Cycling UK Forum

My ideal country was Europe. I am still a citizen but not for that much longer.:( When I got cheesed off with the dour Northerners (who have their humourous charms). I could head South to the sun and heat of the Med. A trip around the Greek islands staying a month or so here and there. Seville and L...

Sycamore is also a very good tree for bees. A bit OT, but I've found that any wood burns fine if it is dry. Exactly that. for all woods are much the same in composition but vary greatly in water content and tightness of cell structure. Ash is rated highly with good reason but often because it quite ...

It is my impression that a lot of non-EU immigration is a result of UK nationals marrying non-UK nationals. Anyone know if that is correct. (A bit OT, perhaps). I can see that there are communities where that is common, on the other hand my community (and family :wink: ) is full of EU immigration f...

Hey don't forget the Celts! Actually as agroup they are already sort of Pan-European, with representatives in all Western (and Northern!) Britain (they used to be the sole indigenous folk of the British Ilses of course)but also in Brittany and in Gallicia in N. Spain. And maybe more !? Certainly lef...

Air pollution is a major problem. The demonisation of diesel is a handy smokescreen ( :roll: ) for those who want to avoid talking about all the other problems. Let's ban diesels so that I can use my car as much as I want, let's have electric trains 'cos then the pollution will be somewhere else......

Stand at Cheltenham Spa station and witness the noise and filth coming out of a Cross Country DMU as it accelerates away, the pollution is orwellian, it can hardly be overstated. Don't believe the lies from the operating companies about upgraded engines. The pacer train on my local line has the cra...

I never said it was a small job. But actually for large streches of track it IS just a question of "stringing a few wires around". More or less. Plus buying and manufacturing new locos etc!! And apparantly steel price is at an all time low too. Never a better moment. A railway system that ...

The reason we aren't 'all electric'(or very nearly)is the same reason we won't ban or restrict ICE powered vehicles in our cities,especially dirty diesel powered buses* and cabs,and continually fall short of pollution levels. More dirt more profit,and all the while we store up health problems for t...

I see it as a huge failure of sucessive govts that our railway system remains largely unelectrified.
The benefits are so enormous.
This report really underlines how filthy diesel trains are.

I found this BBC article - EU referendum: Can Switzerland show UK route to Brexit? interesting. Rick. I would like to add a couple of points to the above article. The Swiss are a nation of around 8 million. around a 25% are "foreign" nationals without citizenship. The foreigner's legal st...

I find it interesting at the moment as we now know which Conservatives are for staying part of the EU and which are for leaving ... except for Boris. By not saying he is keeping the press attention on him with all the :will he/wont he". Undoubtedly Boris knows where he stands on UK leaving the...

I was going to add to my earlier comments that going South to North on the minor roads (LLC) the gradients are overall less steep than going North to South. It is just the grain of the country. Going South to North, by turning into the hills at Llanbedr, the highest point can be reached without any ...

Thanks Brucey. Informative as ever. So ............... motorbikes the (geographic) world over, have their front brakes on the right. This is irrespective of what side of the road they drive on in the country of manufacture. I was going to make the same point. It's a very good reason to use the Brit...

Stainless steel is my recommendation. I bought a nesting billy set many years ago and they have survived everything. They still come up almost like new (even after peat fire cooking) when cleaned with sand. Aluminium has a funny smell when cleaned with abrasives (like bike rims in dirty wet conditio...

But we are talking about Nationwide (no pun intended) banks and intitutions. My take on it is that overall the debt is pretty secure - that secured on property. Even Wales has gone up a bit since then. I am just making the point that the banks have not lost that much money in that area. Whereas oth...