Nuxx:Bc974139-b752-44e9-ad6d-ce76b47424ad@d19g2000prh.googlegroups.com

Path: num2.nntp.dca.giganews.com!num1.nntp.dca.giganews.com!number.nntp.dca.giganews.com!border3.nntp.dca.giganews.com!border1.nntp.dca.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!postnews.google.com!d19g2000prh.googlegroups.com!not-for-mail Message-ID:  From: Nuxx Bar  Newsgroups: uk.rec.cycling Subject: Re: 200 quid fine for cycling in 'Games Lanes' Date: Sat, 18 Jun 2011 17:02:29 -0700 (PDT) References: <2SEKp.7615$fQ4.2858@newsfe16.ams2> <993646dc-a255-4218-9d83-1997fc6bd416@p9g2000prh.googlegroups.com> <8nlov6tp7bm63egt33sk41di34akj194ov@4ax.com>  Lines: 52 Organization: http://groups.google.com NNTP-Posting-Host: 82.71.49.124 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable X-Trace: posting.google.com 1308441837 3380 127.0.0.1 (19 Jun 2011 00:03:57 GMT) X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 19 Jun 2011 00:03:57 +0000 (UTC) Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com Injection-Info: d19g2000prh.googlegroups.com; posting-host=82.71.49.124; posting-account=WrLs9woAAAD151hWKA9yknAtxFHW4kE4 User-Agent: G2/1.0 X-Google-Web-Client: true X-Google-Header-Order: HUALESNKRC X-HTTP-UserAgent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10.7; rv:2.0.1) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/4.0.1,gzip(gfe) Bytes: 4380 Xref: perfectly-safe.chapmancentral.co.uk uk.rec.cycling:813421

On Jun 18, 8:51=A0pm, Simon Mason  wrote: > > Those lanes will be gone by next year and yet we have silly rules > whereby taxi drivers can drive in bus lanes even though the drivers > may be on their own, whereas a private car with 5 people in it is > barred. Taxi and PH drivers seem to get away with a lot for little > benefit to society.

So do you think buses should be allowed in bus lanes when they're carrying fewer than 5 people? If so, why, and what's the difference? What about buses which aren't in service?

I do agree with you that a car is a car, whatever financial arrangements have or haven't been made between the driver and the passenger(s), so the rules are indeed silly: bus lanes should be open to everyone. You yourself said that bus lanes are "useful" as a "deterrent" to driving, so it's OK that they stand empty while other lanes are chocka. I think that especially in this day and age, the authorities should have *much* better things to do with our money than deliberately causing congestion in that way: it's a negative, spiteful and patronising approach which is also grossly undemocratic.

If we had proper local democracy like we do in the US then that kind of crap would be blown out of the water (along with speed cameras, which people have got rid of all over the place there...it seems that strangely enough, those running the cameras there are more interested in making money than improving safety, and are quite happy to be dishonest about the figures to keep their income stream going...*everywhere* that cameras spring up, their proponents are up to the same old self-serving tricks).

Anyway, if congestion hadn't been deliberately caused in the first place with maliciously phased traffic lights and all the rest of the nonsense drivers get subjected to, the chances are that the roads would work properly for everyone and no-one would even need to think about bus lanes or "Olympic Lanes". Just imagine that: *everyone* getting where they want to go in good time. Wonderful, eh? Well yes, for anyone who's not mentally defective, but the car-haters wouldn't like it one bit: they can't stand the idea of drivers not being punished for their transport choice, so they pretend that the only way for the "legitimate" transport modes to get there on time is to inconvenience the "illegitimate" ones. The sad thing is that they seem to have persuaded a lot of people of that, to the extent that it is now just subconsciously assumed that punishing motorists will automatically benefit other modes, even when there's no mechanism for that to happen through.

(BTW, where I am, I don't think private hire drivers are allowed to use bus lanes, but it could be different elsewhere...although in areas where there is no register of private hire cars, I'm not sure how they would differentiate, or whether there's anything to stop just anyone from saying they're using a private hire car.)