What thinks the team?

http://www.cityam.com/233097/forget-speed-bumps-and-cycle-lanes-why-britains-roads-should-be-more-like-ice-rinks

What is the range of velocities and masses and fragility of the people on the ice rink.

How do these compare with, say, an HGV doing 70MPH and a child on a bicycle.

How many HGVs on the ice rink?

Can’t read all the article but the premise in the opening is bizarre.

Go spend an hour or two at the public ice rink outside the Life Centre in Newcastle and note the various injuries, collisions, and people completely out of control. Doesn’t seem like a great model to me.

There have been two occasions recently where I’ve sat in gridlocked traffic around the Oval to Vauxhall area, where seemingly half the road has been assigned to cyclists, only to see the odd one or two riding a bike during those busy periods. Centrally planned traffic management systems are inflexible and eliminate the scope for discretion and common sense.

Common sense being to get on a bike then?

This theory has been thoroughly tested in an on-going 60 year experiment in southern Italy.

It has not been a success.

Its written from a quantitative and not qualitative viewpoint. Like most of those people he knows the cost but not the value of things.

He has a position of responsibility at the Institute of Economic Affairs ? no wonder the economy is shafted if that opinion piece is an example of his thinking skills.

I think somewhere in Holland took away all the road signs etc and found that the accidents went down, but that was in an environment where there is already a culture of “motorist is guilty by default”. It would never work in the UK where motorists speed around with impunity, knocking over whoever gets in their way.

Is this similar to the Poynton ‘shared space’ design? I remember liking that concept very much on viewing the video, yet don’t know how it worked out to date. Any Poynton locals on STW?

[video]http://youtu.be/-vzDDMzq7d0[/video]

I think somewhere in Holland took away all the road signs etc and found that the accidents went down

I don’t think the schemes were ever as successful as people think: http://www.aviewfromthecyclepath.com/search/label/shared%20space

Shall we apply similar libertarian view to air traffic control? After all, it works for an ice rink.

I don’t think the schemes were ever as successful as people think: http://www.aviewfromthecyclepath.com/search/label/shared%20space

Furry nuff.

Shall we apply similar libertarian view to air traffic control? After all, it works for an ice rink.

😆

I **think** there was a study that proved that by significantly reducing the amount of road furniture that driving improved – ie less signs etc so less driving distractions, so net result was actually better driving.

I can see fewer but better signs/controls working, but none would be anarchy.
I’m not liking the few ‘shared spaces’ I’ve experienced so far and they seem even worse for blind/disabled.

Shall we apply similar libertarian view to air traffic control? After all, it works for an ice rink

Shall we apply similar libertarian view to an economy? After all, it works for Somalia.

Despite the terrible analogy with the ice rink and him being somewhat anti-cycling, I do think there are some decent points in there. Speed bumps for instance in most cases do little to improve impact safety but clearly do come at an environmental and construction/maintenance cost.

On the whole 4 way stop junctions work in the US, and roundabouts do here, so a reduced ‘controlled’ traffic management strategy can work in the correct places.

This is also a point worth discussing and investigating:

a culture of dependence on management for safety erodes personal responsibility and courtesy to others on the road.

Isn’t there a proposal to remove 4 out of every 5 set of traffic lights?

A new report by my colleague Richard Wellings and his co-author Martin Cassini…

Richard Wellings is a “traffic economist” nutter who thinks that any bit of road without a private car on top of it is a waste.

Martin Cassini is a ‘shared space’ salesman who pushes the “get rid of the signs and assert your equal right to the road space and join the flow.” philosophy. I believe that he worked on the Poynton scheme discussed in that link.

It’s easy to be a libertarian when you’re the biggest, strongest, fastest and safest (from suffering harm, not safest in terms of not causing harm). If you’re in any type of motorised vehicle, let alone a Range Rover, or the back seat of an S-Class being driven by your man (it is City AM, after all) then you’re at the top of the tree of deadliness and you’re also the in the safest position. To say, from that position, “I should be allowed to do what I want. Sod everyone else” is stupid and selfish.

TfL’s own modelling of the flagship East-West Cycle-Superhighway, for example, shows it will increase peak journey times for vehicles between the Limehouse Link tunnel in Docklands and Hyde Park Corner by around 20 minutes – a huge economic cost for a marginal shaving off the cycle time

“My time is more important than people on bikes not dying.”

“the role of traffic lights themselves in causing accidents”. Don’t you hate it when traffic lights step into the road without looking? 😆

the libertarian view

Libertarians, the ars*holes on the body of human civilisation.

I’m not liking the few ‘shared spaces’ I’ve experienced so far and they seem even worse for blind/disabled.

Yeah, they just turn into “might is right”. And it’s odd that the designers seem to expect cyclists to mix with traffic but depsite calling it ‘shared’ space, they always build a pavement.

Here’s the promotional stuff for a talk about Exhibition Road in London. How lovely, everyone’s sharing, people free to meander where they like. Isn’t it working wonderfully.

And here’s what it actually looks like

The top picture is taken from this flyer, advertising a talk given by Ben Hamilton-Baillie, entitled New Directions in Street Design, Safety and Movement. It was taken in early August last year, when the street was closed to motor vehicles for the Exhibition Road Show

Compare and contrast

We didn’t stop people drink driving by changing the infrastructure did we?

Speed cameras/speed bumps etc were put in because we (the people) have refused point blank to drive carefully as per the law and the terms of our licence.

The problem is one of deliberate and conscious behaviour driven, IMO by the feeling of power and safety when in a modern car. People simply do not behave so badly when their cycling or on public transport.

IIRC drink driving was changed through proper enforcement of existing laws and by making it socially unacceptable. We wouldn’t need physical infrastructure to the same extent if these policy levers were applied to the same extent to speeding and dangerous driving

Oh those lovely libertarians: “here’s a stupid idea, but i’m rich, so A) i’ve got an undeserved platform, and B) i won’t have to deal with the consequences”.

Is this similar to the Poynton ‘shared space’ design? I remember liking that concept very much on viewing the video, yet don’t know how it worked out to date. Any Poynton locals on STW?

Whilst not a local, the first (and last) time I went there and discovered this joyous celebration of togetherness I had no clue what was going on or what it was all about. It was dark for a start and I was new to the area. It was somewhat confusing and people were just walking in front of the traffic. It sort of appears after a narrow, tree lined section that you realise something different is going on, there are signs but it’s really not something I’ve experienced before or would have expected. I guess you get used to it, but still…

I’m sceptical. Disabled drivers used to be allowed in my town centre pedestrian precinct. They got banned after a minority kept the motor vehicle right of way attitude and expected the other users to scatter before them. And this was while cycling was banned!