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50 Comments
Go to buyraycon.com/CHRISSPARGOBC to get 15% off the Bone Conduction Headphones! Thanks to Raycon for sponsoring!
RIP Chris spargo
Now pushing crappy low quality headphones because someone paid him.
8:18 talk about timing 😦
I used to cycle a lot more in the 1990s than I do now, including 1,000+ mile cycle-camping holidays. I have never wanted 'cycle paths' next to roads. They 'look foreign' to me. I used to cycle on roads, including epics like the A30, 13, 303, 38, 65, 591 and it was fine. Ok it wasn't as nice as leisure trails, but it wasn't a barrier to going places. The real problem is the increasing number and bloatedness of motor vehicles, and the ever increased invincibility they afford occupants. Cycling on the roads is more and more like a teenage visit to Little Saint James with every passing year.
I think UK road rules "everyone is a road user" is better than segregated traffic. The problem is too many people mechanically abusing their 'share' of the road too much.
I liked the history lesson. I used to love walking around London Wall in the 1980s on the elevated footways there. The problem of public highways has been regarded as a problem for quite some time!
I used to cycle quite regularly, but haven't for quite some time.
In London, at least, cycle infrastructure has always been half-arsed at best, and down right dangerous at worst!
There are a few improvements that you see here and there, but it's obvious that no one is serious about cycle routes or infrastructure.
And yet, it gets pushed by many councils as a healthy option, and there is a lot of cycle traffic on London's roads now.
I've seen a huge increase in cycle traffic by my offices near Tower Bridge over the past 10 years.
I love the editing and the pace of this video!
Just think.. if they'd taken cycling seriously, we might not have laughed at Norman Tebbit so much when he told us to get on our bikes to find work after they'd hollowed out the economy again
Bit odd to do a video on cycle paths without a look at Milton Keynes which has hundreds of miles of somewhat suboptimal cycleways – but they do get used.
You forgot to mention how lorries became more important in transporting goods in the post-war era and how having to accomodate for massive vehicles travelling 70mph and cyclists would be dangerous and make transporting more difficult.
4:32 Loved that little run😆
I think you’ll find cyclists and pedestrians have priority at junctions since January 2022 in UK.
An important lesson to take is certainly that the small advances in cycling infrastructure we now make shouldn't be taken for granted. We don't want a CYBERAITUBER in 2130 standing there going "well actually in the 2020s England tried again to build cycle infrastracture but …"
04:10, worth noting wearing headphones in some countries whilst cycling is illegal.
Cars are now enormous fast moving ugly lumps of metal compared to 1930s cars. There is no serious attempt to offer alternative methods of travel.
05:57, that super unclear who has priority there (obviously H2 applies)
Born in Coventry in 1950, it may come as no surprise that I used that cycle path to cycle to school in 1962, A few years later I lost that path as the A45 was widened. Grrr.
I think a big reason we don't see so many rural cycle paths is deindustrialization. As was mentioned in the video, a lot of factories were built in rural areas, and workers had to rent or buy homes in nearby towns and villages within cycling distance, so it made sense to have these rural cycle paths to connect commuters to these industries. What's interesting is for a lot of these workers, they didn't adopt cars as readily as you'd think post war, they were still unaffordable for many, so motorcycles became popular as an "upgrade" for the bicycle, allowing for a faster commute while being easy to store in small homes similar to a bicycle and not breaking the bank. By the 70's and 80's as the factories closed and with the rise of the company car, you finally saw a shift to complete car dominance in private transportation.
"Even today cyclist dont always like to use cycle paths"
— said the snarky jackass standing on the road, blocking it
Was waiting for this to drop after I saw you filming in Cov! 🙂
I've watched the internet and can confidently proclaim that being inside a shop doesnt equate to 0% chance of getting hit by a car, either.
Don't be afraid of traffic! Instead get yourself a copy of "Cyclecraft" by John Franklin. Check for more on Wiki or Good Reads – there's British and North American versions.
I find it interesting that cycling infrastructure is so bad in the UK. Even though most of the populated areas are pretty flat and have decently wide roads to accommodate for it
This looks like green screen so often, the camera got too good!
8:15 to be fair, you have a tripod set up on the bike path
The cars taking over the road from the cyclists who have been there before and eventually forcing them onto their separate closed off smaller part. It's called carpartheid.
I just came up with that pun and had to share it.
Please don't take it to serious.
What I like about you mate, is that you do your research and because of that, we trust you.
Thank you for the research and effort you put into each post Chris.
Now do the cycling revolution of Stevenage (Carlton Reid also did a great piece on this a few years back!)
Having lived in places like York and Leeds that have a fair number of bikes around and paths it really makes a difference and makes you want to cycle more! It feels so different to where I grew up which had nothing for cyclists and almost noone used a bike
There's still a good bit of that attitude where currently maintained rural cycle paths still exist – to the point of, not far from where I live there's one that was put in after a young cyclist was hit by a car and didn't make it – it's a bad stretch, very possible to sit at sixty despite being made out of semi-blind corners, and you would not believe how many cyclist adamantly ignore the path that poor kid's bereaved mum rammed down the county council's necks.
Your filming quality has really come on leaps and bounds. This video looks so clean
A hell of a lot of our cycle paths are actually old railway lines 😔
0:47 Hmmm… that looks like the A24, by Box Hill. 3:17 Oh wait, that is the A24 by Box Hill! I never knew that cycle path was there in the middle of the carriageways. Although the newer cycle path on the side of the road is very well used!
The problem with people comparing nations to the Netherlands for cycling is that other nations aren't flat, and people hate cycling up hills.
E-bikes change that, but it will be decades until e-bikes become more commonplace allowing more people to cycle without needing to slog it up hills.
There are actually more long-distance rural cycle paths than you might think, although the off-road sections can be patchy. The NCN are designed as long-distance routes, which also happen to work well over shorter distances within towns and cities. It's not perfect, but cycle infrastructure has come so far in the last 10 years.
@3:20 why did they build it like this?
The majority of car on cycle accidents are at junctions where cars cut across (or sometimes through) cycles. On long roads, where crossing the centre of the road is either not allowed or is controlled by lights, having the cycle path down the centre of the road removes the possibility of a cyclist being cut up by a car. It's by far the safest layout for a cycle path.
The shared pedestrian/cycle path in the centre of Marseilles is like this. Without it the busy road with lots of side streets would be certain death for cyclists.
Some very obvious fake backgrounds in some parts
bet if u use it today the cops would not of known that old old path is still around
that ending about 0 cjance of being hit by a car, oddly i was imagining it
It didn't help that in the 1980s the police would actively stop anyone cycling on some of these paths and force them to use the (usually very dangerous) road as the paths had apparently been designated pedestrians only. I found it amusing 20 years later when they turned the path I was prevented from using on a bike as a teenager back into a cycle path after they forced us to use a car for two decades.
This is a good video, but the title is really misleading. I was interested in finding out why the pavement is made of concrete, but the video ended up being about cycling infrastructure, which left me feeling disappointed despite the fact that I probably would have clicked on the video anyway if it was clearly advertised as a video about cycling.
2:34I used to cycle down that stretch to school and back every day, a trip that was just over 5miles long.
"why did they build it like this?" long pause
Chris mate, I love you
Ah yes, tom Scott but bikes
6:55 Luckily I recently watched a video that explained the difference between what the British call "middle class" vs what the term means in other parts of the world
What doesn't help cyclists is how drivers act entitled like they own the road and treat other forms of transport like cycles and motorcycles as intruders. Often acting toxically or being inconsiderate.
Cyclists should also have to take a theory test before being allowed to cycle on the road.
More cycle paths would certainly help keep cyclists safe though.
Everytime someone makes a video about British infrastructure, I am always surprised how much dilapidated infrastructure there is. Train stations, houses, metro stations, roads, factories. And apparently even bicycle paths.
One of the problems is that no matter how high the quality of the cycle paths are people don't use them, which makes me, as a cyclist, absolutely crazy. We can't have it both ways as a country – and both cyclists and car drivers should demand better cycle infrastructure, but then cyclists should actually use the cycle infrastructure that already exists. Otherwise, it just looks like nobody wants it – and if people think that government doesn't track usage of cycle infra and use that to decide these things they are out of their minds.
There are two cycle lanes on that bit of A24, cyclists wont use either and prefer to ride in the road ðŸ˜
But will adults who ride a bike ever number fewer than 80% obnoxious
The special ramp for entering a side street isn’t implemented on rural roads in the Netherlands, but drivers just pay attention. There are almost as many cyclists on the separate path as cars on the road, and there is literally no driver who doesn’t regularly cycle or cycled almost daily in their younger years.