Water carry-on: Rum roadworks in York

Yorkshire Water are busy digging up York's bike lanes at the moment.

The Planets Trail is up somewhere between Mars and Jupiter (right), necessitating a five-sides-of-a-hexagon detour through the asteroid belt, also known as Bishopthorpe housing estate.

As I discovered yesterday en route to a job yesterday. It made me arrive five minutes late, despite travelling at six times the speed of light, according to the scale.



More worrying is this operation on Malton Road, the A1036, between Monks Cross and the Toby Carvery, where hungry cyclists can refuel on limitless hearty vegetables.

Not only is the cycle lane (but only the cycle lane) closed off on a fast, busy road where some cars pass too close anyway.

First breath of wind and some of the plastic barriers do their impression of a Saturday night stag party in Stonegate, collapsing chaotically.

This forces cyclists out even further into the territory too many drivers think belongs exclusively to them (above right). The carvery must be quite an attraction, because most of the drivers can't wait to get there.

More signs of Cambridge's cycling culture

A fine array of roadworks signs here. In amongst them you'll find a sign helpfully explaining that cyclists, unlike motorists, have through access as usual.

You have to be a voracious reader to fully appreciate the signs, but then this is Mill Road, in Cambridge, so perhaps drivers are more studious here.

Sadly my camera lens wasn't wide angle enough to include the other signs with the bibliography and footnotes.

Cambridge overtakes London in safe-cycling signage

Cambridge can claim to be England's real cycling capital. It's signs like this that show why.

It's the roadworks on Hills Road railway bridge just south of the station. (Roadworks which, incidentally, are for installing bike lanes.)

The cones have narrowed things down to make overtaking unsafe, so the sign instructs motorists not to overtake cyclists.

And it works. We got no hassle from drivers. In fact, we could enjoy the view at leisure from the top, which is one of the highest points in East Anglia.

It took a bit of activism from excellent local group the Cambridge Cycling Campaign to persuade the council to put up such signs for similar works a couple of years or so ago, but this time round it went up without prompting, we're told.


Compare the Cambridge situation with Waterloo Bridge in the capital (right). There are similar works there, but no such signs - and little consideration from buses or taxis. Perhaps Cambridge could lend a couple of its signs to London once those bridge works are done.

It's Barking: Bike lanes blocked by blank signs

It's always frustrating when cycle tracks are blocked by roadworks signs, such as this example on the A13 just east of Barking.


Still, they're there for a good purpose. We need the signs to give us directions and information.

After all, if you didn't have signs, you'd just have chaos, with nobody knowing where to go.

A good sign is concise and clear. These signs don't waste a word.


Just west from here is the start of the new CS3, from Barking to Tower Bridge. Obviously, being a Cycle Superhighway, the cycle track is different from the sort of nonsense you see here.

Instead of green nonsense, it's blue nonsense, as we'll see in tomorrow's post.

Pulling up the Cable: More CS works by Tower Bridge

Cable St is one of London's showpiece cycle tracks - which is a bit like saying Andy Murray represents Britain's fine tennis tradition.

But the western end, near Tower Bridge, is something of a war zone at the moment.


It's being hacked up as part of the preparation for the two Cycle Superhighways opening this summer. Cable St will be part of CS3, Barking to Tower Gateway.


But don't worry, the works are only temporary. The sign there tells us they'll be finished by Friday 7 May.

Oh. That was yesterday, when I took the pictures.

And just think of how much better things will be when they're painted blue.

Oh.

Narrowing experience: Roadworks block Elephant bike path

Work installing the Cycle Superhighways continues apace. This sign has appeared on Churchyard Row, currently part of the Elephant and Castle cycle bypass, and part of the future CS7 from Merton to the City.


Unfortunately, the works don't leave much space for cyclists using the bypass, which purports to offer a safe alternative to the Elephant's lethal double-roundabout. Especially when they have to share it with pedestrians, whose footway is completely obstructed.

It seems a lot of fuss just for painting a blue stripe on the road...

Potholes meet their Waterloo (loo, loo, loo...)

Goodbye snow, farewell ice, congratulations on your retirement frost. Hello potholes [on the radio version of this blog, you now hear a comedy echo, followed by studio laughter].

Anyway, Waterloo Bridge is swamped by traffic cones at the moment. From space or the top of Strata, whichever is the higher, it must look like a tube of toothpaste. At last they're resurfacing it and 'reseating the ironworks'.

It's a comprehensive reskinning for a bridge whose recurring pothole at the north end was suspected by some geologists to have been the crater from an ancient extinction-event meteorite.


So it's currently down to single-lane both ways. Northwards (above, right) it's too narrow for a car to pass, which isn't too much of a problem in rush hour as the traffic is crawling anyway. Still, it can get pretty claustrophobic as you jostle with all those buses.

Southwards (right) the traffic goes in quicker pulses, released from the traffic lights like spawning salmon from a sluicegate.


I've had a couple of unpleasant fast-passes from buses, but most of the car drivers pay no attention to the CYCLE LANE CLOSED sign and give room for bikes. For once I'm glad they ignore a sign.

Still, at least it's goodbye potholes. [Comedy echo, followed by studio laughter]

Obstacles to persuading people to cycle

I was at a very convivial meeting last night - thanks Andy and our sponsors, who plied us with free drink. Everyone there was a blogger, or at least pretending to be, so they were a wide range of ages and types. Strikingly, pretty much everyone was either (a) already a keen cyclist or (b) keen on being a keen cyclist but put off by the safety thing.

I did my proselytising thing to the (b) people, repeating all the things I'd celebrated with the (a) people: that cycling is fast, fun and free...ish. That you actually look forward to your commute because it makes you feel good. That it enables you to do twice as many things in a day because you can whizz around at your own schedule and pace without waiting for buses or being stuck on a stationary train. That it's just the best way of enjoying London, and all that.


I did my best, but it's not always easy. Obviously, I admitted, London's cycle facilities aren't, er, always, um, quite up to Netherlands standards. Look at the state of one of our 'showcase cycle lanes', in Torrington Place, for instance (top right). The roadworks force you out into one-way traffic coming the other way. It's been like this weeks with little sign of progress.

And some road users don't make it easy either. On the way home I stopped at a Chinese takeaway on Baylis Rd, near Waterloo. I had to: this car had parked blocking the lane (right). They must have been waiting for the beansprouts to grow because they were there ages.

So long, in fact, that another car arrived and parked right next to it, blocking the lane even more (below right).


Blimey, this takeaway must be good. Spring Orchid, it's called, if you're interested. As always, by an amazing coincidence, the number plates of both cars were entirely appropriate.

Still, we do know a sure-fire way of getting people to agree that cycling's great. Get them in a social situation and put them with a charismatic, persuasive advocate.

Or, failing the charisma, ply them with free drink.

Mind the gap on Blackfriars Bridge

This is the roadworks at the north end of Blackfriars Bridge.


Having the mandatory cycle lane cut down to an optional one of half-width is bad enough, especially with the line of cones - as yet unliberated by drunk students - that squeezes you right up against those lorries chugging past.


But worse, those covers they've put down have nasty gaps in between, easily big enough to swallow a cycle tyre.


Still, if you do come off your bike here, don't worry: you haven't missed out on much - the bike lane just beyond is closed anyway.

Art for art's sake; any excuse for free wine

Yesterday had an artistic angle to it. Our now-customary free wine and food came courtesy of a visit the end-of-year student show at the City and Guilds of London Art School, in posh Cleaver Square. The quality on offer was absolutely sensational. The art wasn't bad either, especially the world-class stonemasonry.

We felt quite at home in the bohemian atmosphere. I was tempted to talk in a loud voice about how [name of 20th century artist] was completely underrated / overrated and had clearly influenced this year's crop of graduates for the better / the worse / sexual favours. Our favourite was the apple strudel draped with molten brie (food, not an installation).

So it was fitting that, on the way home through Brook St, we found a roadworks clearly arranged by someone with an artist's eye. It honestly would have worked rather well in the show. I enjoyed the use of colour and materials, and its exporation of shape and form.

But it really it needed something else to establish it as a proper artwork. An Artist's Statement explaining how its creator has always been fascinated by the semiotics of traffic signs and sees roadworks as a metaphor for society, perhaps. And a local restaurateur carrying round trays of Sauvignon Blanc and rondels of goat's cheese.