Porty Cotic by Night

So this morning I reach the top of the Royal Mile (well, almost, I wasn't going to the castle). Turning left to Johnstone Terrace. The cobble surface is awful at that point so I'm a little out. I make the left about mid-lane - there's a pedestrian island narrowing the road, so nothing can go past if I'm left anyway. I can feel the van behind me.

The right sweep is off-camber, with a terrible road surface, and at least one manhole cover to boot. Oh, and there are parked cars ahead. I stay mid-lane. Van accelerates, passes quite closely, I turn and the driver has both hands off the wheel shouting and indicating I should be left. I point at the parked cars in disgust. He cuts me up. All in the space of a mere 20-30 yards, he lost about 5 seconds max being behind me.

He's in sight all the way down, and up to Bread Street. I get held up slightly by traffic, but head to East Fountabridge (Breadt Street is closed in the contraflow direction at the moment). He's there, at the red light at the junction with Lothian Road (not in the ASL remarkably, though two cyclists are). Window is down.

I lean back to see if he's looking, he leans out, "It's not worth arguing about mate."

"I'm not going to argue, but it's just there were parked cars so I was staying out for them."

"Aye, but you were in the middle all onto Johnstone Terrace, you were doing it on purpose."

I try to explain about the road surface and the parked cars, but his mind is closed. I'm getting in his way 'on purpose'.

Anyway, lights go green, he passes very close to one cyclist while still having a go at me, then completely cuts up the other cyclist to go through the road narrowing ahead as I turn right into Semple Street.

Seriously, how did we come to the point where cyclists are viewed as actually deliberately trying to get in the way of traffic? I don't know anyone (save for critical mass) who does it in order to hold people up and make their life difficult. For safety reasons mebbes, but for kicks? That would be frankly insane on our part given how squishy we are if hit. Frustrating, too, that they can't see why I was riding where I was...

Argh! Grr! etc etc etc

And then I read in the paper that at the same bit of road (well a little further downhill) on Monday, about half an hour after I passed through on the way to work, a cyclist found himself being attacked by a driver. Thing is, the driver was still in the car. The bike ended up under the car, the cyclist on the bonnet, then being driven down the hill before unceremoniously dumped by the side of the road. The exact circumstances are not really known, there was an earlier altercation between the two. What's depressing are the usual comments on the local paper website which revel and celebrate the fact that a cyclist has got his comeuppance.

Cyclists, you see, don't pay road tax (oh god that one again, do I have to explain how false that statement is again?); all ride on pavements; don't use lights; run red lights... And according to one commenter it truly is all cyclists under 40 who do all this stuff. That would include me. Hadn't realised I was doing all of that. I just find it strange that in a story where a driver has used a vehicle as a weapon somehow cyclists as a whole come out of it as the bad guys. A MAN DELIBERATELY TRIED TO RUN SOMEONE OVER! No matter what the provocation, unless there's a threat to your life (and the driver here followed the cyclist up a road which is 'no entry' to all but buses, taxis and cycles to carry out the assault), there is NO EXCUSE to try and run someone over. It's attempted murder, but if found he'll get charged with dangerous driving and plead guilty down to careless. Think I'm joking?

Let me recount the tale of Eilidh Cairns, killed in London last year. The HGV driver, it was shown, had defective eyesight; had not adjusted his mirrors to cover a blindspot at the front left three-quarters, put in specifically for that task and to comply with EU law; through a pinchpoint; in broad daylight; and he simply drove over her. She was in front, no cycling up the left side of a turning lorry. She was in front. Bearing all that in mind what prison sentence do you think he got? Er... Okay, so he was banned right? Well... He did get three penalty points and a £200 fine...

The weird thing is they found he had defective eyesight, and yet he kept his licence for a further three months until his regular annual eyesight test, at which point it was found... he had defective eyesight and he lost his licence. A few months later? He had his licence back. Ah well, the judge in the original case said that he'd learned, that he was a different man. Except for the fact it's just been revealed that in June this year he ran over and killed a 97 year old pedestrian. As far as I can tell from any research he's still driving.

Hell, the BBC recently sent off a raft of FOI requests around police forces and found thousands driving with omre than 12 points on their licence. Legally. A court has discretion if a car is essential. There are some people out there driving with 3 or 4 times the amount of points that you should get banned at. How much of a warning do you need to drive better? If driving is that important to your life shouldn't you take more care? Not according to the powers-that-be here...

An ironic comment on the local paper today was that it was about time cyclists were licensed. That's priceless. Someone who is licensed tries to kill another human being and the natural conclusion is that the group of transport-users that was the target in that case should be licensed.

Why can't we all just get along?

(N.B. the GRAND MAJORITY of road users are absolutely fine, no matter what their transport choice - the minority spoil it for us all, and that minibus driver genuinely was in the minority in much the same way that (trust me, stand at traffic lights anywhere outside London and watch for a couple of hours, I've done it...) the minority of cyclists run red lights. The difference? Potential harm and an acceptance by the authorities that deaths by vehicles are simply a price that is worth paying.)

Tough day at work, blowing off steam

The almost blip:
Surprising how much you (I) move during what felt like a really solid ten second trackstand...