How to get things done: Chris Boardman

[kwackers]

There were many more "targets" for drivers to hit years ago, and cyclists and pedestrians felt much less at risk. Parents allowed much more freedom for children to "play out" then, for instance.
Drivers have a very strong tendency to use what are touted as safety improvements as performance improvements, braking later for instance. This is called risk compensation, or more accurately, risk homeostasis. Read John Adams Risk.
One famous study looked at the effects of anti-lock braking and found higher speeds, closer tailgating and later braking.

I think you missed the whole point of my argument which was actually about removing risk compensation by removing the monkeys.

[Mike Sales]

There were many more "targets" for drivers to hit years ago, and cyclists and pedestrians felt much less at risk. Parents allowed much more freedom for children to "play out" then, for instance.
Drivers have a very strong tendency to use what are touted as safety improvements as performance improvements, braking later for instance. This is called risk compensation, or more accurately, risk homeostasis. Read John Adams Risk.
One famous study looked at the effects of anti-lock braking and found higher speeds, closer tailgating and later braking.

I think you missed the whole point of my argument which was actually about removing risk compensation by removing the monkeys.

That is a very good point, and as long as humans are controlling their cars they will make their own decisions about risk, so any "safety"intervention which does not change the human tendency to take risks will fail to reduce road danger.
I was taking issue with one of the assertions which you used to make this point, not the point itself.
The roads are not really getting safer for all road users.
In our system of dodgems the dangerous users are insulated from the consequences of their actions, but the vulnerable keep out of the way, adopt flimsy protections, and take more and more care, abandoning certain roads.
As Smeed found, denser traffic in itself produces fewer collisions per vehicle, which is good for the vehicle users, but not always much consolation for us.
|I am afraid I will always express my disagreement with the idea our roads are getting safer. Over my lifetime the proportion of children of primary age allowed to make their own way to school has shrunk by a lot.

In 1971, 80 per cent of seven and eight year old children were allowed to go to school without adult supervision. By 1990, this figure fell to 9 per cent. Road accidents involving children have declined not because the roads have become safer but because children can no longer be exposed to the dangers they pose.

http://www.psi.org.uk/publications/ENVIRON/onefm.htm

[mjr]

Time wasted is arguable. On the minus side, routes and connections are often inefficient, but on the plus, you can do stuff instead of waste time driving.

My bus journey home now takes at best 1 hour 15 mins. The same journey by bike takes about 5 mins off this time at peak period. But you need to add on change into kit as this journey is not doable in work clothes. Then there is the time spent crossing the work building to the secure bike parking and unlocking the bike.

10 years ago the same bus journey took 15 mins less, entirely due to austerity.

The same journey by car at worst is 40 mins peak period, less off peak.

Who has so much time to waste every day, every working week?

I don't know: 40 minutes each way each day of unpaid driving work to save the added cost of a return bus ticket seems like a bad deal unless it was a really really expensive ticket. I'd rather spend the hour or so doing something fun like reading a book or cycling. Why wouldn't you?

[Pete Owens]

I fear the optimism is misplaced. My guess is that people will simply drive rather than cycle instead of using public transport,

This is the typical middle class assumption that everyone has access to a car - which tends not to be the case with the people who use buses.

There is a very large investment to own, run and learn to drive a car so once people have access to one there is a strong incentive to use it for pretty much every journey - rather than pay again to ride on a bus which will inevitably be less convenient since it is running on its own route to its own timetable. Without road pricing this will continue to be the case.

So for many existing bus commuters walking and cycling are the only readily available alternatives. Sitting on crowded buses is going to be pretty risky for a quite a while - and social distancing on narrow busy pavements is going to be tricky. So cycling is becoming very attractive relative to the alternatives - as we are seeing with the large uptake of cycling in the last few weeks with all sorts of people of all ages taking to the road.

And the thing is, once they do start cycle commuting they will realise just how much faster and easier it is than using buses. Cycling to work will become socially acceptable - just normal people trying to keep themselves safe rather than weird social misfits. They will discover to their surprise that they actually enjoy their commute - rather than it being something to endure. So when eventually the buses become safe to use why would they go back?

The days when car ownership was a middle class thing are long gone.

Try reading what I said.
It is not that ownership of cars is limited to the middle classes, but the assumption that everyone has access to a car.
Marie Antoinette made a similar mistake with her infamous comment on bread shortages.

Yes, car ownership is very common - but there are still large minority out there through reasons of poverty, or age or ability who do not have access to cars - and by and large those are the folk who use buses and now are faced with a big problem of how to get to work safely.

Owning a car is expensive. So is using public transport, both in cost and in time wasted, especially if you are a family.

Which is the point I was making.

The people that used buses until a few weeks ago did so mainly because they didn't have access to a car. When they start to get back to work and the bus is too dangerous they will need to find an alternative. If they had access to a car they wouldn't have been using the bus in the first place - this leaves walking and cycling. Now for a journey within walking distance it probably isn't worth waiting for a bus rather than walking the whole journey - so basically we are left with cycling as the only safe way to get about available to many bus commuters.

[Bmblbzzz]

Time wasted is arguable. On the minus side, routes and connections are often inefficient, but on the plus, you can do stuff instead of waste time driving.

My bus journey home now takes at best 1 hour 15 mins. The same journey by bike takes about 5 mins off this time at peak period. But you need to add on change into kit as this journey is not doable in work clothes. Then there is the time spent crossing the work building to the secure bike parking and unlocking the bike.

10 years ago the same bus journey took 15 mins less, entirely due to austerity.

The same journey by car at worst is 40 mins peak period, less off peak.

Who has so much time to waste every day, every working week?

I don't know: 40 minutes each way each day of unpaid driving work to save the added cost of a return bus ticket seems like a bad deal unless it was a really really expensive ticket. I'd rather spend the hour or so doing something fun like reading a book or cycling. Why wouldn't you?

We know you're right. But most people don't. Because they don't think of driving as work, don't think cycling could be enjoyable, and think of sitting on a bus as boredom. Funny how bus journeys tend to be seen as more boring than train, but I think it's down to the nature of both the typical journey (bus = short, urban, commute or shopping) and the vehicle (bus = crammed, stuffy, jerky).

[atoz]

My bus journey home now takes at best 1 hour 15 mins. The same journey by bike takes about 5 mins off this time at peak period. But you need to add on change into kit as this journey is not doable in work clothes. Then there is the time spent crossing the work building to the secure bike parking and unlocking the bike.

10 years ago the same bus journey took 15 mins less, entirely due to austerity.

The same journey by car at worst is 40 mins peak period, less off peak.

Who has so much time to waste every day, every working week?

I don't know: 40 minutes each way each day of unpaid driving work to save the added cost of a return bus ticket seems like a bad deal unless it was a really really expensive ticket. I'd rather spend the hour or so doing something fun like reading a book or cycling. Why wouldn't you?

We know you're right. But most people don't. Because they don't think of driving as work, don't think cycling could be enjoyable, and think of sitting on a bus as boredom. Funny how bus journeys tend to be seen as more boring than train, but I think it's down to the nature of both the typical journey (bus = short, urban, commute or shopping) and the vehicle (bus = crammed, stuffy, jerky).

When reading posts. I find it pays to read them carefully.

All I can say from all this is, with all respect to the post contributors, I have probably done more miles than they have had hot dinners. Particularly in areas that speclalise in vertical hills. If my commute was the same as you'd get in eg going out of Ipswich (where a relative lives near) there would be rather less of an issue. However, this is not so. If I was commuting to my current home address to work 5 days a week, I would be in the running for the national hill climb championship. There is only one road from my home that does not have serious gradients, and it's in the wrong direction for the commute. To give you an idea of what it's like where I live, there is a story a friend of mine tells about when he went into a cycle shop in a big city, and asked for a triple chainset. They said " you don't need one of those- where do you live"? He then told them. They then said "you need a triple". It predated the rise of small compact setups, but you can take the point.

The reason I gave the times for the commute is that it should have been obvious why it was taking so long- a severe gradient on the return leg. As in, 1 in 6. It adds 15 minutes on the time on return. Bear in mind I am carrying weight on a touring bike. The lowest gear on this bike is around 22 inches and you need it.

I don't drive so the car option doesn't exist. So that's why I use the bus. Doing that journey by bike 5 days a week would be tough. But of course some of the posters think they know better. Fine. I prefer to rely on the 40 odd and plus years of cycling experience.

[Cyril Haearn]

More wisdom from Sir Christopher in the Guardian today, +1

[6.5_lives_left]

More wisdom from Sir Christopher in the Guardian today, +1

link here to Guardian article