Arven…Then your perception is wrong ..
Please dont try to tell me what I have or haven’t seen ..I don’t remember you being a passenger in my vehicle at any time either ..to be in a position to contradict me
I live in the country ..its a regular occurrence on roads in and around where I live ..

how terrible it is to ride a bike in the UK, creating a permanent victim mentality out of all proportion to the actual risk.

Utter bollox

The only time I get irate is when the ” club ” are out blocking the road and refuse to move into a line ( even two abreast ) to allow other vehicles to pass..

There’s a disconnect here because that quite well-known picture article about cyclists being 2 or 3 abreast and a lane still being available to overtake is all well and good.

But (a) there often isn’t that neat layout of road (bends, gradients, hedgerows etc all restricting visibility) and (b) most cyclists are appalling at group riding.

Part of (b) is because of (a) – it’s very difficult to maintain a neat close 2-up on climbs, descents, debris-strewn roads but it also means that even if they are sort of 2-up, from behind it will often look 3 or 4 abreast.

I’ve done 2-up chaingang type stuff in Spain where, because of the wide smooth roads, it was possible to be millimetres away from the next rider and be perfectly safe. Try that in the UK and you’d be swerving around potholes and debris, pulling out around parked cars and so on; it makes neat 2-up very difficult.

The only time I get irate is when the ” club ” are out blocking the road and refuse to move into a line ( even two abreast ) to allow other vehicles to pass..

This is the motorist mentality. It’s MY road. It’s for ME, IN MY CAR. I, personally would never do a club run, but why is it so terrible to have to go a bit slower on a Sunday afternoon, just because some OTHER ROAD users are out and about? And the usual reason you can’t pass? Because there are CARS coming the other way.
Yeah and what about those damn cyclists riding to SCHOOL during YOUR rush hour?? Weaving all over the road, pulling wheelies not wearing helmets, or hi-vis! How dare you be young! AND GET OUTTA MY WAY.

They could well also be blocking the road to stop entitled pricks from overtaking at unsafe places….. My experience is the roadies are usually too keen to single out which makes the group twice as long and so harder to overtake safely.

+1

And if you can fit 3-up in a lane, what’s the problem, it’s still no wider than a car and if you have to cross the white lines then it doesn’t matter if it’s by a foot or completely you still can’t do it into oncoming traffic. And being 2 or 3 up means the gap in oncoming traffic you need is shortened by 50%/66% (plus whatever margin you need to pull out/in).

We single out in traffic, but it’s not to make life easier for anyone else, it makes it a PITA for everyone when you’ve not got a 50m long line of riders who’ve all had to slow down to merge together, rather than a van sized block moving at a consistent speed, but it reduces agro from certain drivers.

I think the psychological term is ‘othering’.
Which I guess is intensified mainly through the toxic media we have in the UK.

As with the ‘B’ word this is exactly how media make money. Creating divisive articles that generate hate comments is king of revenue for pay to display/pay per click.

Most drivers take “liberties” on the road too (as you noted) but they don’t get equally vilified. Some driver liberties are now so commonplace that they are not even considered wrong by the majority (e.g. speeding, going through amber lights, parking illegally, phone use etc).

Of course they do … you are suffering a bout of confirmation bias.

I think a compounding factor is a cyclist taking liberties that the driver might like to but can’t.

So close … having missed the above what you are missing is that many cyclists are doing EXACTLY what they are vilifying the motorist for.

If the cycle path is crappy then you slow down or just push the bike… I mean your not in a rush are you? Given the message to car drivers is to slow down, it’s not a race etc. I’d say the compounding factor is one rule for us and another for them.

I get held up by cars every day of the week. Selfish, that’s what car drivers are.

If we actually invested in cycling-friendly infrastructure with segregated bike lanes instead of just paying lip service to sustainable transport while we build more and more roads, it would:

a. Normalise cycling by making it a more accessible, practical means of transport.
b. Reduce conflict between cyclists and other road users
c. Reduce the number of cars on the road reducing congestion / frustration / conflict
d. Improve health and fitness
e. Reduce our impact on the environment

But hell no, let’s build more bypasses and motorways etc and sell more cars and marketing-driven delusions of fluid, congestion-free traffic 🙁

If we actually invested in cycling-friendly infrastructure with segregated bike lanes instead of just paying lip service to sustainable transport while we build more and more roads

Two different issues.

Personally I’d like to see a mixture of intelligently designed on-road infrastructure and off-road routes. I think the problem with segregated infrastructure is it would actually increases the us and them problem.

E.g. there’s an off-road cycleway near work that’s segregated from the road by a kerb and a fence. Sounds great, except that makes it a PITA to use as you can’t see traffic turning into the junctions, and getting to it from the wrong side of the road is difficult at one end unless you follow the maze of crossings across a roundabout. I get more abuse in that 300m section than anywhere else simply because there’s some infrastructure that’s impractical to use.

The road’s more than wide enough they could have narrowed the ‘car’ lanes and put a full bus/cycle lane on each side and still had room for a pavement along most of it.

99% of drivers are fine, you only remember the bad ones. They can be bad in a number of ways. Ever had some doddery old fool not overtake you even though its totally clear, with a line of traffic behind them? Guess who they blame for the problem.

I’d split the outwardly anti cyclists in to two camps.

1) “I’m better than you”
people who have paid alot of money (for them) on their vehicle, and it gives them a sense of entitlement that lesser people need to get out of their way.
This could be a gammon in a new Disco, Kevin with big rims and a stripe on his Corsa, or Louise in her leased white 1 series.
They’ve bought into the mystique of status symbol cars, and anyone who doesn’t have one must be a less successful person than themselves. Why cant these lesser people just get out of my way?

2) “I subconsciously think you’re better than me [for some percieved reason] and I’ve got a massive chip on my shoulder”
Usually thick as mince and with an inability to empathise with anyone who isn’t their socio-economic and age equal, or their immediate family.
We aren’t human to them, just a non-playing-character there to make their hard life even harder, and they resent that.
The balding fat pie-stained 40 year old already halfway to the grave sees a skinny happy 50 year old spinning his way down the road in brightly coloured lycra and decides he’s a wrongun.
The young white van man knows that the only acceptable male sport is football [even though short shorts and knee socks looks even more stupid than lycra when worn out of context], and doing a “real job” instead of those do-nothing office sitters is more than enough exercise for anyone. “And where do these guys get the money for these bikes that can cost over £1000 don’t you know? All my money goes on cocaine and child support”

Idle musings of a bored commuter – not meant to be taken seriously.

stevextc
If the cycle path is crappy then you slow down or just push the bike… I mean your not in a rush are you?

I think that encapsulates all that is wrong with the thinking about cycle paths. That they are seen a recreational facility rather than a transport link.

Why do some people think the cyclist’s journey less important than the car driver’s?

Is it because the car driver is assumed to be of a superior social status therefore the peasants should get out of the way?

The real problem is that the car has hi-jacked the infrastructure that was originally intended for meat powered transport. Take a look at the old photos any town prior to the 1960s, and you’ll see children playing in the street. Streets were a public space not an exclusive zone for fast moving heavy machinery. Cars were also much smaller.

Perhaps we need to close off towns to the auto sector and institute Park and Ride from the edges, or even do what was the norm once, walk, ride, or public transport.

Or simply ban parking in town, have ultra low speed limits and sail before steam type rules of the road and let nature take its course.

If the cycle path is crappy then you slow down or just push the bike… I mean your not in a rush are you?

I’m not out for a wee pootle. I want to get to work safely and efficiently on my bike, and I don’t want to get off and push because my route is badly engineered or poorly maintained.

Perhaps we need to close off towns to the auto sector and institute Park and Ride from the edges, or even do what was the norm once, walk, ride, or public transport.

Or simply ban parking in town,

The problem with that is it’ll kill already dying town centres stone dead.

Or simply ban parking in town, have ultra low speed limits and sail before steam type rules of the road and let nature take its course.

We have 20mph speed restrictions in my village, however, few drivers actively observe this. I have been overtaken before by various ‘grades’ of motorist for daring to observe the law of the land. The speed limit is official with all correct and relevant signage. Its 20mph for a reason.

We make so many excuses for giving over our spaces to cars and marginalising sustainable transport.

Attitudes like globalti’s

What attitude? That cyclists who break the law are idiots because, as Cougar correctly writes on P1 of this thread, a few cyclists ignoring the law and riding selfishly fuels people’s hatred of all of us?

The problem is that cyclists’ smug holier-than-thou belief in their superiority gives them justificatioon for breaking the rules by jumping lights, riding on the pavement and taking a load of other liberties. If you want to be treated in the same way as a car driver, use the road properly.

The elephant in the room of this thread is the behaviour of many cyclists who jump lights and generally ignore the rules, which makes drivers hate them

I think you’re confusing cause and effect – the drivers start hating cyclists and then those incidents provide evidence to confirm that they are right. More motorists than cyclists blow through traffic lights, but that doesn’t “cause” the same hatred.

Perhaps it’s easier to see this with the groups we’re not part of. Some people who identify as Muslims get a bit stabby / bomby – for those starting from a position of hatred, this confirms that Muslims, generally, are a dangerous threat to our society and should be locked up and / or deported. Of course they aren’t. Confirmation bias.

Some people who identify as Muslims abuse children.

Some black people deal drugs and stab people.

Some gypsies and travellers trash sports pitches and rob people.

For all of the above, those who start with the hatred have it confirmed by the anecdata. What we’re talking about is symptom, not cause.

Or, to look at it from the other end: Do you think that, if all cyclists stayed off the pavements and stopped dutifully at every amber / red traffic light, then motorists would suddenly welcome us on the roads and give us proper consideration?

I think that encapsulates all that is wrong with the thinking about cycle paths. That they are seen a recreational facility rather than a transport link.

whooshhh…. it doesn’t matter, if it’s not safe slow down. Isn’t this EXACTLY what we keep telling motorists???

Why do some people think the cyclist’s journey less important than the car driver’s?

Is it because the car driver is assumed to be of a superior social status therefore the peasants should get out of the way?

Where did you even extrapolate that from?
The point that seems to have flown over at 40,000 feet are the messages being given to motorists in the context of “why-are-cyclists-vilified-in-the-uk”
Even as a cyclist it sounds to me like you want special pleading and elevation of cycles being of some superior status over other modes of transport/leisure… and not being subject (in the eyes of some) to the same rules and messages..

(Other than taking the car for its MOT I don’t think I drove into town the whole of last year .. but that’s just me)

The problem is that cyclists’ smug holier-than-thou belief in their superiority gives them justificatioon for breaking the rules by jumping lights, riding on the pavement and taking a load of other liberties. If you want to be treated in the same way as a car driver, use the road properly.

Motorists jump red lights, drive on the pavement, drive under the influence, drive while uninsured/DQ’d/unlicensed, speed, make illegal U-turns….

“Use the roads properly” or “obey the law like car drivers do” is a totally bollocks argument to even try and make.

Traffic lights, bollards, big bright road signs, kerbs and speed limits all exist to try and control the frankly abysmal behaviour of most drivers because the potential for serious injury/death when they don’t obey laws is very very high. And those measures frequently fail anyway.

The problem is that the roads are now so car-centric. That drives the behaviour of “other” road users. Cyclists are concerned about their safety. Put them down a poxy bit of white line painted down a pavement that gives way to every driveway and they won’t use it. Paint a half metre wide “lane” through a bus turning area (Manchester, I’m looking at you) and they won’t use it.

It’s an infrastructure problem, not a “cyclists” problem. Build shit infra and people don’t / won’t use it, they’ll use what is most convenient as safely as possible and sometimes that means a bit of kerb hopping, RLJing etc.

Same in cars – there’s a new dual carriageway near me, 50mph limit. But they didn’t put speed cameras on it so the average speed down there is high 60s. You want people to obey the law, provide them with the infrastructure that drives that behaviour.

If you want to be treated in the same way as a car driver, use the road properly.

The statistics say that the overwhelming majority of cyclists aren’t causing any problems.
Why are you so concerned about a problem that doesn’t exist?

Meanwhile, drivers will kill another 4 or 5 people on UK roads today. I think we should be concentrating on trying to prevent those deaths.

1. We have a grand tradition of car-culture going back to the early 1950s. Bicycles went from ‘normal’ to ‘poor man’s transport’ almost overnight.

Great Britain: cycle traffic estimates, 1949-2018

2. Crap infrastructure leads to friction
3. Poor general understanding of Highway rules and taxation means that many drivers feel that cyclists are ‘taking the piss’ by even using the roads let alone taking primary or two-abreast. Hence psychological projection of ‘entitlement’ onto a minority, ironically from those that feel most entitled (majority)
4. Tabloid-driven media exploits the ‘bad’ ‘out-group’ to vilify for the pleasure of their audience/readership.

ie (sorry)

5. London

Cougar
The problem with that is it’ll kill already dying town centres stone dead.

I’d argue it’s cars that have done that.

The monopolisation of roads for cars has fragmented town centres from a composite into a series of island blocks.

Motorists jump red lights, drive on the pavement, drive under the influence, drive while uninsured/DQ’d/unlicensed, speed, make illegal U-turns….

“Use the roads properly” or “obey the law like car drivers do” is a totally bollocks argument to even try and make.

Traffic lights, bollards, big bright road signs, kerbs and speed limits all exist to try and control the frankly abysmal behaviour of most drivers because the potential for serious injury/death when they don’t obey laws is very very high. And those measures frequently fail anyway.

Other than license/insurance cyclists do all the same but just as it’s not most cyclists it’s not all motorists.

I’m not out for a wee pootle. I want to get to work safely and efficiently on my bike, and I don’t want to get off and push because my route is badly engineered or poorly maintained.

Doesn’t sound all that different to drivers… other than pushing.

The statistics say that the overwhelming majority of cyclists aren’t causing any problems.

Doesn’t sound all that different to drivers…

Why are you so concerned about a problem that doesn’t exist?

Because just as you seem to think its all/most drivers so drivers think about cyclists…

The problem is that cyclists’ smug holier-than-thou belief in their superiority gives them justificatioon for breaking the rules by jumping lights, riding on the pavement and taking a load of other liberties. If you want to be treated in the same way as a car driver, use the road properly.

I’m agreeing with this.

Bikes and cars ideally need different infrastructure. Right now, that favours cars because, guess what, there are a lot more cars than bikes.

Bikes want avoid busy junctions and high speed roads, favouring the shorter route due to lower top speed, but also want to avoid needless stopping and starting as its your personal energy, not petrol that this wastes.

However, still obeying the basic tenets of traffic law – ride on the left, give way when the designed road layout (roundabout, traffic light, major road) tells you to, behave in a vaguely predictable manner and signal your intentions. Following these mutually agreed rules is the only way to transport ourselves in a urban/suburban environment. The occasional person can break the rules and fit through the gaps at a minor inconvenience but if everyone does it chaos ensues.

If every car driver magically started cycling tomorrow and adopted the idiotic approach of the minority of cyclists then the roads will look like Mumbai, and SingleBootWorld will start saying that town centres should ban cyclists and we should all walk as its much safer and quicker anyway.

OP if you read the comments @ that Room 101 video, you’ll understand a lot more.

The problem is that the roads are now so car-centric.

isn’t that because roads were/are built for cars?

Roads have been increasingly built only for cars. But the answer to your Q is both yes and no.

Most roads were not built for use of cars

The strange hierarchy of road vehicles also has something to do with it. As a couple of others have mentioned, drive an economy hatch and you will be bullied by drivers in bigger cars; I also noticed it when I drove Mrs Gti’s Citroen C1. When we owned an elderly Land Rover 90 it was as if we had become invisible as drivers don’t consider a square Landy as a proper car worthy of any attention. It’s no coincidence that manufacturers make their cars look as aggressive as possible – a Mercedes A class racing up behind you looks like a big intimidating vehicle until it passes and you realise that it’s just a vulgar hatchback. Cyclists are so low in the pecking order that drivers sometimes ignore them as of no threat and when they do see a cyclist riding assertively, taking up road space for example, they get upset at being forced to slow down.

DezB …
Just to correct you on one of your points …
The usual reason that I cant get past these riders who are riding 2 or 3 abreast is that I live in a very rural part of the country with quite narrow winding roads ..and when you have a club group ( please bear in mind that this is the ONLY time that I get irate ) of 20-30 riders clogging the road..even when there is a straight stretch with no approaching car in sight..I’m usually thinking can I get past all of these before the next corner without putting myself and them in danger ..now if those riders were a little more considerate by moving into single file ..and stretching things out a little so that motorists could safely pass ..there would be no problem ..but instead the attitude seems to be ” we know you are there mate but you can do one ” ..and they then wonder why frustration boils over from the motorist ..

Where you going in such a hurry? And, as I’m certain others have pointed out, how does them being in one long line on a “narrow, winding road” help? You could always stop and wait until they’ve gone and then carry on with your so important journey without getting frustrated.

Questions in the about were purely rhetorical.

You missed out the bit where I mentioned ..if they were stretched out a bit ..there wouldn’t be a problem …

.I’m usually thinking can I get past all of these before the next corner without putting myself and them in danger

now if those riders were a little more considerate by moving into single file ..and stretching things out a little

So you’d have to be on the other side of the road for longer? Or do you mean if they were single file you could squeeze past them into on coming traffic?

My little (and almost daily) experience of *some* motorists’ attitude towards cyclists is on my journey home from the train station. It features a pretty stiff climb (ie, slow cyclists) up a hill on a narrow road with blind bends. I experience this road daily – sometimes as a motorist, sometimes as a cyclist. Many other cyclists also use this route home from their commute.

Some drivers will wait patiently behind a cyclist and only pass them when it is clear to do so.

Some drivers barrel along without checking their speed and push past even if there is a car coming in the other direction.

Some drivers close-pass cyclists even if the other carriageway is clear (I suppose to teach them a lesson).

Some drivers will drive up behind other cars and tailgate them if that driver (ie me) is hanging back because it isn’t safe to pass.

When I cycle it, I always signal to drivers NOT to pass if I hear them coming up behind me and I can see a vehicle coming from the other direction (I get a better view from the left of the road as it is a r/h bend). Some drivers thank me for this, others get more irate as they clearly don’t like being told by a cyclist.

Generally (when I am driving) I get a waved thank you (most regularly from regular cyclists rather than commuters) when they recognise I have waited / passed safely.

On balance, on this short stretch, I see more impatience shown towards cyclists than I do positive behaviour.

I flatly refuse to ride it in winter as I see it as an accident waiting to happen. Roll on the spring and lighter evenings.

You missed out the bit where I mentioned ..if they were stretched out a bit ..there wouldn’t be a problem …

I think you underestimate how tricky it can be for a group of 20-30 people to decide when it is a good idea to single up, communicate that fact and then organise it, before having to decide that it now may be better to go back to 2 abreast. Ultimately, wherever you live, it is a fair bet that you are held up more often by other motorists in the course of a year than you are by bikes. One of these things is regarded as a normal circumstance, whilst the other gives rise to aggression & villification.
In terms of the OP, do you think that these issues don’t happen in other countries, the question is why, in the UK, this behaviour causes such apoplexy in car drivers.

You missed out the bit where I mentioned ..if they were stretched out a bit ..there wouldn’t be a problem

Maybe I missed it, maybe it just doesn’t make any bleedin sense.
Still, you go on hating our roadie brethrin, no skin off my scrotum.

Neither Mister P ..by stretched out I mean leaving gaps between riders so that vehicles could safely pass..why the **** do they have to be bunched up anyway?
I refrained from using the words “spaced out”..just in case you thought I was implying they were taking drugs …( clear now ? )

Have only been driving for 18 years but have only driven behind a peloton on one occasion. I remember it was a Sunday and sunny, and it was between Bredwardine Bridge and the A4358

Being (as it was) a novel situation I distinctly remember thinking to myself how I’d feel if I wasn’t myself a cyclist? I crawled along uphill at maybe 10mph and held back not to ‘bully’ them. It was about a half a mile until the junction.

10 minutes out of my day. Sun on my arm. Big deal.

Now, the tractors…they rarely pull in to let past, and in a typical year I drive behind hundreds of them. Still no ‘apoplexy’ and neither do I hate farmers. Have I missed the entitlement boat or just too laid back for my own good?

The problem with that is it’ll kill already dying town centres stone dead.

Yeah..making motorists leave their cars in out of town car parks will finish off towns completely..after all Saas-Fee and Zermatt looked dead when I was there last.

Bloke in my office – “Cyclists in all the gear are usually ok.. it’s the kids…” Jeez, he’s not thick (well, not that thick) but it’s just a moronic mentality people who drive around all the time have. (He didn’t get any further than the word ‘kids’ before I shut him off with a tale of my kid getting moaned at by a driver for riding on a crossing on his bike, when he was 11.)