Cycling on dual carriageways

topper75

New to cycling and keen to go for long spins. So far just country roads but want to get going on dual carriageway hard shoulders.

May be a silly question - but what is the safest strategy when crossing a turn-off and I suppose again when passing a slip-road coming onto a dual carriageway? Should you go up the ramp, around the roundabout, and down the other side? The entrances and exits can be quite extended at times.

Experienced bikers care to comment?

kenmc

Are you sure you're talking about dual carriageways and not motorways? Motorways tend to have the ramps/roundabout/slips, whereas dual carriageways tend to have either traffic lights, or just a t-junction. Cycling on motorways is both illegal and pretty dumb. Dual carriageways are fine, just have your wits about you

marco_polo

kenmc wrote: »

Are you sure you're talking about dual carriageways and not motorways? Motorways tend to have the ramps/roundabout/slips, whereas dual carriageways tend to have either traffic lights, or just a t-junction. Cycling on motorways is both illegal and pretty dumb. Dual carriageways are fine, just have your wits about you

Not really anymore ken, most dual carraigeways built in the past few years use slip roads too.

Limestone1

Theres a few on the N11 that can be daunting when traffic is heavy and moving fast. I try to stay on the white line from where it begins - that gives traffic maximum time to see you, but you need to be sure there is nobody on your shoulder about to turn off. The trouble is on these sweeping turn offs a lot of drivers do not indicate until they are already on the slip road so you have to keeping checking behind you.

kenmc

marco_polo wrote: »

Not really anymore ken, most dual carraigeways built in the past few years use slip roads too.

Yeah I suppose I was just thinking about the N11 from Donnybrook to cabinteely, and the N81 from Templogue to Tallaght and the N4 from Lucan to Leixlip. True enough the N7 all the way now has slips from Naas to Clondalkin...

Good question then in that case!

Chips Lovell

Some dual carriageways have slip roads alright, like the N11 or the Tallagh bypass. I stick to the line and keep looking over my shoulder to see if anyone's coming down and make sure they see me. Once past the exit, I'd slip over to the left once there's a break in traffic.

topper75

el tonto wrote: »

Some dual carriageways have slip roads alright, like the N11 or the Tallagh bypass. I stick to the line and keep looking over my shoulder to see if anyone's coming down and make sure they see me. Once past the exit, I'd slip over to the left once there's a break in traffic.

That seems to make sense. I suppose the most dangerous point is going by the first slip road that leaves the dual CW. The one I hope to ride on is Limerick to Ennis (which is not a motorway - I'm aware they are out of bounds). It can be quite heavy and all the slip roads (Shannon, Bunratty, Dromoland) are quite heavily used.

I just fear lazy motorists who do a lively speed and expect to turn-off by drifting leftwards without paying much attention to anything on the inside.

niceonetom

i would make a small suggestion that this is a situation where visibility is key. neon yellow from head to foot would be my preference when you need to be pretty obvious from several hundred feet away (that's nothing at 70mph!).

the bigger the speed difference between you and the rest of the traffic the less time they will have to see you. and they're not even looking for you on dual carriage ways.

Zorba

topper75 wrote: »

New to cycling and keen to go for long spins. So far just country roads but want to get going on dual carriageway hard shoulders.

May be a silly question - but what is the safest strategy when crossing a turn-off and I suppose again when passing a slip-road coming onto a dual carriageway? Should you go up the ramp, around the roundabout, and down the other side? The entrances and exits can be quite extended at times.

Experienced bikers care to comment?

Sorry but u seriously must have a hole in yer head to want to cycle on a dual carriageway. What's wrong with the nice quiet back roads where u hardly meet any traffic ?

penexpers

Well for one, dual carraigeways are usually much better surfaced and don't have as many potholes as the back roads.

gman2k

If I can state the obvious, if you are going to cycle on a d/c, you are dealing with cars that will be travelling at over 100km/h (general limit for d/c is 100kmh max) with most cars travelling at motorway speeds.
Again stating the obvious, to be on such roads these days, you should be dressed up in hi-vis as much as possible, and I always have a rear light flashing - even during daylight.
Every junction should be treated with caution on a d/c, cos if you get a slap of a car, there will be only one winner, and it's no good having right of way if you are six feet under....So, if it's dodgey at a junction, with hi speed traffic, take the long way around.

Danbo!

gman2k wrote: »

if you get a slap of a car, there will be only one winner, and it's no good having right of way if you are six feet under....So, if it's dodgey at a junction, with hi speed traffic, take the long way around.

Well said

Zorba

penexpers wrote: »

Well for one, dual carraigeways are usually much better surfaced and don't have as many potholes as the back roads.

Pot holes can easily be avoided either by steering the bike out of them or if u see them late do an ole bunny hop ! The same can't be said for a car travelling at 100 + km/hr !

Chips Lovell

While the slip roads can be sometimes tricky to deal with, in general I find dual carraigeways some of the safest roads to ride on. You've plnety of space and can ride in the hard shoulder and rarely get people passing you too close. Stillorgan dual carriageway is a pain in the arse though, mainly because of the crappy cycle lanes they've put on it.

Bicyclegadabout

Anyone at all familiar with this route:
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=1799272

??
I'm thinking about taking it as a route home

How safe would it be? afaik I come on at the Coolock lane slip road, and from that point the speed limit is 60kph, but it's a motorway sized road, and there's no other on/off ramps. But maybe I'm wrong

Gavin

Bicyclegadabout wrote: »

Anyone at all familiar with this route:
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=1799272

??
I'm thinking about taking it as a route home

How safe would it be? afaik I come on at the Coolock lane slip road, and from that point the speed limit is 60kph, but it's a motorway sized road, and there's no other on/off ramps. But maybe I'm wrong

Well it is a motorway.. Why not go up the old swords road and take the right onto Coolock lane ? It's an ok road to cycle on.

topper75

Zorba wrote: »

Sorry but u seriously must have a hole in yer head to want to cycle on a dual carriageway. What's wrong with the nice quiet back roads where u hardly meet any traffic ?

The 'nice quiet' roads are not so quiet these days. Car ownership has more than doubled since 1990 here. There are loads of blind bends. Lots of these cars are driven by crazy youngsters/prov licence older people that don't expect anyone else to be on the road. The dual carriageways do not have blind bends, allowing both me and the motorists plenty of forward vision. If you want to get nice momentum on a roadbike, you won't do so on knobbly tar of a country lane, but can do so on the hard shoulder of a dual carriageway. For the most part dual cw seems safer to me, apart from the slip roads so hence this question I posted.

Albeit there was one tragic accident in recent times on the Newmarket on Fergus bypass. RIP that poor man.

I totally understand the 'you'll always come off worse than the car' statement above - we are vulnerable. But it doesn't answer the question. It seems more like a you are making a case for not going out cycling at all!

penexpers

Verb wrote: »

Well it is a motorway.. Why not go up the old swords road and take the right onto Coolock lane ? It's an ok road to cycle on.

The map is incorrect, the motorway only starts at the end of the port tunnel now. Up until then it's still a national road.

Clum

I sometimes use DCs. I'm not in Dublin and there's no traffic lights at the exits, they're slips roads mostly. I usually look back at the traffic well in advance to see what's going on and stay in the hard shoulder for as long as possible, almost up to the split in the road, but checking over my shoulder as often as possible for breaks in the traffic. There's normally a painted section of the road, or the beginning of a mini-hard shoulder, that I cross in to rather than crossing in to an actual traffic lane.

I only use them early on weekend mornings when traffic volumes are low and I think having a lane to myself (the hard shoulder) is great. Although being on long straight roads has it's disadvantages. Troublesome brats see cyclists well in advance and have more time to plan an assault of some kind, whether it's throwing something or even swerving at you! If I ever catch them....

Zorba

topper75 wrote: »

The 'nice quiet' roads are not so quiet these days. Car ownership has more than doubled since 1990 here. There are loads of blind bends. Lots of these cars are driven by crazy youngsters/prov licence older people that don't expect anyone else to be on the road. The dual carriageways do not have blind bends, allowing both me and the motorists plenty of forward vision. If you want to get nice momentum on a roadbike, you won't do so on knobbly tar of a country lane, but can do so on the hard shoulder of a dual carriageway. For the most part dual cw seems safer to me, apart from the slip roads so hence this question I posted.

Albeit there was one tragic accident in recent times on the Newmarket on Fergus bypass. RIP that poor man.

I totally understand the 'you'll always come off worse than the car' statement above - we are vulnerable. But it doesn't answer the question. It seems more like a you are making a case for not going out cycling at all!

Well firstly i'm not making any case for not going out cycling, in fact if more people cycled instead of driving their cars us cyclists wouldn't be giving out about people in cars so much.

I'm lucky where i live in that i don't have to go far to find quiet roads and i'm also lucky that i've lived most of my life around this area so i know where to go and where not to go.

It's just me personally anytime i see some lad on a dual carriageway i think he/she's mad, different horses for different courses and all that. As for being able to build up speed i more prefer to go out cycling on hills rather than relatively flat runs so again duals are of no interest to me.

My vision of cycling on duals is like what Clum said, only use them on early mornings but the brats in cars have more time to plan their assult on u !

markpb

Bicyclegadabout wrote: »

Anyone at all familiar with this route:
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=1799272

I live on Oscar Traynor road so I use that stretch of road every day. It's not a bad road to cycle on, speed limit drops at the end of the ramp to 60kph but most people do a bit more than that. Be prepared to stop at the end of the ramp - it's easier to wait for a gap in the traffic than to have someone approach you at 120kph and hope they see you. Line of sight isn't great at that point.

Keep out from the kerb or people will pass at speed and without changing lanes. The end (at Whitehall Church) can be a bit dodgy mostly because of cars on the N1 trying to move into the bus lane to skip past the traffic. They're likely to change lanes very suddenly and without indicators. It's probably safest to move into the bus lane as early as possible.

The opposite direction is a little harder, it can be quite difficult to keep right at the Santry off-ramp so either build up a lot of speed and merge in turn or wait at the bottom of the ramp for the lights to change so you can merge without any other traffic. After that it's plain sailing.

You'll probably get a few idiots who will blow their horn at you for driving on a motorway. Be content in the knowledge that only an idiot could drive on a road with three lanes, no median, no hard shoulder and green signs and consider it a motorway.

Verb wrote: »

Well it is a motorway.. Why not go up the old swords road and take the right onto Coolock lane ? It's an ok road to cycle on.

The alternative is quite a bit longer and involves more junctions, more bus stops, more pedestrians and crossing right at a bus junction. N1 is a much easier cycle once you get used to it.

blorg

I cycle on the N3 often enough although there is a nicer alternative that is quiet and not too difficult or too much further. When dealing with an exit ramp I will tend to keep left until very close to the ramp exit, and then cut over into the zebra patch, doing this when safe and clear of course.

As others have said, cycling on dual carriageways _with_ hard shoulders is quite safe, you have plenty of room.

The motorway indeed only starts at the port tunnel exit now, you can cycle as far as the exit immediately before that (and it is the easiest way if going to the airport.)