Stupid pedestrians endanger themselves.

[baratron]

I have a new pet hate: people who walk in the cycle lane.

I'm not talking about shared use paths where pedestrians and cyclists are expected to co-exist. On the whole, I have little problem with those: people who are walking see the sign at eye height and know to look out for cycles. Also, the Highway Code is clear that pedestrians have right of way on a shared use path, and on the whole people act sensibly. The problem is the designated cycle-only lanes that run alongside ordinary pavements and roads.

Now, I have to admit, I have no bloody idea what people are thinking. When there is a wide, flagstone pavement for people to walk on, and a narrow, green tarmaced path with pictures of cycles on - why the hell would someone choose to walk in the cycle lane? If the pavement was damaged or blocked I could understand a person needing to walk in the cycle bit, but when the pavement's fully accessible and in good repair it makes no sense.

And the worst part is that the pedestrians won't move out of your way. I approach walking people in my lane and ring my bell. It's pretty loud. No one ever moves. I get really close and ring the bell again. Still no one moves. I shout out "Hello, excuse me, you're in the cycle lane". At that point, people might move - but they'll almost certainly give me a really dirty look. I'm sorry, but what am I supposed to do?

Would you walk down the middle of a road when there's a pavement available? No! The road is for cars! Walking down the road puts you at risk of being hit by cars! Would you walk down the middle of a bus lane when there's a pavement available? No! The bus lane is for buses! Walking down the road puts you at risk of being hit by buses, which have a lot of mass and don't stop easily! OK, so why should walking down a cycle lane be any different? Do you think that cycles don't have enough mass to hurt you? Believe me, that's not true - ask anyone who's ever had a piece of cycle frame go through their anatomy and difficult, complex fractures as a result.

I can't see what makes people walk in the cycle lane. It has weird green tarmac, and big painted pictures of bicycles. There's usually a line of bricks separating the flagstone pavement from the cycle lane. It's clearly not an extension of the pavement because it's a different colour and texture (and often a different height). Yet people walk in it like it's meant for pedestrians. And then, if a cyclist pulls up behind them and asks them to move, they act as though I'm in the wrong when they're in my designated place! AAARRRGGHHH!!

Comments

[ailbhe]

I like countries where cycle lanes are normally at a different level from the other two zones, so you can't walk into them just by being utterly oblivious. There's ONE such cycle lane in Reading, as far as we've found, and I get a little thrill when I cycle on it.

[epi-lj.livejournal.com]

I have possibly depressing commisseration for you: Here, most of the time we don't *have* cycle lanes. What happens? People actually *do* just randomly walk in the road. Not on busy thoroughfares usually (although you see it occasionally), but I constantly come across people just walking in the road in housing neighbourhoods here where there are perfectly good sidewalks (often on both sides of the street). I've been driving and on a few rare occasions had to actually honk at the people to get them to get the heck out of the road so I could drive by. Even more commonly, they walk along the side of the road, which is where bicycles are supposed to be here, which means I have to veer way out into traffic to go around them. I have to deal with people just strolling like that about once a month. About twice a week I have to deal with sporty people jogging in the road, along the side where people are supposed to cycle. About 9 times out of 10 when I run into this, the person is also wearing an iPod and thus can't hear your bell at all.

It happens here in the cycling lanes as you mention above, too, where there are cycling lanes, but I have to deal with the situation I'm describing here more often since there are no cycling lanes between my home and my work, which is the majority of my riding.

[epi-lj.livejournal.com]

Oh, double plus extra peevish points: People who push double-wide baby carriages along the street instead of the sidewalk, in the area where I'm supposed to be riding my bike. I run into that fairly often in my own neighbourhood here. I assume it's because they find it more convenient than attempting to push such strollers on the sidewalks where there are pedestrians.

[baratron.livejournal.com]

That's horrible. Endangering your own, consenting adult, self is fair enough. It gets on my nerves but you consented to it, right? Whereas infants are too young to consent, and rely on their caregivers to make sensible decisions on their behalf...

[a-musing-amazon.livejournal.com]

The problem with pavements (sidewalks) for the driver/pusher of any wheeled thing, whether pram, buggy, bike, trike or wheelchair is the curbs. If the pavement is flat and continuous, and there are effective ramps where you have to cross the road then I agree not sticking to the pavement, and the pedestrianised bit at that, is unreasonable - but too often this is not the case.

[epi-lj.livejournal.com]

I'm having a hard time imagining pushing the baby carriage in the street being a reasonable response to having to deal with curbs, but in the cases I've seen (the ones in my neighbourhood), these are all new sidewalks with ramps. The entire neighbourhood was built in the past four years.