Just why are cyclists hated so much in the UK???

Ah, riding on the roads of the UK….
Potholes, flooded road drains, loose gravel… plus loads of really angry drivers! Just why are road users in the UK so angry towards cyclists (or are they just plain angry?) and other road users?
In this video we take a look at why some drivers in the UK really don`t like cyclists (and other road users) and what could be done about it – some good money spent and a change of attitudes would be a good start…
Sworn at, shouted at, narrow passed, spat at, horn blasts – all just some of the hate aimed at cyclists on a weekly basis – its just not right…

#hatedcyclists
#roadrage

www.vintage-velo.org

hi guys I’m Dan at vintag v.org and today going to have a a little discussion about why uh cyclists in the UK face so much kind of um hatred and aggression on the roads um now a lot of this follows uh well it’s been going on for many many years and kind of getting worse and very recently we’ve just had a new bit of uh law legislation come out uh made a crime of death by dangerous cycling where we can be banged up for 14 years um now statistically you know that’s been ridiculed um you’ve got more chance of being killed by a cow sitting on you or being struck by lightning than being taken out by a cyclist uh but that doesn’t stop points politically being scored um and certain areas of the media loving it and lapping that kind of stuff up uh and you know that in turn leads to quite a bit more aggression on the roads aimed towards cyclist now reason for this video I couldn’t help but notice uh I was riding in the UK uh a few days ago and it was a nice warm sunny afternoon probably the reason why I remember it if I’m honest this year uh and uh I was out on the Vintage biani uh lots of chrome lovely celest color matching kit I thought I was looking pretty neat um and I was on my own if you think that kind of thing you know lone cyclist um I would say clearly into vintage gear might get a little bit of a free pass but no so while I was out there um I’m going to change the language uh here for YouTube um but uh twice I ride by Road users car users on the other side of the road so not even guys I was getting in the way of but guys on the other side of the road felt they were okay toh call me an anchor um one young lady again on the other side of the road called me a Fen King ancher very loudly quite impressive um and then I had a narrow pass with a blaring Hall and gesticulation out of the window um and this was just me on my own now I’m sure Club riders or anyone you know sure if you’re going to a breast and there’s eight of you it must be way way worse and I can’t for one moment imagine what it’s like for HSE riders that must be uh unbelievable for them but uh you know it makes you question why it’s got to the point it has um and in this video we’re going to talk about that and perhaps some ideas on what we do about it but uh first off what’s going on so what are the issues uh facing Us in the uh UK well the most obvious um is a colossal lack of spending on any road infrastructure for many many years it’s kind of endemic within the UK I I know I often joke about comparing the road services to that of Belgium parve and sometimes Belgium parve is better maintained than our road system um but it is unfortunately kind of like that in the UK now I appreciate elsewhere in the world you guys have your own problems I know riding in South Africa um is just kind of crazy and a real challenge Australia with the road trains and the dust you face your own challenges there as well but the UK mostly just angry people um and I’ll be honest with you if you ever watch the angry drivers who are angry at us and honking their horns narrow passing or swearing they then once they’re past us they’re tailgating the next car honking flashing lights and they’re just angry there’s an awful lot of anger uh in the UK at the moment and anytime any money is spent on road infrastructure especially if it’s anything to do with cyclist um then that is immediately denigrated by some areas of the media that that money could well be spent uh on road users and car users and they’re the important ones cuz they pay the money um of course we all know that money is not spent it’s never going to be spent on road users but in general the roads themselves and the infrastructure just needs picking up across the board um it’s going to take years for anyone to do anything really substantial because they are really really bad and just to get them back up to a serviceable nature would take years of efforts infrastructure spending and the political will who knows where we go there’s an election this year things could change maybe not no idea so let’s just touch a little bit on the angry driver situation um especially in the UK now probably like most of you watching this we’ve got a probably have a few commuters uh and there it’s a different animal alog together City riding um but certainly um if you’re a recreation Rider mostly like myself um and you’re probably like me doing it for two reasons the first Fitness uh keeping lead keeping fit it’s really good for us the second sheer enjoyment I love riding my bikes I love everything to do with bikes it’s all great but I don’t like uh the anger and the stress put upon me sometimes in the UK um and um my wife uh you know longsuffering as she is to put up with me to be honest um she did point out to me last year when I came back after a very uh uh head up situation where you things were almost coming to blows with another road user and she did remind me that you know I have to sometimes think of those other Road users there I am I’m out riding enjoying myself enjoying the day enjoying sunny day they’re stuck in their cars trying to get from A to B there’s too much traffic um there’s too much smoke the uh potholes are everywhere they’re trying to dodge them they’re all angry and often those same road road users that are angry are the same ones that are then off tail gaing the next car and it’s not necessarily intended to be aimed at us and sometimes we have to change our mentality just a little bit you know um I do appreciate why some uh Riders have helmet cams and they like to upload footage of dangerous drivers to YouTube and things like that in social media shaming I’m not one of them that’s not what I’m riding for um and you’d be surprised can you change a little bit up here your enjoyment for riding again you know even on those tricky things you just kind of shrug it off what do it matter as long as you’re still upright they haven’t hit you it doesn’t matter let them go let them be angry they’re going to be angry with the next person they’re just angry Okay so we’ve now got an understanding of all the problems uh that we Face uh in the UK went out riding and what any potential politicians in the future uh if they ever bother tackling it uh will have to deal with um but let us presume for moment the spirit of Marco pantani magically appears from my bead on bottle and grants me three wishes as Presidente Dan what would I do as Presidente Dan to deal with a situation ha so Presidente aan At Last I win um now you give me three wishes the first one is obvious let’s get spending on the the infrastructure let’s get fixing those Road surfaces properly let’s start Rin fencing some of that tax dollar make sure that everything is looked after and then we can start improving uh difficult interchanges and Junctions and things like that it’s a no-brainer but someone has to start doing it and have the political will to push it through Presidente Dan I’m on it now the second wish is what I think is pretty straightforward um it’s to directly t local authorities and town councils in with Improvement of cycling infrastructure every year um Now by that I mean like if you go recycling around your local town you will probably spot quite a few miles where you could simply add cycle Lanes be that with an adjustment to a passway the side of the lane something like that but you’d be surprised um I think if you were to legally Force authorities uh to perhaps if it’s a town be a mile a year will be an improvement 5 miles a year will be awesome uh but say you’re a city maybe 20 mil 10 mil a year something like that and after a few years you’re going to really start to see um cycling infrastructure improving and what that directly does is get our cyclists Out The Way of the car users um and the truck users which frees up the roads to flow better because we know where we need to be and you know to be fair also with that I’m going to tie in a little carat that you got to clear the broken bottles and stuff like that out of the cycle ways you know for obvious reasons we all know what happens in the UK um but that kind of thing um is what should be done and then very quickly you’ve got much better cycling infrastructure much safer kids are much safer cyclists are much safer but we’re also off the roads and out of the way of other Road users now with my last wish we definitely need to do something about educating Road users in general uh not just about uh cyclists uh and how to be fairer to us but all other Road users as well um it’s going to need like TV advertising social media campaigns things like that get a few famous faes involved uh imagine James May or Jeremy Clarkson actually coming out on the side of cyclist pedestrians and people like that it could definitely you could change attitudes in a few years if you actually wanted to and here’s something I’m going to touch on and I’m not sure whether it’s somewhere I want to go um but the grief you face as a road user on the UK roads if that was because of your ethnicity your religion your gender anything now we’ve got a lot of race hate laws in the UK that are very very tight um and they’re there for very good reason and you know should I have a lit flat butt flicked at me while someone drives past cuz they think it’s funny should I be on the receiving end of verbal abuse regularly should I have half drunk cups of coffee thrown at me or sprayed by someone’s water jets because they think it’s funny you know I’m not going to for one moment suggest that being a Cy is anywhere near um as bad as some of the racial hatred felt over many many years and things like that um but there is no doubt that as a cyclist you are automatically picked out for ridicule by certain sections of society and you know sometimes I think if you legislated for that you probably make the matter worse um I I think it would just make angry people even more angry and Justified that this is outrageous all the time so I’m going to rain back from that one as one of my wishes and just say let’s just stick with trying to make people nicer now I’m back in from a a good ride um giving me a bit more time to think uh also about that last wish uh which is you know changing the cult cure making people um perhaps be a little bit more aware cyclist and maybe like us a little bit more um I mean if you want a clear example of this um if you ride in say Italy Spain France it’s a totally different thing sure the drivers are often pretty mad out on the road sometimes but they’re very respectful of cyclists they give you a lot of space um I very rarely get any kind of narrow pass they go past me a lot slower uh and I often get waved and encouraged and bonage things like that um that’s a regular occurrence so which is kind of cool and it’s a different way of thinking and sometimes I think maybe us as cyclist we could do a little bit more to perhaps help the way we are perceived on the road uh for sure you know jumping red lights yeah uh and uh when we’re riding in groups certainly to a breast uh if you hear a car coming behind one of you pull over uh pull in behind to let that car go past sure legally nothing up riding to breast it’s completely legal it’s completely allowed it’s in the highway code but you know maybe we should uh you know be a little bit more considerate especially if it’s a club run if there’s like eight or 10 of you uh in line and uh put gaps in between as well because you know the roads are busy car pulls out to overtake quite often it needs to come back in again cuz it can’t make it uh you know to do a run of eight of us things like that we have to think of and maybe maybe uh you know we all should be thinking of things like matte black stealth look bikes and and kit on the busy roads of the UK who thought stealth was a good thing fluo yellow hell yeah I mean I want to do anything to stand out I think it looks cool as well uh but anything to stand out on the road I I really don’t get the idea of trying to blend in uh with the background uh when you’re on busy roads full of angry people but that is just my opinion if we changed uh those attitudes perhaps of all of us um it could be a little bit like more winding on the road to Continental Europe which is a much more pleasant thing um and technically doesn’t really require any Law changes uh but uh there we go um will things ever change I don’t know uh the genie of pantani only gave president Dyan three wishes he didn’t give him a crystal ball to look into that future and see what happens I don’t know hopefully people at the top attitudes will change things will change who knows normally it just stays the same anyway thanks a lot uh do like and subscribe for anything more that’s cool to do with vintage bikes thanks a lot