Pots, kettles and cyclists
Regarding Peter Whitehead’s Life Cycle column in your October 8 issue (‘Magda does lycra a favour’) – it’s marvellous to see so many people taking up cycling. It’s environmentally friendly and it is said to improve the health of cyclists. They have every right to use the road and motorists should extend to them every courtesy.
What is unfortunate is that many cyclists feel so menaced by contemptuous, thuggish motorists that they have retreated from the roads to our footpaths. Unfortunately, the upshot is that cyclists have become very widely feared by pedestrians.
Considerable numbers of cyclists continue to flout laws respecting our pavements – so far, with impunity. They ride at speed on pavements reserved for pedestrians and they don’t even bother to ring a warning bell.
This dangerous behaviour continues, despite the fact that the authorities seem so anxious to secure the cyclists’ vote by pressing ahead to meet their demands by increasing the number of shared pathways and the construction of more and more dedicated cycleways.
Meantime, because of the apparent disdain many cyclists appear to have for pedestrians, there are increasing public calls for cyclists and their bikes to be registered so that the lawbreakers among them can be more easily identified and legal action can be more effectively pursued against them.
In the interim, surely more official policing of our pavements and footpaths is necessary. For example, some cyclists continue to appear oblivious of the 10 km/h speed limit notices for cyclists that have been posted on the Pyrmont Bridge, in the interests of safeguarding pedestrians.
Mr Whitehead noted in his column that driver awareness (of cyclists) is the critical factor in safety. Let’s hope more cyclists become aware of the fact that some of their number have made our pavements and footpaths perilous zones for pedestrians, and that the perceived behaviour of arrogant cyclists is provoking increasing outrage.
After all, the president of the Pedestrian Council, Harold Scruby, notes that elderly victims of hit-and-run cyclists often “don’t come back”. Even a relatively minor injury such as a broken pelvis can entail weeks of lying supine in hospital, with the concomitant danger of a fatal infection.
Ava Hubble, Pyrmont
