Surfindixon

I think there's a time and a place for riding on the pavement.

If a cyclist is on it he/she mustr always give way to the peds. It's the Netherland way of thinking i.e. The ped is 1st, cyclist 2nd (and, even on the road, the car is where it should be, 3rd).

I have no problems cycling on the pavement for three reasons:

1. After four years of commuting I'm sick and fed up with the stress of busy town\city traffic and all the poor driving 'standards' on show there. I used to think it was my right as a cyclist to take my place on these roads but after standing and watching the traffic at Glasgow Cross during rush hour one day I had an epiphany. Drivers have no patience for each other so who am I kidding myself that they're even going to have any sort of consideration for a lowly cyclist.

2. Driving standards are at an all time low. What standards are the Driving 'Standards' Agency and the UK cops trying to uphold exactly? We now have idiots driving two ton planet killers with one hand with the other holding a phone to their ear whilst not paying the blindest bit of attention to what's going on around them. I see mobi phone law broken more than any other but nobody seems to get prosecuted for it. Also, the lack of patience exhibited by drivers is the root cause of every accident on the roads in the UK. Of this I am convinced. The pavement is a a mecca of safety when you take all this into consideration. It has it's own hazards (peds (obviously), driveways, car doors) but.....

3. The majority of pavements are EMPTY. Every pavement outside a main street, high street, city centre is bereft of people. All the lazy idiots are in their cars for goodness sake!!! Nobody walks anywhere now. The urban\suburban pavement is now ours.

There's a time and a place to be on the road and I am fully confident on it but I just don't need or want the grief or hassle of ludicrously impatient drivers any more. Likewise there's a time and a place to be on a pavement and if one is on a pavement when peds are about there's a way to conduct oneself as a cyclist. In two years of taking the 'Peds first on the pavement' approach I have only ever been hassled twice and I would say that one of those was my fault. Peds first, cyclists second. Give way to a ped and they'll respect you for it.

If you are selective about your pavement of choice for your daily commute, you WILL have a safer journey.