Author Topic: On the commute today (Read 2484805 times)

Pingu · « **Reply #17750 on:** 04 December, 2015, 08:11:39 pm »

Quote from: Mr Larrington on 04 December, 2015, 07:27:56 pm

Quote from: Pingu on 04 December, 2015, 01:27:18 pm
Hit the tarmac this morning - ice on a corner

Bit of road rash on my hip.

Bike's OK.

Is your slidey-peng sig a self-portait then?

Pretty much

Kim · « **Reply #17751 on:** 04 December, 2015, 09:12:44 pm »

I thought it was a cat toy...

Pingu · « **Reply #17752 on:** 04 December, 2015, 11:06:34 pm »

It is, but so is the pointer.

falcon · « **Reply #17753 on:** 05 December, 2015, 11:04:35 am »

Riding home along single track road,what I think was a buzzard sprung into the air from the grass verge no more than three feet away from me carrying a rabbit. It then dropped the rabbit narrowly missing my handlebars and carried on its flight. Made my day. I have been commuting 25 miles per day since July and it's things like that that make me forget about the current horrible weather and appreciate my new lifestyle. Previous job involved a daily three hour drive. Give me my bike any day!

sg37409 · « **Reply #17754 on:** 05 December, 2015, 06:29:56 pm »

Sounds a good commute.
My journey back last night on the brompton was into a killer headwind, but almost worse was the really gusty nature of the wind in the city centre, loads of "wind shear". Rain not too bad, it was light/steady.
Just dropped it into 2nd on my 3-sp for most of the trip and pedalled along. It was fine.

Contrast 1 earlier day where I chickened out and got the tram due to the rain in the morning. In the evening, it was dry and I was a bit pissed off at not being on the bike.

TigaSefi · « **Reply #17755 on:** 07 December, 2015, 01:31:28 pm »

http://www.standard.co.uk/news/transport/new-road-layout-at-elephant-and-castle-causes-misery-for-commuters-a3131086.html

I went through my new route of cutting through Elephant Road behind the station and then using the lights to cross onto New Kent Road towards Tower Bridge so avoided this nightmare start...

alexb · « **Reply #17756 on:** 07 December, 2015, 02:53:49 pm »

Is the new layout at Queen's Circle in Battersea finished? Queenstown Road has been a total disaster for months and I don't know if it's caused by roadworks or the new layout. I turn off at Ravenet Street and then cut through the park and cross the river at Albert Bridge, so never use the new junction.

TigaSefi · « **Reply #17757 on:** 07 December, 2015, 03:08:54 pm »

Quote from: alexb on 07 December, 2015, 02:53:49 pm

Is the new layout at Queen's Circle in Battersea finished? Queenstown Road has been a total disaster for months and I don't know if it's caused by roadworks or the new layout. I turn off at Ravenet Street and then cut through the park and cross the river at Albert Bridge, so never use the new junction.

Yes! It's been completed for a while now.... it's nice.... the lights works well if you are patient or you can just follow a car as usual. It's near where I live so I have no problems with it. Takes a lot of the dicey parts of navigating out of it.

trekker12 · « **Reply #17758 on:** 08 December, 2015, 09:06:58 am »

First time on my bike in two weeks. It rained. A lot.

mcshroom · « **Reply #17759 on:** 08 December, 2015, 09:40:42 am »

Rain right at the end, but hard enough to leave me soaked. Sun was still out all the time it was raining too

alexb · « **Reply #17760 on:** 08 December, 2015, 05:52:48 pm »

Quote from: TigaSefi on 07 December, 2015, 03:08:54 pm

Quote from: alexb on 07 December, 2015, 02:53:49 pm
Is the new layout at Queen's Circle in Battersea finished? Queenstown Road has been a total disaster for months and I don't know if it's caused by roadworks or the new layout. I turn off at Ravenet Street and then cut through the park and cross the river at Albert Bridge, so never use the new junction.

Yes! It's been completed for a while now.... it's nice.... the lights works well if you are patient or you can just follow a car as usual. It's near where I live so I have no problems with it. Takes a lot of the dicey parts of navigating out of it.

Wow! It's totally screwed Queenstown Road then. That used to be one of the places I could get a clear shot at spinning out top gear - no more!

Jakob · « **Reply #17761 on:** 11 December, 2015, 03:34:14 am »

Major lucky escape. One section of my commute has a segregated bike path and it's terrible for right hooks (We drive on the right side of the road here). It was dark and rainy, which just makes it worse and I had already eyed out the car for possible wanting to turn right....and he did..just before the intersection, he indicated and started turning. I was already covering my brake (fixed gear w/ front brake only), but when I pulled on the brake lever, the cable just went *PING* and absolutely nothing happened. No time to leg brake or shouting, I just braced for impact and tried to turn with the car...and then he/she saw me and stopped!!.

Rode up to the next light, stopped and then had a colleague (on a bike) run into the back of me as he thought I was going to jump the light, but I really didn't care!

I'm off to buy a lottery ticket now...

Ham · « **Reply #17762 on:** 11 December, 2015, 08:08:29 am »

Quote from: Jakob on 11 December, 2015, 03:34:14 am

Major lucky escape. One section of my commute has a segregated bike path and it's terrible for right hooks (We drive on the right side of the road here). It was dark and rainy, which just makes it worse and I had already eyed out the car for possible wanting to turn right....and he did..just before the intersection, he indicated and started turning. I was already covering my brake (fixed gear w/ front brake only), but when I pulled on the brake lever, the cable just went *PING* and absolutely nothing happened. No time to leg brake or shouting, I just braced for impact and tried to turn with the car...and then he/she saw me and stopped!!.

Rode up to the next light, stopped and then had a colleague (on a bike) run into the back of me as he thought I was going to jump the light, but I really didn't care!

I'm off to buy a lottery ticket now...

Hope your win covers your cleaning bill

sg37409 · « **Reply #17763 on:** 11 December, 2015, 09:07:34 am »

1st commute this week. Caught in on-call hell and had to WFH. Weather was ok, it felt great to be at my desk after a blast of fresh air.

TigaSefi · « **Reply #17764 on:** 11 December, 2015, 11:25:41 am »

Bit of a moan about the elephant and castle new junction lay out = It's a fucking disaster in my opinion as both a cyclist and driver.
As a driver coming into London on Old Kent Road, you have this stupid system of waiting for the lights to cross onto the other side of a two way system. This just creates a back log of traffic as it's definitely not free flowing.
As a cyclist from old kent road on the way to home. I need to get to Kennington which with the old system, I just take a quick left to the 2nd roundabout except now I have to go ALL the round the roundabout with all the stuck cars

I know the cycle paths aren't open yet but they had better be good logical routes so i can by pass the roundabout and continue to take the first left instead.

ian · « **Reply #17765 on:** 11 December, 2015, 06:08:28 pm »

A girl used unnecessary harsh language on me. Oh my. It seems I had the temerity to slow her egress from London Bridge by not wanting to risk becoming the filling in a bus and lorry sandwich. She actually pushed by me muttering something unsuitably foul under her breath before squeezing through the gap in traffic to get a whole bus length further along. It was ok though, I counted no fewer than five lights attached to her bag, bike, and helmet, so she'll be indestructible. Utterly obsessed with getting ahead of stuff, yet not really making progress, and in the space of King William St managed to shoulder barge a bus and bounce off a van. She peeled off by the Bank of England, to bless the good people of Moorgate with her charms, and her ninja cycling skills.

Jakob · « **Reply #17766 on:** 11 December, 2015, 08:41:59 pm »

Quote from: Ham on 11 December, 2015, 08:08:29 am

Hope your win covers your cleaning bill

I'm seriously considering starting to wear a helmet, explicitly for the purpose of mounting a bright fuck-you light that I can flash into the windows of the cars on that section. To be fair, it's very badly designed with trees between the bike path and road, so I acknowledge that it can be hard to see cyclist and I do give them the benefit of doubt on the worst intersections, but most of it is just negligence.

Jurek · « **Reply #17767 on:** 14 December, 2015, 09:44:46 am »

On my commute not today, but Friday.
Only on Friday it didn't have a clamp on it.
What is weird is not so much the clamp, but the car has been properly cooked.
Where it is on my commute is a very quiet series of small, heavily parked roads, with barriers to prevent rat running - the sort of roads where you'd struggle to get a fire appliance round a corner.
The bizarre thing is that I first saw it on Friday morning, by the time I was going home on Friday night, somebody had cut away the front of the car and removed the engine and gearbox.
I cannot imagine that they'd be useful for anything.

CrazyEnglishTriathlete · « **Reply #17768 on:** 14 December, 2015, 09:54:21 am »

Shared a platform with Richard Bailey of HGV Aware last week, talking about cycling safety to commuting newbies and not-so newbies at our office. Was very useful to hear about an HGV driver's perspective and what they can and cannot see. I didn't make fundamental changes to the way I rode in this morning, but was definitely more HGV aware, particularly of the positioning of their mirrors and what they coudl see and not see.

Maybe that helped to have a slow but mild mannered commute today.

benborp · « **Reply #17769 on:** 14 December, 2015, 10:59:27 am »

Quote from: Jurek on 14 December, 2015, 09:44:46 am

I cannot imagine that they'd be useful for anything.

Scrap value of moderately interesting alloys?

TigaSefi · « **Reply #17770 on:** 15 December, 2015, 09:28:16 am »

Hit a lady last night that walked through two large vehicles without peeking through. I had to filter on the outside as the buses were parked by the kerb. Luckily 10mph hit didn't do much damage to her. I politely told her next time to use the crossing just a bit further down from where she came from!! and were also red for traffic so i would have stopped

Cudzoziemiec · « **Reply #17771 on:** 15 December, 2015, 03:44:19 pm »

Quote from: Jurek on 14 December, 2015, 09:44:46 am

On my commute not today, but Friday.
Only on Friday it didn't have a clamp on it.
What is weird is not so much the clamp, but the car has been properly cooked.
Where it is on my commute is a very quiet series of small, heavily parked roads, with barriers to prevent rat running - the sort of roads where you'd struggle to get a fire appliance round a corner.
The bizarre thing is that I first saw it on Friday morning, by the time I was going home on Friday night, somebody had cut away the front of the car and removed the engine and gearbox.
I cannot imagine that they'd be useful for anything.

It reminds me of the Polish* joke about imported cars.They turned out to be a VW, an Opel and a bus stop.

Probably the engine and gearbox would be useful for similar purposes. The car we had in Poland had its gearbox brought in separately so it could be classed as as non-running at the border: lower duties.

*Certainly told over at least half of Europe.

Cudzoziemiec · « **Reply #17772 on:** 15 December, 2015, 03:46:00 pm »

Quote from: Cudzoziemiec on 15 December, 2015, 03:44:19 pm

Quote from: Jurek on 14 December, 2015, 09:44:46 am
On my commute not today, but Friday.
Only on Friday it didn't have a clamp on it.
What is weird is not so much the clamp, but the car has been properly cooked.
Where it is on my commute is a very quiet series of small, heavily parked roads, with barriers to prevent rat running - the sort of roads where you'd struggle to get a fire appliance round a corner.
The bizarre thing is that I first saw it on Friday morning, by the time I was going home on Friday night, somebody had cut away the front of the car and removed the engine and gearbox.
I cannot imagine that they'd be useful for anything.

It reminds me of the Polish* joke about imported cars.They turned out to be a VW, an Opel and a bus stop.

Probably the engine and gearbox would be useful for similar purposes. The car we had in Poland had its gearbox brought in separately so it could be classed as as non-running at the border: lower duties. Clamping it (is that actually a clamp? what are all those bolt-like things?) does seem a bit pointless.

*Certainly told over at least half of Europe.

TigaSefi · « **Reply #17773 on:** 16 December, 2015, 09:33:56 am »

How is it so humid in December! Was sweating my bollocks off and only had a jacket jersey on!

Basil · « **Reply #17774 on:** 17 December, 2015, 08:38:21 am »

Hey! I was feeling really strong this morning!
Then, as I turned back on the little loop just before work, there was this strong headwind that just came out of nowhere.