Tactile Paving (or whatever it's called)

[nicknack]

The stuff on shared cycle paths that has grooves in it parallel to the direction of travel or at right angles to it. I believe it's used to distinguish between the cyclist bit of the path and the pedestrian bit.

But which is which?

I always assumed that the right angle stuff was for cyclists, since you wouldn't (if you had half a brain) expect cyclists to cycle in parallel grooves. But I may be wrong. This isn't helped in Medway by their practice of painting the ped bit red and the cycle bit green and vice-versa so you never know which bit you should be on.

[little miss mac]

Round here, the grooves are parallel to the direction of travel... of a bike. Mad, isn't it. I suppose the logic is that if you feel the bumps under your wheels you know you're on the wrong side.

[hellymedic]

I believe the (sub) standard is for the grooves to run parallel to the direction of travel on the cyclists' bit; crazy but true.

[Mike J]

I always assumed that the right angle stuff was for cyclists, since you wouldn't (if you had half a brain) expect cyclists to cycle in parallel grooves. But I may be wrong. This isn't helped in Medway by their practice of painting the ped bit red and the cycle bit green and vice-versa so you never know which bit you should be on.

Sounds to me like the bit by St Mary's island - its very confusing there 

[Polar Bear]

Parallel for cycle lane, perpendicular for footpath.

[nicknack]

I always assumed that the right angle stuff was for cyclists, since you wouldn't (if you had half a brain) expect cyclists to cycle in parallel grooves. But I may be wrong. This isn't helped in Medway by their practice of painting the ped bit red and the cycle bit green and vice-versa so you never know which bit you should be on.

Sounds to me like the bit by St Mary's island - its very confusing there 

Yes, that's the bit. I usually stay on the road.

[Yorkshireman]

There's two 'styles' of ridging. Flat top

and rounded top

I don't have problems with either type (older 700x32c Armadillo), but I've heard of people complaining of 'squirming' on them (don't know which type though). I seem to remember seeing something in a 'Best Practice' on-line document (during a bit of an 'argy-bargy' with the LA highway engineer re cycling facility work/design) that one type (flat topped) is intended for cyclists and run parallel along the path with the other for pedestrians running across the path. I kept the link for the document in 'favourites' for ages but it looks as though it went in one of my occasional clean up sessions. Sorry I haven't been much help.

[dkahn400]

There was a thread on this about 3 years ago on urc started by me after I came within a gnats crotchet of falling on a path in Sutton. At first I assumed the builders had simply laid them the wrong way but then I noticed they were all like that. It is apparently a national standard that they go with the direction of travel for cyclists and at right angles to it for peds. The reason for tactile paving is so that partially sighted people can tell which bit they're on, and I have no quibble at all with the motivation.

Although an hour of two of testing would have told them that for a cyclist running across the ridges is preferable to running parallel to them, the people who came up with the standard apparently did not think to run tests or even ask a cyclist but instead used common sense. "It was felt that" having the ridges at right angles to the direction of travel would discourage cyclists. So now we have yet another reason to avoid cycle paths. What f#@*ing morons!

 

[wizardoftheplains]

Patterned surfaces are specified in the building regulations. They help stop blind gits stepping out into traffic, or falling down stairs, etc. How stupid of them stepping there! We need the ridges running perfectly for us, sod them. Erm.

[nicknack]

Patterned surfaces are specified in the building regulations. They help stop blind gits stepping out into traffic, or falling down stairs, etc. How stupid of them stepping there! We need the ridges running perfectly for us, sod them. Erm.

I don't think anyone's saying they're not needed. Just that they got them the wrong way round.

[Cudzoziemiec]

Logically, you'd think it was the wrong way round. But it seems to work ok. Remember it is for shared-use paths so it's pretty silly to be going fast on them anyway.

[ChrisO]

Speed isn't the issue. You don't have to be going very fast over one of them to start slipping dangerously. Throw in some wet leaves to reduce traction and obscure vision and you have a very unfriendly obstacle.

Then add in the raised white lines they use to separate the two sides of the path to make it completely lethal-when-wet.

I don't even agree with the motivation. How many blind pedestrians have been injured by being on the wrong side of a cycle path ? Compared to how many cyclists have been injured by slipping on the raised white lines and ridges - I know of three reported incidents, one involving fractures, on Tooting Common alone.

[Marmitegeoff]

There is a set around here on a bend at a cross paths.  Wet or dry it tips cyclists off.  I have complained and complained but it is the "national spec", so it is good and works.

I use the road

Geoff

[Cudzoziemiec]

It might be more than just a national spec, since it's used the same way in Poland. Where it's compulsory to use cycle paths when they run alongside a road, but I've never known anyone have any trouble for using the road instead.

I guess the worst situation would be where the ridges are not precisely parallel to your direction but slightly at an acute angle. But still, I've never personally had any trouble with them even when wet. Personally mind.

[Jurek]

Brilliant!

I'll use the road, thanks.

[Polar Bear]

I'm sure somebody will correct me if I'm wrong here but their purpose to blind and partially-sighted users is to ensure that they are aware that they have now entered the cycle lane at ped crossing points, junctions, etc.   At these points it is reasonable to expect us cyclists to take extra care as it is a designated ped crossing place.  OK, so most peds ignore it anyway and free range, just as we would like to do on our cycles.  A free range visually-impaired ped is likely to be a lost and/or anxious ped.   

Don't forget, a significant number of these people may be less agile and capable than most of us.   Please be considerate to them - they rely on these sections of tactile pavement whereas it appears that some cyclists see them as a nuisance, just like drivers see cyclists as a nuisance on the road.

Oh, and it's not a rant.  Just a request to be considerate to others, please. 

 

   

[TimO]

Regardless of their function, when wet the ones around here are lethal.  At any speed, if you aren't exactly parallel to them, they cause my wheels to slip, and that's on my Tourer, Singlespeed, and Brompton.  They are the only thing I've slipped on significantly in the last few years (and I cycle all year, including on snow).  Going across Tooting Bec common, there are a few railings between the cycle side and the pedestrian side of the path (not that many pedestrians take any notice of the two sides).  Whenever the railings start or stop, there are a set of these slabs, they are utterly incredibly unsafe to cycle over.

They may have a function for blind people, but (i) How did they ever survive before they were invented?  (ii) The risk to cyclists seems far greater than the risk to a blind person.

Of course, I suspect the average blind person would get on perfectly well without them, but with our current nanny state mentality, everything possible has to be done to make the world safe for the vulnerable, even though so many of these instances are ill thought out, and on occasion significantly increase the risk to one party or another (often those who are supposedly being helped, cycle facilities anyone?)

[clarion]

I'm with PB on this.

Why on earth would we be travelling at any sort of speed in these places?

And, so long as they are in the line of travel, they're fine - wide enough.  I'd think that going over crosswise ridges in wet/leafy/muddy/whatever conditions would be more dangerous, since you have less contact.

They're not ideal.  But they're not a problem.

Either way, they're not going to change.

[HTFB]

It wouldn't have made any difference to the blind or partially sighted if the convention had been established the other way around, and it would have made a better protection for them. (For us, if ever I am out without my glasses...)

Indeed the round-topped "corduroy" tile illustrated higher up the thread is supposed to be used---running across the path---to provide a rumble strip where cyclists on the path need to take extra care. I've come across it on the A40 cycle path near Witney, warning of concealed entrances.

Crosswise the tiles provide a warning and an incentive to take extra care; lengthwise they provide an unpredictable hazard and a real addition to the dangers of the path. It's unutterably idiotic.

[andygates]

I don't like 'em and they are squirmy, but if people had actually fallen, and complained, the design would at the least be under review.  No?

[TimO]

You don't have to cross these things at speed for them to be dangerous, in fact you are a bit more stable the faster you do cross them, crossing them slowly make you much more likely to come a cropper.

Often the placement is poor.  On the cycle path up the edge of Queenstown Road, adjacent to Battersea Park, there are some situated where the there is a lowered kerb and sloping tarmac.  If the ground is wet you are pretty much buggered in terms of avoiding an odd angled surface and/or going across the slabs non-parallel to the groves.  The arrangement is pretty much optimised to make them more dangerous to cyclists.

[Jacomus]

They patently should be the other way round, as even at the 12mph suggested maximum speed for cycling on a shared path, these parallel lines will make the bike do all sorts of unpleasant wiggles, especially when wet.

It would be a little better if they actually laid the tiles properly, so that all the grooves joined up properly, and no issue at all if someone in planning had stopped to think and just had them laid the other way round.

[Polar Bear]

They may have a function for blind people, but (i) How did they ever survive before they were invented?  (ii) The risk to cyclists seems far greater than the risk to a blind person.

Of course visually-impaired survived before tactile paving and braille below buttons etc., but every little helps improve their quality of life.   I'm sorry but your statement sounds very inconsiderate and lacking in tolerance.

The RISK to cyclists SEEMS...  Manage the risk.   

Please proceed with caution as per the conditions and be considerate to others.

 

They patently should be the other way round, as even at the 12mph suggested maximum speed for cycling on a shared path, these parallel lines will make the bike do all sorts of unpleasant wiggles, especially when wet.

It would be a little better if they actually laid the tiles properly, so that all the grooves joined up properly, and no issue at all if someone in planning had stopped to think and just had them laid the other way round.

The whole point of changing the orientation is to warn the visually-impaired that they have left the ped lane and entered the cycle lane.

Be tolerant of the needs of others please.

[alexb]

Tim and I ride a simiilar route to work. The ones he refers to at tooting Bec are situated at the entrance to the cycle path, so you enter them at an angle if you are crossing from the road into the cycle path.

So you're at 45 deg to the grooves and then you hit a smooth ceramic grooved surface. It's lethal in slimy wet conditions. Even worse if the path has wet leaves on, which it always does in autumn since the leaves collect in the grooves and when they salt the paths the combination in the early morning is worse than ice.

Why not make them from something other than a slippery ceramic surface?

Another gripe about that path is that they have fitted "safety" barriers in parts of it to divide cycle path from pedestrian path. However, the copuncil lorries can only use the cycling side, since the bins on the pedestrian side make it too narrow for them. As a result the cycling side is always flooded in wet weather because the lorries rut the side of the path and allow water to pool up on the edge.
The barriers don't stop dogs or small children crossing into your path, but they are very effective at stopping the parents/owners from grabbing them. A cleverer design would have been to either omit them completely, or fence right down to the ground.

It's a classic designed nightmare.

[TimO]

They may have a function for blind people, but (i) How did they ever survive before they were invented?  (ii) The risk to cyclists seems far greater than the risk to a blind person.

Of course visually-impaired survived before tactile paving and braille below buttons etc., but every little helps improve their quality of life.   I'm sorry but your statement sounds very inconsiderate and lacking in tolerance.

The RISK to cyclists SEEMS...  Manage the risk.   

Well, the phrase seems could equally apply to visually impaired users.  I'm sorry if you think what I said is intolerant, because it isn't intended to be, but actually cyclists do have rights as well, and the relative risks to all users should be compared and justified.  To me it doesn't seem that these paving slabs significantly improve the safety to blind or visually impaired users whilst they do significantly increase the risk to cyclists, and this has nothing to do with the speed that cyclists go over them at, or whether cyclists are not considerate of other users in their vicinity.