HUBBERS DOT COM BLOG

The socialist who run the unions that work on the London underground went on a 72 hour strike this week. In the end the union called off the strike slightly early after accepting the EXACT package that the Tube bosses offered them in the first place.

Why did they strike then? I have no idea. Maybe just to flex their socialist muscles.

One crazy spin off of the tube strike is that London’s buses and roads became way more congested. One Tuesday and Wednesday on my rides to work I saw some crazy stuff. The significant increase in traffic caused loads of extra pressure and I saw several vehicles do crazy things that you would normally never see. The worst of which was a car that cut across in front of an oncoming car when they both got green lights to go straight ahead. Crazy.

There were also loads of extra cyclists who were riding for two days. All those people who bought bikes and have rarely or never used them were able to dust them off and ride to work. The finniest part was that a lot of the “strike riders” rode in ways that regular riders wouldn’t, like all over the footpath.

There were reports in the news that the queues for the buses were so bad that fights broke out.

I wonder how many people got hurt or ended up in hospital so the unions could flew their socialist muscle.

I have been having a few moans on my blog about the state of cycle lanes and cycling in general recently. Usually when I see something dangerous I take a photo and send the link to that photo to my local councilors, the Mayor of London, Local MP, Transport for London and other people who might have an interest in my moaning.

Last time I had an even better idea and I have decided to harness the powers of Web 2.0 to fight the good fight against the morons who put cyclists at risk in London.

This is a link to my flickr group about cycle safety that anyone can post photos to. Within a week I have already found ten other people who have also been taking photos of anti-cycle-idiocy.

That is the power of the internet my friends, it enables ticked off loonies to find each other and bug elected officials together. Well one of the powers anyway.

These are all from the Evening Standard which seems to be the only newspaper to carry regular articles on cycling and cycle safety in London. My guess would be that one of the editrors at the ES rides to work.

• 372 cyclist were killed or seriously injured on London roads last year
• 19 cyclists were killed in collisions – nine of which involved a goods vehicle
• In 2005 21 cyclists were killed, nine involved lorries
• The was a 30 per cent rise in cycle deaths between 2003 and 2005
• The number of cycle journeys has risen by more than 80 per cent over five years
• There has been a 23 per cent increase in the number of cyclists using London’s main roads, compared to the same time last year
• 64 per cent of drivers never cycle on roads as they are afraid of having an accident

No surprises about that last one.

Earlier this year I wrote to a long list of local councillors about a stretch of cycle lane on the way to work that was blocked in several places by road works. In some places the road was genuinely dug up but in several other the cycle lane was blocked to provide storage space for road signs, equipment and – a portable toilet. I even took some photos (click on the image below to see more).I got a couple of responses about looking at danger areas etc a few weeks later but not much else.

Yesterday on the same stretch of road I took the photo below of a toilet blocking a cycle lane. In the couple of minutes it took me to take these photos I saw two cyclists ride into oncoming traffic on the wrong side of the road to avoid the toilet blocking the cycle lane. While I admit this is an incredibly stupid thing for cyclists to do the fact that a high percentage of cyclists will do this makes the placement of the portable toilet here, dangerous in the extreme.

My proposed solution is that the local councils should outlaw using cycle lanes for storage by road workers.

The Evening Standard have a thoroughly praiseworthy 12-point charter for improving cycle safety in London. I am struggling to find more information about it online except on one other blog so I thought I would promote it here:

1. A real cycle network across London
2. Better cycle lanes with proper segregation
3. Enforcement of special advanced stop lines for cyclists
4. HGVs to be fitted with special cyclist safety mirrors
5. Compulsory cyclist awareness training for all bus drivers and new HGV drivers
6. Make safe the Thames bridges: some of the most dangerous places for cyclists
7. Cycle-friendly streets: fewer one-way systems which funnel cyclists into the middle of traffic
8. More cycle parking across London
9. A police crackdown on bike theft
10. Campaign to urge the selfemployed to claim a 20p a mile cycling allowance against tax
11. Better cycle-bus-rail coordination: adequate parking at all railway stations
12. Cycle training for all schoolchildren and any adult who wants it

Every day when I ride to work I see people step out onto the road without looking. I guess they have forgotten the advice of their parents and are not looking “right then left then right again”. And while ears might be useful for hearing cars and trucks they aren’t so useful for spotting cycles. This often results in the unobservant pedestrians getting a bing from a bell or a toot of a horn and usually a little scare.

Some of these sharp eared walkers have taken offence to cyclists binging them and the local police have been called into action to sort out the silly cyclists. A group of them now regularly patrol the intersection next to Holborn police station issuing tickets to any cyclist who stupidly runs a red light while they are there.

My point is that I don’t think that a lot of pedestrians are getting hurt. But London roads are putting at least four thousand cyclists in hospital each year.

Now if I were in charge of the police (and why not?) I might target my limited resources at minimising death and injury on the roads. Or I might be looking into why thousands of bikes are stolen in London each year. Quite possibly I might send an office down to Brick Lane where rumour has it you can choose from several cut price stolen bikes any day of the week.

That’s just me though. I have crazy ideas for common sense use of limited police resources.

It’s good to know that in this fast paced techy time that I can still have the occasional idea that is ahead of the big players.

My idea to put all the cycle accidents in London isn’t possible on Google Maps … yet. Hopefully they will set it up so that any logged in user can add a flag to a map soon.

This morning I was riding down the cycle lane on Avenue Road on my way to work and a people carrier turned left in front of me without indicating. Naturally I did what any sane cyclist would do and I slammed into his rear vision mirror and was catapulted through the air.

I landed a few meters further down the road. I think my right hand hit first. Luckily I was wearing glove to no damage there. My right elbow followed and was very lightly grazed. Next my right hip landed and took the brunt of the impact. No graze but I think I will have a hell of a bruise. The last to hit the asphalt was the right side of my helmet. It hit with such force that I remember thinking at the time that if I wasn’t wearing it there was no way my skull could have taken the hit and stayed in one piece. All in all I got off extremely lightly.

The driver stopped and was really nice except he was touching me far to much and wanted to tell my what to do all the time. Like lie here and don’t move or let me see you walk to the tree and back. I think he was more shaken up than I was. But then I knew I was going to be okay and he was probably shitting himself that I might have internal injuries or shock or a really nasty lawyer (oxymoron?).

Massive Lucky Break

My apple and banana were both in the left hand side of my pack and escaped the carnage entirely unscathed!

Cycle Crash Map

I knew this street was a bad spot because I have had a few close calls and last year I saw a woman with her bike in the back of an ambulance at the same place. And London is full of places where cyclists regularly get cained.

So I have come up with this idea. I have created a Google map that shows where my accident was and encourages other people to plot their accidents or accidents they have seen on it. Once enough data is gathered the map could be used to get local councils to make dangerous intersections safer.

This is the link to my Cycle Crash Map. If you could link to this on your blog (if you have one) or tell people about it that would be great.

Additional weirdness

While I was dazed and confused by the side of the road the driver kept asking me to move away from a smoking white van that three geezers were trying to start. It was only a little smoke so I didn’t see what the fuss was until the geezers started carrying fists full of dirt to white van. At this stage the guy who hit me moved me to the other side of the road and the white van turned into an inferno. I have never seen a live car on fire before and would have completely missed that if I hadn’t been hit.

I have started cycling to work because the weather is nice and the fitness will do me good. The bike I chose is a Cannondale Road Warrior. Not too sure why it is called a Road Warrior but this afternoon I am popping out to get a bear skin coat and a baseball bat with some nails through it.

I read yesterday that that the bombers only killed 52 people of the three million people who use London transport every day. That’s pretty good odds.

Much better odds than the thousands who have taken to riding bicycles to work. London roads put 4,500 of them in hospital every year.

The Mayor of London, Red Ken, has started up a One London campaign to show that the people of London are united against the bombers.