1880s

This Saturday sees the fifth annual staging of the Tweed Run, in London. Riders will be entertained by the legendary, 1960s-vintage Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band and judged on sartorial elegance by tailors on Saville Row, who come out en masse to watch the 500 riders roll by. This year’s chosen charity is CTC, which was once a very tweedy organisation.

In 1878, the uniform of the newly-formed Bicycle Touring Club – forerunner to CTC – was meant to consist of “dark green Devonshire serge jacket, knickerbockers, Stanley helmet with small peak, and Cambridge grey stockings.”

Not all members were in favour of this proposed colour combination. One critic wrote:

“I must say that grey stockings with green uniform will look absolutely hideous. Why not all dark green?”

All dark green was duly adopted and H Goy of Leadenhall Street, London, was appointed the club’s official tailor (there were also official CTC tailors in most towns and cities throughout the UK; today, of course, there’s Dashing Tweeds, as used by the always dapper Gary Fisher). However, dark green showed “every spot of dirt” and “looked shabby” so the colour was changed in 1882 to “fast-dyed all-wool grey cloth, washable without injury.”

Not all members liked the fact there was only one uniform. In the mid-1880s a member said:

“even in the CTC, class distinctions existed and no amount of Club feeling will annihilate them.”

The member did not think that “baronets should be called upon to wear the same uniform of bricklayers.”

In the 1880s and 1890s this was, largely, an irrelevant point. Most cyclists were middle or upper class, bicycles were for the rich. It was only after the end of the Bicycling Boom – at the very end of the 19th century – that a great many affordable bicycles came on the secondhand market, toff cast-offs.

The British Library holds a copy of Cyclists’ Touring Club’s Uniform rules & regulations, London, 1888. This small pamphlet – coincidentally produced in the ‘Year of Jack the Ripper’ – offers a chance to see and touch what kind of all-wool clothing members of the Cyclists’ Touring Club rode in. Eminently sensibly, the pamphlet remarks that none of the official garb contained cotton. Modern outdoors people know that cotton absorbs and holds sweat, chilling the wearer.

However, the CTC’s E.R. Shipton, club secretary and who wrote the uniform guide, described the act of perspiring and the advisability of use of wicking fabrics far more prosaically: “cotton [is a] material which is a fatal stumbling block to the proper discharge of the bodily functions when undergoing fatigue.”

The uniform – complete with official “helmets”, would you believe – was officially abandoned by the Cyclists’ Touring Club in 1907.

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March 26, 2013 by carltonreid

Former Tory MP dies after “getting out of the way of motor-cars on his bicycle”

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East Grinstead in 1907 doesn’t look terribly swamped with motorcars and would have probably been even less so three years earlier. This was when Sir William Thomas Charley shuffled off this mortal coil. The 71-year old died on a hot July morning shortly after he said he had been “getting out of the way of motor-cars on his bicycle.”

Sir William had been a Conservative MP in the 1860s and 1870s, and later became a judge. Originally from Ireland, Sir William had been living in the Sussex town for five years before his death. Cycling, according to an obituary in The Times, was “one of his favourite recreations.”

He had been president of the Pickwick Bicycle Club – the world’s oldest extant cycling club – for the five years between 1885 and 1889. (He’s still the longest serving president). Sir William was a socially-aware Victorian gent, one of the founders of the United Kingdom Beneficent Association, a charity providing financial help to older people in poverty. This was created in 1863 and now known as Independent Age.

In 1904, there were 8,465 motorcars in use in the whole of Great Britain. Today that’s about the number of private cars in just East Grinstead.

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Photo credit

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March 25, 2013 by carltonreid

Motorists and cyclists are not two tribes, historically they’re from the same tribe

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AA President Edmund King is hot on dispelling the myth that motorists and cyclists come from different planets. In a ‘Two Tribes’ presentation given to a road safety conference he said: “We really must get past this dangerous ‘them and us’ mentality that sours interactions between different groups.” And on Twitter he tries to reduce the animosity shown to cyclists by motorists, and vice versa. The fact remains that – for some motorists, and for some cyclists – never the twain shall meet. Yet, historically, cyclists and motorists have far more in common than many may imagine, a theme I will explore in Roads Were Not Built For Cars, the Kickstarter campaign for which is still taking pledges.

Stanley Show of Cycles, 1896. Cycles, and horseless carriages, too. 12 of them. Two had been displayed at the 1895 Stanley Show, the first time the British public were shown these new contraptions.

It’s usually assumed – and, thanks to some automotive historians, often explicitly written – that motorcars evolved directly from horse-drawn carriages. This is not so. In fact, if a paternity test were possible, it could be strongly argued that motorcars have more bicycle DNA in them than carriage DNA. Extending the metaphor, the automotive industry grew from seeds planted in the fertile soil that was the late 19th century bicycle market. The early motorists – especially the ones who raced for a living – tended to have been cyclists before they were seduced by the greater speed and power of motoring. The first car purchasers were rich and posh, and many would know how to mount and steer their new motorcars because the first motorcars were very much like the tricycles they had only recently given up. A member’s list for the 1904 Automobile Club of Great Britain and Ireland shows that many of the members were proud to display their love for cycling and committee members were officials of cycling organisations, too (E. R. Shipton was editor of the Cyclists’ Touring Club Gazette; Henry Sturmey – who gave his name to Sturmey Archer gears – was also a cycling journalist: wrote a classic 1877 book on cycling and also founded a motoring magazine). The first automobile manufacturers tended to be cyclists: from Henry Ford to Charles Duryea in the US, and Charles Rolls and Lionel Martin in the UK (Rolls Royce and Aston Martin were both co-founded by cyclists). Many of the first car parts were bike parts: the first motorcar wheels were heavy-duty spoked bicycle wheels, and they were later shod with that great cycling innovation, pneumatic tyres.

MOTORING’S DEEP LINKS WITH CYCLING
There were many motorised road-going machines before the birth of the motorcar – mostly steam-engines of one form or another – but the first true car was the one developed by Karl Benz in Germany. Benz was a cyclist and went into business with cyclists. In 1883, he co-founded a gas engine business with Max Rose and Friedrich Wilhelm Eßlinger, owners of a bicycle repair shop. Benz & Cie flourished and enabled Benz to experiment with bicycle technology to create his first motor vehicles. Unlike the horse carriages of the day, which used wooden spoked wheels, Benz used wire spoked bicycle wheels for his first Motorwagen. He also used the same differential gears and chains used on the bicycles of the day. The first true motorcar was a tricycle with a motor, and shared no DNA with horse carriages.

The second customer for Benz’s third design – the first commercially available automobile in history – was Emile Roger, a Parisian bicycle manufacturer. In the UK, the Benz Motorwagen was promoted as a “motor velocipede” not a motor carriage.

John Kemp Starley, originator of the Rover safety bicycle (Land Rover cars were developed by the company created by JK Starley), is one of Britain’s most unsung engineers. As well as developing the bicycle that “set the fashion to the world”, JK worked on an electric car. His battery-powered tricycle, above, was developed in 1888.

Over in the US, Charles Edgar Duryea was the designer of the first-ever American-made gasoline-powered car. His brother, Frank, built this ground-breaking machine. Charles, the elder of the two, trained as a mechanic and after completing his studies he worked in a bicycle shop in Washington D.C. in the mid-1880s. By the end of the decade he had designed and patented a number of bicycle innovations, including a hammock saddle and, to take the sting out of the rough roads of the day, a variety of frame-mounted spring suspension devices.

He was talent spotted by bicycle maker Harry G. Rouse of Peoria, Illinois and the two went into business together as the Rouse-Duryea Cycle Company. This company – via gun and sword maker Ames Manufacturing of Chicopee, Massachusetts – made the Sylph ‘comfort’ bike for men and women.

An 1892 trade catalogue for the company said:

“Our Mr. C.E. Duryea is well known as one of the most prolific practical cycle inventors in America, and as the originator of number cycling features of great value.”

In 1891, Charles designed a gasoline-powered engine but didn’t progress with it. His brother – who had joined the Rouse-Duryea Cycle Company – carried on working on the engine, and perfected it. In 1893, Charles Duryea made the first trip in an American-made, gasoline-powered ‘automobile.’

By 1896 – while still working in the bicycle trade – Charles and Frank Duryea offered for sale the first commercial automobile in the US, the Duryea Motor Wagon. One of these was bought by Henry Wells of New York.

On May 30th 1896 Wells drove his Duryea Motor Wagon into New York City to take part in a motorcar race organised by Cosmopolitan magazine (then called The Cosmopolitan). While racing on public roads, he crashed into Evelyn Thomas, riding a Columbia bicycle on Broadway near West 74th Street. Wells became the first motorist arrested for what would later become known as dangerous driving.

Thomas had been planning to attend a Civil War Memorial Day service but, instead, was hospitalised with a fractured leg. While in hospital, she was visited by Horatio Earle, the leading light of the League of American Wheelmen, and who was elected to the Michigan Senate in 1900 (It was Earle, a cyclist, who pushed through legislation to create the State Highway Department and who later pushed for the earliest freeways in America).

Thomas related her story to Earle and both agreed that cyclists’ rights on the highway would need protecting from a new menace on the road.

Duryea’s Motor Wagon sold in low numbers (13, in fact, unlucky for some, including Ms Thomas), but a vehicle inspired by the Duryea vehicle would soon sell in its millions. But the Model T wasn’t the first motorcar built by Henry Ford. He called his first vehicle the Quadricycle: it used four bicycle wheels, it was chain driven and it even had a bicycle lamp on the front. All of this is natural enough: Henry Ford was a cyclist and even when he had a car factory he rode his bicycle to work.

Ford promoted his cars by demonstrating how fast they could go. To do this he hired bicycle racing champions, Barney Oldfield and Tom Cooper.

Another famous car racer was also a cyclist. And, in fact, remained a cyclist. Or, strictly speaking, a tricyclist. Lionel Martin was the co-founder of the famous motor marque Aston Martin, the British sports car driven by 007 James Bond. Martin was a racing cyclist and was the holder of a number of long-distance records, including tandem and tricycle records. He was a tricyclist to his dying day. Literally. He was killed in October 1945 after being knocked from his tricycle by a motorcar on a suburban ‘rat run’ road in Kingston upon Thames. Ironically, he got into motoring after being thrown from his tricycle in 1900 by a waywardly-driven motorcar. “I saw the monster approaching and I threw myself and ‘iron’ into the nearest ditch, counting myself lucky to escape with my life,” he later wrote. He and his business partner Robert Bamford became specialists in taking ordinary cars and ‘souping them up’ to go faster. The Aston Martin name came from a hill climb race at Aston Clinton in Buckinghamshire (close to the modern day Aston mountain bike course in the Wendover woods). Martin drove a modified Singer car very fast up this climb and, when Bamford & Martin Ltd needed a name for their new car brand, they chose to combine the words Aston and Martin. Singer cars were produced by a company that, of course, had started life as a manufacturer of bicycles. George Singer’s bicycle company was one of the earliest, having been founded in Coventry in 1874, and produced high-wheelers at first and Safeties later. George Singer, while still a maker of bicycles, was Mayor of Coventry three years in succession from 1891-1893.

The Hon. Charles Stewart Rolls – aristocract, playboy, daredevil and co-founder of Rolls Royce – developed his love for speed at Cambridge University, where he won a cycling Half Blue, a university sporting award. Rolls had a collection of bicycles from solos up to four-man tandems. That’s him on the left, on a four-man tandem. I’ve cropped out the other riders and will print the full pic in the book. I’ve licensed the pic from the Science Museum.

In the university newspaper, Rolls gives tips on how to mount a bicycle: “You will first find it necessary to hop two or three times or more till proficient, when one hop should be sufficient.”

KEEP READING, AND WATCHING
In this blog article I’ve just scratched the surface of early motoring’s direct link with cycling. There will be much, much more in the book, available for Kickstarter pre-order right now.

Even if you don’t plan to buy a book, or Kindle or iPad version, do watch the video below. It shows another motoring link with cycling: an 1897 horse, autocar and bicycle repository. This is in my hometown of Newcastle and is a globally-significant example of an extant bicycle/car showroom from such an important cross-over period. In the video I ride an 1890s bicycle in the former Cooper Motor Mart. It’s now an architect’s HQ. Ryder Architects rescued the building and renovated it beautifully.

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March 7, 2013 by carltonreid

“You wouldn’t put Mark Cavendish on a penny-farthing…”

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EE is trying to sell folks its 4G service by using fast athletes on slow modes of transport. “You wouldn’t put Steve Redgrave on a pedalo” is one of the treatments, the other is this take on “penny-farthings” (purists prefer the terms ‘ordinary’ or high-wheel bicycle). Thing is, ordinaries were the red Ferraris of their day, the fastest vehicles on the roads.

When high-wheel bicycles are seen at fêtes, or on telly, or on posters for TfL competitions, it’s ten to a penny (farthing) that the gents riding them will be prim, proper and of relatively advanced age. Top hat. Waistcoat. Long jacket and cravat. Waxed mustache. Respectable. Slow. Staid.

This Victoriana visual is dead wrong. Direct drive bicycles of c.1877 through to the late 1880s had developed bigger and bigger front wheels not for comfort on bad roads but to make the bicycle go faster.

High-wheelers were hard to ride, dangerous, expensive, lightweight, technologically-advanced, and fast, very fast. They appealed to wealthy young men with time on their hands and who craved the speed and excitement of such machines. No doubt Mark Cavendish could whip up quite a sprint on a high-wheel bicycle. There were some diminutive high-wheel champions although it must be admitted most of the faster riders were gentlemen with long legs. The longer the lever the better.

Slow? Ordinaries were definitely not slow, as the book cover below attests. Yes, it’s an exaggeration but it shows a high-wheeler outpacing a train, and an equestrian (and, er, running over a bunny, too – or, as @MinistryofBikes suggests, it’s probably a hare that has collapsed after trying to race the cyclist):

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February 26, 2013 by carltonreid

US president caught speeding by bicycle cops

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In June 1905, a car carrying US president Theodore Roosevelt was stopped for speeding, by two policemen on bicycles. The car was a Columbia, made by the same company that, in 1877, had brought the first high wheel bicycle to America, the bicycle company which created and sponsored the Good Roads movement, a campaign for better highways inspired by Britain’s Roads Improvement Association, an organisation created in 1885 by the National Cyclists’ Union and the Cyclists’ Touring Club.

Before he became US president, Teddy Roosevelt was the police commissioner for New York City. One of his edicts set up a police bicycle unit. The “scorcher squad” was a 29-member patrol team created to catch speeding vehicles (originally horse-drawn carriages and ‘scorcher’ bicyclists but later motor cars, too).

Columbia was the house-brand of America’s then most powerful and successful bicycle firm, the Pope Manufacturing Company. This innovative manufacturer used the sort of interchangeable parts technology and mass production factory techniques that would be later copied by Detroit’s most famous cyclist, Henry Ford (he also made cars).

The Pope Manufacturing Company was founded, owned and run by ruthless monopolist and ardent bicyclist Colonel Albert Pope. Pope Manufacturing was sprawled over five huge factories in Hartford, Connecticut (there were two bicycle factories, a tyre plant, a mill for drawing lightweight steel tubing and, from 1897, an automobile factory). As well as producing Columbia bicycles, Pope Manufacturing created some of America’s first electric cars.

However, the Columbia car that President Roosevelt was caught speeding in (he was a passenger) was an early gasoline car. Roosevelt had another connection with Albert Pope’s bicycle and car conglomerate. On August 22nd 1902 Roosevelt was the first US president to be seen in public in a motorcar. In effect, this was the first ever presidential motorcade. It took place in Pope’s home town of Hartford, Connecticut. A report in the New York Times said President Roosevelt was greeted by “10,000 workingmen.” As this greeting took place in Pope Park (a recreational lung created by Albert Pope for his workers, designed by the same firm that laid out New York’s Central park), it’s likely as many as 2000 of the men in this rent-a-crowd had been provided by Pope Manufacturing. The next biggest company in town was gun and precision tool maker Pratt and Whitney, which went on to become the famous aeronautics manufacturer. At the time Pratt and Witney made, among many other things, bicycle parts manufacturing machines.

Below is a photo showing the first presidential motorcade (first open-top one, to boot). The car is a Columbia Electric Victoria Phaeton. Roosevelt is on the left. On the right is Colonel Jacob Greene, chairman of Hartford citizen’s committee. Note the chauffeurs at the back: one of them is steering with a tiller. The car is flanked by policemen on bicycles. Columbia bicycles. Notice anything missing? Chains. The bicycles are shaft-drive models. Pope was banking on shaft-drives to take-off big-time. They didn’t. Pope was also banking on electric cars to take off-big time. They didn’t either. Not every Pope is infallible.

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Below are the period sources for the facts above. I’m including them almost whole because they provide more details and are deliciously of the time. I particularly like the fact the bike cops put up a “stern chase” of the President’s speeding car and eventually rode past it. This probably says more about the speed potential of cars in 1905 than the athletic prowess of the police officers (25mph bike cops?) The sand in the policeman’s eyes after the chase shows that country roads were covered with macadam at best, i.e. small crushed stones. And the chauffeur’s excuse for speeding is pure gold.

THE PRESIDENT HELD UP

Stopped by Bicycle Policemen for Exceeding Speed in Hired Car

The Automobile

WASHINGTON, D.C., June 22.- President Roosevelt is becoming a very enthusiastic automobilist, and, while he does not own a car, there is not the slightest doubt that he would buy one were he not afraid advertising capital will be made out of his purchase. This being the case he contents himself with occasionally hiring a car from one of the local garages for a spin into the country. Last Sunday a telephone message was received at the garage of the Washington Electric Vehicle Transportation Co. to send a car to the White House for the President’s use that afternoon. A Columbia gasoline car was furnished, with Otto Jacobi as chauffeur.

It was on this trip that the President experienced one of those occasions that frequently confront motorists. When well out of the city Jacobi let the car out a bit and the distinguished occupants were enjoying keenly the rush of air caused by the swiftly moving car, when two of the detail of bicycle police that had been stationed on Conduit road to restrain motorists from violating the speed regulations fell in behind the President’s car and endeavoured to overtake the party. After a stern chase they were successful, and they called upon the President and his chauffeur to stop.

“You will have to meet me in the police court at 9 o’clock tomorrow morning,” said one of the policemen, as he rubbed the sand out of his eyes. Apparently he was addressing the operator of the car, but a man…dressed in khaki riding breeches, a colored shirt, heavy walking shoes and a slouch hat, made the response.

“For what reason?” he inquired.

“You have violated the speed regulations,” continued the policeman. “You were going at least twenty-five miles an hour, and the regulations allow but fifteen miles.”

When informed that he was addressing the President the officer collapsed. However, the President took the matter good naturedly, and cautioning the chauffeur to drive at slower speed, the party proceeded to Great Falls…

It has since transpired that Jacobi, the chauffeur, thought the pursuing policemen were secret service men detailed to guard the President on his ride, and only wanted to make them ride a little faster than they are accustomed to.

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New England Welcomes President Roosevelt

President Roosevelt began his tour of New England today amid scenes of remarkable enthusiasm…On his arrival at Hartford the President was welcomed by a committee of representative citizens, and then taken for a drive around the city, occupying, with Col. Jacob L. Greene, a handsome victoria automobile, in charge of two expert New York chauffeurs. He was enthusiastically cheered all along the route.

The President expressed his satisfaction at the substitution of drives for conventional handshaking. This method of entertainment seems to have given the people the opportunity desired of seeing him.

In Pope Park, one of the beautiful outlying recreation spots of the city, the President was greeted by 10,000 workingmen, who presented him with a magnificent floral horseshoe inscribed: “Workmen’s Welcome to Our President.”

New York Times, August 22nd 1902

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Origin of the Bicycle Squad

From Theodore Roosevelt’s autobiography

The members of the bicycle squad, which was established shortly after we took office, soon grew to show not only extraordinary proficiency on the wheel, but extraordinary daring. They frequently stopped runaways, wheeling alongside of them, and grasping the horses while going at full speed; and, what was even more remarkable, they managed not only to overtake but to jump into the vehicle and capture, on two or three different occasions, men who were guilty of reckless driving, and who fought violently in resisting arrest. They were picked men, being young and active, and any feat of daring which could be accomplished on the wheel they were certain to accomplish.

Three of the best riders of the bicycle squad, whose names and records happen to occur to me, were men of the three ethnic strains most strongly represented in the New York police force, being respectively of native American, German, and Irish parentage.

The German was a man of enormous power, and he was able to stop each of the many runaways he tackled without losing his wheel. Choosing his time, he would get alongside the horse and seize the bit in his left hand, keeping his right on the crossbar of the wheel. By degrees he then got the animal under control. He never failed to stop it, and he never lost his wheel. He also never failed to overtake any “scorcher,” although many of these were professional riders who deliberately violated the law to see if they could not get away from him; for the wheelmen soon get to know the officers whose beats they cross.

The Yankee, though a tall, powerful man and a very good rider, scarcely came up to the German in either respect; he possessed exceptional ability, however, as well as exceptional nerve and coolness, and he also won his promotion. He stopped about as many runaways; but when the horse was really panic-stricken he usually had to turn his wheel loose, getting a firm grip on the horse’s reins and then kicking his wheel so that it would fall out of the way of injury from the wagon. On one occasion he had a fight with a drunken and reckless driver who was urging to top speed a spirited horse. He first got hold of the horse, whereupon the driver lashed both him and the beast, and the animal, already mad with terror, could not be stopped. The officer had of course kicked away his wheel at the beginning, and after being dragged along for some distance he let go the beast and made a grab at the wagon. The driver hit him with his whip, but he managed to get in, and after a vigorous tussle overcame his man, and disposed of him by getting him down and sitting on him. This left his hands free for the reins. By degrees he got the horse under control, and drove the wagon round to the station-house, still sitting on his victim. “I jounced up and down on him to keep him quiet when he turned ugly,” he remarked to me parenthetically. Having disposed of the wagon, he took the man round to the court, and on the way the prisoner suddenly sprang on him and tried to throttle him. Convinced at last that patience had ceased to be a virtue, he quieted his assailant with a smash on the head that took all the fight out of him until he was brought before the judge and fined. Like the other “bicycle cops,” this officer made a number of arrests of criminals, such as thieves, highwaymen, and the like, in addition to his natural prey — scorchers, runaways, and reckless drivers.

The third member of the trio, a tall, sinewy man with flaming red hair, which rather added to the terror he inspired in evil-doers, was usually stationed in a tough part of the city, where there was a tendency to crimes of violence, and incidentally an occasional desire to harass wheelmen. The officer was as good off his wheel as on it, and he speedily established perfect order on his beat, being always willing to “take chances” in getting his man. He was no respecter of persons, and when it became his duty to arrest a wealthy man for persistently refusing to have his carriage lamps lighted after nightfall, he brought him in with the same indifference that he displayed in arresting a street-corner tough who had thrown a brick at a wheelman.

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Pope Manufacturing Company

Hartford Board of Trade, 1889

Hartford, Conn., as a manufacturing, business and commercial center; with brief sketches of its history, attractions, leading industries, and institutions

[Weed Machinery's] reputation for fine and durable work [making sewing machines], its large plant and efficient corps of native American mechanics, brought to the establishment and to Hartford, in 1878, a new industry which, in magnitude and importance, overshades the production of sewing-machines, large as this continues to be. When, in May of that year, Col. A. A. Pope rode circuitously from the station to the office of the company on a bicycle of English make, excited throngs swarmed into the streets through which he passed to catch a view of the strange vehicle. Hundreds of boys took up the line of pursuit, only to find themselves in a few minutes left hopelessly behind. As the Colonel disappeared through the door, the surprise and curiosity were transferred from the outside to the inside of the factory. The object of the visit was not only to place a preliminary order, but to arrange for the manufacture of similar machines on a large scale. The interview, with the business connections growing out of it, have proved eminently satisfactory to both parties.

The first lot of fifty bicycles was turned out [by] Sept. 17, 1878. From that time onward the output, yearly increasing, has amounted to many thousands, and the line has been extended to tricycles, “safeties,” and “tandems.” A very large proportion of the machinery used in the manufacture has been invented by men belonging to the establishment, and is made on the premises. Many knotty mechanical problems have temporarily interrupted the onward flow of development, but the ingenuity of officers and men has proved adequate to their solution.

From their utility as a means of quick and pleasant travel, these machines and their accessories, little known ten years ago, and popularly regarded as a curious but idle toy, have become the staple of a very large trade. Among the different styles on the market, the “Columbias” steadily hold the lead through unequaled excellence of design and workmanship, not less than through the enterprise of the separate company which promotes their use and sale.

Struck, while passing through the factory, by the elaborate care taken to adjust the axis of the wheel so that it should coincide exactly with the mathematical center, the writer inquired of president Day in reference to the advantages gained by this extreme, not to say costly, precision. He replied that a slight deviation from accuracy might pass unnoticed for years, but in time would certainly appear and shorten the life of the machine. To the intelligent and scrupulous care bestowed upon the minutest details of construction, the company largely owes its reputation and present prosperity. Wherever tried, at home, on the racing path, or on continental journeys, their work never disappoints the owner.

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February 6, 2013 by carltonreid

Tacx schmacx: in 1897 this chap rigged up an indoor cycle trainer to 3D rolling road screens

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“Our weather is such that for at least one quarter of the year we must cycle at home or not at all,” stated a correspondent to the short-lived The Rambler weekly cycling magazine in 1897.

“Most of us do not cycle,” he continued, “preferring to abandon our wheel rather than attempt to deceive ourselves with an apology for a spin, but just a few cyclists, on the principle, no doubt, that half a loaf is better than no bread, cover a few miles on their home trainers.”

Such trainers were nothing new in 1897. Riders of high-wheelers and tricycles had such devices in the 1880s. But not everybody was enamoured of them.

Writing in the fifth edition of the Badminton Library’s Guide to Cycling, the aristocrat’s guide to the sport and pastime, G. Lacy Hillier, a top racing cyclist of the day, sniffed that:

“It is possible that a rational use of the home trainer might to some extent assist a racing man who could not afford all the time necessary to get into condition; but even this is very doubtful, whilst for average cyclists, during the winter months, there are many exercises which would prove of much greater service physically. A little boxing, dumb-bell exercise, Indian clubs, or simple extension movements, are all calculated to do more practical good than home-trainer work, during the dead season.”

Boxing? Really?

According to Hillier, the indoor cycle trainers then available were “so designed that the rider can fix his machine upon them and pedal away against a graduated resistance; others are simple standards or pillars, carrying a saddle and a flywheel, with cranks and pedals, upon which riders can exercise in the same way.”

Hillier also described indoor roller racing events, the Rollapaluza events of the 1890s:

“In the winter home-trainer races are promoted by many clubs, the competitors pedalling away at top speed, whilst the excited spectators watch the progress of certain hands round the face of a dial…There are home-trainer champions and home-trainer records…the actual value of the home trainer from a racing point of view is practically nil. None of the men who have shone on these machines have done any real good upon the racing path.”

Indoor roller racing – called Goldsprints to some – became immensely popular in the 1930s and could pack out dance-halls and ballrooms right through until the late 1950s.

Instead of just watching minute hands go round on a clock as in the 1901 image, below, of ‘Mile a Minute Murphy’, there were also Triplets of Belleville style rigs where cyclists were connected to model bicycles that would race each other, with the models powered by riders on indoor trainers.

The first such machine was designed by Arthur Lionel Knighten of Oakham, Rutland. He gained a GB patent for his ‘Racing-index for home trainer cycles’ in 1893:

“My invention consists of a model cycle track of about five feet…on which are two or more model cyclists. Underneath the track, preferably inclosed in a box is suitable machinery worked by two or more cyclists on stationary or home trainer cycles, mounted on a platform in front of the track…The idea of the invention is, to form a game or sport by which persons can contest against each other on home trainer cycles; a model on the track representing each contestant and the faster either person pedals his home trainer cycle the faster will the model representing him, travel on the model track.”

He was granted a US patent in 1895.

And if you think enlivening boring turbo training by watching a DVD of a road scene is somehow modern, think again. In The Rambler of 1897 there’s a description of an indoor cycle trainer with a painted 3D rolling background, and fans to simulate wind:

“One rider…in an endeavour to impart realism to his indoor journeys, contrived an ingenious affair by which he was able to enjoy in unpropitious weather all the pleasures of a country run…He was a scene painter by profession…he painted on canvas rolls two long country views – fields, villages, towns, etc. These he fixed on rollers, and placed either side of his stationery machine. The working mechanism of these rollers was cleverly connected with the rim of the far wheel of the bicycle by means of thin wire ropes, which ran over rollers worked by the revolution of the wheel, and so the strips of scenery on both sides of him were put into action…As he pedalled away he seemed to be passing the country as the scenes were slipping by on his right and his left…But this was not sufficient; he required the rush of air to heighten the deception. He pressed into service four circular fans…And thus he was able to enjoy a ride, the realism of which left little to be desired.”

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January 25, 2013 by carltonreid

History in the round

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Copenhagen has superlative bicycle infrastructure, with those beautiful Danes famously photographed in all weathers by the dogged Mr Cycle Chic, but there’s a location in the Danish capital where it’s possible to cycle in even the fiercest of snow storms. The Rundetårn (or Round Tower) is a 17th-century tower built for King Christian IV as an astronomical observatory. It has a 7.5-turn helical ramped corridor leading to the top. Each year the tower hosts a unicycle race, with contestants riding up and down the tower. In 1989, Thomas Olsen went up and down the Round Tower on a unicycle in record time of 1 minute and 48.7 seconds. But this wasn’t the first bicycle race in The Rundetårn.

No, the first was in 1888 and was a 210m hill climb done on ‘penny farthing’ high-wheel bicycles, probably to promote The Nordic exhibition of Industry, Agriculture, and Art. The spiral ramp has a grade of 10 percent (33 percent if you’re daft enough to take the inside line) and was built wide to allow a horse and carriage to reach the library at the top of the tower.

A Beaufort car was the first motorised vehicle to ascend the tower, puttering up in 1902. In 1911, the newspaper Socialdemokraten arranged a bicycle race down the Rundetårn.

The tower, finished in 1642, is part of Copenhagen University Library, founded in 1482.

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January 21, 2013 by carltonreid

The author of Robinson Crusoe on pay-as-you-go roads and horse-swallowing potholes

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Highgate, London, a “foundrous way”.

Daniel Defoe, author of the 1719 novel Robinson Crusoe, was a great traveller and, in 1724-6, wrote A tour thro’ the whole island of Great Britain, divided into circuits or journies, a valuable source of information for historians. Defoe had much to say on the state of Britain’s roads and their gradual improvement thanks to turnpike trusts. By Acts of Parliament certain roads were privatised and their upkeep handed to local groups of landowners, business owners and toffs. The pay-as-you-go tolls charged by the turnpike trusts were not popular, but the improvements to the roads were substantial (albeit nationally patchy).

In A Tour Defoe described the passing of the first Turnpike Act, in 1663, which helped improve a stretch of the Old North Road from Wadesmill, in Hertfordshire along the line of Ermine Street, the main Roman road to the north.

‘An Act for Repairing the Highways within the Counties of Hertfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Huntingdonshire’ was the start of the turnpike revolution, leading to the repair of many of Britain’s “foundrous ways.” On the best of the improved roads stage-coach speeds doubled to 10mph (hold on to your hats!) . However, with the manic popularity of the railway in the 1830s and 1840s, the macadamised turnpike roads fell out of favour and, for a generation, stagnated. In the 1880s and 1890s, cycling was the marvel of the age, with bicycles and tricycles offering a revolutionary form of transport and leisure that captivated those who could afford what were expensive and technologically advanced pieces of equipment. Thanks to cyclists, long-neglected roads came to life again

Coaching inns, in particular, welcomed the new trade, as described in a Daily Telegraph editorial of September 1880:

Not the worst thing that they have done, these knights of the road, has been to rehabilitate and set on their legs again many of our old posting-houses and decayed hostelries all over the country. Bicycles have…taken the place of coaches; they frequent all our great main roads, and gladded the hearts of innkeepers, who look out for the tinkling bells which herald the advent of a ‘club’ of wandering velocipedists, just as they anticipated of yore the gladsome tootling of the horn that bespoke the approach of the Enterprize, the Highflyer, or some other well-known conveyance of the old coaching days.

Of course, Defoe didn’t live to see the arrival of railways, or the demise of turnpike trusts, and wrote Robinson Crusoe a full one hundred years before the first wobbly velocipedes appeared on Britain’s roads (they soon died out), but he has left us a vivid description of how roads privatisation can – for a time at least – radically improve the no-longer-public highway.

A tour thro’ the whole island of Great Britain, divided into circuits or journies

That an Act of Parliament was obtained about 30 years since, for repairing the road between Ware and Royston, and a turnpike was erected for it at Wade’s-mill, a village so called, about a mile and half beyond Ware: This proved so effectual, that the road there, which was before scarce passable, is now built up in a high, firm cause way; the most like those mentioned above, of the Romans, of any of these new undertakings. And, though this road is continually work’d upon, by the vast number of carriages, bringing malt and barly to Ware, for whose sake indeed, it was obtained; yet, with small repairs it is maintain’d, and the toll is reduced from a penny, to a half-penny, for the ease of the country, and so in proportion.

But now the case is alter’d, labour is dear, wages high, no man works for bread and water now; our labourers do not work in the road, and drink in the brook; so that as rich as we are, it would exhaust the whole nation to build the edifices, the causways, the aqueducts, lines, castles, fortifications, and other publick works, which the Romans built with very little expence.

But to return to this new method of repairing the highways at the expence of the turn-pikes; that is to say, by the product of funds rais’d at those turn-pikes; it must be acknowledg’d they are very great things, and very great things are done by them; and ’tis well worth recording, for the honour of the present age, that this work has been begun, and is in an extraordinary manner carry’d on, and perhaps may, in a great measure be compleated within our memory. I shall give some examples here of those which have been brought to perfection already, and of others which are now carrying on.

…

This encourag’d the country to set about the work in good earnest; and we now see the most dismal piece of ground for travelling, that ever was in England, handsomly repair’d; namely, from the top of the chalky hill beyond Dunstable down into Hockley Lane, and thro’ Hockley, justly called Hockley in the Hole, to Newport Pagnall, being a bye branch of the great road, and leading to Northampton, and was call’d the coach road; but such a road for coaches, as worse was hardly ever seen.

All these roads were to the last extremity run to ruin, and grew worse and worse so evidently, that it was next to impossible, the country should be able to repair them: Upon which an Act of Parliament was obtain’d for a turnpike, which is now erected at Islington aforesaid, as also all the other branches by the Kentish Town way, and others; so that by this new toll, all these roads are now likely to be made good, which were before almost a scandal to the city of London.

Another turnpike, and which was erected before this, was on the great north road, beginning at Shoreditch, and extending to Enfield Street, in the way to Ware; though this road is exceedingly throng’d, and raises great sums, yet I cannot say, that the road itself seems to be so evidently improv’d, and so effectually repair’d, as the others last mention’d, notwithstanding no materials are wanting; even on the very verge of the road itself, whether it be, that the number of carriages, which come this way, and which are indeed greater than in any other road about London, is the occasion, or whether the persons concern’d do not so faithfully, or so skilfully perform, I will not undertake to determine.

The reason for my taking notice of this badness of the roads, through all the midland counties, is this; that as these are counties which drive a very great trade with the city of London, and with one another, perhaps the greatest of any county in England; and that, by consequence, the carriage is exceeding great, and also that all the land carriage of the northern counties necessarily goes through these counties, so the roads had been plow’d so deep, and materials have been in some places so difficult to be had for the repair of the roads, that all the surveyors rates have been able to do nothing; nay, the very whole country has not been able to repair them; that is to say, it was a burthen too great for the poor farmers; for in England it is the tenant, not the landlord, that pays the surveyors of the highways.

This necessarily brought the country to bring these things before the Parliament; and the consequence has been, that turnpikes or toll-bars have been set up on the several great roads of England, beginning at London, and proceeding thro’ almost all those dirty deep roads, in the midland counties especially; at which turn-pike all carriages, droves of cattle, and travellers on horseback, are oblig’d to pay an easy toll; that is to say, a horse a penny, a coach three pence, a cart four pence, at some six pence to eight pence, a waggon six pence, in some a shilling, and the like; cattle pay by the score, or by the head, in some places more, in some less; but in no place is it thought a burthen that ever I met with, the benefit of a good road abundantly making amends for that little charge the travellers are put to at the turn-pikes.

Several of these turn-pikes and tolls had been set up of late years, and great progress had been made in mending the most difficult ways, and that with such success as well deserves a place in this account: And this is one reason for taking notice of it in this manner; for as the memory of the Romans, which is so justly famous, is preserv’d in nothing more visible to common observation, than in the remains of those noble causeways and highways, which they made through all parts of the kingdom, and which were found so needful, even then, when there was not the five hundredth part of the commerce and carriage that is now: How much more valuable must these new works be, tho’ nothing to compare with those of the Romans, for the firmness and duration of their work?

So that on the whole, this custom prevailing, ’tis more probable, that our posterity may see the roads all over England restor’d in their time to such perfection, that travelling and carriage of goods will be much more easy both to man and horse, than ever it was since the Romans lost this island.

Nor will the charge be burthensome to any body; as for trade, it will be encourag’d by it every way; for carriage of all kind of heavy goods will be much easier, the waggoners will either perform in less time, or draw heavier loads, or the same load with fewer horses; the pack-horses will carry heavier burthens, or travel farther in a day, and so perform their journey in less time; all which will tend to lessen the rate of carriage, and so bring goods cheaper to market.

The fat cattle will drive lighter, and come to market with less toil, and consequently both go farther in one day, and not waste their flesh, and heat and spoil themselves, in wallowing thro’ the mud and sloughs, as now is the case.

The advantage to all other kinds of travelling I omit here; such as the safety and ease to gentlemen travelling up to London on all occasions, whether to the term, or to Parliament, to court, or on any other necessary occasion, which is not a small part of the benefit of these new methods.

Also the riding post, as well for the ordinary carrying of the mails, or for the gentleman riding post, when their occasions requires speed; I say, the riding post is made extremely easy, safe, and pleasant, by this alteration of the roads.

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Maps seen at Hertfordshire Archives and Local Studies

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January 21, 2013 by carltonreid

Would a Butt woman benefit most from a visit to a Tingle maker or a Moleskin shaver?

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These are three of the job descriptions given by respondents to the Census of the Population of England and Wales on 4th April 1881. When an overview of the census was published two years later the authors of the General Report wrote that one hundred obscure jobs were definitely odd, admitting that “in all probability an ordinary educated man would know at most but one or two of them, and often would not know a single one.”

Now, a ponty sticker was an “artizan” in glass and a wheel glutter helped make railway train wheels but a Ransacker was unlikely to be a thief, although it was perfectly fine for a great many men to describe themselves as “retired poachers.” (It was also fine to be a ‘Retired Opium Smuggler’).

Of the 100 jobs picked out by the General Report, my favourites are:

Painted-front maker. Bat-printer. Bear breaker. Fagotter. Piano puncher. Ponty sticker. Ransacker. Sad-iron maker. Sand badger. Scratch brusher. Budget trimmer. Spittle maker. Butt woman. Hawk-boy. Spragger. Sprigger. Cheeker. Thimble picker. Churer. Lasher. Thurler. Tingle maker. Coney cutter. Maidenmaker. Crutter. Moleskin shaver. Walk flatter. Cullet picker. Wheel glutter. Whim driver. Dasher. Dirt refiner.

But what exactly do all these jobs have to do with cycling or the history of roads? The 1881 census made a point of mentioning the up and coming occupation of ‘Bicycle or tricycle, maker, dealer’, and the rapidly disappearing job of turnpike-keeper (by 1881 only 184 turnpike trusts remained; the last ones had been set up in 1835-6, by which time stagecoaches were well on the way to being supplanted by the railways; the last tollgate, on the London to Holyhead road, on Anglesey, was lowered for the last time in 1895).

The 1883 General Report of the 1881 Census said:

“Among the occupations that are included in the above reckoning is one that is dying out, namely, Turnpike-keeper. The number fell from 3,928 in 1871 to 1,104 in 1881, On the other hand, there are two that barely appeared in the returns for 1871, but had gained very largely in 1881, and, though as yet not of much importance, doubtlessly will make a much more considerable figure in 1891. These are Tramway service, the persons employed in which rose from 63 in 1871 to 2,650 in 1881; and the making of Bicycles and other Velocipedes, which occupied only 12 persons in 1871, but under which 1,072 were classed in 1881, chiefly at Coventry.”

The 1891 Census of England and Wales mentioned the increasing popularity of cycling: “there is one division of makers of vehicles that, from its rapid growth requires special mention, namely, the bicycle and tricycle makers and dealers. In 1881 only 1,072 persons returned themselves as so employed; but in 1891, the number rose to 11,524; of whom 4,059 were enumerated in Coventry, and 2,575 in Birmingham or Aston Manor.”

And, across in the US, the census of 1900 heaped praise on the bicycle.

The twelfth census of the United States was taken on June 1st, 1900, and the published version was a mammoth tome. A full 16 pages of this tub-thumper of a publication were devoted to bicycles and bicycling; just five pages were devoted to the emerging automobile industry and even then cycling got a mention because, according to the census, “bicycle factories figure largely in the industry.”

The sixteen page special section even quoted a British toff:

“It is safe to say that few articles ever used by man have created so great a revolution in social conditions as the bicycle…Lord Charles Beresford once said, “Whoever invented the bicycle deserves the thanks of humanity,” and no expression was more fit. The bicycle has been the means of bringing out for exercise in the open air millions of persons, men and women, young and old, who otherwise would have confined themselves to homes, stores and offices…The very wide use of the bicycle led to the formation of the League of American Wheelmen, with memberships, at one time, of more than 100,000; and this organization started the agitation for better roads, which led, in many states, to great improvements in public highways.”

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January 11, 2013 by carltonreid

There’s a national blanket ban on cycling on the pavement but none for parking a car on the pavement

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Ludicrous, really. There’s a blanket national ban on cycling on the pavement (and has been since 1888) but there’s a confusing mish-mash of conflicting laws which means there’s no equivalent national blanket ban on parking a car on the pavement. Motorists can’t legally drive on the pavement, but a loophole (see base of article) means, in many localities, they won’t be nabbed for driving their cars onto pavements and leaving ‘em there. Some local authorities have enacted bylaws to stop motorists parking on pavements but these are few and far between.

Those who rant at cyclists for pavement riding tend not to rant at motorists committing the exact some offence. The offence was introduced in 1835. While all other parts of the 1835 Highway Act have been either amended or repealed, clause 72 remains in force. It’s a juicy one:

“If any person shall wilfully ride upon any footpath or causeway by the side of any road made or set apart for the use or accommodation of foot passengers; or shall wilfully lead or drive any horse, ass, sheep, mule, swine, or cattle or carriage of any description, or any truck or sledge, upon any such footpath or causeway; or shall tether any horse, ass, mule, swine, or cattle, on any highway, so as to suffer or permit the tethered animal to be thereon.”

The key phrase is “carriage of any description”. That is a cover-all that is still in force. Motor cars were classed as carriages in the 1903 Motor Car Act; bicycles were so classified in 1888.

INTERLUDE: Despite cars being banned from pavements since 1903, the BBC is not yet up to speed. In a report about a great many motorists driving on a pavement outside a school in Folkestone – video evidence was uploaded to YouTube – the BBC reporter said: “Kent police is now examining the footage to see if any offences have been committed.” And the school’s associate head teacher seemed to be talking about a future of driverless cars when he said: “…for cars to take it upon themselves to mount the pavement to avoid the traffic is absolutely outrageous.” Sadly, the local police told the YouTube uploader that the road traffic offences were the responsibility of traffic wardens (wrong!) which throws into sharp focus the whole problem of there being a national blanket ban on cycling on the pavement but none for parking a car on the pavement. To park on the pavement you tend to have to drive on the pavement – two wheels count, m’lud – but pavement parking is so endemic police look the other way because to enforce the law would involve charging millions of people.

The operators of bicycles and cars (and operators of shoes, too) have the same road rights, that is, being able to pass and repass over the public highway [DPP v Jones and Another, 1999] and as “reasonable users of the highway” are allowed to, say, stop and admire the view or grab a bite to eat while resting at the side of the road: “Highways are dedicated prima facie for the purpose of passage; but things are done upon them by everybody which are recognised as being rightly done, and as constituting a reasonable and usual mode of using a highway as such. If a person on a highway does not transgress such reasonable and usual mode of using it, I do not think that he will be a trespasser.”

However, parking of a carriage is caught up in a swirl of conflicting legislation.

It’s up to MPs to clear up this mess. But, to date, they haven’t. And they’ve had lots of opportunities to do so, and made lots of promises, too, as is made clear by a research document in the House of Commons library. These briefing documents are written for MPs and Peers, giving them an overview of a subject they may not be familiar with.

Parking: pavement and on-street [PDF] was written in 2010 and talks of the “previous efforts to legislate,” efforts which have always come to naught.

Governments have in the past consulted on ways to combat pavement parking and have sought to alter the law. In 1974 Parliament provided for a national ban on pavement parking in urban areas in section 7 of the Road Traffic Act 1974 (this inserted new section 36B into the Road Traffic Act 1972). If implemented, this would have prohibited all parking on verges, central reservations and footways on ‘urban roads’. The Secretary of State could have exempted certain classes of vehicles and individual local authorities could have made Orders within their own areas to exempt from the national ban certain streets at all times or during certain periods. However, full implementation required that the ban had to be brought in by Parliamentary Order and this never occurred. Successive transport ministers argued that there were difficulties for local authorities and the police in finding the resources to carry out the necessary policing and enforcement work. In 1979 the then government decided to defer implementation indefinitely.

In December 1986 the Department of Transport sought comments on a discussion paper, Pavement Parking – Curbing an Abuse. The paper looked at the reasons for pavement parking and the problems it caused. It put forward four options for tackling the problem:

• more private legislation by local authorities;

• more TROs by individual local authorities;

• implementation of the 1974 Act’s national ban; or

• amendment to the 1974 Act to permit local authorities who wished to introduce the ban to do so using the TRO procedure.
In July 1988 the Transport Minister, Peter Bottomley, said he had received over 450 responses to the paper and that he would be announcing the outcome of the review “as soon as possible”,4 but nothing happened. When the 1972 Act was repealed in 1988, section 36B (the ‘national ban’ mentioned above) became, without any amendment, section 19A of the Road Traffic Act 1988 and the matter rested there. Regulations to put into effect the national ban were not brought forward because of the potentially enormous costs to local authorities and police of securing proper policing and enforcement of such a blanket ban. It was finally repealed by section 83 and Schedule 8 of the Road Traffic Act 1991.

The House of Commons library document Cycling: offences [PDF], written in 2012, has a much shorter and simpler message:

It is an offence to ride a bicycle on a public footpath under section 72 of the Highway Act 1835, as amended. This was made a fixed penalty offence in 1999 and since December 2002 Community Support Officers have been able to issue a fixed penalty notices for this offence.

Naturally, enacting a law that enforces a blanket ban on pavement parking won’t be easy. But Scotland is further down the road, as it were. Scottish MPs have agreed to legislate, nationally, to keep motorists off pavements.

In mid-December 2012, The Herald reported that “motorists face a ban on parking on pavements or alongside other parked cars and dropped kerbs under plans expected to be widely backed by MSPs.”

Charities representing older people, wheelchair users and other vulnerable groups have thrown their weight behind legislation designed to prevent pedestrian access to pavements being blocked.

Emergency services have also supported the measures, with Strathclyde Fire and Rescue saying double-parked vehicles can be “a matter of life or death” if they slow down fire engines.

Under current laws, driving on pavements or obstructing access to a pavement are illegal – a situation described as confusing by campaigners who claim drivers are rarely prosecuted.

A Private Members’ Bill was proposed in the last Scottish Parliament by the then LibDem MSP Ross Finnie. It aimed to give councils greater powers to ban parking on pavements, but was not progressed. It was relaunched by Joe FitzPatrick, the SNP MSP for Dundee City West, in March and then taken over by Sandra White, a Glasgow list MSP, in the summer.

A final draft of the plans…as already been backed by 34 MSPs from four parties – enough to ensure it progresses to the formal bill stage.

Ms White said the proposal was about “justice and fairness” for pedestrians. She added: “There are a lot of people using wheelchairs or with toddlers in buggies who cannot get on to pavements because of inconsiderate parking. It’s not unusual to see cars parked with all four wheels on the pavement, which isn’t right. Pavements are for people and roads are for cars.”

Well, not just cars, but that’s nit-picking.

David Goodhew, director of operations at Strathclyde Fire and Rescue, welcomed the proposals. He said: “Anything that frees up our streets to allow swift passage of our appliances has got to be a good thing. Delays caused by double parking or parking on tight corners or street ends can be a matter of life or death.”

Get Britain Cycling, a parliamentary inquiry inspired by the ‘make cities safe for cycling’ campaign by The Times, starts hearing evidence on 23rd January. There will be six evidence sessions with a panel of MPs and Peers who will take verbal evidence from a selected group of witnesses. The last session will be on the 6th March.

According to the All Party Parliamentary Cycling Group, the inquiry “will examine the barriers which are preventing more people from cycling in the UK.”

One of those barriers is pavement parking. Motorists leaving their private property on the public highway is a nuisance to other road users and, frankly, an unsightly mess.

Professor Ian Walker, a transport and environment psychologist at University of Bath, said the inquiry ought to examine pavement parking because:

“Pavement parking enforces a ‘streets for drivers’ mindset.”

Twitter user John The Monkey said: “[It's] indicative of an institutionalised hypocrisy regarding the transgressions of drivers and cyclists.”

UrbanManc added: “It’s turned communities, especially schools, into hazards and no-go areas for pedestrians and cyclists alike.”

I have been asked to give evidence at ‘Get Britain Cycling’ and, among other issues, will be raising the subject of pavement parking. I’m due to give evidence on 23rd January.

+++++++++++++

A CRANE PUT MY CAR ON THE PAVEMENT, OFFICER

Section 72 Highways Act 1835 is used in the current Highway Code. Rule 145 states:

“You MUST NOT drive on or over a pavement, footpath or bridleway except to gain lawful access to property, or in the case of an emergency.”

Since January 1999 a fixed penalty notice can be issued with the offender given a ticket with fine and points attached unless they appeal in which case it goes to court.

This regulation tends not to be used, especially if a police officer doesn’t see the driver actually driving on to the pavement. A police officer may have “reasonable grounds” to believe the motorist drove on the pavement – it would be up to the courts to decide whether a driver was telling the truth should he claim his car was placed on the pavement with the use of a crane. However, unlike for a speeding offence a police officer has no power, in relation to driving on the pavement, to insist that the keeper of a vehicle tells of who was driving at any particular time. For this and other reasons the police generally don’t enforce this particular law and tend to refer complainants to local authority parking enforcement officers, who have few mechanisms in which to tackle the problem.

Now, back to that crane. If there was one knocking around the police officer should use it to lift cars off the pavement, ship them off to the pound and charge motorists for the process. Then perhaps our pavements could be freed of private property obstructing the public highway. But don’t stand still: highways, such as pavements, are there for passage, to be used to pass and repass, and obstruction of the highway is an offence. An offence only ever rarely enforced, of course, which is why motorists feel free to dump their motor vehicles on the carriageway, and have done so since the early days of motoring.

=================

Public Information Film ‘Don’t Park Your Car On The Pavement’, 1981:

‘The Young Ones’ spoof ‘Don’t Drive On The Pavement’, 1984:

Man On TV: Let’s assume for one moment… that this table is a crowded shopping street on a Saturday afternoon. And this… meringue, filled with whipped cream, is a young mother weighed down with groceries. And this… juicy, over-ripe tomato is a tiny little girl, who doesn’t know what a dangerous place her exciting new world is. And let’s assume that this… clingfilm parcel, of mashed banana and jam, is a deaf senior citizen, who is in a wheelchair, and is blind. And this… cricket bat, with a freeze-block nailed to it, is your car. Now what happens when your car mounts the pavement?
[annihilates the meringue, tomato and parcel of banana and jam with the cricket bat]

Think once. Think twice. Think DON’T DRIVE YOUR CAR ON THE PAVEMENT.

American and British cyclists of the 1890s saved roads for ALL users

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Tweed Run, 1888

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Former Tory MP dies after “getting out of the way of motor-cars on his bicycle”

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Motorists and cyclists are not two tribes, historically they’re from the same tribe

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“You wouldn’t put Mark Cavendish on a penny-farthing…”

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US president caught speeding by bicycle cops

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Tacx schmacx: in 1897 this chap rigged up an indoor cycle trainer to 3D rolling road screens

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History in the round

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The author of Robinson Crusoe on pay-as-you-go roads and horse-swallowing potholes

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Would a Butt woman benefit most from a visit to a Tingle maker or a Moleskin shaver?

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There’s a national blanket ban on cycling on the pavement but none for parking a car on the pavement

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