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Old October 13th 17, 07:58 PM posted to uk.transport.london
Robin[_4_] Robin[_4_] is offline
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First recorded activity at LondonBanter: Nov 2011
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Default Oxford to London commute

On 13/10/2017 18:55, wrote:
In article ,
(Robin) wrote:

On 13/10/2017 14:37,
wrote:
snip

The problem with relying on cyclng is that it's lovely when the
weather is, and when it isn't it's bloody horrible.

I live on what is allegedly one of the busiest cycle routes in the UK
and it's incredibly noticeable how usage drops when the weather is
less than clement.

Because of this I'd seriously argue that a modal shift to cycling is
impossible - you still have to dimension the transport infrastructure
for those bad days, and if you've just taken a chunk out of it to
accomodate the cycle lane then for periods of the year (e.g.
"February") you're actually making things worse, not better.

Sorry, but that is as ridiculous as saying you will drive even though
10% of the time traffic will be so bad that you will be seriously late
to work. Non-trivial rain occurs as commuter time well under 10% of the
time. It isn't that hard to get good cycling raingear either.

Look at Cambridge commuting if you don't believe me. Traffic is worse on
wet days but that makes cycling even more advantageous in travel times.

I am unclear.

Are you arguing that Someone Somewhere was:

a) wrong in his observation that the number of commuting cyclists
falls when the weather is bad or

b) wrong about the consequences for other modes of transport - eg
because the missing cyclists work from home when the weather is bad?

Or is it something else entirely?


That the effect on cycling is surprisingly is marginal. Traffic is mainly
worse because it is driving slower due the the adverse driving conditions.

So it's (a) - ie you are disagreeing with Someone's observation about
the variation in the number of cycling commuters with weather.

I have no idea which of you are right. But may I ask if your "marginal"
comes from your personal observations of CS1 or CS2 etc, or from TfL
figures, or what?



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Robin
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