Cycling in London

Just had a few days working there so decided to use bike (Paddington to
Convent Garden) for 2/3 days.

Pretty well first time i've cycled in town for 35 or so years since moving
to Yorkshire.
But it does give a critical view that other "strangers" might not have.

It's absolutely mad, Oxford and some other streets have been made far too
narrow now, nothing can get past the buses - especially an ambulance that
needed to.
Pedestrians are just as dizzy as they always were, wandering mindlessly
about.
So many streets partially or completely closed off making navigation quite
illogical.

The traffic jams on the Friday night. No-one getting anywhere.

Best of all for me was these cycle rickshaws, so many of them, apparently
staffed by bewildered foreigners, steering with one hand, A-Z street map in
other. One had three gigantic fat blokes as passengers - no wonder they're
so very low geared.

I'll be back, I hope.

John
www.calder-clarion.co.uk

John Clayton wrote:

Just had a few days working there so decided to use bike (Paddington to
Convent Garden) for 2/3 days.

probably easyer than tube etc i often just walk when in central.

Pretty well first time i've cycled in town for 35 or so years since moving
to Yorkshire.
But it does give a critical view that other "strangers" might not have.

It's absolutely mad, Oxford and some other streets have been made far too
narrow now, nothing can get past the buses - especially an ambulance that
needed to.
Pedestrians are just as dizzy as they always were, wandering mindlessly
about.
So many streets partially or completely closed off making navigation quite
illogical.



The traffic jams on the Friday night. No-one getting anywhere.

doesn't need central for that out on the edges does that as well heh!

Best of all for me was these cycle rickshaws, so many of them, apparently
staffed by bewildered foreigners, steering with one hand, A-Z street map in
other. One had three gigantic fat blokes as passengers - no wonder they're
so very low geared.

they are quite fun if a rather pricey way to get around.

I'll be back, I hope.

John
www.calder-clarion.co.uk

roger

--
www.rogermerriman.com

In article , John
Clayton writes
Just had a few days working there so decided to use bike (Paddington to
Convent Garden) for 2/3 days.

It's absolutely mad, Oxford and some other streets have been made far too
narrow now, nothing can get past the buses - especially an ambulance that
needed to.

If you need to do it again, check the A-Z for parallel streets that are
much quieter with respect to buses, pedestrians and traffic generally. I
use these.

Pedestrians are just as dizzy as they always were, wandering mindlessly
about.

I blame mobiles and mp3 players. And pedestrians, of course.

So many streets partially or completely closed off making navigation quite
illogical.

The traffic jams on the Friday night. No-one getting anywhere.

That's a feature of London almost anytime. Sundays are as bad as the
rest of the week now.

Best of all for me was these cycle rickshaws, so many of them, apparently
staffed by bewildered foreigners

One of my friends does this - he's Scandinavian and was originally in
marketing, but prefers the rickshaws.

I'll be back, I hope.

I take it you enjoyed the experience overall?
--
congokid
Eating out in London? Read my tips...
http://congokid.com

"John Clayton" wrote

[snip]

It's absolutely mad, Oxford and some other streets have been made
far too narrow now, nothing can get past the buses - especially an
ambulance that needed to.

[snip]

Private cars are banned from Oxford street. Therefore it's the only
street that the Congestion Charge has not helped.

Choose an alternate route, perhaps. Get a copy of the free bike
map(s), by phone, the same phone number that you use for bus or tube
maps: 020-7222-1234. For the old edition, You probably want map 10.
For the new edition, just being issued, it's map 1, "Cycling in
Central London".

Jeremy Parker

On Sat, 11 Aug 2007 00:27:42 +0100, "Jeremy Parker"
wrote:

Private cars are banned from Oxford street. Therefore it's the only
street that the Congestion Charge has not helped.

In a way it's made it worse, as one of the things that came with the
Charge was an increase in bus services.

Some of the problems with it are down to poor street design, though.
It could be made a *lot* better - the stop layout is utterly illogical
from the point of view of traffic management and for the passengers.
This didn't matter with Routemasters, as people normally just boarded
and alighted at traffic lights, but with bendies and modern deckers it
causes chaos.

Neil

--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the at to reply.