Are cars really the problem? London cyclists, it’s time to look within our ranks
Have vigilante cyclists shouting at cars been waging the wrong war? London biker Mauricio Alencar says it’s time for cyclists to look within their own ranks for the real problem on London roads
This week, a viral video on X showed the dangers of cycling in London – not for cyclists, but for everyone else. The clip, filmed at the floating bus stop at Farringdon Street, shows hordes of bikers recklessly streaming over a zebra crossing as pedestrians are left stranded, unable to cross, on both sides. Unfortunately, a frequent scene at this particular junction.
While cyclists with cameras strapped to their heads (see Jeremy Vine and Cycling Mikey) have demonised motorists for aeons now, the recklessness of cyclists themselves has long been ignored. No longer.
I am a cyclist myself. I began cycling last summer.It’s now quicker, cheaper and livelier to get into work. Bike doctors funded by Westminster Council have sorted my issues on numerous occasions. I also think the introduction of e-bikes is one of the best things to happen to the capital in recent years and has made travel on nights out far easier. Lime is nice, but Forest is far better.
But this is now a moment of reckoning. While e-bike riders are by no means morally pure, there is one particular group of uncouth pedallers terrorising our streets that everyone seems too scared to call out: dweebs in lycra.
Identifying the enemy
These cyclists are the worst of our lot. Worse than novice riders, tuk tuks or racers using mechanical doping. Shiny-sided and high in the air, my view of these offending types is more often than not from the rear. I call them the bums.
These bums mainly come in one form. They wear skin-tight lycras. They have eye-sore crotch cushions installed. They balance on their two pedals when they are forced to wait at a crossing where an elderly lady is waddling by. They probably run low-alcohol beer companies or pretend to be investors in carbon capture and the like. Their gears screech as they cycle. They wear overpriced helmets and a sad-looking pair of shoes. They will brush your shoulder as they whizz past you on narrow roads. Their bums are normally small, if toned. And they have no care for the rules of the road.
To me, these small bums are public enemy number one. One of their specialty traits is worse than everything else, and I can only explain it by an example. When you are riding from the City to Westminster Bridge on the Thames cycleway, you come to a traffic light which only goes green for a number of seconds. It is an irritation, certainly, especially when one is in a rush, and the cycleway is often clogged. Nonetheless, rule-respecting, God-fearing cyclists like myself line up to form an orderly queue. But not the bums. Rather than wait their turn at the back, they cut the queue, veering to the opposite side of the cycleway to overtake the whole pack and join the head of the peloton. Nasty, contemptuous, and very, very un-British.
I admit, I’ve taken to angling my own bicycle at a diagonal to stop them being able to pass – my first step in a civil war against the bums, which I hope my fellow cyclists will join.
It’s time for cyclists to step up
For years, the National Federation of the Blind UK has rightfully vented fury at floating bus stops, while pedestrians too are now making a late entrance to the Hundred Gears’ War. But really it should be up to us fellow cyclists to reprimand our more deviant ranks.
That doesn’t mean making it harder, or worse, to cycle in the City. I refuse to endorse critics saying there should be fewer cycle lanes (although floating bus stops are quite obviously a travesty) and I will not back those suggesting workers should not receive discounts to buy bicycles. But there are clearly circumstances where city planners have sided with the wrong team.
Take the crossing between Southwark Bridge and Queen Street through Upper Thames Street. Which fool thought it was a good idea to allow cyclists to invade a path that has strangely-positioned plant pots on it? Which joker thought that cyclists would obey traffic lights that allow pedestrians, not cars or motorbikes, to walk freely? Likewise, floating bus stops, the infrastructure at the heart of this recent furore, are clearly a travesty. In my view, refusing to stop at a zebra crossing should be worthy of time in community service.
An easy remedy would be to ban cyclists from wearing lycras unless they are competing in a race. If you are wearing a lycra because your bum is hurting too much, you should not be cycling that far. Cycling to work should be a casual affair, not some twisted ego trip for Tour de France wannabes who think themselves to be the kings of London.
Better yet, I implore my fellow cyclists to pause in their war against motorists, and instead look within. Together, fellow bums, pedestrians and motorists, we can bring peace and order back to London.
My manifesto for good bums
- Never wear lycra on the commute
- Wait your turn at the Thames cycleway
- Accept that cars aren’t always the villain
- Slow down at pedestrian crossings even if you plan to disregard a red light
- Don’t be an arse