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Steve Peake wrote:

The thing that is missing from all this is the fact that off road cycle
paths are significantly more dangerous to the cyclist than cycling on the
road.

Interesting, but I suspect misleading.

"Offroad" cycle paths are often used as sporting activities
On Road paths are used for utility purposes

The former is more dangerous becuase of the use, not the road.

You would need to look at figures for Road side, segregated paths in
Germany and Holland, or perhaps Milton Keynes.

Milton Keynes has been shown to be *more* dangerous. Next?

Milton Keynes are 'off road' but not sporting tracks.

--
Helen D. Vecht:
Edgware.

On Thu, 15 Sep 2005, Neil Williams wrote:

On Wed, 14 Sep 2005 20:33:04 +0100, Tom Anderson
wrote:

If that's true, then i suggest that the key bit is "less rushed" - if
they're less rushed, they're bound to be more relaxed, and so more
friendly and pleasant.

Agreed.

I will neither speculate nor comment on any possible connection between
this difference in degree of rushedness and the threefold difference in
GDP per capita [1] between London and the north.

Most probably true, but money isn't everything.

No, of course not. But the degree of economic activity is likely to be
correlated to levels of other activity, for example cultural. It would be
nice to see a Eurostat survey of things like artists per capita! So it's a
matter of activity of all sorts versus relaxedness.

I would be interesting to see how the comparison would work if compared
between similarly sized entities such as "the North" and "the South
East",

According to Wikipedia:

London 7,421,228 (2005)
North West England 6,729,800 (2001)
West Midlands 5,267,337 (2001)

I'd say those were pretty similarly sized!

Just for laughs, some other definitions of London, of increasing
silliness:

London (urban area) 8,278,251 (2001)
London (metropolitan area) 13,945,000 (2001)
London (GLA 'metropolitan region') 18,000,000

or "Manchester and London", though

Greater Manchester 2,530,956 (2003)

- while I expect it to be the same way round, I would not expect it to
be as drastic.

You might well be right. The figure for Outer London is much lower than
that for Inner London; fairly close to the better-off northern figures,
and rather lower than the richest bits of the home counties.

As far as the census and Eurostat are concerned, Inner London (again
according to Wikipedia) means the cities of London and Westminster, the
boroughs touching them (except Brent), plus Newham, Haringey, Hammersmith
& Fulham, and Lewisham. This area has a population of 2,904,600 (2003), so
perhaps there comparisons with Manchester would be apposite.

I'm a bit puzzled by the GDP numbers, though. Are they by location of
residence or location of work? If work, i'm not surprised, since outer
London is basically a dormitory for jobs in the centre (with one or two
exceptions, like Croydon). If it's residency, though, i'm suspicious -
there are huge numbers of people working in well-paid jobs in inner London
but living in the suburbs. But then, that would explain the high GDP of
bits of the home counties. Anyway, it might be fairer to take the GDP per
capita of the whole of London, to avoid the effect of commuting.

tom

--
Also, a 'dark future where there is only war!' ... have you seen the news lately? -- applez

wrote:
Steve Peake wrote:

The thing that is missing from all this is the fact that off road cycle
paths are significantly more dangerous to the cyclist than cycling on the
road.

Interesting, but I suspect misleading.

"Offroad" cycle paths are often used as sporting activities
On Road paths are used for utility purposes

I think that in this case we are discussing paths such as those
n Milton Keynes[1], ie alternative routes built for cycling which
do not run next to the roads, whereas you seem to be thinking
of something more like rural mountain biking trails.

The former is more dangerous becuase of the use, not the road.

I'd say the usage is much the same, mosty utility/commuting
cyclists. Probably fewer sports cyclists than on the road because
of the inherent speed limitations of such paths.

There are, however, likely to be a higher proportion of
young and/or inexperienced cyclists who are likely to be
more accident prone.

You would need to look at figures for Road side, segregated paths in
Germany and Holland, or perhaps Milton Keynes.

These are even more dangerous, especially the contra-flow ones, as
they are usually crossed by side roads and driveways where cyclists
are often struck by motor vehicles in spite of having right-of-way.

"For urban roads, with many junctions, accident analysis suggests
the opposite, that segregated cycling facilities are likely to
increase collisions. These conclusions are supported by the experience
of countries that have implemented segregated cycling facilities.
In the US, UK, Germany, Sweden, Denmark, and Finland, it has
been found that cycling on roadside urban cycle tracks/sidepaths
results in significant, up to 12 fold, increases in the rate of
car/bicycle collisions. At a 1991 European conference on cycling,
the term Russian roulette was openly used to describe the use of
roadside cycle paths.

"In Helsinki, research has shown that cyclists are safer cycling on
the roads mixed in with the traffic than they are using that city's
800 km of cycle paths See Finnish Research. The Berlin police
reputedly came to a similar conclusion in the 1980s" [2]

For rural roads with few junctions and higher traffic speeds, there
is some evidence that segregated paths may be safer.

Pete.
[1] Disclaimer: I have never been to Milton Keynes so may be mistaken
as to the nature of the paths there. A better example might be the
paths across the common in Southampton or in Hyde Park in London.

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Segrega...cle_facilities or http://tinyurl.com/cjtdtA - this article is
written from a somewhat pro-cycling viewpoint however it seems factually
correct and references the research should you wish to check for yourself.

Neil Williams wrote:
On Sat, 10 Sep 2005 17:13:38 +0100, Edward Cowling London UK
wrote:


Surely it's time for cycles to be registered and insured ?


I may have just fed the troll, but surely it's time for nothing of the
sort. Surely it's time for more police, out on the streets and
visible, issuing fixed penalty tickets for cycling infringements as
well as ticketing motorists for dangerous driving (can't do that with
a camera), deterring other crime and assisting the public where
required?

Cameras, CCTV and the likes, while useful, are no substitute for
proper policing on the front line.

Surely it's also time for the public to stand up and do something about
it. On my walk home I will pass a comment[*] to (almost) anyone cycling
on the pavement on my route.

I don't claim any great success, mostly I get a gobful back or at best
someone swerves on to the road, only to have hopped on again 100yards
away when out of earshot, but if more people moaned and complained, a
few lessons might be learned?

[*] Obviously it helps that it's in a leafy part of comfortable
South-West London, not a dodgy part where you're risking life and limb
in opening your mouth.

An interesting and counter intuitive article.

Thinking about it I agree side roads and roundabouts can be very
dangerous for cyclepaths.

So how should cycling be encouraged, and made safer?

"Mike Bristow" wrote in message
...


The only offences commited on the road that are enforced are those
that can be enforced with a camera. This is true all over Britain.


What sort of camera is detecting drivers who are over the alcohol limit
then?

Paul

On Thu, 15 Sep 2005, Pete Bentley wrote:

wrote:
Steve Peake wrote:

The thing that is missing from all this is the fact that off road
cycle paths are significantly more dangerous to the cyclist than
cycling on the road.

Interesting, but I suspect misleading.

"For urban roads, with many junctions, accident analysis suggests the
opposite, that segregated cycling facilities are likely to increase
collisions. These conclusions are supported by the experience of
countries that have implemented segregated cycling facilities. In the
US, UK, Germany, Sweden, Denmark, and Finland, it has been found that
cycling on roadside urban cycle tracks/sidepaths results in significant,
up to 12 fold, increases in the rate of car/bicycle collisions. At a
1991 European conference on cycling, the term Russian roulette was
openly used to describe the use of roadside cycle paths.

"In Helsinki, research has shown that cyclists are safer cycling on the
roads mixed in with the traffic than they are using that city's 800 km
of cycle paths See Finnish Research. The Berlin police reputedly came to
a similar conclusion in the 1980s" [2]

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Segrega...cle_facilities
or http://tinyurl.com/cjtdtA - this article is written from a somewhat
pro-cycling viewpoint however it seems factually correct and references
the research should you wish to check for yourself.

That diagram of a junction reminds me a lot of the junction of Gordon
Square and Gordon Street, which is on my route to work. I haven't been hit
by a car anywhere in London yet, but that junction is where i've come
closest, many times.

tom

--
mimeotraditionalists

In message . com,
writes
So how should cycling be encouraged, and made safer?
By discouraging it and using a taxi as a safer alternative.
--
Clive

In message , chris harrison
writes
I don't claim any great success, mostly I get a gobful back or at best
someone swerves on to the road, only to have hopped on again 100yards
away when out of earshot,
Tell then to try it in the Lakes', I think you'll find most coming back
disgruntled because the local fuzz won't stand for it and as soon as
it's witnessed a £30 penalty ticket," though you could appear in court a
month later and pay £60" will ensue. I think they only get away with
it because they can, but up here where the fuzz have nothing else to do,
let them try their illegal practises and see who wins.
--
Clive

Clive wrote:
writes
So how should cycling be encouraged, and made safer?
By discouraging it and using a taxi as a safer alternative.

More like: By *encouraging* more cyclists onto the road and enforcing
a zero tolerance policy on bad driving by taxi drivers, who are some
of the worst offenders when it comes to ignoring stop lines and
advance stop lines, running red lights when they're "just a bit" red,
making sudden manouvers without signalling and so on.

Studies usually show a negative correlation between the number of
cyclists and the rate of serious accidents, ie the more cyclists
there are on the road, the lower the rate of accidents per journey.

Getting rid of some of the farcical cycle "facilities" would help
too, eg badly designed lanes which encourage unwarey cyclists to
ride in the "door zone" (in the last set of TfL figures I saw,
something like 12% of deaths and serious injuries to cyclists we
related to people opening car doors in their path).

Pete.