Shrouded in mystery

Problems for pedestrians and cyclists on Cairo Road E17.

Firstly, this scooter has taken permanent root on the pavement in an area which receives at least once daily visits from parking attendants. If they are doing their job correctly it will by now have received numerous tickets for footway parking. The fact that it is still there, day after day, suggests that they might not be. It's a mystery.




















Secondly, just yards away, the plastic illuminated signed bollard designed to prevent vehicular access from Cairo Road to Hoe Street, was demolished by a vehicle in 2006. The bollard was never replaced, which in itself creates a hazard, since the remaining hollow base could easily be tripped over. Much worse, however, is that drivers have reverted to using Cairo Road as a rat run. Mainly Four Wheel Drive owners, naturally. Just drive your SUV in the cycle lane and over where the bollard used to be and on across the pavement on Hoe Street and you can save yourself a minute or two from queueing at the lights on Church Hill. Look carefully and you'll see the tyre prints from drivers who perform this manoeuvre. Of course, if the Council replaced the plastic bollard, tranquillity and the safety of cyclists and pedestrians would be restored. But I'm afraid maintenance isn't this Council's strong point.

An award winning Council

A cycle lane in the cutting edge, award winning London Borough of Waltham Forest.

Waltham Forest Council has been one of the leading local authorities in London in its commitment to introducing cycling facilities over the past decade. From 1991 when it first agreed the London Cycle Network to be on most of its main roads, the Council has regarded cycling as a key mode of transport to be integrated into all its road schemes. By 2003 almost all main roads in the core of the borough had cycle lanes (20 miles) and a substantial network of quiet routes (also 20 miles) using residential roads and park land was also in place. The Council has won two awards from the LCC (London Cycling Campaign) for best cycle route, (Forest Road and Orient Way) two awards for its Bike to Secondary School Scheme and one for its bike recycling centre opened in 2003 and run jointly with the local LCC.

And this is how cyclists are sometimes integrated.

Shall we take a closer look at the pothole repair in the photograph above? Yes, a crack team from Environment & Degeneration has filled up the pothole with loose bricks. Sadly, they ran out before the jigsaw was complete. (It's on Markhouse Road E17 between the junctions with Downsfield Road and Low Hall Lane if you happen to be passing that way with some spare aggregate.)





















On the award winning Forest Road cycle facility the Council has thoughtfully placed a litter bin for the benefit of passing cyclists:





















A few whingers might complain that a section of the award winning Orient Way route has half-vanished under slimy, slippery moss, in that section which involves two slopes which meet at a blind corner. I'm afraid some people are just never satisfied.

Short cut

'There are literally thousands of short cuts and little known paths that you can use,' says Mayor Livingstone, in the TfL London Cycling Guides. And the same applies to walking. If you walk you get to know routes unknown to those who cocoon themselves in a ton of metal for a short drive. 'Half of all trips in London are less than three kilometres.'

Here's a popular walking short cut between Somers Road E17 and Storey Road. It's a shame about the state of the environment for those who choose to walk rather than drive.

‘Anti-social behaviour’ and the police

The aftermath of the trial of the youths found guilty of the murder of Garry Newlove has generated enormous publicity. He went out to confront youths who were kicking his wife’s car outside their suburban home in Warrington, Cheshire, and they beat him to death. Appalling. But there is a wider context.

The Newloves' own cars had been scratched or had the wing mirrors smashed on at least four occasions, she said.

Annoying, no doubt, but fairly trivial criminal damage. But how many cars did the Newloves have and where did they park them? On the pavement? Judging by the photograph above, widely reproduced in the media, that seems to be where some people on the Newloves street park their cars. Some forms of anti-social behaviour attract no media interest and even enjoy the active sympathy of the police.

On any rational analysis, the biggest social group guilty of anti-social behaviour, lawlessness and causing violence and death are not drunken and murderously violent teenagers, yobs with knives or men with guns, but motorists. No other group regularly kills 3,500 people a year. No other group can display lawless, dangerous behaviour in the same place at the same time day after day and benefit from the benign indifference of the police.

With tongue firmly lodged in cheek, the Cheshire Living Streets website advises in relation to cars parked on the pavement:

We don't recommend the following:
• carrying Vaseline and generously smearing the pavement-side wing mirror
• smearing mud
• windscreen stickers - a Greek group use Day-Glo orange depicting a donkey in a car above the message, "I park wherever I want."
• deflating tyres - a French group known as the Deflated discovered that this is legal in France so long as no damage is caused
• scratching cars
• car vaulting (going over cars blocking pavements), originated in Germany, but may damage cars
• sticking a knife in a couple of the tyres

Plainly the yobs who were kicking one of the Newlove cars were not environmentally motivated. But as the Living Streets site hints, vandalising obstructive cars in Cheshire may be the last desperate resort of pedestrians who can get no support or action from the police. Graphic photographs of anti-social behaviour by Cheshire drivers here.

Nationwide, the police collude with driver criminality and anti-social behaviour and by doing so actively promote danger on the roads for the most vulernable road users, particularly cyclists and pedestrians. In Waltham Forest police apparently issue, on average, just under 9 fixed penalty tickets a day for motoring offences. Consider that in any sixty seconds between 8 a.m. and 6 p.m. there are surely at least nine instances of lawbreaking by drivers (speeding, red light jumping, intruding into ASLs, for example). Nine is probably an underestimate. Thus the local police are dealing with driver crime for just one minute of the day. For the other nine hours and fifty nine minutes, drivers are free to break the law, day after day after day.

Meanwhile the City Cyclists website understandably rages against a dressed up anti-cycling operation from the police force with the worst record on road safety in the whole country.

Footnote

Tributes were paid today to a British cycling champion who was killed in a road accident near his home. Jason MacIntyre, a road and time trial cyclist, was hit by a van on the A82 near Fort William in the Highlands, where he lived with his wife, Caroline, and eight-year-old twin daughters. The 34-year-old was taken to Belford Hospital where he later died. Figures in the cycling world have paid tribute to one of Scotland's "finest cyclists".

I do wish journalists wouldn’t use that word ‘accident’. Most road crashes and road collisions are not accidents but the consequence of deliberate, conscious risk-taking and lawlessness. To describe any crash as an accident is to pre-judge its causation.

Advanced Stop Lines and a legal loophole

On its website Westminster Cycling Campaign has a useful page on Advanced Stop Lines (ASL). It sets out the legal position:

The Traffic Signs Regulations and General Directions 2002 came into force on 31 January 2003, replacing the 1994 version. Full text and illustrations here.

The Department for Transport published a leaflet explaining new road markings and signs, including Advanced Stop Lines. The leaflet stated:

"Where a cycle reservoir has been marked out at traffic signals at a junction, all vehicles MUST stop at the first stop line reached unless the signal is green, or the vehicle cannot be safely stopped for an amber signal. Pedal cycles may use the approach cycle lane to enter the reservoir without crossing a stop line. Motorcycles MUST NOT use the approach cycle lane to enter the reservoir while a red signal is showing even if the cycle lane is an advisory one rather than a mandatory one."

In Waltham Forest there are two problems. One is the level of non-compliance, which is substantial. It is plain that drivers will only respect ASLs once they know there is a strong probability that they will receive a penalty for driving into them, either from CCTV or parking attendant enforcement. However, ASLs are currently excluded from such types of enforcement.

The other major problem is the legal loophole. It is an offence to drive beyond the first stop line. However, it is perfectly possible for buses to stop lawfully at the line and still obstruct an ASL, as shown below (photos taken at the Baker's Arms junction, where bus drivers do this all day long). This badly drafted legislation takes no account of vehicle overhang.

Failing Nick (4)

More crap walking; more failing Nick.

Sutherland Road E17 at the junction with Stirling Road Path. A popular route for local residents.

Beware! Danger! You are now entering Waltham Forest!

As you cross into the London Borough of Waltham Forest from Tottenham on the A503 you'll encounter this massive pothole, which is big enough to cause problems for someone on a motorbike or a scooter. Just the sort of thing that motorcycling groups are concerned about when they warn of rubbish roads ahead.

This pothole is unlikely directly to affect cyclists, as no one would want to cycle on this terrifying road of aggressive speeders (drivers brake when they come to the speed camera a bit further on). It affects cyclists indirectly however, because the contents of the hole get thrown across the cycle lane on the offroad shared use route. Cyclists on the right, pedestrians on the left. This facility is so good that it won an award from the London Cycling Campaign. Indeed, looking at these photographs who can doubt that Waltham Forest is paradise on earth for two-wheelers?