Fuel

[Two_Sheds]

You can't carry bags of compost, seed potatoes, manure, chicken wire and the rest ...ditto a weekly shop for a family of 4 or 5.

Well how do you think I manage? I sold my car in '92 because I couldn't justify the expense (and it was making me fat).

I get heavy/bulky stuff eg. bales of compost, delivered (or use a taxi). Online grocery shopping is great for a bulk order of heavy items.

I can get 3 full carrier bags of shopping on my bike (in panniers), and because I use local shops (supporting them) I can get the groceries on my way to and from work (5 mile round trip).

You are over-stating the dangers of cycling, which really isn't helpful.

[organic]

Long post alert - it's a difficult and complex subject and I don't want it to sound like I'm writing off the perfectly valid things you've said without any real consideration. I've considered the issues carefully over a long time (particularly when the biking withdrawl-symptoms kicked in after I hung my bike up - story to follow) so this isn't the usual "it's too dangerous/slow/sweaty" thing you tend to hear. ("Not as dangerous as it's made out to be/not for journeys under 6 miles/slow down then." being the correct answers to those points - but you knew that already )


TS - Please don't think I'm anti-bike or trying to paint a bad picture, I'm really not. The reason I stopped riding as my main means of getting around was a week where I was riding in a cycle lane and for no reason other than a bad feeling I jumped onto the pavement (mountain biking skills enabled it, there was no dropped kerb) and before my wheels touched the ground a car passed me with its wheels about 6 inches from the kerb. He was speeding, hadn't seen me and I'd be surprised if the avoided impact was survivable.

About 200 yards down the road from that I had a flat bed truck pull out causing me to brake so hard I came close to crashing - and again it was my off-road skills that kept me on the bike - only to get a load of abuse and threats hurled at me by the driver.

On the same day I was almost flattened by a bus driving down the same cycle lane (the mirror passed over my head) and that week I twice had people try to swerve into me... one of them after a specific threat to run me over... for pulling ahead into the green painted area while waiting at a red light exactly like a cyclist is supposed to.

It was an "enough is enough" moment in a bad, but not atypical week and I've not been out on my (lovely) bike since. It's a shame, but someone who lists hitting a dry stone wall after coming off at about 30mph on a downhill section of a track as one of the best bike related moment of his life, who used to go out and ride daily just for fun and could hold his own in traffic - was made so afriad for his safety that he hung up his bike. If that's how it goes, the chance of positively persuading others onto the road is an uphill battle at best... of course, none of that changes the fact that positive encouragement, (favouring the cyclist in accidents a-la Netherlands) proper routes, decent provision of facilities and so on would do plenty to get people onto their bikes while the current approach of "tax them out of their cars" is ineffective and painful for those who don't have any choice. Heck even letting people ride on pavements where segregated facilities aren't in place would be a good start but even that seems unlikely!


I've tried that site before, and while it's good to see a route planner that works to avoid main roads (I think it says a lot about the state of play on the roads that it skips around proper cycle lanes, instead favouring side roads and very large detours) for most of my journeys it substitutes the kind of roads where you're liable to be knocked off your bike for ones where you're liable to be grabbed, dragged off the bike and left to walk home if you're lucky. I'd think twice before driving through some of the areas that suggested riding a bike through.


Oh and you were spot on with your estimation of the cycle time... a sign of a long term rider for sure!
13 mins, free... but... one of the steepest hills in the city (yeah, yeah, I know, "get over it" it keeps you fit and all that ) and through one of the roughest areas (my site is in a really bad area).


The general point remains though, if you don't want to rely on taxis (a very expensive way of getting around if ever there was one) or need to get to varied and distant workplaces the busses don't serve conveniently (my last client would have meant 2.5 hours of cycling to get there and back) you simply can't do without a car and the tax increases on petrol do nothing to me but hurt my pocket with no real benefit to anyone or anything.

Considering I usually need to do my surveys on the weekend, going by bike could typically mean losing between 2.5 and 4 hours of the weekend just on travel (that'd usually be 1 hour at the absolute most) plus the actual work time. The cost of getting out of the car is the best part of entire day gone rather than the usual morning. that would hurt even more than the needlessly high cost of fuel.


I understand that drivers react differently to bikes with kids on them - interestingly they also react differently to bikes that look like they have women on them - but assuming most people won't want to dress in drag and ride everywhere with a child seat on the bike - the complete and utter lack of consideration for cyclists shown by a handful of drivers prevent cycling from being a realistic choice for most people. I was about as assertive as they come when I was riding. I wasn't quite a D-Lock warrior like the courier stereotype, but I rode with a similar mindset of equality on the road and taking the space I needed to take. I had no qualms about pulling to middle-of-lane to prevent overtakes at choke points and all the other "assertive riding" techniques that take some bottle to pull off... yet I still felt I was relying too much on unreliable people.

That very situation (combined with the "don't want to be covered in sweat when I get to work" non-starter) is one of the big things that stops cyclist numbers increasing in a way that makes them all collectively safer than they are with fewer on the roads.


As it happens I'm thinking about getting back on bikes (in fact, I'll either be getting a cargo bike or making a trailer precisely for big loads) but the fact remains that they are not a complete solution, nor is public transport a realistic or affordable alternative. The 4-figure price tag on most cargo bikes puts them in the "Are you having a laugh?" category for most people too. Pity really as I adore them and would love to see them on the roads every day.

[Two_Sheds]

You argue your point well Organic, and I concede that the bike is less good for distances over about 5 miles (which I cover in about 25 mins).

However, it is a superb option for most people, for short journeys. For an example, on my estate we have a mini-mart/newspaper shop, and yet everyone drives to it, just to pick up a newspaper or a pint of milk.
I watch them, my neighbours and my OH, fat men, huffing & puffing in and out of their cars as they park as close as humanly possible to the front door of the shop. I want to shake some sense into them! It's half a mile: use your legs, get some exercise and fresh air! Meet your neighbours on the way, see the flowers, talk to the birds. Don't drive everywhere from door to door, it's madness.

What we need is a complete shift in attitude. At the moment cycling is seen as great for raising charity money, but not for transportation: that's bonkers.

The police are anti-cyclist too, which doesn't help. Dangerous drivers should be taken off the road, and anyone involved in a crash should have to resit their test, imo. The guy who hit me last year said he "didn't see me" (because he was looking over his shoulder for a parking space) but the police/CPS did nothing. I sued him and he settled out of court, but I would rather that he had to resit his test.

Every cyclist has horror stories to tell, my own journey isn't a pleasant one and I have near-misses every day (as often with dog-walkers as with cars: why do they think it's OK to allow their dog to run loose on a cycle lane?) but then so do motorists.

The benefits of cycling (to me) outweigh the risks.

[organic]

Oh I am right with you on the short journeys front!
Another client of mine lives less than a quarter mile from my house - when I said I'd walk around with their plans in about 10 minutes they asked "why not drive?"

Madness.

For the kind of distances we're talking about now, up to about half a mile or so - I wouldn't even bother taking the bike out of the garage! The extra time taken to lock it up outside the shop negates most of the time saved by the quicker journey... especially when there's no proper bike parking where you're going.

The fundraiser vs charity point is a really good one. That does need to change.

The mad part is, as has been said by a million people, fifty million times, if we could get more cyclists on the road things would change by default - we'd all be safer, provisions would be made and so on... but until things are made safer it's almost Mission: Impossible to get people onto bikes! I definitaly agree that a shift in the way those who hit cyclists are treated would go a long way to help.

As would ritual beatings for anyone who "didn't see you" when it's clear that if they'd bothered to look, they would have.

You know, if nothing else, this thread has made me realise just how much I miss cycling! I think it's about time I dug out my tools and overhauled my bike.



EDIT
Oh - and I'm sorry if my last post came across as a bit full-on or even as a bit of an attack. Really I just love bikes and hate the way they are treated as sub-human by many drivers (and "target practice" by others)... I know I probably didn't need to lay out all that detail but I wanted you to understand that I'm really not anti-bike and had really very good reasons for stopping... mainly boiling down to rational fear.
Sorry.

I'm still going to overhaul my bike though.

[Two_Sheds]

Don't be sorry, I enjoyed our chat.