r/londoncycling

What tyres do you use?

I have a gravel bike that normally ride on the road with road wheels/tyres. I recently switched the wheels out for 650b 47mm Vittoria Terreno Zero TNT G2.0 tyre. They have next to no grip, but I'm running them as low as possible (35psi) and are fine on 90% of the gravel paths.

What I find really sketchy is the sandy sections in RP and on Wimbledon Common between Beverly Brook and Camp Road. I didn't expect my tyres to be good, but I didn't expect to feel as bad as they do and have had to walk at points.

Do better tyres make much of a difference, or is the sand an issue no matter what? I want to ride Wolf Way at the end of the month which is a mix of road and gravel with sections of sand (that I think are unridable). I'm trying to decide if I should switch out my tyres for something else or not.

Hi everyone!

I’ve been working on a website that tracks London’s Boris Bikes over time:

https://boris.kardol.us/

Rather than only showing the current state of the network, it stores historical snapshots so you can explore how stations behave over time. You can browse the city, drill down into individual stations, and see patterns in bike availability, free docks, and activity throughout the week.

City overview

The site also lets you spot stations that regularly run out of bikes or docks, making it easier to understand how the network behaves beyond what’s happening right now.

Station details

I’d love to hear your feedback!

• Are there any statistics or visualisations you’d like to see?
• Any stations or areas that would be interesting to compare?
• If you spot a bug or have an idea for an improvement, let me know!

I cycle in 2-3 days a week, I might get 1 incident or just issue with a driver once a week at most, yesterday had 3 where drivers just seemed to be paying no attention, I wondered if loads half asleep from watching the football 😂

Reported 2 as just dangerous driving, the 3rd was just someone shouting at me for not stop in the cycle lane so he could turn left across the cycle lane

Hi everyone,

I'm currently completing my Master's dissertation on cycling in London and would really appreciate it if you could take a few minutes to fill in my survey.

The survey explores how different factors influence people's cycling route choices in London and takes approximately 5 minutes to complete. Whether you cycle regularly, occasionally, not at all, or are considering cycling for yourself or your children, your views are valuable!

https://qualtrics.ucl.ac.uk/jfe/form/SV\_88G9OJilfgIlSuO

Thank you very much for your time and support. Please feel free to share this post with anyone who may be interested!

And can anything be done about it? I'm sure it's been asked before but it's driving me mad. The Lime app works every time, so I know it's technically possible, but I live in a Forest-only area.

Someone flew deep into the bushes around 7:45pm today on the Broomfield Hill descent.
Firefighters, followed by ambulance arrived.

Hey there fellow cyclists from across the pond

I’ll be visiting London in early August and have absolutely 0 plans, and honestly I just want to rent a bike and explore the city by bike as much as I can. I’ve visited before and seen the typical major touristy places, and I’m a very type B traveller not super keen on making a ton of concrete plans or checking off a big list of sightseeing. I think the only thing I really want to see is where Ted Lasso was filmed and ideally I’d like to do that by bike haha.

If anyone has any recommendations on bike rentals, scenic bike paths, or other chill bike-centric itinerary ideas for me, I welcome all your ideas! Ideally would like to rent a helmet and good lock too but I could bring my own if I really must.

I also don’t have any accomm booked yet so location flexible as well. Will be flying into Heathrow

Thanks in advance!

Cycling yesterday, perfectly safely and legally on a rotary junction that is functionally a roundabout. A car came onto the junction at speed, using his horn rather than giving way to me. He then wanted to change lanes so we came to a stop next to each other. I started sweary ranting, he told me to fuck off and shot off.

I knew he'd get snarled in traffic so I caught up with him and continued my rant, which was sweary but very clearly objecting to him not giving way. He was then super nice, apologised, shook my hand and wished me a safe journey. I apologised for my language.

Today I feel bad, I think I over-reacted. He did use the horn to alert me to his presence, which is legit. I'd rather he would have given way, but I think I came across as a madman in our subsequent interaction.

What's the best thing to do in these situations?

I've been looking at getting prescription sunglasses. Regular sized sunglasses generally look ridiculous on me so for many years I've worn Oakley Fives Squared which are wraparound glasses. I tried to get prescription sunglass lenses in these a few weeks ago but when the lenses arrived there was something slightly off about them. The place I got the lenses assured me they were the correct prescription and I could see through them properly but it felt like my eyes were slightly strained and each time I'd move my eyes it would take slightly longer than normal to focus. I was able to return them and get a refund and they did say that it's possible that this is just the limitation of using lenses in wraparound frames as the lenses in these frames sit at a slightly different angle to the face than regular glasses which are more parallel.

Has anyone else managed to get prescription wraparound sunglasses that work and if so where did you get them from?

Some historical posts about this and I've looked elsewhere online, but options seem to change/close/open from one year to another, so worth asking again. Plus, I'm at an event in the area tomorrow, and would ideally cycle...

Can anyone recommend secure bike parking anywhere in the greater Shoreditch area?

It looks like Spokesafe has or had something at Old Street; however, it's not showing on the map in the app, and the webpage for that location on the Spokesafe website no longer exists.

I could use Spokesafe Angel or London Bridge but was ideally hoping for something closer... also, I've only ever used Spokesafe's proper lockers at Waterloo before: are the vertical racks that are available at Angel and London Bridge for individual bikes or are all bikes together on one larger rack? If the latter, are they as secure as the individual lockers at Waterloo?

Cheers

Hello, I was hoping you guys could help me.

I am moving to London to work, and the cost of transport terrifies me. I would plan on cycling, but I hear so much about bikes being stolen that it's putting me off the idea. I cannot take my bike on the train, so the plan is to leave as cheap a bike as possible at Liverpool Street station when not at work (double locked).

Is this just going to get nicked straight away as I'm leaving it overnight?

Hi all, a couple of weeks ago I had a pretty nasty accident after my bike went into a pothole. I suffered a broken shoulder, which will probably lead to lifetime damage and possibly surgery in the future.

The council where it happens have a claims form on their website, but I’m a bit wary of filling it in myself, and considering getting a claims lawyer.

Has anyone else made a successful claim for a serious injury? Did you require legal help? How much (roughly) did you manage to get?

Any help would be appreciated.

Hi everyone, fellow sensible cyclist here. I was driving 20mph when there were two cyclists ahead of me, each of them were on the left with one in front of the other. The one at the front decided to suddenly start veering right with zero indication nor hand signals etc. and then was in line with my right headlight and suddenly started slowing down, again with no indication at all of the manoeuvre. At this point I was driving about 15mph I checked on the dash, as he was slowing down I could not tell his next move as he was pedalling and braking pedalling and braking and I sped up to 20mph and moved slightly to the left to pass him as he was clearly not riding properly. However, at this point the other cyclist from the start of the story was on the left side and I did get slightly close to him unfortunately, I would estimate about a metre away. He then followed me and started taking pictures of my car and plates. I wanted to talk to him to explain but there wasn’t enough time. What is the verdict here given the situation, and am I likely to face punishment should this go to court etc. Thanks in advance.

5 phone drivers within 17 minutes.
These 4 shown here were not reported.

Based on recent reports they would get nothing or only a warning letter.
The 5th one who is not shown was reported as the video is longer and shows more interaction. That one was also not wearing a seat belt and no tax. Will probably have to wait a year for that one to be published due to CPS not allowing video of ongoing cases to be published.

EDIT: This is along Bayswater road and Holland Park Avenue.
The traffic has been extremely heavy west bound since the bus fire under the A40 Westway.

EDIT: to add so reasons it is dangerous.

I understand that. It looks innocent.

There are several problems though.

The distraction continues for several seconds after the phone is put away.

When looking down not being aware of surroundings. For example, A girl who fell over on a crossing in front of a distracted driver was run over, fortunately not badly injured.

Many people start driving in a panic without looking when they suddenly noticed the lights had changed, vehicle in front has moved, or they get beeped.

Many many people continue to creep along slowly in slow moving traffic without putting the phone down or looking properly before moving.

The solution is incredibly cheap as well. If you have to interact, just leave it in the cradle. Won't fully stop the distraction but will prevent the head and eyes down into the lap instead of in front, And is the same as interacting with the screen built into the vehicle. Can still be done for not paying attention though.

Per title. I can make out LV72 of the reg (I think). Any one got tips or software recos on slowing the video down to get the plate so I can report it?

FYI The video is 1440p not sure if that will show on youtube tho

Edit: Video at 2 mins 49 secs. For some reason the time stamp didn't copy/ apply. Sorry