Craig Steeland,
Chester Cycling Campaign

Thanks for your message below, Craig. It hasn't been raised yet on the CTC
Rights e group, but will do by cc.

Haven't seen the article yet (will do), but just returned home after
speaking at a meeting of the Green Party and Plaid Cymru at Bangor. It was
mentioned there. It providing a chap of similar vintage yours truly with
the opportunity to go on about cyclists on pavements and lights jumping etc
etc. I would like to think I responded appropriately to a widely held
perspective of some cyclists' behaviour not reflected in the 45,000 killed
and seriously injured on the roads of this country every year by motor
vehicles. Acccording to the worry beads on my abacus, this amounts to
almost 1000 a week ! But figures only aquire substance when given human
form. You will recall this was chillingly achieved by Rod King during his
presentation at the CTC/CCN conference at Warrington.

Do please convey my best wishes to your new neighbours

Regards

Roy
CTC RTR Denbighshire/Conwy

----- Original Message -----
From: "Craig Steeland" <craig@...>
To: "Cyclomania" <cyclomania@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Monday, June 05, 2006 8:57 PM
Subject: [cyclomania] Observer Magazine Cycling Article


> Has anyone had a look at the lengthy piece in yesterday's Observer
> magazine
> about the virulent anti-cycling lobby brewing in Britain at the moment?
>
> Horrific quotes about people wanting to take shot-guns to cyclists, etc.,
> etc.
>
> However, there are some interesting points made by the cyclist author of
> the
> piece:
>
> "Out there, everybody's trying to kill us. Everybody hates us. The council
> hates us, with their potholes, ignored broken glass, imbecile cycle lanes
> and 6in moats around storm drains. Buses hate us, pedestrians hate us,
> cabbies hate us, van men hate us, motorbikes hate us, Lord Howarth of
> Newport hates us, even God hates us, with his wind and sleet and
> unreasonable, arrogant bloody hills. To cycle in Britain is to feel like
> the whole of the universe is giving you the evils......... So, in the head
> of a typical driver, subconsciously and automatically, things like these
> happen: the behaviour of the worst cyclist is used to judge them all; any
> cash the council visibly spends on them seems maddeningly unfair; any
> accident is the cyclist's fault; when making a decision, the motorist puts
> the needs of other motorists first; any behaviour at all that is
> 'different'
> to the driver's own is wrong."
>
> He explains that he doesn't use cycle lanes because "they're filled with
> holes, telephone boxes, grates, craters, broken glass, trees, pedestrians,
> parked cars, waiting cabs and litter bins; but mostly because they stop
> and
> start suddenly, up on high kerbs, so to get off the road and on to them
> safely I'd have to master some nifty manoeuvre to do with quantum
> bi-location, atomic wormholes and halting earth time. Also, they often
> last
> for all of 10 metres."
>
> Over at the Sun, Emma Parker Bowles has come up with her own 'special'
> solution to the problem of cyclists, "There needs to be a natural
> extermination process for these infuriating people."
>
> But then motorists are responsible for "3,500 deaths a year - compared
> with
> cyclists' annual tally of none whatsoever."
>
> If you made some of the comments made about cyclists in the article and
> directed them against women, gay people, or black people, you would be
> likely to be prosecuted for inciting hatred or violence. How can people
> get
> away with talking about cyclists like that?????
>
> Full article is on the web:
>
> http://observer.guardian.co.uk/magazine/story/0,,1788039,00.html
>
> Craig
>
>
>
>
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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