"speeding cyclists on towpath"

In article <[email hidden]>, junk@raven- family.com says...

Quoted message said:

AFAIK, most of the Thames towpath in London where cycling is permitted is where the Local
Authority has established permissive use status or it has been unopposed tradition. Very few have
had cycling legally established under the Highways Act 1980 or Cycle Tracks Act 1984. I do not
know the particular status of the Putney-Barnes Section but it is likely that bicycles are there
by permission, not right.

So go careful out there and treat those pedestrians and spectators with respect. They have a right
to be there, you do not necessarily have one.

Now that's the sort of argument stopper Ii like! :-)

"Just zis Guy, you know?" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
"]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Sky Fly said:

Quoted message said:

3,400 dead, 36,000 seriously injured, 263,000 lesser reported injuries, the leading cause of
death among in the 4-16 age group. Sounds pretty bad to me.

Quoted message said:

It's not the fact that there are significant number of deaths on the road that I disagree with -
it's the use of the word 'carnage'. This makes it look like there are a large number of deaths
occurring within a very short period of time in a restricted space.

Carnage means "massive slaughter, as in war; a massacre."

Guy, when I think of 'carnage', I think of an action or a series of related actions caused on
purpose, as you might see during war. I honestly don't think that the word 'carnage' describes what
goes on on our roads - perhaps another word should be found for this, but I'm not a big fan of word
devaluation where words lose their value because they used to describe any kind of event, no matter
how trivial. For example, if it was determined that the total number of deaths on the world's cycle
over a period of decades topped one thousand, would it be right to say that there was carnage on the
world's cycle paths? I mean, what will be left to use to describe horrors like World War II if
'carnage' is used to describe what happens on the roads?

Or I don't know - perhaps you're happy using the word because because you (and others on this
thread) feel so strongly about the road death statistics. Me, I prefer to reserve the word for other
kinds of events.

--
Akin

aknak at aksoto dot idps dot co dot uk

On Sun, 4 Jan 2004 18:56:44 -0000, "Sky Fly" <[email hidden]>

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Carnage means "massive slaughter, as in war; a massacre."

Quoted message said:

Guy, when I think of 'carnage', I think of an action or a series of related actions caused on
purpose, as you might see during war.

Could equally apply to a natural disater. The root is from carnis, flesh, so all that's needed is a
big pile of bodies.

Quoted message said:

I honestly don't think that the word 'carnage' describes what goes on on our roads - perhaps
another word should be found for this, but I'm not a big fan of word devaluation where words lose
their value because they used to describe any kind of event,

I think it's appropriate for two reasons: first, I think the scale of road death is shocking, and
the equanimity with which people accept it appalls me. Second, it actually includes the word "car"
so it works on an alliterative level, which appeals to me.

Quoted message said:

if it was determined that the total number of deaths on the world's cycle over a period of decades
topped one thousand, would it be right to say that there was carnage on the world's cycle paths?

No, because the numbers of deaths are small. Road traffic fatalities are the leading cause of death
in the 4-16 age group. /that's/ carnage. Thousands dead every year. More people killed by cars in
the last century than in all the wars during the same period.

Quoted message said:

I mean, what will be left to use to describe horrors like World War II if 'carnage' is used to
describe what happens on the roads?

"war."

Quoted message said:

Or I don't know - perhaps you're happy using the word because because you (and others on this
thread) feel so strongly about the road death statistics.

Got it in one. We are orders of magnitude less likely to cause a road traffic death and at least two
or three times more likely to suffer one, yet we are told by the popular press that even the small
amount of traffic enforcement that goes on is intolerable, and that it is we, and children, and
pedestrians, who should learn to deal with the car, rather than it being car drivers' job to drive
carefully. Is it a surprise that feelings run deep?

Guy
===
May contain traces of irony. Contents liable to settle after posting.
chapmancentral.demon.co.ukchapmancentral.demon.co.ukOpen ↗

Dave Kahn said:

Frank X said:

"Dave Kahn" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
"]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

That's why shared use paths are such a bad idea. A run round the path at Richmond Park is often
marred by the crass behaviour of some cyclists.

marred in what way?

By having bicycles ridden at high speed passing within inches of you.

Depends what you mean by high speed, there is a speed limit in place on that path which should be
kept to, but a lot of people forgot that its use as a bike path was the primary reason for building
it. There are many miles of path round the park where bikes are strictly prohibited, you meet
cyclists by choice when using that path.

Steve

"Dave Kahn" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
"]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Frank X said:

"Dave Kahn" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
"]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

That's why shared use paths are such a bad idea. A run round the path at Richmond Park is often
marred by the crass behaviour of some cyclists.

marred in what way?

By having bicycles ridden at high speed passing within inches of you.

As a cyclist you must be used to having cars crassly overtake with only inches to spare, so I guess
cars on roads are a bad idea?

Running is pretty disconcerting too, I've never hit a ped on a bike but I have knocked one over
while running so I guess we better ban running too.

Frank X said:

As a cyclist you must be used to having cars crassly overtake with only inches to spare, so I
guess cars on roads are a bad idea?

Running is pretty disconcerting too, I've never hit a ped on a bike but I have knocked one over
while running so I guess we better ban running too.

Again it comes down to treating others as you would like to be treated. Its not nice as a cyclist to
have cars overtaking with inches to spare; its not nice as a pedestrian to have cyclists overtaking
with inches to spare. The answer is not a ban in both cases but to leave more room and if there is
not enough room slow down and be prepared to stop until there is. Ditto running.

Remember cycling in the Royal Park is by consent and there is already talk of introducing a speed
limit for bicycles.

Tony

Frank X said:

As a cyclist you must be used to having cars crassly overtake with only inches to spare, so I
guess cars on roads are a bad idea?

If they overtake with inches to spare, in clear contravention of the Highway Code's overtaking
rules, yes, they are a bad idea.

Of course, it's an absurd pieve of reductionism to say that just because someone in a *a* car does
it we shouldn't allow any cars. OTOH that doesn't make it okay for the folk in the cars there are to
break the rules.

Pete.
--
Peter Clinch University of Dundee Tel 44 1382 660111 ext. 33637 Medical Physics, Ninewells Hospital
Fax 44 1382 640177 Dundee DD1 9SY Scotland UK net [email hidden]
dundee.ac.uk~pjclinchOpen ↗

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Carnage means "massive slaughter, as in war; a massacre."

More people have been killed on the roads of the UK since WW2 then the number of British citizens
killed in WW2 itself...

In Europe car crashes are the biggest casue of premature death for those aged between 5 and 35.

World wide in 2002 more people died in car crashes then died in armed conflict.

(Plenty of info to be found on the World Health Organisation site at who.intenOpen ↗ and in
the estimating Global Road fatalities report at factbook.netEGRF Exec Summary.htmOpen ↗ ).

World wide car crashes kill more people then endemic diseases such as malaria.

society.guardian.co.uk0,7884,921595,00.htmlOpen ↗

Add to this the huge number of people killed by pollution from motor vehicles (The British Medical
Council estimates that in the UK alone as many as 22,000 people die prematurely each year due to
pollution produced by cars and lorries). Add to this the hundreds of thousands that die each year in
the UK of diseases related to living a sedentary car bound lifestyle (such as heart disease,
diabetes and certain forms of cancer) and it is obvious that the CARnage IS the most appropriate
word we can use to describe car related deaths...

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Carnage means "massive slaughter, as in war; a massacre."

Reuters

Tuesday, May 13, 2003;

GENEVA, May 12 Traffic kills four times as many people as wars and far more people commit suicide
than are murdered, the World Health Organization said today.

In two reports on injuries, both accidental and deliberate, the United Nations agency said they
killed more than 5 million people in 2000, one-tenth of the global death toll...

Road deaths, totaling 1.26 million, claimed the highest number of victims, followed by suicide at
815,000 and interpersonal violence at 520,000.

Wars and conflicts ranked sixth -- between poisonings and falls -- with 310,000 deaths.

Read that again 'Traffic kills four times as many people as wars.'

Looking at the WHO site is is also notable that car crashes will soon be the third ranking cause of
the total net loss of actual living years. OK, so we all have to die sometime but cars tend to kill
the young and healthy, depriving them of many years of quality life...

"Tony Raven" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
"]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Frank X said:

As a cyclist you must be used to having cars crassly overtake with only inches to spare, so I
guess cars on roads are a bad idea?

Running is pretty disconcerting too, I've never hit a ped on a bike but

I

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

have knocked one over while running so I guess we better ban running

too.

Quoted message said:

Again it comes down to treating others as you would like to be treated.

Its

Quoted message said:

not nice as a cyclist to have cars overtaking with inches to spare; its

not

Quoted message said:

nice as a pedestrian to have cyclists overtaking with inches to spare.

The

Quoted message said:

answer is not a ban in both cases but to leave more room and if there is

not

Quoted message said:

enough room slow down and be prepared to stop until there is. Ditto

running.

Quoted message said:

Yes of course. Consideration is the key, but on balance I don't think it is fair to ban all cyclists
just because of a few inconsiderate ones, causing a minor nuisance.

I also think the dangers to pedestrians of shared use cycling are overstated. Many people are
willing to forgive the massive negative effects cars have on pedestrians but are up in arms about
virtually harmless behaviour by cyclists.

I think a lot of this stems from the British attitude that cycling is for children and it is only
right that adults tell children off, often in a totally hypocritical way.

Quoted message said:

Remember cycling in the Royal Park is by consent and there is already talk

of

Quoted message said:

introducing a speed limit for bicycles.

I have no probem with a speed limit, it is a park after all. If people want to ride fast they should
use the road.

The 'melicans suffer one World Trade Centre's-worth of deths on the road every three and a half
weeks. However, we have yet to see President Twig and Mr Ynot B Liar launch a Wa Against [censored]
Drivers...

--

Dave Larrington - legslarry.beerdrinkers.co.uklegslarry.beerdrinkers.co.ukOpen ↗
===========================================================
Editor - British Human Power Club Newsletter
bhpc.org.ukbhpc.org.ukOpen ↗
===========================================================

Dave Larrington said:

The 'melicans suffer one World Trade Centre's-worth of deths on the road every three and a half
weeks. However, we have yet to see President Twig and Mr Ynot B Liar launch a Wa Against [censored]
Drivers...

Would certainly concentrate their minds under threat of a cruise missile through the windscreen ;-)

Tony

Frank X said:

"Tony Raven" <[email hidden]> wrote in message -"]news:[email hidden]-
berlin.de...

Quoted message said:

Frank X wrote:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Remember cycling in the Royal Park is by consent and there is already talk

of

Quoted message said:

introducing a speed limit for bicycles.

I have no probem with a speed limit, it is a park after all. If people want to ride fast they
should use the road.

Errrr, there already is a speed limit on the only permissible off road track in the park.

Steve