Not been for a cultural visit to London for many years but visited Sunday just gone. I was amazed by the amount of kamikaze/reckless bike riders both on Boris Bikes and private bikes of all types. Ignoring red lights at busy junctions, cutting across carriageways in front of vehicles without an apparent care in the world, charging through pedestrianised/shared space areas without a care about little kids or anyone else on legs.
They actually had me cursing each and every one who were ‘owning their space’.
On the plus side, vehicle drivers were all patient, courteous and sensible and I dare say it made less progress than a loon on a hack bike.
Anyway that’s me done for London for another 15 years and I’m fully with the thought that some cyclists down that way give us all a bad name.

Anyway that’s me done for London for another 15 years and I’m fully with the thought that some people down that way give us all a bad name.

FTFY.

Twattery is not the exclusive preserve of the cyclist down here.

Anyway that’s me done for London for another 15 years

2001 was the last time I was there,never been a fan of the place.
I take it there’s a few people riding bikes around the place now,surely that’s a good thing?
Or were you surrounded by ‘hipsters’ 😯

You just have to get with the groove Grandad.

Or stay away.

I take it there’s a few people riding bikes around the place now

You could say that.

we don’t go to London Tubbs

That’s just London. Londoners are just pushy ****, whether travelling by foot, bike, car or pogo stick.

Marvellous place, utterly bonkers, I love it. 😀

look at those buggers….stopping at red lights and queuing quietly

the Horror!!!

serious point – you get the cyclists you design for – design a city where only the fast and aggressive riders will survive – then thats the only riders you get.

Most dangerous encounters on my daily commute are inexperienced or reckless cyclists.

It’s easier to forgive the Boris bikers, they probably don’t know better.

The reckless either don’t care/respect the law, safety of others or have a sense of entitlement…

Roll on the autumn weather…they disappear once the weather turns.

I was amazed by the amount of kamikaze/reckless bike riders both on Boris Bikes and private bikes of all types. Ignoring red lights at busy junctions, cutting across carriageways in front of vehicles without an apparent care in the world, charging through pedestrianised/shared space areas without a care about little kids or anyone else on legs.

Have you ever used a hire bike and been within seconds of going over the free half hour and needing to get to a docking station? Makes the average courier look positively safe! 😉

Many regular users have perfected the art of jumping the lights, bouncing up the kerb and sliding it straight into the dock. While scattering innocent pedestrians and simultaneously instagamming their ORSUM SKILLZ.

Go and read a psychology book about confirmation bias, prejudice and stereotyping OP and come back here and tell us what you’ve learnt… what a load of generalising old toss!

TBH I suspect that London, being an open-minded, liberal, ok to cope with ‘the other’ type of place will be quite happy for you to stay away for a further 15 years…

Don’t go to New York then, that would upset you even more.

serious point – you get the cyclists you design for – design a city where only the fast and aggressive riders will survive – then thats the only riders you get.

Just what I was gonna say, but put better than I would have managed.

what a load of generalising old toss!

And a bit of that.

As I said in a previous post, I’ve worked in and around London most of my life, I spent a few years Cycling there myself, personally I love be the place, the buildings, the diversity, the politeness of people who work in the shops, coffee shops and restaurants, the bike shops clothes shops, it’s great.

I like the fact that everyone I know thinks it’s a hell hole and full of southerners, I’m amazed that when I come home to Yorkshire the People are so rude, and he Yorkshire folk like to think we are chirpy and chipper,

I admire the bike couriers who know the sequence of traffic lights and exploit every short cut they can, the moped riders who seem to be able to weave in and out of the tiniest of spaces, and as you said the motorists who are I think key to most of the serenity on the roads in London. In Yorkshire if you beep your horn that’s it, pull over and get out, in London it just means thanks, move forward, how did you end up there or you can’t drive down here. Seriously, the patience and driving ability to weave through a place like that and keep your calm has to be admired. And finally I’d just like to say that the Motirists are a lot more tolerant Of Cyclists than they were just 2 or 3 years ago.

As someone above said, that’s just London mentality, I go down every so often for work duties, and people are all so rude and self entitled.
Makes me really appreciate the Yorkshire life!

Last time a woman loudly tutted at me when boarding the tube as she tried and failed to push past me.. No patience even though there’s a train every 2 mins or something daft.. And you see people running for them.. Why? I’ll never fathom that.

On the plus side, vehicle drivers were all patient, courteous and sensible and I dare say it made less progress than a loon on a hack bike.

Rrrrrrrrriiigghtttoooooo skip!

I want some of what your smoking……

TBH some are like that…..but there’s an awful lot who aren’t!

(I’m thinking must be a troll……3/10)

No patience even though there’s a train every 2 mins or something daft.. And you see people running for them.. Why?

I’ve lived here for 10 years & I’m none the wiser….I guess some folks hit the Red Bull too hard ??

love be the place, the buildings, the diversity, the politeness of people who work in the shops, coffee shops and restaurants, the bike shops clothes shops, it’s great.

See? It’s not all bad!

Running for the tube, that’s an easy one to answer……..

It’s so you can drag your feet and turn away with that “I didn’t really wanna catch it anyway” routine as you turn away when the doors have passed the point of no return,

I rode straight past the docking station because it was on the opposite side of the road from what I expected – I think I was about a minute over in the end 😥

Suggsey…You must be my boss. That was our exact conversation this afternoon after he visited London recently…

Running for the tube, that’s an easy one to answer……..

You never know if the one you get on will be the last to make it through the signal failure of the first to be stuck for 2 hours…

I go down every so often for work duties, and people are all so rude and self entitled.

This is the problem – both you and the OP – you go there occasionally and think you can judge the place, without actually living there for any time yourself! Just naked prejudice…

London has a manic energy – you won’t get anywhere if you don’t decide where you want to get to and make a beeline for it. Walking, driving, cycling, Tube, everything.
Honestly – you’ll be late for every meeting you try to get to if you’re not assertive – what do you expect when you cram so many people into narrow streets. You try saying ‘hello’ to everyone you walk past and you’ll be hoarse before you get to work…

I’ve left now and I miss it like crazy and I’d go back in a heartbeat if I could afford it. I saw moments of kindness and generosity every day – which you won’t see if you go in with a ‘it’s a full of entitled people’ lens on everything you look at.

The biggest image problem London actually has is visitors coming in expecting the place to be rude and aggressive, only noticing those behaviours, never looking for the niceness and not staying long enough to actually get under the skin of the place and then going around telling everyone they know how nasty Londoners are!

I’ve never found London rude. Maybe you are misinterpreting people? Or maybe you are fannying like a tourist nd getting in the way?

As for the bikes, London is the best urban area to cycle I have come across in the UK. Ofcourse somepople ride badly, but it’s not noticeable because tee are not people riding.

I’ll tell you one bloke who made my day every day for years, the BIG Issue seller near Charing X

http://www.gettyimages.no/detail/news-photo/big-issue-seller-steven-jokes-with-people-as-he-works-in-news-photo/140061232

Ah, so the “assertion” is fine because it’s a requirement?

Ah, so the “assertion” is fine because it’s a requirement?

No. The assumption/interpretation/judgement that people being assertive is somehow rude. Especially from anyone who’s not actually spent any time living in London and getting to know it’s codes and way of living.

One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter and all that…/before you judge a man, walk a mile in his shoes etc

What’s offensive about all this ‘Londoners are all rude’, ‘cyclists are all RLJers’ is the negative judgement that starts in the observer’s head, which that observer then transfers onto the unwitting recipient

What about sinner or winner?

With a population of 8.5millions and likely to be 10 million by 2025 it dwarfs other western European cities – to try and make a comparison to rural parts of the UK is pointless. I really warmed to London with the Olympics and experienced the vibe it could generate. I’m in London on a weekly basis and often fascinated by the institutes and history of the place as well as the dynamics – others in the country perhaps don’t appreciate how it attracts business and people who contribute to the UK economy because it’s London. Might not be to everyone’s taste but I like it in small doses – as long as the trains into Waterloo keep running! I almost never use the Tube and walk everywhere as my coping strategy.

I’ve never found London folks to be any ruder than any other city,..but it’s just so claustrophobic, so many people, i find it really stressful. I’m always relieved to be getting on the train home.

Having just spent a long weekend in London, I have to say I was overly impressed with the competency of cyclist overall. Put Birmingham to shame for sure.

I ride in London every week and have done so now for 20yrs.

I love it.

Ive never felt threatened or unsafe.

As above, I think the quality of road driving has improved immeasurably. The two things I hate the most though are site lorries without skirts and driving too fast (because unladen, the drivers think the brakes designed for laden use will cover all their ills) and killer railings on the inside of corners to prevent peds from crossing.

Apart from that, it’s still my favourite thing to do in London. I might ride over 20 miles between meetings from Shoreditch to Chelsea via Mayfair and back again in the day, and I think it’s a great way of getting around.

This is the problem – both you and the OP – you go there occasionally and think you can judge the place, without actually living there for any time yourself! Just naked prejudice…

London has a manic energy – you won’t get anywhere if you don’t decide where you want to get to and make a beeline for it. Walking, driving, cycling, Tube, everything.
Honestly – you’ll be late for every meeting you try to get to if you’re not assertive – what do you expect when you cram so many people into narrow streets. You try saying ‘hello’ to everyone you walk past and you’ll be hoarse before you get to work…

I’ve left now and I miss it like crazy and I’d go back in a heartbeat if I could afford it. I saw moments of kindness and generosity every day – which you won’t see if you go in with a ‘it’s a full of entitled people’ lens on everything you look at.

The biggest image problem London actually has is visitors coming in expecting the place to be rude and aggressive, only noticing those behaviours, never looking for the niceness and not staying long enough to actually get under the skin of the place and then going around telling everyone they know how nasty Londoners are!

You must appreciate the irony of lecturing the OP on confirmation bias then typing that lot. Throwing stones and glass houses spring to mind. Just your bias is a little more glass half full.

Not been for a visit to Birmingham for many years but visited Sunday just gone. I was amazed by the amount of kamikaze/reckless motorists of all types. Ignoring red lights at busy junctions, cutting across carriageways in front of pedestrians without an apparent care in the world, charging through shared space areas without a care about little kids or anyone else.

Not been for a visit to Manchester for many years but visited Sunday just gone. I was amazed by the amount of kamikaze/reckless motorists of all types. Ignoring red lights at busy junctions, cutting across carriageways in front of pedestrians without an apparent care in the world, charging through shared space areas without a care about little kids or anyone else.

Not been for a visit to Nottingham for many years but visited Sunday just gone. I was amazed by the amount of kamikaze/reckless motorists of all types. Ignoring red lights at busy junctions, cutting across carriageways in front of pedestrians without an apparent care in the world, charging through shared space areas without a care about little kids or anyone else.

Not been for a visit to Leedsfor many years but visited Sunday just gone. I was amazed by the amount of kamikaze/reckless motorists of all types. Ignoring red lights at busy junctions, cutting across carriageways in front of pedestrians without an apparent care in the world, charging through shared space areas without a care about little kids or anyone else.

You sure have visited a lot of places last Sunday.

to try and make a comparison to rural parts of the UK is pointless.

To try and make a comparison to other uk cities is pointless when the centre of Manchester (the main business/entertainment/shopping district bordered by ancoats/Piccadilly/deansgate/the river) basically fits inside the boundaries of Hyde park.

Best city on earth.

Least worst city on earth.

FTFY 😛

I ride in London every week and have done so now for 20yrs.
Ive never felt threatened or unsafe.
As above, I think the quality of road driving has improved immeasurably

Another 20 year rider but that’s not my experience at all. It might be better in zone 1 (but then really dense traffic was never a problem anyway) but I get and see more aggression and deliberate endangerment now than I used to. Maybe it’s being older and more aware of my own mortality, maybe it’s more experience and a more VC style but it’s not even just at me – I’ve seen horrible abuse of mothers riding with kids

It might actually be better here than elsewhere in the UK (Road riding in the south east is never without an unnecessary near death moment) but that’s only because the speeds are (usually) lower.

Worth remembering that a lot of the people who you will have encountered are probably not from London, just live and work there. In my last team of c25 33% commuted (from as far away as Leeds and Manchester). Of the remainder who lived inside a London borough, only 4 had done so since childhood, the remainder all arriving post education, with at least 5 being from Yorkshire (mix of urban and rural). And yes, all of us demonstrate the mix of boorish, kindness, off-handedness, caring, tolerance, intolerance, parochialism, acceptance, aggression and many other traits you get in this horrible wonderful city. Being a northerner doesn’t make any difference.

Those who find London overcrowded & aggressive should try Mumbai/Beijing/New York. They make London look like an oasis of calm!!

Bikeradar >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>