerous and at the extreme end you get drivers that feel like Rimsy (not saying you do personally) but they choose to vent their anger by purposely doing punishment passes for fun
 
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Feek said:
Apart from the obvious safety reason which I've already mentioned, the Highway Code says you should.

To be exact, it says "Give motorcyclists, cyclists and horse riders at least as much room as you would when overtaking a car"
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But that means about 0.5m. Giving a single cyclist 0.5m space barely puts you into the other side of the road. Passed 2 or 3 abreast means you are fully over and for longer before you can pull back in safely.
 
Rimsy said:
Of course if some cyclists didn't act like entitled arrogant pricks and actually pulled over every so often to let traffic past the roads would be far less angry places... But that's not in line with every man for himself society we live in is it.
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Or use the cycle track running a couple of meters next to them, instead of the toad.
 
Rimsy said:
Of course if some cyclists didn't act like entitled arrogant pricks and actually pulled over every so often to let traffic past the roads would be far less angry places... But that's not in line with every man for himself society we live in is it.
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No they wouldn't be less angry places because for some reason as soon as some (usually but not always) men get behind the wheel they turn into aggressive morons.
 
200sols said:
No they wouldn't be less angry places because for some reason as soon as some (usually but not always) men get behind the wheel they turn into aggressive morons.
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Exactly right. I was driving down to see a friend the other week and was driving on the M25 and there was a 50mph variable speed limit in place. All three lanes were busy and I was in the outside lane, when a van driver decides to tailgate me literally just off my bumper. I tend to leave a decent amount of braking distance to the car in front of me and he wanted to force me to close up the gap so im bumper to bumper like he is. Im sitting at 50mph and Im not going to speed and not get anywhere faster especially with all the gantry cameras there are on the M25. He then starts flashing his lights and I do the up and down slippy pole sign to him which he then gets a rage on, forces his way into the middle lane, eventually undertakes me and literally cuts me up and throws an empty can out of his window at me all to gain a couple car lengths so he can sit on the car bumper in front of me. Moronic, dangerous and pointless, some people are just stupidly aggressive for little or no gain
 
200sols said:
No they wouldn't be less angry places because for some reason as soon as some (usually but not always) men get behind the wheel they turn into aggressive morons.
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those aggressive morons are always going to be just that. they will always find something to trigger them.

there are however plenty of 'normal' drivers who end up frustrated or annoyed which can lead to anger when faced with half a dozen cyclists who refuse to pull over to allow them to pass safely on a windy country road. if the cyclists who do that would also give consideration to other faster moving road users then, yes, the roads would be less angry places.
 
Feek said:
What, you only leave 0.5m gap when you overtake cars? Seriously? Good luck when someone opens their door without looking.


.
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Why would somebody travelling at 50 mph open their car door??

Plus hate to break the news to you some roads in this country are only 5.5m wide. So if you are 2m wide and the car you are passing is 2m wide there is only 1.5m left for the gap between them and the kerb, between the two cars and you and the other edge of the road. hence 0.5m gap in each bit.
 
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