Journalism and cycling

magicbastarder

https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/david-mcwilliams-lurid-gear-and-swanky-bikes-mark-cycling-as-the-new-golf-1.3500071

subscriber only. mcwilliams should stick to economics.

Here he is so self-assured, you don’t even have to sneak up on him. Secure among his own species, the normally socially anxious Mamil congregates with carefree abandon. Today, he luxuriates in the bright sunshine, resplendent in multi-hued plumes of bright pinks, greens and blues.

Rechuchote

Saw an excellent presentation by around 15 or 20 students from DIT Architecture yesterday, on what a paradise they would make of Harold's Cross. Mouthwatering! And it included the bridge over to the back of Griffith College.

Fighting Tao

magicbastarder wrote: »

https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/david-mcwilliams-lurid-gear-and-swanky-bikes-mark-cycling-as-the-new-golf-1.3500071

subscriber only. mcwilliams should stick to economics.

I’m glad he can see cyclists.

rubadub

magicbastarder wrote: »

https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/david-mcwilliams-lurid-gear-and-swanky-bikes-mark-cycling-as-the-new-golf-1.3500071

David McWilliams: Lurid gear and swanky bikes mark cycling as the new golf
Cycling,

jaysus, that phrase is so old it would not surprise me if it has gone full circle and have someone say golf is the new cycling.

once a blue collar sport, is now the pursuit of choice for the professional classes

a blue collar sport? never heard that one before, a decent bike that competitive sporting cyclists use has always cost a fair bit.

magicbastarder

cycling being a working man's sport was something i've read quite a bit.

John_Rambo

rubadub wrote: »

jaysus, that phrase is so old it would not surprise me if it has gone full circle and have someone say golf is the new cycling

I've heard it bandied about for lots of different sports including my own. A lazy (and as you rightly pointed out) continuously rehashed, unimaginative comment to stir up a bit of hate.

eeeee

magicbastarder wrote: »

cycling being a working man's sport was something i've read quite a bit.

It is absolute bullcrap now. Racing anyway. The vast and overwhelming majority of bike racers are not working class from my experience. I've been racing 4 years now. It's a sport that requires 10 to 20 hours a week training, expensive equipment, and the necessary economic and social stability for both. Training requires recovery too, which is even more time.
That's not to say there aren't any, or it hasn't or isn't being done, of course it is, and I know some, but none of the top people in my group are working class, or near it.

magicbastarder

i should have meant i have read that in an historical sense.

eeeee

magicbastarder wrote: »

i should have meant i have read that in an historical sense.

Maybe it was back in the day. It's certainly an emancipatory tool. Bikes rule!

magicbastarder

IIRC, it was mentioned in 'slaying the badger', one of the books i've read more recently, about hinault being from a very working class background and this being quite typical.

Grassey

The formation of the Clarion Cycle Club in 1895 signifies the first explicit recognition of
the potential linkage between working class identity and cycling in the UK (Pye 1995).
The Clarion’s motto (taken from William Morris) “Fellowship is life – lack of Fellowship
is Death”, and its propagandising work aimed to promote the use of the bicycle as a
means of liberation for working class men and women. Though the intention of the
Clarion CC was primarily propagandist and cycling was simply a means by which to
spread propaganda, the growth of local clubs and activities, and the increasing
availability of a second-hand cycle market enabled a significant change in the image of
the cycle as a bourgeois plaything. The process enabled by the bicycle for the Clarion
CC was two fold – both to provide physical means of escape from the confines of urban
industrial life and to provide the means for said fellowship.

An interesting and diverting read for a Monday morning
http://www2.uwe.ac.uk/faculties/FET/Research/cts/cycling-society/Peter-Cox.PDF

CramCycle

loyatemu wrote: »

there are some examples of good infrastructure about

Grand Canal Cycleway
Rock Road cycle lanes and the nearby contraflow lane on Newtown Ave
Clontarf Rd cycle path.
the new lanes on Wyattville Rd. are well designed.

more generally I'd like to see more contraflow lanes and bypass lanes at the top of T-junctions.

I would disagree, I find most of these examples of bad infrastructure. I nearly always use the road around the grand canal. The lights there infuriate everyone except those going across the canal to the point where pedestrians and cyclists have no idea what is really going on (Rock road crossing), with several shared points being so narrow that you can barely have more than two people there(crossing as you head west at Leeson St.). The rock road is still horrible with several motorists driving over the bollards on a regular basis, and the clontarf cycle path suffers from "bigus dicus" where a small number of cyclists can't deal with pedestrians in a civilised fashion.

As I said to my partner on Sunday as comment was passed on the pedestrians on the cyclepath.

There is one thing worse than a pedestrian on a cycle path, and that is a cyclist who cannot safely get around a pedestrian on a cycle path.

Doctor Bob wrote: »

Not necessarily true.

There was a scheme in Poynton in the UK a few years ago that relied heavily on shared space, i.e. mixing cycling and motorised traffic. As I understand it, it did deliver considerable benefits for pedestrians - who had dedicated space, interestingly - and resulted in a less traffic-dominated town centre. But cyclists didn't benefit as much as was hoped/promised. One of the roads in the scheme had a single 3 metre traffic lane in each direction, separated from each other by a raised central median. This did slow traffic and require drivers to pay more attention, but it also required cyclists to queue up as there wasn't space to pass up the inside of traffic (unless they used the footpath). Had the scheme included segregated cycle tracks, cyclists would have been able to bypass the traffic queue.

I'd have no issue with that to be honest. Pedestrians must always be the first priority and they seemed to nailed that. I remember the pics from the scheme. If I have it right it seemed more that some cyclists were unsure of what they were and were not allowed do rather than a lack of space.

Doctor Bob wrote: »

I'm sure I've said it on here before, but bad infrastructure is not an argument against infrastructure, it's an argument against bad infrastructure.

I'd probably share your concerns on the likelihood of getting good infrastructure, but it's worth noting that such a thing does exist.

It does exist but it is so rare that one wonders if trying to remove or rehabilitate the road users that cause the danger might be a more productive use of resources.

monument wrote: »

To add to what Doctor Bob said above, the idea of motorists all behaving, along with vehicular cycling, was the aim of cycling campaigners here and in the UK and elsewhere for a long time. It has not worked anywhere, not even in places like Germany where we think they are more law abiding.

It won't work here until enforcement is brought in heavy handedly. You report an incident here, with camera footage and it routinely gets ignored. It should have a civilian team, get unedited footage and a fine. Keep that up for long enough, along with red light and average speed cameras and you will solve an outrageous amount of issues in 3 months. Not only ones caused by motorists but by cyclists as well.

tomasrojo

The McWilliams article is behind a registration wall, but I probably wouldn't read it anyway. I assume it's another attempt to make out that adults on bikes are just taking part in the latest craze, rather than leveraging a wonderful, versatile transport mode to make their lives better, as if bikes are essentially hula hoops (or golf clubs).

McWilliams wrote an article years ago, which I've never seen since, in which he claimed that child bike seats were the ultimate symbol of smugness, again with the implication that things that appear to be practical adaptations to make some activity possible or easier are in fact just a form of virtue signalling.


Also, professionally he only ever had one good idea, which was to look at house prices in terms of price/earnings ratio, which meant he correctly judged that house prices in Ireland were substantially overvalued. He was wrong in thinking that they couldn't get much more overvalued though.

Chips Lovell

It's the laziest thing I've seen in ages. Not so much phoned in as yawned from beneath a duvet.

buffalo

tomasrojo wrote: »

The McWilliams article is behind a registration wall, but I probably wouldn't read it anyway. I assume it's another attempt to make out that adults on bikes are just taking part in the latest craze, rather than leveraging a wonderful, versatile transport mode to make their lives better, as if bikes are essentially hula hoops (or golf clubs).

I read it on Saturday. It's an odd article essentially arguing that cycling is great and healthy, but is the hobby of the elite rich people, written in a constantly condescending tone.

I came away from it wondering if he was trying to rile cyclists up, but hadn't the heart to really commit. It certainly hadn't anything that merited being published.

Here are some samples, hopefully avoiding the Sherlock:

Once refreshed, the congress of Mamils and Willows get back on their carbon-framed Ridleys, Specializeds or Canyons, bikes that can set you back more than a few grand, and head up the steep Wicklow hills. Cycling is not for the faint-hearted; it is difficult and demands commitment and this is why it’s popular.

Cycling is hard, it gets people fit and even if the caricature of the Mamil is as much defined by his paunch as his mettle, imagine his paunch without the wheels?

Or maybe the camaraderie of a congress of Mamils and Willows, head to toe in excessively tight, almost auto-erotic, exotically coloured, flamboyant clobber is simply too irresistible.

tomasrojo

So he's going with a minor variation of cycling gear is sexually perverse. He's terribly original, isn't he?

Also, just on stylistic nit picks:

Today, he luxuriates in the bright sunshine, resplendent in multi-hued plumes of bright pinks, greens and blues

"Luxuriate", "bright" and "resplendent" are all doing much the same thing.
"Multi-hued" followed by a list of colours is also pretty redundant.

QueensGael

Ooo, I'm a Willow now, and there I was, tearing around unmonikered all these years

CramCycle

What in ****s name is a Willow? I can understand the Mamil but Willow?

Women in luxurious lycra ominously weaving?

Grassey

CramCycle wrote: »

What in ****s name is a Willow? I can understand the Mamil but Willow?

Women in luxurious lycra ominously weaving?

Women I'd Love-to Look-at Out-in Wicklow

QueensGael

Women in Lurid Lycra on Wheels

(not all that dramatic really!)

tomasrojo

Journalist Economist Rattling Keyboard

Annie get your Run

QueensGael wrote: »

Women in Lurid Lycra on Wheels

(not all that dramatic really!)

I think its Luminous :pac:

QueensGael

My bad!

eeeee

QueensGael wrote: »

Women in Lurid Lycra on Wheels

(not all that dramatic really!)

Ha ha ha I'm a willow so too!
I'll glad there's a counterpart to the mamil, andr you don't even have to be middle aged to be a willow! #winwin

Grassey

Jesus. The last word was on as I drove home.

200k inbound commuters to Dublin cc based on the canal count. 50+% using public transport, 30% cars 20%, cycle (and walk I assume)... Enter Conor Faughnan for a rant aided by Cooper on how the poor motorist is discriminated against in their expensive cars, and taxed to be damned. How there is a secret cabal in DCC promoting a car hating agenda, and who gave them a mandate for this... Etc etc

The only positive take away was that CF stated that cycling is safer now than it ever was, with a decreasing death rate over last 30 years, with last year was an exception.

Chiparus

Grassey wrote: »

Jesus. The last word was on as I drove home.

200k inbound commuters to Dublin cc based on the canal count. 50+% using public transport, 30% cars 20%, cycle (and walk I assume)... Enter Conor Faughnan for a rant aided by Cooper on how the poor motorist is discriminated against in their expensive cars, and taxed to be damned. How there is a secret cabal in DCC promoting a car hating agenda, and who gave them a mandate for this... Etc etc

The only positive take away was that CF stated that cycling is safer now than it ever was, with a decreasing death rate over last 30 years, with last year was an exception.

CF apparently is a regular cyclist, and he come across very pro cycling.

https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/i-prefer-the-bike-to-my-car-any-day-says-the-public-face-of-aa-30884859.html

Grassey

Chiparus wrote:

CF apparently is a regular cyclist, and he come across very pro cycling.

Im aware of that, and in fairness I think Cooper was trying to bait him into an anti cycling rant, so his response was great and well measured.

However, you'd swear it was 2 different personalities when he launched into DCC plans to make City transport less dependent on private cars etc

Pinch Flat

Grassey wrote: »

Im aware of that, and in fairness I think Cooper was trying to bait him into an anti cycling rant, so his response was great and well measured.

However, you'd swear it was 2 different personalities when he launched into DCC plans to make City transport less dependent on private cars etc

Conor is paid by the AA, a motoring organisation. So he knows what side his bread is buttered on.

I’ve met him in work scenarios and can confirm indeed he’s a keen cyclist. He cycles to work most days. “Sure you’d be mad to drive in Dublin” he told me once.

Corca Baiscinn

Grassey wrote: »

Jesus. The last word was on as I drove home.

Enter Conor Faughnan for a rant aided by Cooper on how the poor motorist is discriminated against in their expensive cars, and taxed to be damned. How there is a secret cabal in DCC promoting a car hating agenda, and who gave them a mandate for this... Etc etc.

He has an absolute bee in his bonnet about the "ideology" at work in DCC. I've heard him on same topic on other Newstalk programmes when he was discussing speed limits, twice within a month on Ciara Kelly and also on Pat K and I think Seán O' R. I wrote one letter calling him out but of course never got around to sending it! Somebody needs to explain to him that ever expanding numbers of cars into finite space wont go.

Going on what you're saying, istening back now to Matt Cooper would only wind me up but next time........

CramCycle

Apparently the AA are a registered lobby group. I was wondering, are there issues with showing bias by actively letting a lobby group have so much airtime on the national airwaves. Seems like it shouldn't be allowed but I don't know enough on the area.