DulwichLondoner

As per the subject. The fact that motorcycles are only allowed in some of the bus lanes is extremely confusing and, frankly, defies logic. Either it's safe or it's not. It cannot be safe on one road and become immediately dangerous after a few yards. For example, on Camberwell road, from Medlar street to Camberwell Green, motorcycles are not allowed. Carry on straight ahead, and, after Camberwell Green - surprise! - as soon as Denmark Hill starts motorcycles are allowed. However, most motorcyclists do not even know, because the sign is positioned so close to the Camberwell green bus stop that busses will almost always hide it from the sight of oncoming motorcyclists. My question is about Southwark because this is the East Dulwich Forum but the same applies throughout London. Also, who decides these things? What exactly is decided by TFL and what by each council? James Barber, do you know? I believe you mentioned in another discussion a while back that some cyclist association was against sharing bus lanes because of some report that would point to increased risks - do I remember correctly? Do you still have that? TFL's conclusions are radically different: https://tfl.gov.uk/info-for/media/press-releases/2011/december/motorcycles-to-be-allowed-permanent-access-to-bus-lanes http://content.tfl.gov.uk/motorcycles-in-bus-lanes-report.pdf

Lowlander Wrote: > Those against the 20mph limit are using > questionable data and processes. > > Those supporting 20mph limits are using the proper > processes consistent with those used in medical > studies. Ehm, I'm not so sure. The PDF from the brake website is just unsubstantiated propaganda. Lambeth Council, on its official webpage about the 20mph limits, did not deem it appropriate to present the slightest bit of evidence in support of the measure: https://www.lambeth.gov.uk/parking-transport-and-streets/streets-and-roads/lambeth-goes-20mph . They present a bunch of numbers, but, as the authors of the BMJ article rightly claim, you can't infer anything from just a few numbers. I explained my reservations about the BMJ article so I'm not going to repeat them, other than to stress that they are very similar to the criticism of the statistician in your Telegraph article about the lack of a control group (where on earth was the control group in the BMJ article? How do we know the 20 and non-20 areas compared are, in fact, comparable)? Totally unsubstantiated claims, like those of the lady at the beginning of this video of the 20 is plenty campaign, that this will increase property values and solve all kinds of problems: remind me of the propaganda of the over-enthusiastic North Korea news anchor lady: :) The Rospa link does have more material. I don't have time to go over it now, but I will soon. There is something very basic I fail to grasp. The campaign claims that the difference to journey times during rush hour won't be huge, and I tend to agree. So how on Earth can lower limits possibly account for something even only remotely close to the 40ish% reductions in collisions claimed in the BMJ article??? Do most collisions happen in those very rare and very short periods when motorists can actually reach 30mph? Do they mostly happen at night when roads are emptier (and fewer pedestrians are around)? For example the Telegraph article you mentioned says that: "only 15 per cent of fatal crashes and 5 per cent of all accidents are caused by speeding." Let's not forget that a part of these speed-related accidents is caused by behaviour which, however despicable, is unlikely to be affected by lower speed limits (e.g. drunk driving). Can you understand my confusion? PS I wonder if this was the decision-making process: :)

More spurious correlations here: http://www.tylervigen.com/spurious-correlations

Ampersand Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I'm not sure of > the logistics, but couldn't bus routes terminate > at each end of Oxford Street, St. Giles and Marble > Arch? And how would busses go from East to West? The whole point is that Oxford street is one of the main arteries between East and West London. TFL talks about using Wigmore street, which I believe is less wide than Oxford street. My concern is that this would create a cascading effect of more congestion and more pollution for everyone. Even if you ban ALL private cars, of which there aren't many already in zone 1, there will still be loads of goods that need to be carried back and forth on large vehicles. Just to give you an idea, right now it's 10.15 am, ie no longer rush hour. I chose a bus stop at random, and noticed about 10 buses, in one direction only, over the coruse of the next 10 minutes or so: https://tfl.gov.uk/bus/stop/490019653E/bond-street

rendelharris Wrote: > No, moving traffic offences are the likes of > blocking stopboxes, making illegal turns, driving > the wrong way up one way streets etc, speeding > offences are separate and the revenue goes to the > treasury. I see - my bad, then. Do councils still somehow get the money back, i.e. is that money reallocated back to road safety, etc, or can the government use it for whatever it wants? In other words, do councils really have no financial incentives whatsoever in speeding tickets? I hope you'll forgive my scepticism :)

James Barber Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Hi DulwichLondner, > It is immensely frustrating. But would you want a > son, daughter, partner, friend, neighbour killed > by an out of control moped or scooter ridden by > someone being chased or even the police car or > cars chasing them about a smartphone theft. > Epseically when those phones can be valueless if > the owner uses some common sense. Of course not, that was my very comment. However, there have also been cases of thieves of brand new motorcycles, worth tens of thousands of pounds, not chased by the police, either. The press wrote the police didn't give chase because the thieves had removed their helmets and so might get hurt in a chase - worrying about the thieves' wellbeing is quite different from worrying about that of innocent passersby. Of course the press' description might be inaccurate, I'm not sure about that. One such case in Manchester: http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/police-told-not-to-chase-motorbike-896469

James Barber Wrote: > I can't make the Police break their London wide > held rules for chasing people on scooters. James, do you know where the policy of not chasing motorcyclists with no helmet comes from? AFAIK the policy applies throughout England (I have no idea about Wales, Scotland and NI). I don't think it's an explicit law, is it? Has each police authority reached the same conclusion independently? In our case, would it be down to the Metropolitan Police and therefore the Mayor of London? I find it insane not to chase these people because otherwise they could hurt themselves, but I do understand that chasing them might end up hurting other people - e.g. if these distinguished gentlemen hit other passers by while trying to escape.

So do you agree with me that cyclists and motorcyclists should stay back from large vehicles? I thought you had said I was anti-cyclist for saying so! Yes, of course, it does not absolve HGV drivers who behave recklessly. I did ask you before if/how you know for a fact that most collisions between HGVs and cyclists are the HGV's fault; you did not answer, so I'm not gonna ask again. You know, cyclists rightly maintain that single incidents of cyclists misbehaving should not be generalised; similarly, the bad behaviour of other categories should not be generalised. Single cases, however egregious, are utterly irrelevant! I will be keen on segregated cycle lanes once the benefits are proven. Until that point, I will continue to think it was an utter folly to embark on this initiative ignoring the concerns of the travel watchdog, and an even greater folly to build even more segregated cycle lanes without assessing the impact of the existing ones. If it weren't insane, it would be ridiculous that one of the effects of the segregated cycle lanes is greater congestion and therefore greater pollution, all courtesy of the green cycle lobby! Oh, yes, we all agree that 'something' should be done to limit all the nasty HGVs etc, but, nothing has been done, nor is anything in the works AFAIK, so we are stuck with more congestion and more pollution. Way to go, cycle lobby - our lungs thank you, big time. I appreciate that, in the era of Brexit Trump fake news alternative facts etc. I am in the minority, but - call me crazy - I still believe that decisions should be based on some kind of evidence, of data, of cost-benefit analysis, rather than on ideological guff shouted from the rooftops with no backing.

Try asking here: http://forums.pepipoo.com/ They will know more

TFL has a consultation here: https://consultations.tfl.gov.uk/roads/oxford-street/?cid=oxford-street As is unfortunately common in these 'consultations', details are few and vague. It is not clear at all to me that removing busses from Oxford street wouldn't cause more congestion - and therefore pollution.

The one piece of technology which I think is key is ABS. It saved my hide a couple of times (both times when I made panic stops to avoid idiot pedestrians who wanted to win the Darwin awards). Also bear in mind that, in the same situation, it is harder to make a proper panic stop, ie without locking the wheels, on a powerful bike with powerful brakes than on a 125; in other words, the fact you may have never needed it on a 125 doesn't mean you won't need it on a bigger bike. The most modern bikes, with slipper clutch, ride-by-wire and engine modes (google them if you don't know what these mean) are easier to ride than older, less powerful bikes without these contraptions, so much so that they might delude inexperienced riders into a false sense of security. I find it much easier to get a smooth power delivery on a new BMW S1000XR (with ca. 160hp) than on an old Bandit 600, for example. The debate on the number of cylinders is very subjective. Twins without a slipper clutch nor ride-by-wire tend to provide a jerkier acceleration and a very strong engine brake , which some people don't like for city riding. Of course, YMMV big time.

If you're going to install something that drains your battery (tracker or alarm), be sure the battery is in good shape. On most bikes it's best to change it after 3 years maximum.

Well, I always use a bluetooth headset for my calls, for convenience, but it does help reduce the risk of the phone being snatched from my hands if it's in a pocket

Lowlander Wrote: > I can help you - attached. Thank you. Do you work in the biomedical field? Can you get access to the other article I found on PubMed, too? As for the BMJ article, I honestly struggle to follow it. Maybe you can clarify some of my doubts. I would have expected an analysis of 20mph limits to be similar to the analyses of a new drug vs placebo: you compare two similar sets of roads, one with 20mph and the other with 30mph limits, and se if there is any statistically significant difference. Or, similarly, you analyse the accident frequencies on a set of roads the year before and the year after the introduction of 20mph limits. Of course the set of roads must be large enough to have a meaningful number of events to compare; there is an inherent variability in this phenomena which makes them ahrd to study unless they are frequent enough. For example, in 2015 there were ca. 2000 fatalities and serious injuries in London ( https://tfl.gov.uk/info-for/media/press-releases/2016/june/road-casualties-in-london-continue-to-fall-but-concerns-remain-about-motorbike-collisions ); if you drill down into too much detail, you'll be left with not enough data points for a meaningful analysis. These are some of the reasons why the DfT (see my previous links) said the evidence on 20mph is inconclusive. Anyway, I would have expected these two kinds of analyses, but it is not clear to me at all that this is what was done in the BMJ article. The authors have information for 385 of the 399 20mph zones introduced from 1991 to 2007, but that's too long a period for this kind of analysis, because all kinds of trends and factors over such a long period of time may contribute to a change in the number of accidents: safer cars, stricter driving tests, more speed cameras, dramatic changes in the population of motorists and road users, etc. The authors say they reach similar conclusions when they analyse the most recent years only, but it is not clear to me what was compared over the last few years: how many 20mph zones were introduced over that period? How comparable are they to the non-20 mph zones? Table 1 gives some indications on these points over the entire period (which, as I said, I consider too long). One thing that jumps out is that, over the entire period, they analyse 2006 kms of 20mph roads, vs almost 14,000 kms of non-20mph zones. My main objections/doubts are 2: 1) how comparable are the 20 vs non-20 zones? E.g. to what extent are there fewer accidents in the 20mph zones because there is less traffic flow anyway? 2) even if they are comparable (and it's a big if), the mere fact that the vast majority of the dataset relates to the non-20 zones makes the results for the 20mph zones much harder to interpret and less statistically significant, because we are basically comparing a large vs a small dataset. > > Essentially - "Commenting on the Department for > Transport figures, Grundy told the BMJ. ?We can?t > tell anything from the raw numbers alone.?" Makes sense. Just like I struggle to make sense of their analysis without clarifications to my two points above. Also, I note that the data of the Metropolitan police, which classifies collisions in London by main cause, was not used. I can't find the link now (I'll try to refine my google skills later...) but that would be useful to look at, because clearly some types of collisions would be reduced by lower limits, but not all, e.g. drunk driving, low-speed collisions at dangerous junctions with limited visibility, etc. Finally, I can't help but continue thinking that there must be something wrong in either the BMJ study or the DfT's; we're not talking about small differences, we are talking about a 40% reduction vs inconclusive results. One of the two must be hideously wrong!

Btw, there has been a long, and successful campaign, to replace the "cyclists (and motorcyclists) stay back" stickers with something less offensive for those poor sensitive souls. I now see lots of "caution, blind spot" stickers instead. As I said countless times, I am a motorcyclist, I stay back from large vehicles myself, and I most certainly do not feel offended by a "cyclists and motorcyclists, stay back" sticker. The sticker makes me think we live in a world full of brain-dead idiots if they even need to be reminded of such a banal concept, but, well, it seems we do. To be absolutely clear, there is nothing wrong in overtaking a large vehicle in a lane next to you, if you can do so safely and quickly, in a straight stretch of road with no bends nor intersections, but riding intentionally and for prolonged periods of time on a lane next to large vehicle is just stupid, for all the reasons discussed at length. I am particularly shocked because it seems that more time and energy have been dedicated to changing the wording into something more politically correct, than to actually warn those on two wheels of the bloody danger. If i google "cycling london safety tips", the first page that comes up is one by TFL which does mention "stay back from HGVs". However, cyclists' association do not seem to care as much about the point - asserting their constitutional right to be killed, ehm, to ride next to large vehicles seems more important to them. There's a link from LondonCyclist which recommends not to undertake, but doesn't say anything about staying back from large vehicles: http://www.londoncyclist.co.uk/7-mistakes-you-are-making-with-your-cycling-and-how-you-can-correct-them/ The BBC: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-33779950 again, no mention The London Cycling Campaign does mention that "behind a lorry is often the safest place to be", but does not shout "stay the hell back" from the rooftop like I believe it should be done . I couldn't find anything at all on the bicycle association website: www.bicycleassociation.org.uk This is the kind of attitude I find idiotic, and which I hate with all my heart. I know what I am talking about because I am a motorcyclist: for my own safety. I always stay the hell back from large vehicles, and this was the first piece of advice I gave to a friend who asked me after getting his motorcycle licence. Shame that the cyclists associations seem more interested in the political correctness of a sticker, than in actually informing their members of the danger they are exposed to when riding next to a large vehicle, which, yes, is in theory perfectly legal, it's their right, etc etc, but is still dangerous.

A few more thoughts: * the clutch. Don't underestimate the importance of a bike with a clutch that does not require a bodybuilder's strength - when commuting you'll be pulling or slipping it more often than not * I find a digital speedometer more convenient, especially with the almost ubiquitous 20mph limits, because a quick glance lets me understand immediately if I am within the limit or not, whereas with an analog speedometer it's not as immediate

rendelharris Wrote: > Just to repeat as one has to many, many times, > local councils do not benefit from speeding fines, > all revenue from speeding fines goes to > H.M.Treasury. That's not what I had understood from Kingston's official website: https://www.kingston.gov.uk/info/200195/parking/627/penalty_charge_notices_-_parking_moving_traffic_and_bus_lane_penalties/6 I'd assume speeding tickets are part of the penalty charge notices "from moving tarffic". "Where does the money go? Any profit made from parking, moving traffic or bus lane penalties once the cost of providing, managing and enforcing on-street parking have been deducted must be used by law to fund off street parking or any of the following: public passenger transport services highway improvement works highway maintenance the cost of anything that has the approval of the Mayor of London and which facilitates the implementation of the Mayor's transport strategy."

uncleglen Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > a broom handle to stick in the wheels would be > effective.....the police cannot be everywhere And, even if they were everywhere, they cannot chase a motorcyclist who throws his helmet away, otherwise he might get hurt... http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-10984311 It's a true policy all over England, it's not a joke.

One thing I quite never understood about electric cars is how polluting (or not) is it to generate that electricity? And what happens to the batteries, can they be somehow recycled, do they pollute a lot, etc? I had always understood that vehicle batteries pollute a lot, but the batteries of a Tesla are, for obvious reasons, huge compared to the battery of a non-electric car. Also, building a new car, however green its emissions, is not an eco-friendly task. For the planet as a whole, I do wonder (genuinely, I don't have an answer) what the best compromise is between using a more polluting car a bit longer, or replacing it with a less polluting car, whose production however is, well, polluting.

Post-Brexit, Blackpool is the new Vegas :)

But no one would try cutting the post instead of the chain! :)

Lowlander Wrote: > Anyway, stats? How about some evidence from the > British Medical Journal showing a 40% reduction in > injuries: First of all, this is precisely the kind of research that the 20mph campaigners should be publishing on their website and shouting from the rooftops. The fact that they don't makes me extremely suspicious and makes me think that either evidence does not exist, or that these campaigns don't feel they need them because they have a dogmatic ideological approach. Isn't it odd that the conclusions of these studies are radically different from those I quoted, which prompted the DfT to define the first trials 'inconclusive', and to commission more research into the matter? The DfT did the right thing: inconclusive doesn't mean it works, doesn't mean it doesn't, it means: "we can't really tell". Why did so many councils not wait for the DfT to finish its job? For example, in another article on the BMJ, the same researches are called to defend their conclusion because, well, practical experience seems to show the exact opposite, ie that casualties have * cough cough* increased after the introduction of 20mph limits! http://www.bmj.com/content/345/bmj.e5580 I don't have access to the full article - if someone does and could comment here it would be great. Running a quick pubmed I have also found this other article: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27173361 which supports the 20mph limits. I don't have access to the full article but I'll see if I can get it through some friends. Like I said, I genuinely want to understand more. I am skeptical because the 20mph campaigns have not presented much evidence, because the initial conclusion of the DfT was that the results were inconclusive, and because it seems fishy that councils wouldn't want to wait for the DfT to finish its study, but if there really is overwhelmening evidence that lower limits work so be it - I will gladly support them despite the inconvenience as a motorcyclist. The point is, I want to reach an informed opinion based on facts as evidence rather than ideology! I would also add that it will soon be possible to compare accidents and casualties between 20mph and 30mph councils in London - that will be very interesting.

rendelharris Wrote: > And how do you know it's going to be green? > Traffic lights in 20MPH zones are phased for 20MPH > driving, so the smoothest flow through them will > be at the posted speed limit. The difference in busy urban areas at rush hour will be minimal. But outside of rush hour it won't. And let's please ignore the 'average' journey within London - that's about as relevant as calculating the 'average' salary between myself and one of the residents of a Belgravia villa. Consider going from south to North London at night, when the roads will be mostly empty. That's when the speed limit can make a difference. A shorter journey time can mean less pollution. Traffic lights programmed for 30mph limits can mean vehicles will spend less time at traffic lights at night, and, again, pollute less.

peckham_ryu Wrote: > Mine is chained to a post that I reckon will > withstand freeze and angle grinder attacks. Chain > is good although not quite uncroppable I must say I am confused. Why do you think your chain is croppable but would withstand an angle grinder? AFAIK chains with links >= 16mm (Almax and Pragmasis) are almost impossible to boltcrop, whereas nothing can withstand an angle grinder - it's just a matter of time.

rendelharris Wrote: for once I agree > with Dulwich Londoner, where are all the Oxford > Street routes going to go? We happen to be in agreement: I shall offer you a pint to celebrate the event! :)