Monthly Archives: December 2011

Cycle safety in London – getting worse, not better

Posted on December 26, 2011 by

Transport for London’s latest Travel in London report is out – the fourth. In the section on ‘Road Safety’, we are told that The year 2010 was the target year for both national and more stringent London-specific targets for the … Continue reading →

Posted in Boris Johnson, Department for Transport, London, Road safety, Targets | 24 Comments

Just what is ‘smoothing traffic flow’?

Posted on December 19, 2011 by

In last week’s London Assembly motion on Cycle Safety (which you can view again here, around four hours in) Labour’s AM Val Shawcross made the following comments about Transport for London’s ‘smoothing traffic flow’ agenda, and how the policy is, in … Continue reading →

Posted in 20 mph limits, Boris Johnson, Car dependence, Dangerous driving, Infrastructure, London, Road safety, Smoothing traffic flow, Speeding, Transport for London | 2 Comments

Is the bicycle being forgotten about in London’s new street designs?

Posted on December 16, 2011 by

Danny of Cyclists In the City has been tireless in documenting the increasing rash of widened pavements and narrowed carriageways that are springing up all over London. In his most recent piece on a location where a street has been … Continue reading →

Posted in Infrastructure, London, Uncategorized | Tagged , , | 22 Comments

How ‘smoothing traffic flow’ is needlessly causing death and serious injury

Posted on December 13, 2011 by

I am indebted to Olaf Storbeck of Cycling Intelligence for the background to this post. He has published an open letter, written to Camden’s Culture & Environment Scrutiny Committee, by Kenji Hirasawa, the boyriend of Deep Lee, the young woman killed … Continue reading →

Posted in ASL Abuse, Boris Johnson, Car dependence, Cycle Superhighways, Cycling policy, Infrastructure, London, Road safety, The Netherlands, Town planning, Transport for London, Uncategorized | 10 Comments

Lethal drivers

Posted on December 10, 2011 by

On the 21st of November last year, Matthew Bailey, a 22-year-old scaffolder from Gosport, headed out into town for some drinks with friends. A few hours later, returning home, he was struck and killed instantly by a car as he … Continue reading →

Posted in Car dependence, Dangerous driving, Infrastructure, Road safety, The judiciary | 2 Comments

Coned off

Posted on December 9, 2011 by

Heading back from an excellent Street Talks at Look Mum No Hands on Tuesday evening, I found myself cycling south on Blackfriars Bridge, on my way to Waterloo. This is the location of a disastrously poor cycle lane, the lethality … Continue reading →

Posted in Infrastructure, London, Road safety, Transport for London, Uncategorized | 9 Comments

Cycling as a stress-reliever, in Sweden and Horsham

Posted on December 7, 2011 by

Here’s a good comment piece from the West Sussex County Times, published in last week’s paper. Curiously, the paper’s website suggests that it was written by Conservative Party Chairman, and local MP, Francis Maude – but that isn’t the case. … Continue reading →

Posted in Car dependence, Horsham, Horsham District Council, Infrastructure, Safety | 2 Comments

‘A very safe activity’

Posted on December 6, 2011 by

David Hembrow has recently posted a piece about a family in Cambridge who are considering giving up cycling – this after a nasty incident on a roundabout, in which a van struck the mother’s bakfiets, with her baby in it. … Continue reading →

Posted in CTC, Cycling policy, Cycling renaissance, Infrastructure, Road safety, Safety In Numbers | 23 Comments

Cycling on the pavement

Posted on December 5, 2011 by

I wrote a rather long piece a few months ago about a West Sussex County Times article entitled Councillor warns of road ‘peril’. This was an article that, for some reason,  decided to focus entirely on the dangers of ‘selfish cyclists’ who … Continue reading →

Posted in Cyclecraft, Helmets, Horsham Police, Infrastructure, John Franklin, Transport for London | 9 Comments

When and how the Dutch separate bicycles from motor vehicles

Posted on December 2, 2011 by

If you live in the suburb of Baggelhuizen in Assen, which lies in the south-west of the city, outside its ring road, you will use Hoofdlaan to get in and out of the city. It’s a fast, straight road, with … Continue reading →

Posted in Infrastructure, The Netherlands, Town planning | 2 Comments