Susannah Constantine apologises for “joke” about killing cyclists

Dr Lincoln Grant wrote:

Well, she's right in one sense: TfL, Boris and mayor Khan have spent £1 billion on narrowing London's once beautiful broad boulevards - the only major city in Europe to do so.

Take Pall Mall - once a safe cycling avenue - but now the width between bus/truck and bicycle has been cut from 6ft to 6" if you're lucky.

Wonderful road 'improvements'.. most 'wonderful' at killing and injuring cyclists?

The latest 'super-slow' highway - along Bayswater Rd - often has fewer than 20 cyclists using it each morning, while a mile of traffic, maybe 2,000 people sit in buses and cars..

The ludicrous Boris bike scheme is only kept alive by massive subsidies, and many bikes have never been used. 

The tiny rise in London's cycle population coincided with a steep rise in bus fares under Ken Livingstone, which ousted most young people and students.

The only way London's retail, cafe and street economy will survive, if at all, is if tens of thousands of car parking spaces are restored across central London. (Yes, really). Delivery drivers outnumber cyclists in London by 30:1.. wot's the logic?

Are the media types who whitter on, (especially at the dire BBC - who watches it?), about the glories of urban cycling are a dying minority.

Is London's bike 'strategy' a total failure in need of a total re-think? Yep, no doubt about that!

Ha ha - stupid non-cyclists going nowhere when they could be getting fitter, healthier and complete their journey quicker.

Dr Lincoln Grant wrote:

... narrowing London's once beautiful broad boulevards ...

Is there another London, then?  I thought we were talking about the one on the Thames.

brooksby wrote:

Is there another London, then?  I thought we were talking about the one on the Thames.

Funnily enough. Yes, there is another London, in Ontario, Canada. Meandering through it is the Thames river as it passes Oxford Street, Victoria Park, Museum London and under Blackfriars bridge. 

You've not heard of a place called Paris? Do some research. It has boulevards. And guess what? It has a very pro-cycling transport approach. 

Meanwhile Berlin has been criticised for not being sufficiently pro cycling.

Quite. She happily goes round murdering foxes for so called sport. I've encountered the hunt a few times when out on my bike. Arrogant lot directed me to go a different way to make way for their entourage including a load of range rovers.

handlebarcam wrote:

What she means when she says it was a joke is that, within a year, she'll be talking about how cyclists have no sense of humour for not "getting" her hilarious comedy about wanting to murder them. Probably at dinner parties with other faded ex-Sloane Rangers, people who were once on TV and reckon they've been "cancelled" but actually everyone else just realized they were completely devoid of talent, and the lunatic fringes of the Tory Party (i.e. members of the cabinet.)

Just so.

Getting "an apology" from such degenerates who enjoy emitting these "jokes" is a waste of time and a distraction. One might as well believe the excuses of a Tory for doing Tory things. They will continue to feel and do bad things no matter how thickly papered-over with "apologies" and double-speak.

Other hater syndromes such as racism and misogyny remain in the heads of those harbouring them but have been discouraged to a degree only by laws. No law will change the inner attitude but the nasty behaviours engendered by such attitudes will reduce if there's a good chance the behaviours will be punished.

Good theory - which can work if actually implemented.

Eventually, the fact of their illegality and their association with criminality will begin to change the damaging attitudes of some folk. Peole are generally rather conformist but tend to avoid conforming to illegal behaviours unless they're in a gang of mad loons (such as The Tory Party) determined to act outside of socially-acceptable norms whilst maintaining a veneer of respectability.

And there's the rub.

At present, Tory disingenuousness concerning law and order has permitted loon-groups of every ilk & tittle to come baying from their various holes and caves. Many laws against damaging others are no longer enforced. Even if a law was made that nominated cyclist-persection as a hate crime, no one would enforce it - unless the cyclist was a Tory politician, of course.

Cugel

Well, you say that. And you are probably at least partially right. The problem is that there are frequent incidents where people in cars randomly attack cyclists. There are far too many cases where this sentiment clearly isn't a joke

Agree.