Relief from CS7: Gently amusing pics for Friday

It's easy to criticise the Cycle Superhighways. Which is why we all enjoy doing it so much.

But it's time for a rest before Monday's launch officially unleashes the Cobalt Calamities on the world. So here's four amusing, non-Superficial-Cycleway-bashing, pictures from my photographic slush pile.

Cycle parking in the City is thin on the ground, but there are some places where you can improvise. This statue of Cigarette Packet Man isn't quite as alluring as the naked ladies of the fountain near Tower Bridge, but it's handy for Shoe Lane library.


While this - which reminds me of those student graduation projects for a 'radical new design of bike' - adorns the entrance gate to Regents Canal towpath on Lisson Grove in Islington, just down from the Beatles' Abbey Road crossing.


And this is the Bicycle Magic shop in Greatorex St, near Brick Lane, in east London. We like this.



Clearly it's been inspired by real life, such as this cycle path in Greenwich.

But there are worse examples out there. As we shall find out on Monday...

More thin stuff on CS7

Final preparations for the launch of the first two Superficial Cycleways, CS3 and CS7, are moving on apace. And it's good to see forward-looking, pro-bicycle facilities such as this, on Keyworth St at the back of the Elephant.

The mandatory cycle lane - which drivers are not allowed to enter - has taken up most of the space here, leaving only 60cm for motor vehicles. Perhaps it was laid out with the pencil-thin electric solo transport vehicles of the future in mind.

Meanwhile, luckily, no driver of a conventional width vehicle is going to ignore that by, say, swooping into it when forced to do so by a car coming the other way.

Sarky comments: Comedy Greenwich bike facilities

A fabulously sunny day yesterday to bike along the riverside to Greenwich, and enjoy some of their innovative cycle facilities.

I liked the bit by the Cutty Sark, where the sign for THAMES CYCLE ROUTE is immediately followed by a sign for no cycling.


And I was impressed by the cycle track just before it, on Glaisher St. The council has kindly installed bollards to prevent cars from parking on it.

Bloody Tower traffic signs: Anyone understand this?

Sometimes it's not clear when a cycle track ends, and no signage means you can end up unwittingly cycling on a pavement - possibly getting fined. (The north-east exit of Hyde Park, to Marble Arch, is an example that has caught out many who've made an honest and understandable mistake.)

So it's always good to have unambiguous signs telling you your position. Such as here, on Byward St, just north of the Tower.


It's a shared-use path for pedestrians and cyclists, without a physical separator. On which cyclists are not allowed. With a physical separator between the path for pedestrians and cyclists.

Well, that all seems perfectly clear.

Bad bike lanes, the spice of life

This is the cycle lane on New Rd, in east London just south of Whitechapel Road. Turn left here and you're in Fieldgate St, home of the outstanding Tayyab restaurant. It serves superb quality curries at very reasonable prices; no wonder it's always so full. But if you can't get a table, at least there's this bike lane - either crashing you into the kerb or abruptly chucking you into the traffic - to quicken the pulse, raise the sweat, and exercise the bowels. Who needs a vindaloo when you're cycling in London?

Uncommon problems at Clapham junction

What would the person on the Clapham omnibus think about this? This junction has been exercising a few minds on the Lambeth Cyclists e-group.

It's the end of Cedars Rd, heading south towards the edge of Clapham Common. Motor traffic can only turn left (left lane) or right (right lane), but cyclists can go straight on, taking a recognised, signed cycle path across the Common. There's a nice prominent ASL, and without traffic it looks pretty straightforward (right).



But the traffic lights have recently been changed to add a left-filter, which kicks in several seconds before the general green (right).



So if you're going straight on, and you've positioned yourself in the ASL at red anywhere except the far right-hand side (a natural thing to do if you don't know the junction, with the entry to the ASL being on the left - see picture right), you're in trouble: left-filtering traffic behind you will be hooting you to get out the way, and hustling past. It's a nasty little example of designed-in conflict.

You can't solve it by adding a straight-ahead cycle filter simultaneous with the left-filter, because there's left-to-right sideways traffic in front of you in that phase.

You could add symbols to the ASL, splitting it into two with a prominent left arrow in the left half, and straight-on-and-right arrows in the right, but that might be thought too complicated. Similarly, you could redraw the ASL half-size as a box at the top of the right-hand lane, though again that might be thought confusing.



Or you could just acknowledge your mistake and remove the left filter.

Or you could solve it the London way (right): render the ASL unusable by having traffic routinely block it anyway.

Shining example of bad design on Cromer St

This is Cromer St, part of a bike route south of Kings Cross station. It's been carefully designed to stop cars using it, by the insertion of a bollard; to stop motorcyclists using it, by the insertion of jagged flagstones; and to stop cyclists using it, by the insertion of a parking space right at the end.

(Yet again, by astonishing coincidence, the number plate is appropriate... see also here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here.)

This is actually a rare view of the facility without a car parked right on top of it - where the bicycle symbol is. Google's Street View shows it as it normally appears, with a car loading up on toilet rolls and 2-for-1 party packs of Mars bars from the shop to the side. Good to see that some businesses are weathering the recession.

Beyond our ken on Clerkenwell Rd

This splendid new cycle lane was recently installed at the crossroads of Clerkenwell Road and Farringdon Road. So why isn't this cyclist using it? Perhaps he is a smug environmentalist, or likes flouting the rules, or is just a troublemaker?


Er, no. You're simply safer sticking to the road here. Take the cycle lane, and when the lights change you realise there are no signs saying you can go straight on along the footpath - and to do so illegally would risk slaughtering thousands of innocent pedestrians in cold blood - so your only option is to dodge back into the fast-moving traffic. Another example of London cycling's junk DNA.

The message of cycle lanes: Translator, please

Cycle lanes in Britain have two purposes. The main one is safety. By forcing you to stop, get off your bike, and walk, they make you get home later, thus reducing the amount of time you spend in the house, which as we all know is the place most accidents happen.

The second purpose is the message they send out to motorists, letting them know how the road space is shared out. The message sent out is usually in Basque or Etruscan or Linear B because nobody can understand it. But this one, in Lombard St in Battersea, is pretty clear: cyclists, get off the road, and go where you belong, er, on to the pavement.

Happy New Year (but not on Blackfriars Bridge)

I hope one of Transport for London's New Year Resolutions is stop putting in expensive and pointless facilities like this one. It's just appeared at the north end of Blackfriars Bridge.

It's a short length - maybe 20m or so - of separated cycle lane. Just after the lights, it rejoins the road, merging with the traffic that's turning left. The lights have three phases: (1) red for both bikes and cars; (2) red for bikes, with a green left filter lane for cars (right); (3) green for bikes and general-green for cars (below).


Now, even if you have a Hogmanay hangover the size of Southwark, you'll spot the flaw straight away. What possible benefit does this separated lane offer cyclists? When the bike signal is at red, traffic is turning left in front of you. When the bike signal turns green, you still have traffic turning left in front of you.

In other words, all the signal does is (a) hold you up, and (b) offers no safety benefit. It's useless. No wonder every cyclist we saw simply ignored it and rode through red (below). By doing so, of course, they're at risk from left-turning traffic in front of them - just as they are if they wait for the green.


In fact, it's worse than useless. Not only has it wasted money, it also encourages cyclists not to use the cycle lane, but go on the main part of the road with the traffic and go through the left-filter. Which drivers won't be expecting, of course, even though it's perfectly legal, and they'll and shout and complain and resolve to run over the next cyclist they see.

Integrate cyclist with main stream of traffic, or build a segregated Dutch-style system? It's one of the big debates of the moment. In London, all attempts to do the latter have failed miserably. By contrast, all attempts to the do the former have failed appallingly.

Which side am I on? Whichever side has the green signal.

Happy New Year everyone!

Making light of pavement-cycling police blunders

This last week, the City Police have been clamping down on people cycling at night without lights. Offenders are fined £30. But, if they turn up to a safety demo at St Paul's on Thursday 26 with lights on their bike, they'll have the fine rescinded.

This is all fair enough and I don't have a problem with it. (Though I think there are better uses of police time; and the press release's statement that '28 cyclists were injured in collisions' in the dark, without evidence any of them were caused by lack of visibility, looks suspiciously like victim-blaming.)

I'm not quite so sure about trying to arrest people for cycling on cycle paths, though. That's what happened to a Southwark Cyclists member on Monday night shortly after he followed the sign pictured here and turned right.


He was stopped by the police for 'cycling on the pavement' - despite the fact that this 10m section of pavement is signed and marked as a cycle route (right). The markings are faded, sure, but not invisible.

(And cycling across the pedestrian crossing is perfectly legal, as it isn't a toucan crossing. [See update in comments below])

It's by Meadow Row, and is part of the Elephant and Castle by-pass - the same route which, unmodified except for a tin of blue paint, will be part of the forthcoming South Wimbledon-to-Bank Cycle Superhighway. It doesn't bode well...


Presumably the officer simply didn't see the pavement markings in the dark. Perhaps they were dazzled by the rider's lights. Honestly, some of these cyclists, swanning around floodlit with LEDs strobing everywhere like a Pink Floyd laser show. It's about time the police clamped down on them.

Long and short of Docklands bike lanes

Well, only the short, actually. This bike lane is near the Museum of London in Docklands, though it's stretching a point to call it a lane when it's barely the length of a bicycle.

To paraphrase the old slogan for Anadin, 'Nothing is as effective than a cycle lane in London' - so why not use nothing instead. That'd be cheaper too.

Cycle lane: bin and gone

Something for the weekend sir? How about another amusing picture of a blocked cycle lane.

This is the one on the footway near the top of Park Lane, obstructed by a council litter bin. [Insert joke about rubbish here - ed]

Docklands bike lane: load of old blocks

In April I posted about a cycle path, purportedly leading to the Museum in Docklands, which led nowhere but right into a blue hoarding blocking your way.

I passed by it again yesterday, and I'm pleased to say the blue hoardings have been removed.

Now, instead, the way is blocked by concrete blocks and metal barriers.

Bike lanes: Use it or lose it

Something that infuriates motorists, understandably, is when they see cycle facilities that aren't being used. (Freewheeler recently brought a pertinent example to our attention in his home territory of Waltham Forest.)

Here's one in Liverpool Grove, just off Walworth Road in south London. In the ten years I've been around here, I've never seen a single cyclist using this bike lane. It clearly can't be the fault of the parked car - that's in a marked bay, placed quite legally. Use it or lose it, guys!

By-pass the lethal Elephant. Except you can't

One of the pleasures of living near the Elephant and Castle is seeing the local newspaper hoardings with headlines like TV STAR TO WED ELEPHANT WOMAN or ELEPHANT RATS ON RAMPAGE.

Not everything is so amusing though. The long-promised safer-friendlier redesign of the twin vortices that are the Elephant and Castle roundabouts are not even halfway there. Conversion of the south roundabout's detested, stinking, sewer-underpasses to overground pedestrian-friendly crossings won't begin until Christmas. And there isn't even a timetable for redesigning the north roundabout, where cyclist Meryem Ozekman was killed by a lorry last month.

There is a so-called 'cycle by-pass', but it's worse than useless. Especially just now, thanks to these roadworks that have just gone up opposite Churchyard Row. No notices, no alternative routes: just a dumb blockade, a mute testament to council and contracting contempt.

Comedy Cycle Lanes 3: Cardigan St, SE11

This cycle facility is in Cardigan St, in Lambeth, south London, not far from the Oval cricket ground. The car is parked legally in a marked bay.

Once you've squeezed past it, you're then in a contraflow street cycling against the traffic, such as the taxi coming the other way.

Bad bike lane in the dock

The cycle route to the Museum in Docklands, where we went yesterday, is very clearly signposted.


Just follow the bike lane and you can't miss it.

Two die, but cycle lanes get squeezed even more

It's been a sobering week, with two more cyclists killed on London's roads: both women, both crushed by lorries turning left. That brings the total of cycling fatalities in London so far this year to four, compared to nine in all of 2008.

Wednesday's fatality was at the Elephant and Castle; Thursday's, at the junction of Goswell Road and Old Street.

We know the Elephant only too well: a hideous double-whirlpool in south London's traffic ocean, whose dangers are perpetually ignored by politicians. There is a so-called 'cycle by-pass'; but it is badly signposted, counter-intuitive, incomplete, and not remotely satisfactory.


So our blood was boiling last night. The cycle lane at the north end of Blackfriars Bridge has just been reduced to under half its previous width (top right). At the top it has shrunk from 88 inches wide to 34 inches (224cm to 86cm). At the bottom (right) it funnels down to a mere 30 inches (76cm). According to the Department of Transport's design guidelines (Oct 2008, 7.4.2), the minimum recommended width for a cycle lane is 59 inches (150cm).

Worse, though, the lane has changed from a 'mandatory' lane (one traffic must stay out of, marked by a solid line) to an 'advisory' lane (one traffic can go in if it wants, marked by a dashed line).


The photos (right) clearly show the old and new dimensions, and the effect the reduction of width has had: cyclists are now cramped between HGVs and the kerb.


There are roadworks here, which may or may not have something to do with the reduction. If so, the repainting of the lines is a bad solution. There should be far better signage and provision for cyclists; at the moment there is no warning of this confiscation of safe territory. This isn't good enough. And it's dangerously not good enough.

We'd rather be relaxing this Easter weekend than fretting about cycle facilities. But we're chasing this up with TfL of course. In a week when two people were pointlessly killed, simply going about their business on this most gentle, benign and sociable form of urban transport, it seems the most decent way we can turn our anger and sorrow into something positive.

Rubbish cycle lane

Nice bright morning, so I treat myself to an alternative way in to work: over Southwark Bridge, up Watling St past St Paul's, through the Oxbridge-college-like quiet courts and back alleys of Lincoln's Inn, and along Lamb's Conduit St, home of Bikefix.

And it was at the bottom of Lamb's Conduit St that I found, to my delight, this genuinely rubbish cycle lane.

(Larger version on Flickr.)