cfsmtb wrote:
>
> jcjordan Wrote:
> > The simple fact is that the NRMA, Evans in particular, hate all non car
> > users and this hatred is particularly aimed at cyclist. As can be seen
> > by his organisations numerous attacks against us and the conclusions of
> > various 'studies' that the organisation quotes, but can never back up
> > with actual data.
> >
> > Events like this unfortunately give him more opportunity to attack us
> > and wont let the facts of the event get in the way. Calling the time
> > that the riders were on the road as 'peak hour' is a bit rich
> > considering they were going the opposite direction of 99% of the traffic
> > on a three lane road.
>
> A online petition has been created for NRMA members.
> http://www.gopetition.com/online/19181.html
>
> Details from site: NRMA, stop attacking cyclists or we will cancel our
> membership
>
> Category: Roads & Transport
> Region: Australia
> Target: Sydney
> Description/History:
> The NRMA is vocal in their opposition of the development of cycling
> infrastructure in Sydney and is opposing the use of existing roads by
> cyclists in Sydney during Peak hours.
>
> Despite the increasing congestion, high fuel prices and climate change,
> the NRMA continues to attack cycling as an alternative method of
> personal transport for commuters and recreational users.
>
> Cyclists have every right to use the States roads. Cyclists, as a
> legitimate road user group, are growing in number in direct proportion
> to the increasing fuel prices. Clearly, MORE cycling infrastructure is
> required, not more car lanes.
>
> Most cyclists are also car owners. A great many of these car owning
> cyclists are NRMA members and IAG customers. I would ask these people to
> reconsider their position on contributing money to an association that
> opposes theirs, and their communities' cycling needs.
>
> --
> cfsmtb
I'm a car owner, '86 Ford Laser, and a keen cyclist.
The trouble with democracy is that it isn't understood for what it is.
Its all very well for us cyclists to bleat about our rights, but
for me at least ANY discussion of rights also must be accompanied by
what duties of care are involved and attatched.
In a society where everyone claims a right for this and that, and nobody
spells out their willingness for duty of care to others, you have
anarchy, not democracy.
For example, although its law that cyclists are entitled to ride two
abreast
on roads, I damn well won't, too much risk to life, unless I am well out
on very lonely
country roads, and there i go single file if I am with others when I
hear a car coming up behind me
and there is no cycle lane.
So the argy bargy will always exist between cyclists and motorists
because
the motorists claim the cyclists don't practice duty of care, by holding
up car drivers
on the road, and getting in their way, running red lights, and forcing
car drivers to take risky evasive action
in tenuous situations.
Cyclists claim motorists are a bunch of Toads who antagonise cyclists.
Its been the same now ever since our great grandfather's rode old penny
farthings.
Lots of wrong on BOTH sides, from what I witness every day.
I hate driving a car on Sydney's roads, and cycling is an unpleasant
experience.
I don't ever see a future there for safe cycling.
Does anyone think the NSW State Government will spend a billion bucks
just
to please a tiny minority crew of mainly wingeing young men who insist
on riding bikes?
I don't think so.
So like it or hate it, the fact is that NOTHING MUCH will ever happen to
improve the
lot of the tiny cycling minority, such as dedicated cycle ways all
around Sydney
allowing good separation of motorists and cyclists.
And unless the cycleways or cycle paths are MORE convenient and smooth
surfaced than nearby roads.
many cyclists just won't use them, and motorists get the ***** when they
see cyclists
riding on the road where there is a cycle path which is empty of traffic
running right alongside the road.
All that expense for nothing they moan.
One could say cyclists should get down on their knees each evening and
pray to God or Allah
or the Snake Serpent that petrol will rise to $10.00 per litre in 6
months, and that
speed limits on roads within 30km radious of Sydney CBD be reduced to
30kph, and that
anyone within 20km radius of CBD must have a City Entry Certificate, CEC
which
is bought for $200 each month.
That ought to reduce traffic to densities about the same as 1950, but
the roads can ALL have a cycle lane both sides.
Pigs will be available for porcine flight before such draconian measures
are implemented.
Apart from the tiny minority of mainly young men ppl who ride much at
all,
trying to get the rest of the population onto bikes is like trying to
teach elephants to dance a polka.
People just ain't willing to bike it any more than they'd like to go
back
to horse and buggy days.
We all know that prayer doesn't work, and pigs don't fly,
and that Sydney looks set to just get a whole lot worser and bloody
worser.
I could see this in 1972, and I voted with my feet.
When I was young, I rode a motorcycle for most of my twenties.
Don't ask me how I survived with so many drunks on the road back then i
don't know.
By 26, I was SO GLAD to leave Sydney, a huge dump of a place which was
grossly dysfunctional in 1,001 different ways.
No apologies, but that's how I saw it. People were dominated by chasing
money and
traffic. Sydney is an alienating environment where hardly anyone I ever
knew there
knew how to be happy, and how not to worry.
I discovered Canberra, where someone actually bothered to plan a place
that grated less
on an ordinary human.
Then I discovered its cycle paths, also a result of planning them in
as a matter of course during suburban developments.
Even Canberra is slowly and surely being Chatswood-ised, or
Paramatta-ised,
and that's all **** where its happening; progress and growth, like
cancer to me.
But fortunately the town dysplanning muckeration is not universal,
and I can be in paddocks where cows and sheep graze peacefully
within 5 minutes of leaving home on a bicycle from my house in Watson
which is 6km out of
Canberra CDB, 'Civic', as its known.
Patrick Turner.