Irish Times article: Time to clamp down on the lawless world of cyclists

Hermy

doozerie wrote: »

On my commute home this evening I saw a car turn onto Memorial Road, heading north against the one-way traffic

Last year I saw a guard do something similar.

Jawgap

This eveing on my spin home I saw at least 6 cyclists stop for red lights - obviously Irish Times readers.......

Chips Lovell

tomasrojo wrote: »

It's a fair point that the Irish Times is not uniquely to blame for the property bubble, but it failed to be an independent and considered voice in Irish life. In fact, it because hopelessly dependent on revenue from its property supplement and this very significantly affected both how it reported on the state of the property market, and how it placed new items inside the newspaper. It became a vested interest, and behaved accordingly.

It wasn't just the Irish Times, virtually every national newspaper was heavily dependent on property advertising, although the Times was probably the biggest winner. But as I pointed out, opting not to carry it was tantamount to commerical suicide.

To conclude that this led them to deliberately misleading their readers about the prospects for the economy though is a stretch. I know how most newsrooms work and I can tell you nobody from the commercial side of the house is sitting in on meetings trying to get their oar in on what gets reported or where it gets placed in the paper.

I think people attribute a level of omniscience to the media that it just doesn't have. It is largely dependent on what politicians, businessmen, economists etc tells them. So simply not telling people loudly every day that a crash was on the way does not mean it was hiding it from them. You report the data as you get it and by large it split into three camps: no end in sight, soft landing ahead, and doom ahead. The Times reported on all of them.

tomasrojo wrote: »

It did indeed publish commentary by Morgan Kelly reasonably prominently ... but in 2006, when the bursting of the bubble was just a few months away. It did report on ESRI reports and such like, but these reports themselves were also hopelessly in thrall to the notion that property was not greatly overvalued, and that Ireland was such a productive economy that prices that were extremely high by international standards were maintainable. It was quite noticeable that any negative commentary on the state of the property market was pushed far back into the paper, but positive reports were either headlined on the front page of the main paper, or on the front page of the property supplement.

Have you any data to back this theory on story placement up? Because off the top of my head I can recall several negative stories getting a lot of play. This made it to the front page in 2004 for example, while this was on the front page in 2005. The Economists prediction of an Irish property crash in 2003 also got a lot of coverage.

Chips Lovell

tomasrojo wrote: »

As owner of myhome.ie they changed the way the put prices into webpages so that page-scraping scripts used by irishpropertywatch.com could not gather information on house price drops, claiming that the information, freely available to anyone who accessed myhome.ie, was commercially sensitive. This runs directly counter to their notion that they favour freedom of information where it is in the public interest.
http://irishpropertywatch.wordpress.com/2007/10/08/recent-developments-at-myhomeie/

If the paper's editorial policy really was to cover up the crash, why did it get one of its own journalists to write a report about how myhome had block screen scrapers.

Moflojo

Is it just me or has this thread taken a really bizarre twist?
It's quite entertaining though, please continue.

Hermy

It's quite okay - they're all wearing helmets.

Lumen

Moflojo wrote: »

Is it just me or has this thread taken a really bizarre twist?
It's quite entertaining though, please continue.

I'm out. I refuse to debate with people in possession of actual facts.

Chips Lovell

Lumen wrote: »

I voted SF, for the sake of personal irony.

If ever there was a case of turkeys voting for Christmas, this is it.

650Ginge

ThisRegard wrote: »

That 'journalist' is an idiot, another from the mutually exclusive school of thought that you're either a motorist or cyclist, you can't be both. While his point is ultimately right, the way he gets there is the woe of me being a poor mototist path, I've read a few of his articles and he's a tit for the sake of it.

Why can't you be both? I cycle I love it I drive I love it, there is plenty of room out there for either one, what lacking is consideration of others, in todays ireland that is not exclusive to either drivers or cyclists.

tomasrojo

el tonto wrote: »

It wasn't just the Irish Times, virtually every national newspaper was heavily dependent on property advertising, although the Times was probably the biggest winner. But as I pointed out, opting not to carry it was tantamount to commerical suicide.

And it remains to be seen how well they survive the aftermath of making themselves so dependent on bubble money. The fact that they bought myhome.ie at a very inflated price suggests to me that they bought the notion of never-ending price escalation and made some very poor decisions.

In that light, you could argue that they honestly believed in never-ending house price escalation, or its very slightly more credible cousin, the soft landing. In which case, it would be wrong to say they deliberately misled. But they were woefully wrong either way.

el tonto wrote: »

Have you any data to back this theory on story placement up? Because off the top of my head I can recall several negative stories getting a lot of play. This made it to the front page in 2004 for example, while this was on the front page in 2005. The Economists prediction of an Irish property crash in 2003 also got a lot of coverage.

No, I'm afraid I've no data there. All I have is the memory of five or so years of grinding my teeth as I saw them put cogent analysis of why we were in real trouble on page 10 of the Business section, with he-said-she-said reporting on the front page. A few years before Morgan Kelly's landmark article, I remember an incisive piece by an academic from Maynooth pointing out how our economy was becoming like a pyramid scheme, with immigrants coming in to build houses for people who were also employed in construction. It was, again, placed about page 10 in the Business section.

It was rather like the New York Times in the run-up to the Iraq War. It wasn't that they never ran any stories that contradicted the case for war, but it was pushed into parts of the paper that wouldn't catch most people's eye, while Judith Miller's sabre-rattling articles went above the fold on the front page.

But I can't provide data, and it would be quite an undertaking to compile some for the purpose of continuing this tangent!

I do remember them covering the Economist prediction prominently and some pessimistic report by the IMF also receiving coverage. But I also remember in 2005, when the decelaration in house prices was really evident, the Irish Times analysing the trends by using an year-on-year average, which, intentionally or not, hid the change in price trajectory. The real news should have been the marked deceleration. If that had been covered, some people, who knows how many, might not have bothered securing the mortgage that led them to buy in 2006, when the whole market crashed.

I should have perhaps made more notes on what I perceived to be their distortions and omissions over the years, but I didn't know that one of their second-string writers would be covering footpath cyclists in 2010.

tomasrojo

el tonto wrote: »

If the paper's editorial policy really was to cover up the crash, why did it get one of its own journalists to write a report about how myhome had block screen scrapers.

Because it was in the news, I suppose.

The fact that the Irish Times owns myhome.ie doesn't show up until the fifth paragraph.

The notion that the page-scrapers were in breach of the law, as suggested at the time by myhome.ie, is not tenable. Automatically gathering data that is freely available to anyone with internet access can't be illegal. It is more credible that it was to hamper the free flow of information, because they didn't like what the information was saying.

monument

http://universitydiary.wordpress.com/2010/08/14/on-becoming-a-cyclist-again/

Chips Lovell

@tomasrojo: Tempting as it is to keep this up and provide another rejoinder, I guess I've contributed to dragging this thread far enough off topic already, so I'll leave you with the last word. Thanks for an interesting discussion.

Jawgap

monument wrote: »

http://universitydiary.wordpress.com/2010/08/14/on-becoming-a-cyclist-again/

How dare you post that on here - a well, written articulate piece that reasonably argues for the proper enforcement of road traffic laws in a moderate tone has no place on the d'interweb - and even less place here.:)

Please only link to bile-spitting invective that means one or more of the following criteria:
1. Demands the immediate re-tasking of all Garda resources away from gangland crime to deal with pavement pedallers, red light jumpers and cycle salmon.

2. Insists that laws are brought in to require all cyclists to wear full body armour and full face helmets.

3. Points out that cyclists don't pay road tax, don't have to have insurance, are not required to be registered and are not subject to an NCT.

thank you for your consideration......

n-dawg

monument wrote: »

http://universitydiary.wordpress.com/2010/08/14/on-becoming-a-cyclist-again/

He seems to meet the worst cyclists in Dublin.... One calling him a w-ker and the other abusing a pedestrian when they had a green man! I have cycled in Dublin/Wicklow for 8 years now and have actually never seen this type of behaviour. In general cyclists are very polite to each other, in fact anytime I have been involved in albeit very minor bumps with other cyclists both have us have been very apologetic and end up laughing at our own stupidity for causing the bump.

On the other hand I have had 2 serious incidences with Taxi drivers, one involved a taxi driver turning left across me at a junction. He got out and abused me for 10min until the guards and ambulance showed up. The guards put him in the squad car and I was taken to hospital with the understanding that he would be reprimanded for his behaviour. He got a warning!

The other incident involved a Taxi turning right onto a minor road with NO traffic (he/she saw me) and me going over their car. They then stopped, looked out their door at me on the ground and drove off. I was ok, some road burn and a bump on my head, and went straight to the Guards who simply said "sure your only a cyclist".

After these two incidences I feel quite annoyed when I hear people saying cyclists need to be punished for what are very minor road traffic violations that dont indanger themselfs or others (If a cyclist breaks a red light and indangers themselfs or others I think they should be punished). In both my crashes, neither of which were my fault, the guards did nothing. I always feel that its a two way thing, if the guards want to start policing cyclists more they need to police crimes against cyclists too. Even this morning I was passed by 40-50 cars by less then 1.5 m and mayber 5 by less then 0.5 m, saw maybe 10-20 cars go not only after the light went orange but after it had gone red! A car go straight in a left only lane in the process cutting across a cycle lane all without checking there mirror and 5 or so cars illegally parked in cycle lanes.

Rant over back to work!!!

doozerie

n-dawg wrote:

He seems to meet the worst cyclists in Dublin.... One calling him a w-ker and the other abusing a pedestrian when they had a green man! I have cycled in Dublin/Wicklow for 8 years now and have actually never seen this type of behaviour. In general cyclists are very polite to each other, in fact anytime I have been involved in albeit very minor bumps with other cyclists both have us have been very apologetic and end up laughing at our own stupidity for causing the bump.

I have experienced both of those extremes, but mostly the aggressive end of the scale in recent years. It has reached a point now where most of the altercations, or near misses, that I have are with other cyclists who behave on a bike like the worst example of car drivers do behind the wheel.

It is pointless to call for one particular group of road users to be punished while turning a blind eye to the dangerous antics of another group - that practically encourages stupid behaviour. The law needs to be applied to all road users and calling for it to be enforced on cyclists, who have been largely ignored by the gardai for years (which not only means we can get away with some really stupid/dangerous behaviour but also has the consequence that we are not treated as valid road users by the gardai when we are subjected to dangerous behaviour by others), is not a call for enforcement on other road users to be relaxed.

CramCycle

n-dawg wrote: »

He seems to meet the worst cyclists in Dublin.... One calling him a w-ker and the other abusing a pedestrian when they had a green man! I have cycled in Dublin/Wicklow for 8 years now and have actually never seen this type of behaviour. In general cyclists are very polite to each other, in fact anytime I have been involved in albeit very minor bumps with other cyclists both have us have been very apologetic and end up laughing at our own stupidity for causing the bump.

Sorry to hear about your other problems with drivers, I have experienced alot of that myself. That said alot of cyclists can be just as Narky in their attitude towards other people. (great video of a bike courier ploughing into a guy in NYC on the broomwagon thread). I have had cyclists jeer and laugh at me because I stop at red lights, I have been told to F off by ninja cyclists whom I didn't see until we were nearly mangled together (all I said was (in a nice tone) you should get some lights its really hard to see you. One of my favourites is the DB rider who told me to "F off, I'm on a bike you tosser" after he swerved across two lanes of traffic in the wrong direction and straight towards me as he proceeded the wrong way down a cycle lane. All I did was shout "Wrong way" and hopped out of his way.

My point is some people are absolute *******, doesn't matter the time or the situation, I know,

I'm a ****** sometimes as well.

Lumen

CramCycle wrote: »

Sorry to hear about your other problems with drivers, I have experienced alot of that myself. That said alot of cyclists can be just as Narky in their attitude towards other people. (great video of a bike courier ploughing into a guy in NYC on the broomwagon thread). I have had cyclists jeer and laugh at me because I stop at red lights, I have been told to F off by ninja cyclists whom I didn't see until we were nearly mangled together (all I said was (in a nice tone) you should get some lights its really hard to see you. One of my favourites is the DB rider who told me to "F off, I'm on a bike you tosser" after he swerved across two lanes of traffic in the wrong direction and straight towards me as he proceeded the wrong way down a cycle lane. All I did was shout "Wrong way" and hopped out of his way.

Conflict between cyclists is a good sign, IMO. It represents the normalisation of cycling as a mode of transport rather than some obscure cult.

Chips Lovell

n-dawg wrote: »

He seems to meet the worst cyclists in Dublin.... One calling him a w-ker and the other abusing a pedestrian when they had a green man! I have cycled in Dublin/Wicklow for 8 years now and have actually never seen this type of behaviour. In general cyclists are very polite to each other, in fact anytime I have been involved in albeit very minor bumps with other cyclists both have us have been very apologetic and end up laughing at our own stupidity for causing the bump.

I've no problem believing his piece. I've seen plenty of similar behaviour from cyclists around Dublin myself.

n-dawg wrote: »

After these two incidences I feel quite annoyed when I hear people saying cyclists need to be punished for what are very minor road traffic violations that dont indanger themselfs or others (If a cyclist breaks a red light and indangers themselfs or others I think they should be punished). In both my crashes, neither of which were my fault, the guards did nothing. I always feel that its a two way thing, if the guards want to start policing cyclists more they need to police crimes against cyclists too. Even this morning I was passed by 40-50 cars by less then 1.5 m and mayber 5 by less then 0.5 m, saw maybe 10-20 cars go not only after the light went orange but after it had gone red! A car go straight in a left only lane in the process cutting across a cycle lane all without checking there mirror and 5 or so cars illegally parked in cycle lanes.

Two wrongs don't make a right. By and large there was zero policing of cyclists until quite recently compared to the amount of Garda time devoted to motoring offences.

monument

"Why are you stopped? You're on a bicycle, you can go where ever you want!" I was told by some teenagers the other day while out on a late night cycle with little to no traffic in sight and me still waiting to turn left.

CramCycle

Lumen wrote: »

Conflict between cyclists is a good sign, IMO. It represents the normalisation of cycling as a mode of transport rather than some obscure cult.

+1, it also seems to be putting on more social pressure for cyclists to fall in line with the law, which can only be a good thing.

The percentage of cyclists who now regularly obey traffic lights has incresaed dramatically, in my view, over the last 2 years. At this pace it will not be long before you only have as many cyclists running red lights as cars. (So about 1 in 4 then :rolleyes:)

previous user

'The lawless world of the cyclists should consider this the next time they look for a tax break for a new bike or a new €10 million cycle lane.'

Is this guy saying maybe there should be a tax on bikes, twat.

seensensee

To be pragmatic, there are a few gray areas in relation to cycling on foot paths which I exploit from time to time.

Firstly there are occasions when pedestrians are using the road as a thoroughfare and the footpath is completely vacant, In this case I can safely use the path until a pedestrian should mount the kerb.

Secondly when the road has no cycle lane but the traffic is fast and heavy one may notice that the footpath is devoid of any pedestrians over long distances, there is less danger to the cyclist to use the path and no one (drivers included) is inconvenienced.

Another factor to consider is when a bike moves along the pavement at walking pace surely it is preferable to have the cyclist mounted so as to be less of an obstruction?

Although the above are technically unlawful in appropriate circumstances they prove to be beneficial to everyone.

tomasrojo

el tonto wrote: »

@tomasrojo: Tempting as it is to keep this up and provide another rejoinder, I guess I've contributed to dragging this thread far enough off topic already, so I'll leave you with the last word. Thanks for an interesting discussion.

You're a gent.

Perhaps we should have taken the discussion to thepropertypin.com!

n-dawg

el tonto wrote: »

Two wrongs don't make a right. By and large there was zero policing of cyclists until quite recently compared to the amount of Garda time devoted to motoring offences.

I completely agree with you about the guards not caring about cyclists until very recently. However I feel they currently only seem to care about punishing cyclists for offences such as cycling on an empty footpath or breaking a red light when the road is empty which don't endanger anyone. They don't care about punishing motorists dangerously overtaking, cars parked in bike lanes or other careless behavior by motorists around cyclists. Offences which very much endanger the cyclist.

Don't get me wrong I'm not saying that sailing through O'Connel bridge when the lights are red in rush hour or cycling with out lights at night should go unpunished but there has to be some reciprocal policing of motorists offences

monument

previous user wrote: »

'The lawless world of the cyclists should consider this the next time they look for a tax break for a new bike or a new €10 million cycle lane.'

Is this guy saying maybe there should be a tax on bikes, twat.

No, in fairness, he's talking about the tax break that is the bike-to-work scheme.

doozerie

seensensee wrote:

Although the above are technically unlawful in appropriate circumstances they prove to be beneficial to everyone.

The "beneficial to everyone" bit is not strictly true. It is certainly of benefit to the cyclist to use the footpath when it suits but it can hardly be said to be of benefit to pedestrians on the footpath, at best what you described could be referred to as being of "least impact" to pedestrians which is not the same thing.

As a comparison, on my commute I frequently encounter cars parked in cycle tracks. The car drivers might well have parked their cars there when there were no cyclists on the track so from their point of view their actions are considerate and potentially of benefit to everyone (they often park half on the footpath, half on the cycle track, presumably giving some thought to both cyclists and pedestrians alike), whereas to me as the cyclist that has to get round them my view of their actions is very different. It's all a matter of perspective, while the rules of the road are supposed to be unbiased.

doozerie

n-dawg wrote:

I completely agree with you about the guards not caring about cyclists until very recently. However I feel they currently only seem to care about punishing cyclists for offences such as cycling on an empty footpath or breaking a red light when the road is empty which don't endanger anyone. They don't care about punishing motorists dangerously overtaking, cars parked in bike lanes or other careless behavior by motorists around cyclists. Offences which very much endanger the cyclist.

I think you are on a very slippery slope when you describe the likes of cycling on an empty footpath as not endangering anyone. The footpath is only empty until someone steps out from a doorway or driveway onto it, and they are not going to expect to have to allow for stepping into the path of someone moving faster than walking pace - sure, they should really look both ways for safety's sake, but do you do so every time yourself when you are stepping onto a footpath? By comparison, all road users are supposed to look both ways when going through a road junction on a green light too, despite the green light giving right of way ("if the way is clear") - you would presumably, and rightly, be annoyed at someone coming through on red, whether a cyclist or a motorist, from either side and running into you and you probably wouldn't entertain any argument from them that their actions didn't endanger anyone.

Specifically on the footpath thing though, there were roadworks near me recently for the duration of which one stretch of road on my commute was blocked off to through traffic. They positioned large chunks of concrete at one end of the road to keep cars from passing through but left the other end open for local access to houses along the stretch of road. They also left gaps between the mounds of concrete so cyclists could get through. The diversion for motorists added about 1.5 miles at most, I reckon. Despite this relatively small inconvenience, I saw car after car drive up on the footpath to get round the concrete mounds. From the drivers point of view they did nothing wrong as no-one died, but they were driving right past the exits of driveways of a couple of houses and I'd imagine the people living in those houses would have disputed the supposed safety of the situation.

ceannair06

breaking a red light when the road is empty which don't endanger anyone

---

NOT THE FCKING POINT!!!

Why is is so hard for cyclists to just obey the law ???

eightyfish

ceannair06 wrote: »

Why is is so hard for cyclists to just obey the law ???

Parking illegally in cycle lanes, pulling out into the path of a cyclist while talking on a mobile phone, driving in the cycle lane, not giving right of way because they see two wheels rather than four, opening a car door right across a cycle track without looking. Every day I encounter at least one of these on my commute.

Why is is so hard for motorists to just obey the law ???

ceannair06

eightyfish wrote: »

Parking illegally in cycle lanes, pulling out into the path of a cyclist while talking on a mobile phone, driving in the cycle lane, not giving right of way because they see two wheels rather than four, opening a car door right across a cycle track without looking. Every day I encounter at least one of these on my commute.

Why is is so hard for motorists to just obey the law ???

Okay, any of these going to kill you ?

No - however some nutter on a heap of metal going at 30mph WILL.

Stop at red lights ffs - it means all of you.

<snip>

CramCycle

seensensee wrote: »

To be pragmatic, there are a few gray areas in relation to cycling on foot paths which I exploit from time to time.

There are very few grey areas, the law is the law and it is there to be obeyed, not for a "when it suits" attitude.

If a car done what you described, in the same situations, it could be argued that there was no real danger but you would still not let them away with it. It should be no different for cyclists. The point is, the law is there for your safety and protection as well as everyone elses.

EXPECT THE UNEXPECTED

CramCycle

ceannair06 wrote: »

Okay, any of these going to kill you ?

Quite a few of them actually in the right situations, I've seen enough of them put people in hospital with serious injuries.

monument

ceannair06 wrote: »

Why is is so hard for cyclists to just obey the law ???

Why is it so hard for everybody to just obey the law???

Hermy

monument wrote: »

Why is it so hard for everybody to just obey the law???

Cause hoomans don't like laws.
Doesn't matter whether it's pedestrians, cyclists, motorists, taxi drivers, bus drivers or emergency vehicle drivers - we're all guilty, myself included.

CramCycle

Hermy wrote: »

Cause hoomans taxi drivers don't like laws.
Doesn't matter whether it's pedestrians, cyclists, motorists, taxi drivers, bus drivers or emergency vehicle drivers - we'are all guilty, myself included.

I'm sorry, i had too do it.

Apologies Hermy

eightyfish

ceannair06 wrote: »

Okay, any of these going to kill you ?

Yes. A friend of mine was in hospital for 5 days after some kunt on a mobile pulled out in front of him. Another friend of mine was on crutches for a month after some other kunt opened a car door in front of him and he was catapulted over the door.

ceannair06 wrote: »

Stop at red lights ffs - it means all of you.

Generalise much?

eightyfish

monument wrote: »

Why is it so hard for everybody to just obey the law???

That's more like it

Hermy

CramCycle wrote: »

I'm sorry, i had too do it.

Apologies Hermy

You're so funny CramCycle.
For that you're now banned from the internet for the rest of the week!
That'll learn ya to mess with a taxi man!!!:pac:

doozerie

It seems like the discussion here has veered into the pointless "you are 'wronger' than me" realm, rather than actually discussing the benefits (in my view) or otherwise (the counter view) of penalising cyclists that break the rules of the road. Much like Logue's own article then.

eightyfish

doozerie wrote: »

rather than actually discussing the benefits (in my view) or otherwise (the counter view) of penalising cyclists that break the rules of the road.

It's all benefits. More enforcement all round, pls.

CramCycle

Hermy wrote: »

For that you're now banned from the internet for the rest of the week!
That'll learn ya to mess with a taxi man!!!:pac:

Sob

Looks like I'll have to start doing work again, goodbye cruel interweb.

seensensee

CramCycle wrote: »

There are very few grey areas, the law is the law and it is there to be obeyed, not for a "when it suits" attitude.

If a car done what you described, in the same situations, it could be argued that there was no real danger but you would still not let them away with it. It should be no different for cyclists. The point is, the law is there for your safety and protection as well as everyone elses.

EXPECT THE UNEXPECTED

It's just that sometimes I feel obliged not to be holding up the traffic or enduring the road experience on a dark wet winters evening while a wide and deserted pavement beckons. Sometimes I cycle at a really slow pace and am in no rush, a busy road can be quite intimidating.
I will continue to cycle on pavements when necessary and am prepared to be stopped by law enforcement and pay a reasonable fine, it's a price worth paying for my safety and peace of mind.

I'm not prepared to expect the unexpected on a hazarous busy road as a cyclist, I've had enough of being cut off and pushed onto the pavement by cars and some buses.

CramCycle

seensensee wrote: »

It's just that sometimes I feel obliged not to be holding up the traffic or enduring the road experience on a dark wet winters evening while a wide and deserted pavement beckons.

Bicycles rarely hold up traffic as if the roads are wuiet, they can easily overtake and if the roads are busy, overtaking woin't really do much as they'll get stuck at the next lights.
Also, the evenings are still dark and wet whether on a road or a pavement.

Sometimes I cycle at a really slow pace and am in no rush, a busy road can be quite intimidating.

This is unfortunately true but giving into our fears and letting other road users intimidate us of the road does no one any favours, it's just leading to a cycle where by the next cyclist will think it's OK, or a motorist will think it's OK to force bikes off the road and not all of these people will be as careful as you on the footpath, that is why the law is there, because everyone is not the same and one guy breaking the law safely does not mean everyone will or that they won't get complacent while doing it for many years and make a mistake. Correct me if I'm wrong but the reason these laws are there is to set a standard to take this possibility as much out of the equation as possible.

I will continue to cycle on pavements when necessary and am prepared to be stopped by law enforcement and pay a reasonable fine, it's a price worth paying for my safety and peace of mind.

I see your point but your argument reads that if you are rich it is OK to break the law to an extent because you can afford it. IMO this is unacceptable. While it will never happen, again because bikes are not always treated as other road users, if you were pulled over for riding on a pavement, unless you fit within certain provisions (eg the young, the infirm etc.) I believe you should be hauled to court the same way a car driver etc. would be. If a car driver can't drive with confidence and respect for the law, we all agree they should not be on the roads. It should be the same for cyclists. That does not mean cycle on the pavements before people get pedantic

I'm not prepared to expect the unexpected on a hazarous busy road as a cyclist, I've had enough of being cut off and pushed onto the pavement by cars and some buses.

Again fair point, I see were your coming from but its the general populaces acceptance of these attitudes that means they will prevail. I make a point of trying my best to stick to the law when on my bike. I make mistakes, but I hope that my actions will spread. By stopping at lights, i guilt some RLJs to stop (not many), by giving right of way where it is entitled i might give someone time for consideration before they break lanes/yield signs/stop signs without looking/indicating. In the long run the effect of my actions will be minimal but if enough people follow me the way I started following those who i first seen following the road rules (I was once a chronic law breaker on my bike), it's possible things will change.

One day it maybe so rare that society/road users/Gardaí will be so appauled that they will go after those who do it in line with how they would treeat any other road user.

I also now throw dirty looks at RLJs the way some of them throw dirty looks at me for stopping

previous user

monument wrote: »

No, in fairness, he's talking about the tax break that is the bike-to-work scheme.

oh, ok, more bikes in the city is better for everyone though, I admit sometimes I have cycled on the path but only because i was cut off on the parallel lines which a car or bus was hogging.

Lumen

seensensee wrote: »

It's just that sometimes I feel obliged not to be holding up the traffic

You are traffic.

seensensee

Is it possible to enforce safe cycling?







I'm afraid of the nasty traffic :eek:

petethedrummer

If there were no traffic lights there would be no RLJ's. Join my anti-traffic light campaign.

CheGuedara

seensensee wrote: »

Is it possible to enforce safe cycling?




I'm afraid of the nasty traffic :eek:

Wow.

I think nasty traffic and this springs to mind -->



Your perception seems to be more along the lines of properly dangerous motors -->



Cycling is safe.

Not all cyclists are safe (and neither are all motorists) but if you get on a bike and just cycle intellegently - that is to say cycle appropriately assertively and defencively (see the safe cycling bit in the cycling wiki about these) - your life it much more likely to be incident free.

Not cycling on footpaths where you risk injuring a pedestrian (along with yourself) or being injured by a car pulling out/in of a driveway or jumping the lights will also both go a long way in maintaining your health

Lumen

seensensee wrote: »

Is it possible to enforce safe cycling?

Someone died in that accident. :rolleyes: