I bet you have! You look the type!

A balanced and completely non-hysterical view of towpath cycling in yesterdays Guardian

On roads, cyclists are vulnerable – but on towpaths they’re the menace

The author has some valid points although canal commuting is great and I cannot see it stopping anytime soon. I used to use the canals alot and rarely saw walkers using it to commute. Loads more dog walkers though came from nowhere and must have used parks beforehand.

Not sure if you’re being tongue in cheek? Apart from the kitten nonsense it makes sense. Shared paths don’t work when any kind of urgency is involved.

Canals, particularly in rush hour, have become the domain of bicycles, the trucks of the towpath. Some travel so manically they are called cyclopaths.

🙂

But the best one….

These waterways should be calm spaces where people seek solace

Eh? It’s working space.

Round here we’ve loads of people who live on the canal, people who work on it and keep it open, people who use it every day.
And loads of tourists. And fishermen.

And lots of bikes.
Everyone uses it, it’s safe, traffic free so parents encourage their kids to use it.
People use it to get to the trails, to go shopping or as an easy escape route, because it’s just much more pleasant than the main road.
On the whole, I hardly see anyone behaving badly.

Everyone seems to get on.
It just works.

Very sad about the kitten.

I just used to go slow past the dog walkers. Never any conflict.

Same here. I commuted down the canal towpaths around Manchester virtually every day for years. Never had any issues at all

I definitely didn’t mow down any blind pensioners

I aim to push at least one blind pensioner in to the canal, kick three ducks, seven geese and drown a puppy for every five days of towpath commute. Are you now telling me that this isn’t normal behaviour for my commute?

The article should just be about London, where it’s overcrowded anyway everywhere.

It looks as though that piece is written from the view of riding in a very built up area.

Our Canals up until a few years ago had ‘no cycling posts’ up. After talking to the canal trust, they positively encourage cycling (safely). The posts have now been removed. I was once told that I needed a permit to ride on the towpath.
The canals around here are valuable for commuters choosing to ride and walk to their place of work instead of bunging up the road in a vehicle.

A bell is a must (better not get into that argument).

I’ve never run over anything, not even a tiny duckling or a slow fat rat. But I have got tangled up in those awful retractable dog leads, got chased by dogs and had to avoid large amounts of dog poo.
The 2 canals that I live near are normally fine with everyone being friendly and considerate.

Having ridden and walked round London’s towpaths, the pedestrian traffic on many (especially the one that runs from Hackney to islington) is now such that they are definitely neither safe, fun or suitable for cycling at times of peak pedestrian usage.

If you’re dumb enough to try, you deserve to pushed in the drink by a rightfully hacked off pedestrian.

Those that head out north from Hackney & Limehouse are a bit less busy, but I still would still avoid them at the weekend when they seem to be at their busiest.

No such problems round similar paths I’ve ridden Brentford, Canterbury or Leeds – so I think it’s just the very busiest where this is an issue.

Aren’t you also likely to get shanked by a feral, Spice-fuelled yoot?

I have pasted groups of druggies but without conflict. They just kept themselves to themselves.

A bell is a must (better not get into that argument).

My bell is the “towpath bell”. It’s the only place I need it. I often quote a response I’ve had when using it: “at least you’ve got a bell!”… yeah thanks for that.

Half the time it’s of no use with so many with headphones in plus the old deaf folk (sometimes feel it’s deliberate though).

Problem is towpaths are used both productively to get from A to B and for meandering, and the latter group of people see bikes as a nuisance to their afternoon stroll.

Also mornings are cheerful in my experience. Mostly runners and early bird dog walkers and generally active types who are in a good mood. Often others will greet me with a “morning!” before I’ve had a chance to.

Afternoons are miserable folk and a lot more stubborn about letting you past (even if you slow, stop, say high or ring a bell, give plenty of room, etc). Dirty looks, sarcastic comments and barely a grunt in response to a greeting.

Evenings the phone zombies are out, kids and later drunks if it’s near housing. Not too bad, but I’m cautious in some areas due to known muggings. After 10 and it’s a free run and quiet.

Depends on the towpath though and the area it’s running through at the time.

All said, I rarely am on there in rush hour, but when I am, through town areas there are a fair amount of people on BSOs or commuter bikes speeding along and often won’t slow or give way, so I can see the frustration.

Never any problem with cats. They are off out of the way quick usually. Foxes occasionally stand there with my lights in their eyes but will jump off. Had deer leap out of a bush into the canal! The main issue though are geese that take up residence on the towpath and get very aggressive as you go past. None I’ve run over. Think I’ve only ever run over a squirrel and that was on a road when it shot out in front of me.

I used to do the canal towpaths through Trafford park into Manchester, and pass by this inspiring and aspirational graffiti every day. 😀

The only problem I remember having is the occasional fisherman with a 20ft long carp pole across the path. That used to just mystify me as to why, having decided to spend the day fishing, you’d choose a spot in the shadow of a derelict warehouse in Salford with the canal full of shopping trolleys

Oh Far Canal !

Sad for the kitten but the author is by own admission, part of the problem by rushing etc etc…

Rule 1, don’t be a dick and get a bell…however, phone zombie maggots are beyond saving..

Well the article did go on to bemoan the lack of good cycling infrastructure and how that creates potential for “conflict” between cyclists and walkers. Still a bit crap overall though.

I’d agree especially in Central London, bikes and people don’t mix on canal paths. Though even outside of London i’ve seen terrible behaviour, West Drayton MBC are notorious for riding as fast as they can along the grand union in search of whatever KOM they’re chasing

I have never had any significant issues on the edinburgh canals – but I do practice “polite cycling” ding ding ” can I squeeze past please?” ” thank you” “Lovely day”

Four canal barges!

These bicyclists get worse every day!

I aim to push at least one blind pensioner in to the canal, kick three ducks, seven geese and drown a puppy for every five days of towpath commute.

Don’t go for the swans do you, hard man! 🙄

😂

They can break your arm though. As can wild-looking beardy blokes with cans of special brew

How do you know swans don’t like Special Brew? Speciesist!

Swans on Special Brew are an even scarier prospect than the tooled-up feral youth of London

Exactly binners. The towpath warrior only picks on the infirm and weak. He cycles like the wind when confronted by swans or the feared Tennent’s Supertramp.

I use tow paths a lot now – used to be a roadie, but get mashed too often by drivers, so include tracks, bridleways and canal paths locally for training. A have a good 16 mile circuit I use to keep fit. Loads of other users, so you slow down. It’s great at night, as there is hardly anyone out.

I’m tempted with the ‘cow bell’, although I just say ‘excuse me can I pass’, followed by a few thank you’s. Never had any issues other than the odd person who moans about a bell, yet they have seen and heard me. I usually say ‘nicer to talk’. Best were two female runners, both with headphones in – took a few ‘calls’ to get them to hear me, then they moaned about no bell… wouldn’t have heard it anyway.

i ride on the kennet & avon regularly and have never really had any issues over the years (i live in devizes so get quite a few people walking the towpath esp summertime). i don’t have a bell but slow down for people,animals. i do get the bell comment but never any aggro that i can remember.

the canal is perfect for getting to trowbridge,bath and bristol as i ride my ht mtb and barely have to go on the road to get to those places.

aren’t canals great. Some of them look great and take you away from the dirty streets very quickly.

Odd as surely they would like to see us away from the road network.

Plus we pay tax to gov’t for these two wheeled objects that do not kill the planet when in use.

I ride on London canals often.
Never had any grief , but I don’t ride like a dick and slow down and say hello etc…..
I did once get fishing line caught in my cassette and it caused my free hub to explode! Bastid fisherperson.

I like the bit in Tod with the high black wall, I like to imagine I have to scale up it or I will be leathered by a mob of Canada Geese.

Those stats seem made up, 3.5k killed or seriously injured in 2015. Really?

Fact checker says about 100 which sounds more more (still sadly) believable.

https://fullfact.org/health/cyclist-deaths/#

Those stats seem made up, 3.5k killed or seriously injured in 2015. Really?

Fact checker says about 100 which sounds more more (still sadly) believable.

Approximately 10 cyclists per year are killed in London alone. Do you really think that only 90 more are killed and seriously injured in the rest of the country?

It says 3.5k killed or seriously injured, of whom 100 were killed ie 3.4k were seriously injured. It seems a straightforward enough claim, and not particularly unbelievable.

That used to just mystify me as to why, having decided to spend the day fishing, you’d choose a spot in the shadow of a derelict warehouse in Salford with the canal full of shopping trolleys

Once walked past a pond on a housing estate in North Wales. There was a fishing rod propped on a metal fence attached to a float bobbing in the pond scum. Took me a short while to realise that the owner was parked in a white transit with the engine running, puffing cigarette smoke out of the van window. The scene prompted odd reminiscence of that ‘Hamlet’ cigar advert, and I remembered the plodding strains of Bach’s ‘Air on a G String’. And then I thought that the angry looking young fisherman in the van represented a new generation for whom ‘Air On A G-String’ meant nothing except that it sounds like unsavoury underthings. I then realised that Adrian Mole seemed to be living in my head and that I didn’t like the whole business.

Carp pole

Now I recall being a teenager ‘racing’ a Suzuki ZR50KX1 along a towpath in Stourton, where I hit some mud trying to avoid a carp pole. I went down and the bike went half in the cut. The fisherman just sat and watched, as I attempted to haul my bike out – a tug of war against gravity and Neptune. My trainers had no purchase in the mud so I was mostly just flapping around in a muddy puddle on my arse with both hands gripping one handlebar of my slowly drowning mopedbikething.

Canals are silly places for odd people.

That ‘soapytitwank’ gratify is sensational.

But, but, but, why was she taking a kitten for a walk along the canal????

Why is she talking to a melon and what is occurring in the nearby boat?

That ‘soapytitwank’ gratify is sensational.

Freudian slip of the week…

The cat incident, at the start of the article, us difficult to judge, as they do have a worrying habit of just running across the path of a jogger/cyclist/motorist.

You can’t really criticise the cats, as they haven’t read the green cross code, and you can’t necessarily blame the unfortunate person involved in the demise of the cat, as there often isn’t time to avoid the impact.

Just yesterday, whilst slogging up a hill, on my bike, a very striking Jaguar patterned moggy watched me for a good 10 seconds, before running out in front of me (just as I reached it)
Luckily for him, the car that was just starting to overtake at the time, had pretty quick reactions, and it was their tyres that squealed, and not the cat.

And then there was the time that a squirrel rushed into the road and used my front wheel, in the same way that a spacecraft uses a planet’s gravitational force as a slingshot, to propel itself to within a millimetre of my following friend’s ear.

Overall, though, it’s just the same as the drivers Vs cyclists rant – it’s merely idiots Vs sensible people, and their respective choice of transport can be more or less ignored.