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£1k was including 4 tyres at £170ish each.
Here's the road:
We were cycling on the left pavement. It's a residential road but a through road. If you follow it down the hill the pavement is really quite shit for cycling on
Collision occurred at the first driveway on the left here:
My daughter is not very confident generally and doesn't like to put much effort in. I asked her before we came down the hill and she said she wanted to cycle on the pavement.
We could cycle on the road I guess, there's more traffic than that Streetview applies due to two schools in the vicinity and quite a bit of housing, and cars parked on the nearside also, but it's not so busy that they couldn't pass us travelling down there at about 5-6mph without difficulty.
Trouble is my wife doesn't think children should be on the road at all. In fact she doesn't think SHE should be there. Last year my wife was cycling on the pavement in the ice/snow and got a nasty gash on her knee. I pointed out that it wouldn't have happened on the road but she doesn't listen.
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Well I already told her she has to pay the petrol bill. That hasn't stopped her.
Next thing is the car insurance coming next month. That's going onto her name.
Service due in January, that was £1k last time, not sure what she'll think of that...
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My wife and I don't see eye to eye on cycling matters unfortunately.
I'm still trying to persuade her she should cycle to work.
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I have invested in a cargo bike for both of them, but it's set up for me so my wife takes them (rarely) on their own bikes.
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TBH I'd rather not cycle with them. They sit on my bike, we very happily cover 1000 miles or so per year that way.
I am opposed to cycle helmets, but it's a difficult position to hold because if you have any kind of minor accident they will ask 'why wasn't he wearing a helmet', no matter how irrelevant it might be to the cut knee. He's at a private prep school, so they are all goody-two-shoes ten-year olds, and quite a few say 'where's your helmet'.
My wife is a pavement cyclist. I don't like this. But realistically my daughter is going to cycle at 6mph max, and we can't go on any but the quietest of cul-de-sacs at that speed.
My son has Aspergers and not great at awareness and stuff like that. He has been told before not to go off in front, but obviously not really drilled in well enough. We had a good go at him and said that next time he might not be so lucky.
I just came back from parent's evening, and the woman who hit him was there.
I get the impression that she feels that she might bear some responsibility and seemed quite contrite. I spoke to my son earlier and it seems that he was hit from the side. She said something about coming out 'very slowly' and there being hedges blocking the view. The bike was in the road, so I am not sure what kind of evasive action was taken.
Ultimately it would be better to cycle in the road, and I'd be cycling close to the centre line and he to my left, and visibility would have been good, but I've not seen my five-year-olds on the road. The odd one or two on the pavement with Dad cycling in the gutter alongside sometimes.
I've cycled home with him on the road a few times, I try to drill it to him - we're turning right here, keep to the right of the lane, remember to change your gears down, but he doesn't have his own road sense to really think and respond to things like a car noise behind (shoulder check), or sometimes when I say 'move over' he can take it too literally and start cycling on the verge or something. Not fun for me, at all.
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I hate it.
Went to pick my daughter up from school today on my bike. Went to the supermarket afterwards, no problems, then back to school to pick up my son (he finishes later).
I think 'hmm there's lots of bikes in school today'. Then I notice that they are my kids bikes.
Annoying, the wife must have brought them in.
So I get my daughter off the back of my bike and tell her to get on her bike. My son goes on his.
It takes us about five minutes to get out of the gate because the path is narrow and not suited to bikes and I have to shout at the kids 'don't go out the gate'.
We go onto the road and cycle along. My daughter is five and cycles very slowly, but we cycle along the road, blocking half of it (the other half blocked by parked cars). Cars wait patiently behind us.
Then my daughter falls of into a puddle. Wah. Take several minutes to persuade her to get back on otherwise we won't go home. Get to the end of the road, she wants to cycle down the pavement, so we cross the road together and cycle down the other side.
Pavement is rough, and has trees in it.
My daughter doesn't like going fast, so cycles down at 5mph with her brakes on. My son (10) is off, I'm staying with my daughter.
Get down the hill, my son is sitting with his head in hands, his bike in the road.
Oh shit.
Seems he's hit a car.
Woman emerging from driveway of nursery, he's gone into her.
Man there says he's come bowling down the hill and hit the car or tried to take evasive action.
Seems he's not really injured and neither is the bike, he has a bloody chin and that's about it, but passer-by man and female driver both concerned.
I'm a bit embarrassed, it seems like my son at fault, the woman is keen to exchange details with the male witness as I think she's worried if it's said otherwise.
Will probably get some annoying letter from the school about wearing a helmet or something (because they do a good job of protecting your chin don't they?). I have told my son that if he's going to cycle on the pavement he needs to go at walking pace.
I hate having to shepherd kids on bikes. No road sense, the pavements are dangerous for cycling, and I'd just prefer to take them home on my bike.
Grr.
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The previous convictions aren't all that bad tbf. His driving here sounds awful though.
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Evoque designer in need of a sandwich.
A knuckle sandwich?
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I took this route:
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/231438678
I'm not sure I took the best route to cross the Central Line. Google Maps suggests taking the footbridge a way south of South Woodford station. Obviously a stupid idea.
The Garmin however told me to go down to the Green Man roundabout and take the fourth exit (not much fun), and then up Whipps Cross Road past Whipps Cross. Turning right past Snaresbrook station would have been shorter/quicker, so not sure why it did this.
Lea Bridge Road was a veritable cycle superhighway compared with Ruckholt Road - faster by bike than car and not many traffic lights. Did gesture at one driver who was trying to block my lane so he could turn right across me. Brakes a bit dodgy and I don't want to stop anyway.
Came through Dalston and shouted at a couple of girls crossing the road in my path.
Down Essex Road, Rosebery Avenue, Farringdon Road, Blackfriars Bridge and right on the Cut. Coming down Blackfriars Road, signalled right getting ready to turn right, cunt in a white van didn't want to let me in, but I was going faster than him, and pulled in front of him anyway, he then pulled into the left lane and cut me up back into right lane, then 40 yards down the road went back into the left lane as it was moving faster.
Got the train then went to pick my kids up from school. Came down the hill, oops not going to stop (brakes still dodgy), we bailed into one of those plastic beacons. Scraped my knee but no harm done otherwise. Brake service was booked on Saturday, for Wednesday....
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Yeah tbh I find it much easier cycling in London. Flat as a pancake, road surfaces good despite what the 4x4 arseholes might claim, and doing 12 miles on Friday felt the equivalent of doing 5 miles in Surrey.
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I normally cycle in Surrey, where it's six miles between towns and there's one set of traffic lights en route.
It's a bit easier to be a righteous red-light stopper-at there.
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So I came up over Blackfriars, up past the Bank, then my Garmin tried to route me through the back of Liverpool Street station and to make various impossible right turns (I found out later it was set to pedestrian mode).
Ended up somewhere in Hackney full of warehouses called things like 'Blood and Fire Ministries', but the roads weren't bad for cycling. As I came into the Leyton area it got much worse, there was Ruckholt Road, which seemed expressly designed to put cyclists at risk - cars parked all the way along, a door-sized 'cycle lane' then a lane for traffic doing 30mph or so (I can't cycle that fast), and then after the road got wider but the cars just drive faster and closer
Went cycling towards Newbury Park along the Southend Road/A12 as well. Not fun, drivers around here seem to hate cyclists, assume they are out to kill you and it will be ok. Decided to cycle back on the shared use pavement thing: that was shit, lots of tactile paving slabs, risk of being run over at every side road as cars come turning off the dual carriageway at speed, so cycled on the dual carriageway instead.
Still not sure which route back to Waterloo.
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passing on the left is no big deal, but he doesn't need to try and 'buzz' him.
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I've always thought so too.
The Evoque is a particularly cuntish cuntmobile though:
http://www.newautosnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/Range-Rover-Evoque-2012-3.jpg
These people are so thick that they think bikes cost about £50 from Halfords and anyone riding one must be poor.
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I was cycling up George Lane, South Woodford today, and pulled over on the pavement to check an address.
Having done so I tried to cross the road here (so from 'Enzo' to 'Zizzi' - crossing the side road):
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=george+lane,+south+woodford&hl=en&ll=51.594695,0.023947&spn=0.000013,0.010568&sll=51.584107,-0.03407&sspn=0.232103,0.676346&hnear=George+Ln,+London+Borough+of+Redbridge,+London+E18,+United+Kingdom&t=m&z=17&layer=c&cbll=51.59477,0.023821&panoid=NaUeC1HmjxmiU3zdIrEESg&cbp=12,290.67,,0,2.74There was a white Range Rover Evoque that wanted to turn right - which it did, very nearly hitting me.
I said 'watch where you're going', to which his response was 'you don't even have a driving licence' (not true, obviously, I've just got more sense than to be driving around congested city like London), so I then spent several minutes shouting at him and telling him that if he's turning into a side road he should give priority. He wouldn't accept that he had done anything wrong, and eventually drove around me.
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As per title - any recommendations?
Fewer traffic lights would be a preference.
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The motorist has today been arrested.
http://www.getsurrey.co.uk/news/s/2121638_woman_arrested_over_andrew_dixon_crash_death
The suspicion is of death by careless driving, a relatively minor offence.
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More detail on the deceased (could someone update the thread title?) here:
http://www.getsurrey.co.uk/news/s/2121401_death_crash_cyclist_was_a_hero_to_two_sons
http://www.justgiving.com/Andy-Dixon66
https://twitter.com/andyd66
http://www.youtube.com/user/andyd66 -
*THE East Anglian Air Ambulance flew to the assistance of an 11-year-old boy cyclist who had been involved in a collision with a car at Lynn on Saturday.
Critical care paramedic Gary Spitzer, treated the youngster for a suspected broken leg at the scene.
*
http://www.lynnnews.co.uk/news/traffic-transport/king-s-lynn-air-aid-for-cyclist-11-1-4297255
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Picked my son up from school today. He got looked up and down by a father who takes his son home in a Mercedes ML, a sort of 'you neglectful bastard, how dare you take your children home by bike' look.
I asked him if he had been quizzed about it. 'The school secretary asked me what happened, I said I fell off my bike, and she asked me why, so I said I got hit by a car' 'She said I should wear a helmet'. I said to him 'that won't do much to protect your chin will it'.
He then asked me 'how do bike helmets work'. I said 'do you see that car? What will happen if it hits another car?' 'It will crush', he said, 'so bike helmets work the same way'. 'Yes I said, but do you know how much a car weighs?' 'Two or three tonnes' 'And how much does a bike helmet weigh?' 'About 300 grams'. 'And do you know what the formula for force is?' 'No' 'It's force = mass * acceleration. What do you think the acceleration would be if a car hits a wall at 60mph?' 'About 5mph per second?' 'No, it wouldn't take 12 seconds to stop would it, it would be much quicker than that.'
Anyway he had to go to his climbing lesson at this point, so I didn't have time to explain the rest of the relative physics of deceleration between a car bonnet and airbags and a polystyrene helmet.