Yet Another Cycling Forum

General Category => On The Road => Topic started by: trekker12 on 27 January, 2019, 09:24:35 am

Title: Dealing with congestion
Post by: trekker12 on 27 January, 2019, 09:24:35 am
I received a survey this week from our local candidate hoping to become the next conservative mp. We currently have a labour mp but that only changed in the last general election (I didn't vote for either party).

The survey was all about congestion and what did I think about improving parking, fixing potholes, bus and train services in and out of the town, the building of a new bypass, what would make a difference locally to me and my journeys etc.

No where, not once was there any mention of cycling and walking provision or improving the air quality by reducing traffic. It was entirely about 'me and my car'.

At every opportunity I added comments about poor cycle lanes and highlighted not everyone has to drive somewhere.

You never know he might actually read it......
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: diapsaon0 on 27 January, 2019, 05:07:13 pm
You'll be lucky!
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Phil W on 27 January, 2019, 05:34:43 pm
Make driving short distances as inconvenient as possible whilst improving cycling and walking provision will clear congestion no end.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: ian on 27 January, 2019, 05:37:11 pm
Sadly, people do drive everywhere and those of us that don't are in a very small minority.

Reading about two shops closing in our local town centre, the usual about 'there's no parking' came up, which is always bizarre, because there's lots of parking and its even free, but yes, you would have to walk maybe two entire minutes. There is actual parking on both sides of the high street, of course, but that's all the space there is. If your business is dependent on somehow abrogating the physical laws of the universe and manipulating time and space to allow several cars to park simultaneous in the same place, well, I admire your optimism. I'm not sure, to be honest, that people get up in the morning and decide to drive to the local town centre just to buy a sausage roll either.

The irony, of course, is that car-culture is one of the key things killing local high streets. I think it says something that people just don't get that, there's a certain blindness.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: cycleman on 27 January, 2019, 06:51:38 pm
Rely on parliament  , not me  . I use  sinex.  O:-)O:-) ;)
In my ideal world only emergency services and suppliers for shops would be able to use motorised transport. Disabled people would have electric mobility available.  Even if we had a rule of one car per family congestion would largely disappear.
One can dream  :)
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Ben T on 27 January, 2019, 07:16:34 pm
Wouldn't even need to be that radical. Simply ban (overnight) parking on the road. If you want a car, you need to either own or rent enough land to keep it on.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: De Sisti on 27 January, 2019, 07:22:38 pm
In my ideal world only emergency services and suppliers for shops would be able to use motorised transport. Disabled people would have electric mobility available. 
There's a massive supply chain in the manufacturing and maintaing of motor vehicles who'd end up
unemployed. There'd also be thousands of people in rural areas who'd also be disadvantaged
in your world.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: grams on 27 January, 2019, 07:39:09 pm
Many people would be freed from the burden of work, you mean.

We are talking about an *ideal* world.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: drossall on 27 January, 2019, 08:16:28 pm
Wouldn't even need to be that radical. Simply ban (overnight) parking on the road. If you want a car, you need to either own or rent enough land to keep it on.
Although I'm not sure I'd support this (my son parks on the road outside our house for a start), I was fascinated by the reference in "Roads Were Not Made for Cars" to the early debates about street parking. Highways are, in law, as I understand it, for the passage to and forth of the public (or words to that effect). Use of vehicles is no more than a reasonable way of achieving that - it's the public, not the vehicles, that the roads are for. So, parking those vehicles is outside the intended purpose of roads, and owners of horses and carts were expected to meet Ben T's requirement above.

In the age of the motor vehicle, enforcing this quickly became impracticable, and had questionable public support.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: hellymedic on 27 January, 2019, 08:29:07 pm
The legal requirement for parked cars to be lit when parked on the road reduced the desire to store parked cars there. On street parking really took off after this was lifted.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: orienteer on 27 January, 2019, 10:05:32 pm
In Japan you must have off-street parking for a full-size car (not mini-cars), and it is illegal to park in the road anywhere, anytime. Too late to introduce that retrospectively here I fear, and it hasn't prevented congestion in Japan. But bikes are used extensively for utility purposes, and urban areas are well-served by rail. Rural lines are closing, partly due to depopulation leaving just the elderly.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: De Sisti on 28 January, 2019, 05:50:54 am
Many people would be freed from the burden of work, you mean.
....and have to rely on unemployment benefit. How will that be funded in an ideal world.
Oh, I know, money trees. :-D
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Jaded on 28 January, 2019, 07:44:49 am
Without cars we’d have fewer people anyway.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Peat on 28 January, 2019, 08:32:08 am
In Japan you must have off-street parking for a full-size car (not mini-cars), and it is illegal to park in the road anywhere, anytime.

I like the 'Parking Towers' every few blocks.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: ian on 28 January, 2019, 10:41:08 am
Managing on-street parking would certainly help mitigate the current predicament (not to mention make the urban environment far better and more appealing – which makes it more likely people will walk and cycle). At a minimum, all vehicles should be safely parked on the road. There should be zero tolerance for pavement (and other forms of already illegal) parking. It's not just annoying, it's dangerous. If we let people park wherever they want, they'll just keep acquiring more cars, and they won't be small cars, because excessive parking optimism seems to be an actual pathology that many drivers suffer. If you have difficulty parking your current car, why not buy a bigger one. Then write to the council to complain about the parking situation.

Frankly, the entire industry based around cars is a con that just sucks money out of people and governments. It's tax money that pays for roads and the costs of the sprawl they facilitate (which is orders of magnitude higher than direct costs), for the massive healthcare needs (direct medical interventions each year, plus the impact of air and noise pollution etc.), and direct corporate welfare to the car manufacturers. Not to mention, that new cars are now literally debt-vehicles for a growing financial sector. And of course, the costs are paid primarily by us – a society structured so we have to have multi-car households so we can hold jobs that enable us to maintain multiple cars. And the corollaries roll downhill from there. It's not the people sitting in the cars that benefit from any this. They don't even get the joys of an open road that the adverts promised. They get a queue for the Tesco carpark and a rapidly expanding gut.

Cars aren't evil – we have one – but a society entirely based around motor vehicles is a sickly one.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: mattc on 28 January, 2019, 01:14:48 pm
Many people would be freed from the burden of work, you mean.
....and have to rely on unemployment benefit. How will that be funded in an ideal world.
Oh, I know, money trees. :-D
You could start a war - they're good for jobs (and unemployment figures).
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: trekker12 on 28 January, 2019, 01:22:03 pm
I have three cars. My father owns four - of those seven cars four of them were built before 1980 and two others are the same (sort of) manufacturer which is now defunct. All of the cars are parked off the public road and most of them do <2500 miles per year.

I'm a petrol head, motorsport enthusiast and competitor and I'm completely and utterly sick of the motor industry for the reasons Ian highlights and the misery that comes with every day driving.

Driving, even 23 years ago when I passed my test was fun, I enjoyed going places in Mums car and then the joy and freedom that came with saving up and buying my first actual car (which replaced the 1978 MGB I never drove). Insurance was relatively expensive, tax was quite expensive and petrol wasn't cheap but I would get in my car just for he fun of driving it. I went to university and studied a Motor Engineering degree where I met a bunch of like minded people who introduced me to the muddy world of Rallying, a sport I still occasionally compete in.

All this time I've also ridden bikes and the more often I do it the more I realise how pointless driving is. I am conflicted because of the reasons above but I actually hate it. I want congestion eased to make driving fun again, for those that want to drive, not those that the motor industry and the governments they fund tell them it's the only option they have.

And before you ask an electric car is on my wish list but my main car is only at 135,000 miles so why should I change it :)
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: ian on 28 January, 2019, 01:40:55 pm
Our car does <1000 miles a year (much to the amusement of the garage that does the MOT). It's there if we need it, but we don't rely on it, and it wouldn't significantly impact on our lives if we didn't have it. It's quite liberating not to be dependent on two cars, most of the people we know are effectively wedded to their cars, and everything they do involves a default car journey, worries about parking etc. If they enjoy the 'freedom' of car ownership, they don't show it. That and the expense, because what car you drive is apparently most people's measure of status.

When we last moved we did consider moving further afield, but it was the reliance on cars that put us off.

I learned to drive in the US, where there really isn't an option not to drive unless you're in NYC. While it was fun at first, after a while it got tedious that every single task involved in picking up your car keys, but of course that's the expectation if you're living in North America.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Peat on 28 January, 2019, 01:49:23 pm
That and the expense, because what car you drive is apparently most people's measure of status.


My brother-in-law gets visibly agitated by the sight of my 12 year old, rarely clean, smokey old estate. He hates 'bloody cyclists' at the best of times, but that I would rather spend my money on them instead of upgrading my motor is the source of great confusion/frustration for him as evidenced by him remarking on it every time I see him.

As a matter of principle, I am now committed to running this one into the ground, if only to annoy him.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: trekker12 on 28 January, 2019, 01:52:54 pm
That and the expense, because what car you drive is apparently most people's measure of status.

Which, considering most cars are purchased on credit or lease schemes is even more stupid.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: arabella on 28 January, 2019, 01:55:50 pm
I've yet to elicit a sensible response to the question as to why folks pay £x/month for a car to sit in a traffic jam, rather than progressing past it on a push bike.
I just hire a car/van when required.  Cheaper than having a car full time by my calcs.
Our road is lovely when empty of nose-to-tail with parked cars (on the pavement, so I walk in the road, which isn't popular with said motorists ...)
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: grams on 28 January, 2019, 01:59:01 pm
....and have to rely on unemployment benefit. How will that be funded in an ideal world.
Oh, I know, money trees. :-D
Who needs money when the robots provide for our every need?
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: ian on 28 January, 2019, 02:33:01 pm
That and the expense, because what car you drive is apparently most people's measure of status.

Which, considering most cars are purchased on credit or lease schemes is even more stupid.

Yes, it's a growing issue, basically, new cars are now often (mostly?) just another excuse for generating debt for the finance industry to sell derivatives off the back of. That worked out so well for mortgages, too.

I can appreciate that some people like and are interested in cars, but I do wonder about the average person just worried that other people may think of them based on the car they drive. I know people who I'm quite sure earning far less than my wife and I do, have a couple of kids, a large mortgage, and still manage to produce a pair of expensive cars on the driveway. I guess they have a lot more appetite for debt than we do. We run a 12-year-old Ford Ka, bought new and thus far only needed a new battery and set of replacement tires with the last MOT – once something expensive breaks, we'll probably buy whatever the cheapest electric car is at the time. Though I'm hoping for a few more years. Our last car was a VW Golf that we sold at the grand age of 18 to someone who wanted something to learn in (we were hardly using it, it tended to dramatically overheat in stop-start traffic, and parking where we lived in Shepherd's Bush wasn't worth the effort).
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: markcjagar on 28 January, 2019, 09:01:37 pm
I'm 30, never learned to drive, never needed too, still don't.

If you live in a city there's no point in owning/running a car yet everyone I work with is paying off massive loans so they can have a nice new shiny toy.

I work with a 24 year old who has a nice looking Audi. His dad bought a nicer model Audi and he won't shut up about how he needs a newer/flasher car because he's embarrassed that his dads got a nicer one. I don't understand how he affords the insurance let alone the finance...
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Phil W on 28 January, 2019, 09:19:49 pm
There is a lot to recommend the low cost life style.  The lower your outgoings, the more relaxed you can be about the job you do.  Too much debt and you need a suitably stressful job just to service it.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Kim on 28 January, 2019, 09:20:08 pm
If you live in a city there's no point in owning/running a car yet everyone I work with is paying off massive loans so they can have a nice new shiny toy.

It wouldn't be so bad if they actually seemed to get pleasure from them...
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: ian on 29 January, 2019, 09:05:49 am
There is a lot to recommend the low cost life style.  The lower your outgoings, the more relaxed you can be about the job you do.  Too much debt and you need a suitably stressful job just to service it.

That's the circular irony though, people have to work to pay for the car to get them to work to pay for the car.

Debt is a valuable commodity though, the financial sector has grown leaps and bounds by securitizing and derivatizing our debt. Mortgage, personal finance, car loans, it's all grist. You can guess who benefits from this.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: trekker12 on 29 January, 2019, 11:12:38 am
I'm 40 in May, I have a few old cars lying around none of which are particularly valuable, I just get enjoyment from working on them. Our day to day car is currently in the car park here at work (out of town industrial estate) because I didn't cycle today. It's 15 years old, has 135,000 miles on the clock and there are younger people here with much bigger nicer, newer cars who probably look at me in disdain and I really don't care.

I don't know many other nearly 40 somethings without a mortgage and absolutely zero debt. I know I'm lucky and not having kids has a significant impact on disposable income but I get to go on ski-ing holidays and cycle tours through Europe rather than watching (figuratively speaking) my bank manager go on such trips.

If my job ends tomorrow I won't worry, I'll probably not go on holiday in the summer but I'll be OK for a while. It would give me a chance to get one of my old wrecks back on the road!
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: matthew on 29 January, 2019, 11:33:19 am
I live on a recently built estate. Each house has two car paring spots, one on a driveway and the second in the garage. Most households have two cars but none store them in the garage therefore a lot of the houses use the road outside their front door for a second car. However not all the houses are adjacent to the road so not all have this facility, therefore there is often conflict over using the designated visitors bay for the extra vehicles.

Recently a household moved into one of the properties, three cars and occasionally the son's works van as well. They do have road parking for one car and drive for the second but the garage is full of boxes and the other 1 or 2 vehicles are in the fight for the visitors space and blocking other areas.

Me I have one car on my drive and a garage full of bikes and tools.  :smug:
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: trekker12 on 29 January, 2019, 11:38:20 am
Some of us with too many old cars and even more bikes are desperate for a proper garage (I keep one car in Dad's) and yet all over the place no-one ever keeps their car in the garage.

This is mostly to do with the fact the car they paid for with a giant debt is too big to fit in the garage because it has to be bigger than the car next door.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: matthew on 29 January, 2019, 11:53:34 am
But the developer had to come back and rebuild some of the garages as they were too narrow for the vehicles. New doors, relocate the access stairs to the coach house above and then new dividing walls.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: ian on 29 January, 2019, 12:55:21 pm
One suspects that if you annexed a part of the road outside your house to build additional bedroom because you had another child it would be frowned upon. Yet it's apparently OK to do so with cars.

I used to manage a small private estate of 12 houses in south London, each house had one parking space (for a four-bed) along with four guest spaces. I got fed up of the arguments pretty quick, what you see is what you get, I can't manufacture additional parking spaces. I blocked off stupid parking places with heavy planters. I'm not sure what the logic is in buying a house with one parking space if you have four cars (the estate agent told them 'it would be OK' apparently).
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: orienteer on 29 January, 2019, 02:20:07 pm
If you calculate the cost of renting a plot of land large enough to park one car, I'm sure it would be more than the annual car tax in most localities.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Gattopardo on 29 January, 2019, 02:24:47 pm
I received a survey this week from our local candidate hoping to become the next conservative mp. We currently have a labour mp but that only changed in the last general election (I didn't vote for either party).

The survey was all about congestion and what did I think about improving parking, fixing potholes, bus and train services in and out of the town, the building of a new bypass, what would make a difference locally to me and my journeys etc.

No where, not once was there any mention of cycling and walking provision or improving the air quality by reducing traffic. It was entirely about 'me and my car'.

At every opportunity I added comments about poor cycle lanes and highlighted not everyone has to drive somewhere.

You never know he might actually read it......

Ah the tory that cut spending....
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: teethgrinder on 29 January, 2019, 03:06:03 pm
One suspects that if you annexed a part of the road outside your house to build additional bedroom because you had another child it would be frowned upon. Yet it's apparently OK to do so with cars.


I own a 2 bed flat that comes with a parking space and have no car. I haven't looked into it, but I expect that I wouldn't get planning permission or permission from the landlord to put a shed on my own parking space. I doubt they'd object to me owning a large van and parking it in my own space though, which I have considered.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Ian H on 29 January, 2019, 03:13:53 pm
Wouldn't even need to be that radical. Simply ban (overnight) parking on the road. If you want a car, you need to either own or rent enough land to keep it on.
That would discriminate against the less-well-off.  Besides, especially in residential areas, parked cars are effective traffic-calming features.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: ian on 29 January, 2019, 04:12:13 pm
They would be if they parked them on the actual road and not the pavement.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Cudzoziemiec on 29 January, 2019, 04:17:33 pm
People working to pay off debts incurred to buy cars they need to get to jobs they have to have to buy cars and stuck in traffic and not enjoying it one bit used to be referred to by Patrick Field as "the primary victims of car dependency".
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Kim on 29 January, 2019, 05:09:31 pm
Wouldn't even need to be that radical. Simply ban (overnight) parking on the road. If you want a car, you need to either own or rent enough land to keep it on.
That would discriminate against the less-well-off.  Besides, especially in residential areas, parked cars are effective traffic-calming features.

For values of traffic-calming that might reasonably described as "traffic-enraging".  Sure, it slows the cars down, but effectively creating pinch-points or single-track roads makes drivers more likely to close-pass or bully cyclists.  I'm sure we've all had the pleasure of cycling uphill on a residential road with cars parked on both sides so there isn't enough room for a safe overtake...
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: ian on 29 January, 2019, 05:15:22 pm
People working to pay off debts incurred to buy cars they need to get to jobs they have to have to buy cars and stuck in traffic and not enjoying it one bit used to be referred to by Patrick Field as "the primary victims of car dependency".

Yet those are the same people who will demand more cars, more parking, more roads and fight any attempt to change that paradigm.

Possibly in the same way as more guns are the solution to violent crime.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: markcjagar on 29 January, 2019, 09:23:49 pm
I'm sure we've all had the pleasure of cycling uphill on a residential road with cars parked on both sides so there isn't enough room for a safe overtake...

Far to often, unfortunately. They'll never accept they're likely part of the problem
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: drossall on 29 January, 2019, 09:54:53 pm
That's the circular irony though, people have to work to pay for the car to get them to work to pay for the car.
There was a calculation once. Take the average annual mileage of a car. Divide it by the hours taken driving it, cleaning it, filling it with petrol, and earning the money to pay for its purchase, maintenance, fuelling, storage, etc.

It would be quicker to walk.

(But we do have a car. Officially, it's my wife's.)
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Ben T on 29 January, 2019, 11:32:04 pm
One suspects that if you annexed a part of the road outside your house to build additional bedroom because you had another child it would be frowned upon. Yet it's apparently OK to do so with cars.


I own a 2 bed flat that comes with a parking space and have no car. I haven't looked into it, but I expect that I wouldn't get planning permission or permission from the landlord to put a shed on my own parking space. I doubt they'd object to me owning a large van and parking it in my own space though, which I have considered.

Why don't you just rent it out?
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: teethgrinder on 30 January, 2019, 11:15:36 am
Who would pay me money to park their car in my space when they can park on the street for free? Especially if it will involve a short walk as people prefer to park outside their own doorstep.
Parking isn't a problem in the cul de sac where I live. Everyone seems to have 1 car per home. It's when I turn out into the street, it's the usual 2 lanes turned into 1 by parked cars.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: trekker12 on 30 January, 2019, 01:34:39 pm
Unfortunately by the time you have taxed it, MOT'd it insured it and moved it into your space even for storage you would be better off going to a local container storage company.

If you don't tax it, one of those people blocking the rest of the street but unable to use your space will look it up on the DVLA and report you for owning an untaxed vehicle. Even if on private land the freeholder would probably decided they have a right to remove it if the DVLA can't be bothered.

You might be able to declare it SORN but that would depend on the rules for your flats. Someone will be petty enough to get upset about it no matter what you did.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Cudzoziemiec on 30 January, 2019, 01:38:13 pm
You could use a caravan to avoid all those requirements.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Ben T on 30 January, 2019, 02:37:17 pm
Who would pay me money to park their car in my space when they can park on the street for free? Especially if it will involve a short walk as people prefer to park outside their own doorstep.
Parking isn't a problem in the cul de sac where I live. Everyone seems to have 1 car per home. It's when I turn out into the street, it's the usual 2 lanes turned into 1 by parked cars.

Maybe not if there's free parking generally available...but it is 'a thing', possibly more so in bigger cities. One of my flats in sheffield has got one which was 10 grand to buy, as it is it just goes with the flat and slightly increases the rent of the flat, but it is possible to rent it out separately.
Is it a designated space or just the right to park 'somewhere'? If the former, you might find people park in it anyway, you could then simply invest in some yellow stickers...  :demon::)
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Cudzoziemiec on 30 January, 2019, 03:32:03 pm
People renting out their driveways is a thing in some places.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: trekker12 on 30 January, 2019, 03:36:18 pm
Especially if you live near a major sports or entertainment venue.

https://www.parkonmydrive.com/
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: teethgrinder on 30 January, 2019, 07:21:37 pm
It's a designated parking space and (my) private property, so I could probably SORN a van and dump it there, even wheel clamp it if it works. Nobody uses it as far as I know. I can see it if I poke my head out of my bedroom window.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: ian on 30 January, 2019, 07:37:01 pm
When we lived in Brockley, we parked our dustbin in our dedicated space (on the private street), otherwise, it would have been annexed (we lived a few minutes from the station). I think we could have been persuaded to rent it if anyone had asked, we'd got rid of our car and it was only occasionally used by guests.

In the next place, our neighbours wanted to rent our space (in fact they came round about five minutes after we moved in). Which would have been nice, but we liked the idea of parking our own car in it.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: teethgrinder on 30 January, 2019, 07:48:52 pm
If you do have an unused parking space that you could rent out, especially in a premium area, then I don't think you should overlook the malevolent glee of not renting out that space and blocking it off so that it can't be used. Money simply cannot buy such riches.... :demon: ;D
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Adam on 30 January, 2019, 09:37:07 pm
I'd deliberately park an old bike in the space and bolt it into the ground.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Jurek on 30 January, 2019, 09:53:53 pm
With a sign stating:
'Car parking space occupied, by prior arrangement'.
Or something..... :demon:
No. That's just mischievous.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Ben T on 30 January, 2019, 10:48:28 pm
Or just park a really, really small car there, like a matchbox toy car.
Or a skip  :)
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: De Sisti on 30 January, 2019, 10:53:39 pm
Or just park a really, really small car there, like a matchbox toy car.
Or a skip  :-)
A skip? And have all the neighbours fill it with their rubbish?

Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: JennyB on 31 January, 2019, 07:40:44 am
It's a designated parking space and (my) private property, so I could probably SORN a van and dump it there, even wheel clamp it if it works. Nobody uses it as far as I know. I can see it if I poke my head out of my bedroom window.

Or if that 'lowers the tone'  an 'orse box trailer.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: drossall on 31 January, 2019, 08:09:30 am
Or in the case of one of our neighbours, a large boat. It used to be a medium-sized boat, but overnight a good few years back it doubled in size. It's down a quiet cul-de-sac arm of a quiet cul-de-sac, so it doesn't cause any problems, but it's an unusual sight out of the window ;D
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: mattc on 31 January, 2019, 09:00:12 am
recently on one of the site roads where I work there was a parked hovercraft - that was also an unusual sight!

weird shit like this often pops up on ebay - classic car restoration projects are often abandoned and are basically worthless to their owners, so there are probably other (more interesting) vehicles around for pennies. (military jets? )
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: DuncanM on 31 January, 2019, 11:37:40 am
Get a tank and park it there just to intimidate anyone who might be tempted to block you in! ;)
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: yorkie on 31 January, 2019, 12:27:56 pm
Get a tank and park it there just to intimidate anyone who might be tempted to block you in! ;)
My younger brother has a Daimler Ferret armoured car and has been known to do exactly that!
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: mattc on 31 January, 2019, 12:31:55 pm
Get a tank and park it there just to intimidate anyone who might be tempted to block you in! ;)
My younger brother has a Daimler Ferret armoured car and has been known to do exactly that!

Has he worked out how to park it WITHOUT intimidating anyone?!?
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: yorkie on 31 January, 2019, 12:39:25 pm
Get a tank and park it there just to intimidate anyone who might be tempted to block you in! ;)
My younger brother has a Daimler Ferret armoured car and has been known to do exactly that!

Has he worked out how to park it WITHOUT intimidating anyone?!?
Yep, a large shed on a remote farm in the middle of nowhere. Also comes in handy for storing the 7.5 ton Bedford truck (also ex-military) which he uses to transport the aforementioned Ferret.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Ben T on 31 January, 2019, 11:35:58 pm
It's a designated parking space and (my) private property, so I could probably SORN a van and dump it there, even wheel clamp it if it works. Nobody uses it as far as I know. I can see it if I poke my head out of my bedroom window.

Or if that 'lowers the tone'  an 'orse box trailer.

Or just an 'orse.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Jakob W on 01 February, 2019, 08:40:17 am
I gather wooden ones are good for storage...
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Butterfly on 01 February, 2019, 12:47:48 pm
My dad discovered that a dodgy an enterprising mate of his had been renting out the spaces in the church car park to Whitstable commuters. There were a lot of days when the church didn't use it and was very convenient for the town or the station.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Jurek on 01 February, 2019, 01:10:44 pm
I've done car park duty in the charity car park in the school that's next to the library in Whitstable.
Park your car and pay by voluntary contribution, stay as long as you like.
We took over £700.00 on the Saturday that I was there - That's 09:00 to 17:00
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: hubner on 10 February, 2019, 12:50:56 pm
Don't we need MORE congestion for private motorists but minimal or no congestion for public transport and emergency vehicles?

How we get to that of course is the question, and it won't be easy given that everything in the UK for the last 60 years has been based around the motor car.

Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Cudzoziemiec on 10 February, 2019, 12:58:07 pm
I'm not sure that more congestion for private motorists will benefit the world at large. Vehicles at idle are less efficient and more polluting. And they're an eyesore. They also prevent use of the road for other vehicles and other purposes, including crossing the road. And they're still cars.

There might be gains to be had from concentrating private motorist traffic on a few main roads, perhaps by use of selective filtering, but only to the extent that it puts people off driving.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: quixoticgeek on 10 February, 2019, 11:03:27 pm

So where I live we have a problem with parking. Despite a large obvious space that is accessible and has a number of vehicles parked there, people have taken to parking their vehicles on the pavement, usually at the choke point where there is already a lamp post in the pavement. The lamp post constricts the pavement width such that a wheel chair won't fit, and only the narrowest of push chairs will fit. Parking a vehicle there makes it almost impassible except on foot if you stand sideways. It's driving me nuts, not just the inconsiderate parking, but which ever moron put the lamp post there. I've been considering getting some cards printed up with "you park like an arsehole" in a selection of languages and fixing them to the vehicles in question.

This is Amsterdam, all vehicles in this situation are bikes (or a close approximation, if you're charitable in how you define "bike").

We have to be careful, what we say now about the parking of cars on our streets, if we take the cars away, people will start saying the same about bikes. Sure parking a bike takes up less space than a car, but you're still using public land to park a private vehicle.

J
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Cudzoziemiec on 10 February, 2019, 11:13:30 pm
Several months ago I went out with the local CTC on one of their Wednesday night pub rides. The pub we ended up at was, unusually, right in town, meaning security was an issue and the only thing to lock to was a lamppost and some railings. These were on the pavement, with cars parked legally and reasonably along the street. "I don't think we should park there," said Dave (it's a rule of these rides that there's always at least one Dave), "I'm conscious that we won't leave enough room for a wheelchair to pass." And he was right. Inconsiderate parking which blocks the passage of a wheelchair or push chair is inconsiderate whatever the vehicle is. It does no good to excuse it on the grounds that it's smaller than a car.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: quixoticgeek on 10 February, 2019, 11:15:20 pm


This is the lamp post:

(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DzFIHuhX0AIodCV?format=jpg)

The space behind the small railing where the bikes are, has stepped access at either end, so if you are in a wheel chair or a buggy, you have to go round it via the bit where the lamp post is...

People have taken to parking bikes between the lamp post and the small railing.

J
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Cudzoziemiec on 10 February, 2019, 11:28:06 pm
Why does Streetview, presuming that's what that is, scrub out the shop names with red blocker like that in NL? Or did you do it, in which case same question?

Solution here is surely to remodel the street so that area of pavement is accessed by a slope instead of/as well as steps. But in the meantime, no, people shouldn't be parking bikes (or cars or shopping trolleys) there.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: quixoticgeek on 10 February, 2019, 11:35:55 pm
Why does Streetview, presuming that's what that is, scrub out the shop names with red blocker like that in NL? Or did you do it, in which case same question?

I did, it's from street view, and to make it harder to find the building.

Quote

Solution here is surely to remodel the street so that area of pavement is accessed by a slope instead of/as well as steps. But in the meantime, no, people shouldn't be parking bikes (or cars or shopping trolleys) there.

Yes, but that would be a complicated situation, as the land between the building and the railing is owned by the building, where as the pavement is owned by the Gemente (city council).

The lamp post could be moved back 2 tiles, or forward 2 tiles, then there is enough space.

The thing that just boggles the mind is how anyone thought it was ok in the first place. It's just crazy.

J
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Cudzoziemiec on 10 February, 2019, 11:38:34 pm
Why does Streetview, presuming that's what that is, scrub out the shop names with red blocker like that in NL? Or did you do it, in which case same question?

I did, it's from street view, and to make it harder to find the building.
No one would have paid any attention to it before but now half of yacf will be searching for it.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: quixoticgeek on 10 February, 2019, 11:59:25 pm

No one would have paid any attention to it before but now half of yacf will be searching for it.

Good if you work it out, do send me a postcard :p

J
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Kim on 11 February, 2019, 12:02:42 am
Do we have a geoguessr (https://geoguessr.com/) thread?
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Cudzoziemiec on 11 February, 2019, 12:33:13 am
As if you have to ask! (https://yacf.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=71569.msg1483101#msg1483101)
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: quixoticgeek on 11 February, 2019, 11:04:54 am

Double whammy of shit parking today!

(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DzHp2n8X0AYB9Iv?format=jpg)

The BMW is across 2 marked bays, and the bike. Just wow.

The bike looks like it's one from Swapfiets.

Now what's the Dutch for "you park like an arsehole"...

J
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Jurek on 11 February, 2019, 11:15:10 am
Je parkeert als een klootzak.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Cudzoziemiec on 11 February, 2019, 11:20:40 am
(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DzHp2n8X0AYB9Iv?format=jpg)
You forgot to obliterate those distinctive wall and trestle (railway relic) structures, we'll all be geoguessing your location now.  ::-)
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Cudzoziemiec on 11 February, 2019, 11:22:00 am
Quote

Solution here is surely to remodel the street so that area of pavement is accessed by a slope instead of/as well as steps. But in the meantime, no, people shouldn't be parking bikes (or cars or shopping trolleys) there.

Yes, but that would be a complicated situation, as the land between the building and the railing is owned by the building, where as the pavement is owned by the Gemente (city council).

The lamp post could be moved back 2 tiles, or forward 2 tiles, then there is enough space.

The thing that just boggles the mind is how anyone thought it was ok in the first place. It's just crazy.

J
There's another wide issue here of space that appears to be public but is privately owned.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Peat on 12 February, 2019, 03:54:12 pm
On topic article: https://road.cc/content/news/256093-most-congested-roads-arent-those-cycling-infrastructure-whatever-opponents-cycle
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Jaded on 12 February, 2019, 11:03:23 pm
(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DzHp2n8X0AYB9Iv?format=jpg)
You forgot to obliterate those distinctive wall and trestle (railway relic) structures, we'll all be geoguessing your location now.  ::-)

It it in Foreign Place?
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: quixoticgeek on 12 February, 2019, 11:28:30 pm
It it in Foreign Place?

That would depend on where you are...

J
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Jaded on 12 February, 2019, 11:34:04 pm
 ;D

Soon, everywhere will be Foreign Place.  :'(
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: quixoticgeek on 28 February, 2019, 05:04:37 pm

Just had an email from the Gemente (City council), they agree the lamp post is in a poor position and will move (or is it remove, my Dutch is not so good), they reckon it will be at least 50 days before it happens.

Oh, and swapfiets called the person renting the bike who moved it within 24 hours, (or swapfiets came and collected it, not sure).

I honestly expected the Gemente to say "meh, go away", esp as I filled in the form in English. I'm impressed!

J
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Cudzoziemiec on 01 March, 2019, 08:34:02 pm
Wow zoinks! I'm not about to start contacting the city council here in Dutch!
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Kim on 01 March, 2019, 09:20:33 pm
Wow zoinks! I'm not about to start contacting the city council here in Dutch!

I might try that next time they do something ridiculous in the name of cycle infrastructure...
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Cudzoziemiec on 02 March, 2019, 06:39:10 pm
Dutch would be near the top of the short list of "Western European languages you rarely hear on the streets of Bristol." You'd have far better chance in Spanish, Italian or even German.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: fd3 on 03 March, 2019, 04:02:24 pm
Wouldn't even need to be that radical. Simply ban (overnight) parking on the road. If you want a car, you need to either own or rent enough land to keep it on.
That would discriminate against the less-well-off.  Besides, especially in residential areas, parked cars are effective traffic-calming features.
Most systems to reduce traffic are: congestion charges, increased tax on cars (emission based or not), higher fuel duty - all are things that hit poorer people hardest.  Also, we've seen in London that cost-based approaches work for a short time, but then people complain about the cost but still drive.  In Paris they shut roads and turned them into pedestrian beaches, made roads one-way and the like.  I think that's the most effective approach, but we won't make any money out of it.
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: quixoticgeek on 22 June, 2020, 01:08:12 pm

(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DzHp2n8X0AYB9Iv?format=jpg)



Just had an email from the Gemente (City council), they agree the lamp post is in a poor position and will move (or is it remove, my Dutch is not so good), they reckon it will be at least 50 days before it happens.

Oh, and swapfiets called the person renting the bike who moved it within 24 hours, (or swapfiets came and collected it, not sure).

I honestly expected the Gemente to say "meh, go away", esp as I filled in the form in English. I'm impressed!

Today I woke up to find construction workers outside, it would appear that the lamp post has been moved across the street to next to the bins (left in the photo above). Meaning the pavement is nice and clear. It took them a long time to do, as apparently the ground conditions meant they couldn't move it a short distance to clear the path, hence the somewhat grander solution of moving it to the other side of the building.

It was not a fast process. But it looks like we have the right outcome eventually.

WIN!

I'll post a photo when I've been outside to take it.

J
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: quixoticgeek on 03 July, 2020, 09:38:15 pm

Update. Came home to find that they have moved the lamp post yet again. Seems that they didn't like it's new position, so they moved it from the left of the bins... to the right of the bins...

J
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: Cudzoziemiec on 03 July, 2020, 09:41:42 pm
Seems like the "Flying Dutchman" was actually a lamp post!
Title: Re: Dealing with congestion
Post by: quixoticgeek on 03 July, 2020, 09:51:49 pm
Seems like the "Flying Dutchman" was actually a lamp post!

Housemate has suggested that the new location may have interfered with the truck that comes to empty the bins.

Either way, it wasn't on the footpath when I cycled home, so I am happy.

J