Robert Winston and cyclist number plates
Discussion
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/29/robe...
Hmm.
If he had been assaulted by a pedestrian, would he be after pedestrian number plates?
Because number plates solve all of the issues like red light jumping.
How much clout does this chap have? Could this go anywhere?
Hmm.
If he had been assaulted by a pedestrian, would he be after pedestrian number plates?
Because number plates solve all of the issues like red light jumping.
How much clout does this chap have? Could this go anywhere?
I heard this on Nick Ferrari's LBC show yesterday. Seems that Lord Winston "challenged" a woman riding her bike on the pavement. Just a few days before, he was calling for number plates for cyclists. During all of the discussion, no-one explained "challenged"...did he do such a thing verbally or did he "grab" the cyclist? We're not told what he did to kick off such a reaction from the cyclist? Also, did it even happen?
A newspaper reported:
"The Labour peer told the paper he had not reported the incident to the police because it would be "impossible to identify the cyclist"."
Really? In these times of CCTV just about everywhere? The incident happened in Central London.
I ride into Central London everyday Mon-Fri and my biggest issue is with pedestrians, mainly those staring at their phone and crossing the road without looking. Not to mention pedestrians "jumping" the red man and crossing the road. I had 3 peds just walk out in front of me by the Bank of England last week, all staring at their phones and how the fook I stopped in time is anyone's guess.
Note how nothing is being said about the idiots on the eleccy powered skateboards and scooter things, they're the danger - not to mention the idiots riding those cycle taxi things on the cycle lanes...AND...I have to say, the de-restricted e-bikes too. I'm on CS routes riding 20-25mph and many of them pass me? On Victoria embankment last week, I had a bloke on a skateboard and another on a scooter overtake me...I was doing approx. 26mph??? What amazes me is that such people pass Parliament where there is a huge police presence and the police do nothing?
My money is on Lord Winston has made up the whole thing in order to get his leftie bill higher up the ladder and get it passed by parliament - more socialist nonsense. Put forward your socialistic agenda and then create an "incident" to give it some legs. If anything, Lord Winston needs to get on the bike himself.
A newspaper reported:
"The Labour peer told the paper he had not reported the incident to the police because it would be "impossible to identify the cyclist"."
Really? In these times of CCTV just about everywhere? The incident happened in Central London.
I ride into Central London everyday Mon-Fri and my biggest issue is with pedestrians, mainly those staring at their phone and crossing the road without looking. Not to mention pedestrians "jumping" the red man and crossing the road. I had 3 peds just walk out in front of me by the Bank of England last week, all staring at their phones and how the fook I stopped in time is anyone's guess.
Note how nothing is being said about the idiots on the eleccy powered skateboards and scooter things, they're the danger - not to mention the idiots riding those cycle taxi things on the cycle lanes...AND...I have to say, the de-restricted e-bikes too. I'm on CS routes riding 20-25mph and many of them pass me? On Victoria embankment last week, I had a bloke on a skateboard and another on a scooter overtake me...I was doing approx. 26mph??? What amazes me is that such people pass Parliament where there is a huge police presence and the police do nothing?
My money is on Lord Winston has made up the whole thing in order to get his leftie bill higher up the ladder and get it passed by parliament - more socialist nonsense. Put forward your socialistic agenda and then create an "incident" to give it some legs. If anything, Lord Winston needs to get on the bike himself.
Edited by LeMansNut on Saturday 30th March 23:10
LeMansNut said:
My money is on Lord Winston has made up the whole thing in order to get his leftie bill higher up the ladder and get it passed by parliament - more socialist nonsense. Put forward your socialistic agenda and then create an "incident" to give it some legs. If anything, Lord Winston needs to get on the bike himself.
The indecent does seem to conveniently back his arguments up . . .Edited by LeMansNut on Saturday 30th March 23:10
Though I wouldn't be all that surprised if it did happen. If he goes looking for trouble, eventually he will find it.
I find it better to ignore t
ttish cyclists. pablo said:
Mobility scooters are even worse..... Just because your 8mph max class 3 scooter can be driven on the road, doesn’t mean you should... their owners are oblivious to all around them and driving standards are as bad as any cyclist I’ve ever seen.
There's a couple of them knocking around here in my corner of SE London and on the pavement too. In my opinion, the ones I've seen are doing massively more than 8mph. One bloke goes past at what looks to be more like 20mph and usually holding a can of Strongbow? Believe me, I live in "Tosspot Central" where adults ride motorbikes and drive cars on the pavement. I watched a pair of "adults" walk past my place whilst flying a drone about a few feet above there heads. Where's the police, you may say? Well they're usually bombing past at around 70mph. It'll go nowhere, just like all previous attempts at numberplates, licencing and compulsory insurance for cyclists. A junior civil servant will be given a spreadsheet, and a calculator, and pretty soon the cost/benefit analysis will tell them what we already know. Such a system would be prohibitively expensive, and probably wouldn't prevent such an assault anyway.
Plus it's being supported by the "United Cabbies Group". I can hear their knuckles dragging along the ground as I type.
What about number plates for dogs? I mean one bit me a few rides ago and I tried to fight it but it wouldn't stay still. Perhaps if it had a number plate I'd could have calmly taken a photo, and reported it to police, instead of getting worked up, realising I couldn't outrun it, so I got off and got really angry at it, trying to punch it and threatening to beat it to death against a tree. It's owner's reaction? "It's just a dog". Well fk you, bh. If you don't get your dangerously out of control mutt out of my sight, and it's teeth out of my foot, I'm going to kill it, and I might be tempted to kill you too. An over-reaction? Probably, but my dander was rather up at that point as a result of the "fight or flight" instinct, and "flight" having been ruled out by my cycling UP a hill and being unable to outrun the dog. Maybe the dog and the owner need matching "numberplates"? Or maybe we accept the argument that numberplates on cars and motorcycles don't prevent idiots from being idiots and doing illegal stuff on a daily basis. Or perhaps we cyclists ought to embrace the number plate, and then join the BMW drivers club and routinely butcher the issued number plate to make words out of numbers and generally have them look like something they are not. And Christ only knows how big these plates will have to be to be readable by the spinning pedestrian you just whizzed past so fast he's now whirling around like a top.
TL;DR?
Not this fking nonsense again...
Plus it's being supported by the "United Cabbies Group". I can hear their knuckles dragging along the ground as I type.
What about number plates for dogs? I mean one bit me a few rides ago and I tried to fight it but it wouldn't stay still. Perhaps if it had a number plate I'd could have calmly taken a photo, and reported it to police, instead of getting worked up, realising I couldn't outrun it, so I got off and got really angry at it, trying to punch it and threatening to beat it to death against a tree. It's owner's reaction? "It's just a dog". Well f
k you, bh. If you don't get your dangerously out of control mutt out of my sight, and it's teeth out of my foot, I'm going to kill it, and I might be tempted to kill you too. An over-reaction? Probably, but my dander was rather up at that point as a result of the "fight or flight" instinct, and "flight" having been ruled out by my cycling UP a hill and being unable to outrun the dog. Maybe the dog and the owner need matching "numberplates"? Or maybe we accept the argument that numberplates on cars and motorcycles don't prevent idiots from being idiots and doing illegal stuff on a daily basis. Or perhaps we cyclists ought to embrace the number plate, and then join the BMW drivers club and routinely butcher the issued number plate to make words out of numbers and generally have them look like something they are not. And Christ only knows how big these plates will have to be to be readable by the spinning pedestrian you just whizzed past so fast he's now whirling around like a top.TL;DR?
Not this fking nonsense again...yellowjack said:
It'll go nowhere, just like all previous attempts at numberplates, licencing and compulsory insurance for cyclists. A junior civil servant will be given a spreadsheet, and a calculator, and pretty soon the cost/benefit analysis will tell them what we already know. Such a system would be prohibitively expensive, and probably wouldn't prevent such an assault anyway.
Plus it's being supported by the "United Cabbies Group". I can hear their knuckles dragging along the ground as I type.
What about number plates for dogs? I mean one bit me a few rides ago and I tried to fight it but it wouldn't stay still. Perhaps if it had a number plate I'd could have calmly taken a photo, and reported it to police, instead of getting worked up, realising I couldn't outrun it, so I got off and got really angry at it, trying to punch it and threatening to beat it to death against a tree. It's owner's reaction? "It's just a dog". Well fk you, bh. If you don't get your dangerously out of control mutt out of my sight, and it's teeth out of my foot, I'm going to kill it, and I might be tempted to kill you too. An over-reaction? Probably, but my dander was rather up at that point as a result of the "fight or flight" instinct, and "flight" having been ruled out by my cycling UP a hill and being unable to outrun the dog. Maybe the dog and the owner need matching "numberplates"? Or maybe we accept the argument that numberplates on cars and motorcycles don't prevent idiots from being idiots and doing illegal stuff on a daily basis. Or perhaps we cyclists ought to embrace the number plate, and then join the BMW drivers club and routinely butcher the issued number plate to make words out of numbers and generally have them look like something they are not. And Christ only knows how big these plates will have to be to be readable by the spinning pedestrian you just whizzed past so fast he's now whirling around like a top.
TL;DR? Not this fking nonsense again...
Maybe being a member of Strava and recording with GPS should become law and then there will be no hiding for any sportist, there's no way it could be abused, by say integrating traffic light sequences with segments and automatically issuing tickets for flagged behaviour...Plus it's being supported by the "United Cabbies Group". I can hear their knuckles dragging along the ground as I type.
What about number plates for dogs? I mean one bit me a few rides ago and I tried to fight it but it wouldn't stay still. Perhaps if it had a number plate I'd could have calmly taken a photo, and reported it to police, instead of getting worked up, realising I couldn't outrun it, so I got off and got really angry at it, trying to punch it and threatening to beat it to death against a tree. It's owner's reaction? "It's just a dog". Well f
k you, bh. If you don't get your dangerously out of control mutt out of my sight, and it's teeth out of my foot, I'm going to kill it, and I might be tempted to kill you too. An over-reaction? Probably, but my dander was rather up at that point as a result of the "fight or flight" instinct, and "flight" having been ruled out by my cycling UP a hill and being unable to outrun the dog. Maybe the dog and the owner need matching "numberplates"? Or maybe we accept the argument that numberplates on cars and motorcycles don't prevent idiots from being idiots and doing illegal stuff on a daily basis. Or perhaps we cyclists ought to embrace the number plate, and then join the BMW drivers club and routinely butcher the issued number plate to make words out of numbers and generally have them look like something they are not. And Christ only knows how big these plates will have to be to be readable by the spinning pedestrian you just whizzed past so fast he's now whirling around like a top.TL;DR?
Not this fking nonsense again...=D
Scabutz said:
Unelected bellend invents story to push through his agenda that wont work and that he knows nothing about.
Shocking
IVF pioneer and elected Lord wants to be able to identify cyclist who jumped off bike and assaulted him. Perfectly reasonable idea on the face of it, but actually the bloke just gets insulted by internet warriors hiding on car forum.Shocking
Shocking.
popeyewhite said:
Scabutz said:
Unelected bellend invents story to push through his agenda that wont work and that he knows nothing about.
Shocking
IVF pioneer and elected Lord wants to be able to identify cyclist who jumped off bike and assaulted him. Perfectly reasonable idea on the face of it, but actually the bloke just gets insulted by internet warriors hiding on car forum.Shocking
Shocking.
d who didn't want to report this assault to police, but now wants to drive through an act of parliament to solve the perceived "problem".Why didn't he report it to police?
The cynic in me says it's because it never happened, and he knows that reporting something that might later be proved a fairy story could land him with a charge of wasting police time. So he instead uses his elevated position and media standing to peddle his tale of woe and stoke the fires of opinion.
He's as mad as a box of frogs, as is "Ken Ward" from Bristol, who wrote, in a letter to the Sunday Express this week, on the subject of mandatory insurance for cyclists. After a t
twaffley anecdote about fining cyclists 5 Shillings for not displaying their annual tax disc while serving in the Northern Rhodesian Police nearly six decades ago, he wrote this..."But now, with very powerful bikes in use, cyclists surely must be forced to take out at the very least third party cover for death or personal injury.
Failure to do so must be dealt with by hefty fines and/or imprisonment in serious cases."
Which, apart from the question about what punishment (or lack thereof) serial car insurance avoiders ought to suffer, begs the MASSIVE question....
...of just what the actual f
k constitutes a "very powerful bicycle"? Because any bicycle is only as "powerful" as the legs and lungs of it's rider. And before you point to e-bikes, road legal pedal assist bicycles are legally limited and the assistance cuts out at a speed well below that which any reasonably fit adult could pedal a non-assisted bike at. Anyone riding a twist & go electric bike either has to have it SVA tested and properly registered as a motorcycle, or they are riding it illegally, in contravention of existing law. So if someone is breaking the law already, why does anyone even begin to imagine that the same person will fall into line if a new law were to be created?I'm sorry, but anyone advocating "number plates" for cyclists is either a gibbering w
kspangle, or they are the organiser of a mass participation cycling event...
I'll be zip-tying a numberplate to my bike on Sunday. It'll have my name on it too. Then I'll ride a 45 km race on a desolate Welsh beach, and take it straight off again. And if I clatter into anyone, then ride off to make my escape, it'll be of no use to the person I clatter into, because it'll be zip-tied to the front of the bike, which, by the way, is the only safe place that is wide enough and secure enough, on a bicycle, to put a "number plate",
tl;dr? Not this f
king nonsense AGAIN!popeyewhite said:
Scabutz said:
Unelected bellend invents story to push through his agenda that wont work and that he knows nothing about.
Shocking
IVF pioneer and elected Lord wants to be able to identify cyclist who jumped off bike and assaulted him. Perfectly reasonable idea on the face of it, but actually the bloke just gets insulted by internet warriors hiding on car forum.Shocking
Shocking.
It would be like Bradley Wiggins using his social influence and standing to push a genitics issue through social media for his own means.
He may be an expert, but not in this field.
lllnorrislll said:
Or man with scientific / educated background, ignores any previous research, to push his own agenda through privileged channels.
It would be like Bradley Wiggins using his social influence and standing to push a genitics issue through social media for his own means.
He may be an expert, but not in this field.
That chip on your shoulder looks heavy.It would be like Bradley Wiggins using his social influence and standing to push a genitics issue through social media for his own means.
He may be an expert, but not in this field.
"own agenda/privileged channels"
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