White van man, black cabs, buses and lorries

I must admit, I've vented my spleen at all of the above at some point, so I guess I have to repay the karma in a small way by saying:

Thank you!

to all of the above in the awful grid lock that was most of the City this afternoon due to the road closure and fire in Shitechapel. Drivers of heavies and commercials of all types did their best to clear paths for filtering bikers in the traffic mayhem...

I guess you are not all bastards after all

We had gridlock in Bristol due to Jon Bon fuckin Jovi playing at Ashton Gate. Made my cycle ride home very easy because the cars were hardly moving.

I saw the Rolling Stones at Ashton Gate in '82.

I went by bike. What congestion?

Central London isn't such a bad place really for biking, 'most' London cagers are bike aware*.

I did Manchester and Newcastle in rush hour once and it was much more scary than London despite the amount of 'foreign drivers' (ahem) down here in the smoggy south'. Those Northern cnuts seemed to really begrudge bikes getting past them in their stationary shit boxes whilst stuck in traffic.




* My bike is now repaired and so are my arms, toes, ribs etc.

Know wotcha mean; drivers in London were pretty cool this afternoon, considering the almost total gridlock that happened.

With the heat and the frustration, I wonder if it would boil up against the filtering bikers, but it went totally the opposite, good karama all round.

Perhaps the fumes coming off the fire were from a drug factory

I've said it before and will say it again: black cabs, lorries, white van man - contrary to popular belief, they are the ones on the road who care most for bikes. Classes of traffic that involve "professionally" driving for a living are generally much better to be around (I except buses here, as their stop-start nature means that drivers have to employ "special" tactics).

Folk just love to stereotype and discriminate and this skews their view. Any excuse for a moan, innit.

When the traffic gets really shite and nothing's moving at all I tend to see a hint of the old blitz spirit coming in and people really will try to let bikes through where possible.

I remember one guy pulling his mirror out the way. When I thanked him as I squeezed past he said 'one of us might as well get home for tea' and smiled.



I ride in town most days and IME some of the black cabs are driven by absolute cunts. I think they're just bitter at having had to run around on a c90 for years with a clipboard.

It's a better place for cycling though. More freedom, more fun.

I reserve my hate for bus drivers and minicab drivers in London, the rest are usually pretty good I've found.

Never ridden in London, but in my experience Manchester is much the same; most drivers seem willing enough to either ignore you or actively get out your way. Bus drivers are the worst round here; so Mr lorry driver can use his mirrors, why cant Mr bus driver?

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TALK TO ME OR THE BUNNY GETS IT!

What is this? National Brown Nose Day?

IME black cabs get out of the way whenever they can. Someone told me that, if they have an accident, they have to immediately take the cab off the road to repair it and that costs them money in lost fares and repairs.

Upper Thames St has been gridlocked all this week during the morning and I could have got RSI from nodding or waving to drivers who have made an effort to let me through.