Pedalling Dope (From Watford Observer)

Pedalling Dope

11:02am Monday 1st June 2009

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By Catherine Cain »

When I rule the world, which can surely be just the matter of a few weeks away, cyclists will be banned.

All those pinched-faced, mealy-mouthed, Lycra-bound superior beings who seem to feel that the roads are their own personal fiefdom will have their bells silenced and their bicycles confiscated until they can actually behave on the streets like decent, socially adept, rule-abiding members of the human race once again.

Perhaps being a cyclist confers super powers of avoidance when it comes to the basics of the Highway Code, or perhaps it’s the fact that their chosen mode of transport is just so darn green and groovy that they feel themselves to be way above the rules applying to all the rest of us poor mortals? Whatever the reason for their bad behaviour and shaky grasp of basic road ettiquette, it certainly seems to me that around 90 per cent of cyclists need to take a standard proficiency test before being allowed out.

I write this after being mown down at a crossing by a particularly repellent example of the species last week.

One minute I was walking across a busy London street with a takeaway coffee in my hand, the next thing I knew I was sprawling inelegantly across the black and white road markings drenched in steaming hot latte, having been knocked off my feet by a cyclist.

I feel I should point out that the green man was still flashing away as I attempted to gather together the strewn contents of my handbag from the coffee slick around me.

Instead of apologising, the cyclist - a skinny man wearing more eye-poppingly tight green Lycra than the average Marvel Comic mutant - proceeded to berate me for “not looking where I was going”. His language was peppered with so many expletives that it was quite difficult to follow the gist of what he was shouting, but I gathered the main thrust of his diatribe was that I could have caused hundreds of pounds worth of damage to his bike!

His mean, rat-like little features were contorted with hatred as he continued to hector me at the roadside, where I‘d stopped to examine the graze on my knee through the tear in my (new) tights.

In fact he held his red face so close to mine that I had avoid the shower of spittle that accompanied his rant.

When he felt that he’d humiliated me enough, he folded his prissy mouth back into the shape of a cat’s bottom, adjusted his helmet, climbed back onto to his infernal machine and pedalled haughtily back into the traffic, presumably confident that yet another pesky pedestrian who dared to use a crossing when it was perfectly legal to do so had been shown the error of her ways and the majesty of the bicycle.

For once I was speechless.

As I stared in amazement at his rapidly receding form, a man tapped me on the shoulder and asked if I was OK.

He’d seen and heard the whole thing and was disgusted. “If bikes had a licence plate I’d take his number and report him to the police,” he said, adding: “These cyclists are all the same, they think they own the road. People like him need shooting”.

I privately thought that this was probably taking it a bit far down the Charles Bronson route, but couldn’t help wanting revenge. Fortunately, I’m pretty certain that if my assailant continues wearing his shorts that tight the subsequent lack of blood supply to a particularly sensitive part of his anatomy will hopefully leave him a unicyclist.

The oddest thing of all was that at the moment I was knocked off my feet, I heard myself saying “ooh, sorry”, as if the incident was actually my fault, when nothing could be further than the truth.

Although it was the first time I’ve actually been hit by a bike, I’ve lost count of the number of occasions when I’ve been legitimately crossing a street, only to be on the receiving end of a barrage of furious bell tinging or a mouthful of fruity abuse from someone who thinks that attaching a pair of bicycle clips to their calves confers divine right of way.

Motorists stop at a red light and allow pedestrians to cross the road in safety, so why do so many cyclists seem to feel that this basic tenet of the Highway Code doesn’t apply to them?

And it’s not just their behaviour at crossings that makes me see amber and then red.

When we were on holiday in Cornwall a couple of weeks ago, we got stuck in a mysterious traffic jam on an unlikely country road. At first we thought this was due to a tractor or a herd of cows heading off to the milking shed, but actually, after half an hour, we discovered it was two totally selfish cyclists who insisted on riding abreast of each other on a narrow, winding road.

(Fashion tip: at this point I’d just like to say that there’s nothing more hilarious or unflattering than a large expanse of Lycra-clad bottom lurching from side to side as its lardy thighed owner ‘powers’ up a hill. Cyclists beware, you might think you look hot and sporty, but actually you look like a bouncy castle with pedals).

We particularly enjoyed the way the couple airily waved the queuing traffic past when they deemed it safe to go, clearly viewing their gesture as an act of extreme generosity.

I won’t describe my husband’s hand gesture in response.

But at least those two had got on their bikes and ridden far from civilisation where you could draw some small comfort from the fact that here their supercilious arrogance would cause minimal public annoyance.

In my brave new world, it’s those smug city cyclists who will banned. They always seem to be so proud of their healthy transport choice, it’s a just a pity that they couldn’t care a fig for the well being of the poor pedestrians they so happily and so recklessly mow down.

To paraphrase George Orwell, two legs good - two wheels bad.

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