In Oxfordshire, the council have introduced a lot of traffic calming measures, which invovle narrowing the road. The aim is to make cars slow down and therefore reduce the number of accidents. However, this particular design is a real pain for Cyclists. This is at the bottom of a steep hill running into Horspath, just outside the ring road. It means you have to come to a complete stop as cars are usually coming the other way. (You can see several cars behind). As an after thought there is supposed to be a cycle lane to the right of the bollard. But, as you can see, the cycle path is completely useless; certainly not something to be negotiated at 20mph.
I don’t know if you can see, but the path is all gravel. Making it impossible for a road bike. But, it is also so narrow and involves a sharp left turn, something you don’t want to do at 25mph.
I am not opposed to slowing down traffic; evidence suggests it does help to reduce fatalities. But, I wish planners would not completely ignore the cyclist. It would have been hard to design a cycle facility less useful; it could encourage cyclists to squeeze into the middle which would be dangerous.
Much better alternatives would have been to
- Make sure the path was straight, narrow, well maintained and wide.
- Use speed humps rather than narrowing road.
- Use speed cameras.
Leave a comment if you have any pictures of crazy bike lanes.
And if you want to see more, check out these crap bike lanes
Crap Cycle Lanes at Amazon.ukCrap cycle lanes – facility of the month
Thanks Jon! appreciated.
Common Mistakes in Cycling
11. Not looking far enough ahead and thus failing to anticipate the need to reduce speed.
Though clearly the council have failed to maintain their road.
Tejvan, using a spell checker would improve the blog and might make you some more money. Pannier links do not work and Dueter should be Deuter.
And it would all be so avoidable if our local authorities bothered to learn from best practice in Copenhagen, Amsterdam and elsewhere or looked at Prof. Pucher’s video with which all highway authorities ought be be thoroughly familiar by now or they are simply not doing their job.