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“Lawless” motorists driving in cycle lane force council to reinstall bollards – just weeks after they were removed

The bollards were removed in January over concerns that cyclists could collide with them, but since then footage has emerged of drivers using the painted cycle lane and mounting the pavement

Cycle lane bollards will be partly reinstated on an Edinburgh road just weeks after they were taken away, after councillors criticised the ‘depressing lawlessness’ of motorists who capitalised on the bollards’ removal by continuously driving in the now unprotected cycle lane.

In September, the City of Edinburgh Council agreed to remove the bollards on Drum Brae North due to safety concerns for cyclists “at risk when coming downhill on the steepest section of the hill”.

Councillors claimed that people using the segregated cycle lane, installed during the Covid-19 pandemic as part of the city’s Spaces for People scheme, were in danger of colliding with the bollards if forced to take “evasive action such as if someone was reversing from a driveway”.

However, since the bollards were removed in January, images and videos have been posted on social media of drivers treating the cycle lane like another lane of motor traffic, with one motorist even filmed driving along the bike lane before mounting the pavement, almost hitting a child.

According to the Edinburgh Evening News, locals have warned the council that, despite the authority’s apparent aim to reduce the threat posed to people on bikes on Drum Brae North, the road has become even more dangerous in recent weeks thanks to the lack of protection for cyclists.

Labour councillor Scott Arthur, the city council’s transport convenor, said action had to be taken to improve safety on the road, and that the “lawlessness” displayed by drivers in the area was “depressing to see”.

A report by the council’s transport committee found that residents had witnessed “multiple vehicles regularly encroaching into the cycleway”, while the removal of the bollards had “made parents feel unable to safely cycle with their children”.

Following the report, the committee voted on Thursday to reinstall the bollards – but only along half of the cycleway, in the section where, the council says, “issues have been reported and observed”.

The council’s transport manager, Dave Sinclair, admitted taking the bollards out was the wrong decision, and that officers would continue to monitor the road to determine whether they should be reinstated along the entire length of the cycleway.

“I think we’re clearly revisiting that to manage the risk – we have a duty of care and we have seen the videos,” Sinclair said.

“I think it’s reasonable that we reinstate the area where we know that driver behaviour is so poor that physical reinstatement is reasonable.”

> ‘Moronic’: Edinburgh Council to make changes to bizarre zig-zag cycle lane after social media backlash 

However, Liberal Democrat council leader Kevin Lang questioned the “piecemeal and premature” reinstallation of the bollards, which he claimed represents the “hokey-cokey approach that appears to have been taken with this road”.

“I’m worried we’ll be back here again, probably pretty soon with something else, and the hokey-cokey will continue,” he said, before pointing out that “incredibly disruptive” roadworks elsewhere had “probably doubled” the volume of traffic on Drum Brae North in recent weeks.

Conservative councillor Christopher Cowdy echoed Lang’s analysis by suggesting that the closure of Clermiston Road was behind the increase in incidents reported to the council, a claim which prompted head of placemaking Daisy Narayanan to point out that the problem owed more to poor driver behaviour than the volume of traffic on the road.

“We’re just accepting there’s an issue here that needs to be addressed. I think most people accept that something has to be done here,” added Arthur.

“What this is about doing is reinforcing that message to drivers that they shouldn’t be driving in the bike lane and they shouldn’t be driving on the footpath.”

> Residents blame increase in motorist-related collisions on recently installed cycle lanes

The desire to blame external factors on poor driving isn’t new in Edinburgh. Last year, residents on the city’s Lanark Road – a road notorious for cycling-related casualties – blamed the increase in the number of collisions involving motorists in the area on the recently installed cycle lane.

The Lanark Road cycle lanes continued to fuel the anger of motorists throughout 2022, with members of a nearby golf club starting a petition last February to have the bike lane removed – so they could park their cars on it.

> School bike bus being used for “political ends”, claims MSP

Meanwhile, Scottish Conservative MSP Sue Webber came in for criticism in June after she claimed that a school bike bus on the Lanark Road was set up simply to score political points, as a public consultation over Edinburgh’s much-debated Spaces for People scheme drew to a close.

Ryan joined road.cc in December 2021 and since then has kept the site’s readers and listeners informed and enthralled (well at least occasionally) on news, the live blog, and the road.cc Podcast. After boarding a wrong bus at the world championships and ruining a good pair of jeans at the cyclocross, he now serves as road.cc’s senior news writer. Before his foray into cycling journalism, he wallowed in the equally pitiless world of academia, where he wrote a book about Victorian politics and droned on about cycling and bikes to classes of bored students (while taking every chance he could get to talk about cycling in print or on the radio). He can be found riding his bike very slowly around the narrow, scenic country lanes of Co. Down.

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23 comments

Avatar
chrisonabike | 1 year ago
2 likes

Only a couple of miles from me. Two issues here beyond the obvious.
1 the presumption of "maximum capacity for driving" barring special circumstances - Covid here. As soon as that was "done" it was "full speed ahead with driving again or we'll know the reason why".
2 - This and other roads act to *block* connections for active travel. Drum Brae North is a pretty steep road and itself a distributor road - which in the UK style means "almost as busy as an arterial road at times". Even though it's also a "place" with houses either side and even a nursery! Not an obvious choice for a cycle route. However from the north-west there's about a mile between direct, convenient (slightly) cycle friendly routes (basically there's Clermiston Drive - others are even busier and/or steeper or in the navigational challenge category). But there's also "what happens at the north end of Drum Brae"? You're out on the "urban motorway" of the A90. There is no *network* for cycling - unless you're happy cycling with lots of fast traffic (plenty of coaches and lorries) - uphill too! Most likely you want to travel East-West here but all your options either involve braving the traffic, going out of your way (and still braving some traffic) or the usual mix of kerb-hopping, cycling on a mud track (where cycling is actually forbidden) and navigating minor roads.

Motorists naturally just drive directly along the wide Queensferry road, 40mph+, clear signage...

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Rik Mayals unde... | 1 year ago
4 likes

A point pretty much everyone has missed, first and foremost, Scot Plod should be patrolling there, dishing out fines to everyone who reversed out onto the main rd. Unless it's not a driving offence now. 

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hutchdaddy | 1 year ago
6 likes

...well it's no wonder that drivers take over cycle lanes, when they're not being used by cyclists who don't pay road tax...

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kallack replied to hutchdaddy | 1 year ago
3 likes

What this argument again?  Most cyclists own cars and leave them at home leaving more space for you.

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Bikey Pete replied to hutchdaddy | 1 year ago
0 likes

.........

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Secret_squirrel | 1 year ago
18 likes

"with one motorist even filmed driving along the bike lane before mounting the pavement, almost hitting a child."

OOO ooo I know the answer to this one Bob. 

Is it " Pull your finger out ScotPlod and deploy a video upload portal before someone dies"

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ShutTheFrontDawes replied to Secret_squirrel | 1 year ago
9 likes
Secret_squirrel wrote:

"with one motorist even filmed driving along the bike lane before mounting the pavement, almost hitting a child."

OOO ooo I know the answer to this one Bob. 

Is it " Pull your finger out ScotPlod and deploy a video upload portal before someone dies"

INCORRECT! The correct answer was "blame the driver when someone gets killed (but not punish, or even bother to find said driver) and ask 'what could we possibly have done to prevent this tragedy?!'"

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OldRidgeback replied to ShutTheFrontDawes | 1 year ago
10 likes
ShutTheFrontDawes wrote:
Secret_squirrel wrote:

"with one motorist even filmed driving along the bike lane before mounting the pavement, almost hitting a child."

OOO ooo I know the answer to this one Bob. 

Is it " Pull your finger out ScotPlod and deploy a video upload portal before someone dies"

INCORRECT! The correct answer was "blame the driver when someone gets killed (but not punish, or even bother to find said driver) and ask 'what could we possibly have done to prevent this tragedy?!'"

Nope, the ScotPlod answer is to blame the child for not wearing hi viz.

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matthewn5 replied to OldRidgeback | 1 year ago
2 likes
OldRidgeback wrote:
ShutTheFrontDawes wrote:
Secret_squirrel wrote:

"with one motorist even filmed driving along the bike lane before mounting the pavement, almost hitting a child."

OOO ooo I know the answer to this one Bob. 

Is it " Pull your finger out ScotPlod and deploy a video upload portal before someone dies"

INCORRECT! The correct answer was "blame the driver when someone gets killed (but not punish, or even bother to find said driver) and ask 'what could we possibly have done to prevent this tragedy?!'"

Nope, the ScotPlod answer is to blame the child for not wearing hi viz.

No, it;s to blame the child for not wearing hi vis and then sympathise with the driver 'who will have to live the rest of their life with this'

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bikes replied to ShutTheFrontDawes | 1 year ago
11 likes

The judge will note in their sentencing that in this case the driver is full of remorse and there will be no benefit to society by doing anything, there will be particular hardship if banned from driving etc. Same old story.

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nosferatu1001 replied to bikes | 1 year ago
8 likes
bikes wrote:

The judge will note in their sentencing that in this case the driver is full of remorse and there will be no benefit to society by doing anything, there will be particular hardship if banned from driving etc. Same old story.

and that it was a one off, exceptional event, and it was a cyclists fault for havin g run a red light a week prior, and...

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chrisonabike replied to Secret_squirrel | 1 year ago
5 likes
Secret_squirrel wrote:

OOO ooo I know the answer to this one Bob. 

Is it " Pull your finger out ScotPlod and deploy a video upload portal before someone dies"

Close. If there are enough deaths there will be more urgency to doing something. But people will correctly point out that a reporting portal only helps in retrospect, then a lawyer will raise privacy concerns. Finally the police force will claim this would require more "operational resources" than are available (without re-tasking polis from "real crimes"). And the plan will then lose momentum and be dropped until next time.

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lllnorrislll | 1 year ago
9 likes

Lawless? Would suggest that there is a lack of laws, but the truth is there are laws, they are just not being enforced!!

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wycombewheeler replied to lllnorrislll | 1 year ago
6 likes
lllnorrislll wrote:

Lawless? Would suggest that there is a lack of laws, but the truth is there are laws, they are just not being enforced!!

Lawless
1. without law
2.  disobedient to the law
3.  contrary to or heedless of the law
4.  uncontrolled; unbridled

seems to fit the definitions

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eburtthebike | 1 year ago
16 likes

While it's good that they acknowledge the illegal, inconsiderate and dangerous driving, why haven't they prosecuted the drivers?

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Oldfatgit replied to eburtthebike | 1 year ago
29 likes

They questioned each driver, but as each driver couldn't remember committing the offence, there was nothing Police Scotland could do.

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grOg replied to Oldfatgit | 1 year ago
1 like

You jest but this actually happened to me; I reported a very close pass by a truck to plod, who spoke to the driver and the cop rang me back to tell me that the driver couldn't recall pasing a cyclist, so that was that..

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mctrials23 replied to eburtthebike | 1 year ago
7 likes

I would give them a whacking fine and 6 points. In the grand scheme of dangerous driving its pretty low on the list but it just shows an unbelieveable level of entitlement and disregard for the rules of the road. 

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Safety replied to eburtthebike | 1 year ago
7 likes

"While it's good that they acknowledge the illegal, inconsiderate and dangerous driving, why haven't they prosecuted the drivers?"
Good point but you forget prosecuting the drivers would be the responsibility of Polis Scotland. The institutionally anti cyclist force.

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nosferatu1001 replied to Safety | 1 year ago
4 likes
Safety wrote:

"While it's good that they acknowledge the illegal, inconsiderate and dangerous driving, why haven't they prosecuted the drivers?" Good point but you forget prosecuting the drivers would be the responsibility of Polis Scotland. The institutionally anti cyclist force.

Presumably anti pedestrian as well.

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Sriracha | 1 year ago
21 likes

Signpost it clearly, unambiguously, in-your-face unmissably, and install revenue generating cameras. Ring-fence the money to build better cycling infra. Simples.

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belugabob | 1 year ago
10 likes

...but...cyclists...

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nosferatu1001 replied to belugabob | 1 year ago
3 likes

It'll absolutely be the fault of a cyclist I'm sure.  Something something red light no doubt. 

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