Copy of email to Cambridge police

UPDATE: Via a circuitous route local police are taking this seriously - local political blogger/independent journalist Richard Taylor tweeted this on to several councillors, who contacted local police who as a result got right back to me with the information that they're looking to prosecute. Good news - but deary me, why ought this be so complicated?
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Just spent a frustrating little while talking to our local police force on the phone. First officer I spoke to was just colossally unhelpful, and wouldn't give me an email address to send video evidence to. She felt it was appropriate to bring some kind of text link to that to the station and hand it over while being interviewed - and that might not be for days. When I said that this is silly and could I speak to her superior officer she hung up. I was livid.

Phone back, got email address but no clear indication they'd definitely even look at an email.

I hate 'but its the year (x)!' type outrage - but come on Cambridgeshire Constabulary, sort this out. This isn't ok.

Anyway, here's the text of the email I've sent.

Video evidence for incident 95 (reported today). Incident was at about 6:15 PM yesterday.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OLmBAeZxGLI

I would like you to find someone to look at this ASAP please - I'm sure you'll agree that someone oughtn't be driving like that. I'd be happy to come in to the station to make a statement about this, but I'm concerned that you'll not start investigating this incident until then (and the earliest time you had for an appointment for that was Saturday evening).

It does concern me that this guy will be driving around until at least then without you having initiated any kind of discussion with him, and I would have thought that on the evidence of the video footage alone you've got more than enough to go and have a word with him to initiate your investigation. And I feel fairly sure that even if the first step is that this guy knows you're looking in to his driving he'll be taking some more care - prompt action could (and looking at the video I think you'll agree very likely will) prevent someone getting hurt.

Would you be able to give me some feedback on how you'd like to handle this today please?

Lastly, you've really got to update your system for handling reports of crime. You've got a single not-necessarily monitored email address for receiving crime reports and many of your staff aren't even aware of if, believing its rational to require that members of the public attend the station and presumably write down weblinks? You know full well that isn't ok.

Thanks,

Colin Davidson.

Normal, Everyday Cycling - Roundup.

I'm looking back at posts about riding my bike from last week, where I was making an effort to document every ride in a way I'd never normally consider, and I'm mostly struck by how little cycling really defines my time.

Yeah, I get around that way, so I've got to remember bike lights and a lock and do need to think about waterproofs at this time of year, but I'm not waiting for the bike to warm up in the morning, I'm not choosing travel times and where to shop based on how heinous the traffic will be, and I'm certainly not spending so long sitting angry in traffic that it has any negative impact on my mood. My means of getting around costs me next to nothing and it takes less time than any other available options. Yeah, its healthy and green so in some ways more 'virtuous' than driving, but I'm riding a bike about because its the most practical, time and space efficient way of getting from A to B, allowing me to split journeys more productively and get to where I want most effectively. My riding isn't about other people driving - its a rational choice for me. 

Could it be better still? Well, yes, many of the routes I'm using lack good cycle facilities and its fairly obvious that the presence of such would help out where traffic is heavy and drivers angry. But even as things are I'm left with three thoughts about cycling every day from this. 

Firstly, my bike riding defines me less, in any practical respect, than the people driving are defined by their transport choice. My method is cheaper, easier, faster, and puts way less strain on any aspect of my life than theirs. Calling them 'motorists' and me 'just a person getting about' makes more sense than the normal view of 'cyclists' as strange outsiders while drivers are 'normal'. Whats 'normal' about choosing one of the least convenient and practical forms of transport for most journeys?

Secondly, it takes actually sitting down and thinking about the massive convenience of being able to lock up and shop, look, wander about wherever I want to bring home the benefits of a cycling lifestyle - or, rather, a non-motorised transport dependent lifestyle. I couldn't stop off at a shop on the way home if I was on the bus and I'd struggle to do that by car in most cities. I couldn't combine a car journey with a ride around a few likely green spaces looking for wild mushrooms on a car, so if I'd been driving a car about all these years my knowledge of what grows where and how I can use it wouldn't be what it is now. Riding a bike frees time, yes, but it also allows us, physically, to see more of whats in our neighbourhoods and be more involved in our communities. Cycling facilitates personal growth within our environments by reducing the physical and conceptual distance between us and what is around us. I know what trees grow on all of my regular routes because I've time to see them, and when they're shedding useful or tasty fruit I can stop and pick it.  I know when to pop in to the local farm shop because he'll have discounted game. I know when to pop in to the assorted local ethnic food shops to talk to the most enthusiastic staff there who'll want to share passion for their own cuisines and encourage me to try something new. Bluntly, cycling rocks.

Lastly, its amazing just how chilled out most cycling is. Yeah, you'll get the occasional nutjob on the road. But for the most part its relaxed, easy and simple. Yet every working day last week I passed the same folk sitting in the same cars in the same traffic jams, usually with the same stressed and unhappy looks on their faces. I'm forced to ask - why is it I'm the odd one for cycling?

Sorry for getting evangelical. But biking around really does make life better in all sorts of ways that most people never even think about. I wonder, when trying to get more people out on bikes because the net impact of that is better for everyone else, is the fact that our lives can just be better a more effective way of selling cycling?

Normal Everyday Cycling - Day 6 and 7

Horrible weather on Saturday, but we could still pick up the remainder of our shopping by bike. First went out to Daily Bread, a sort of wholefood place where as ever I was struck by people driving colossal 4x4's to a supposedly 'ethical' outlet to buy less stuff than we get home by bicycle. Only a small load required this week though, not enough to warrant the bike trailer so we wend there and filled the bike trailer with dried fruit for Christmas cooking, 5kg of flour and yeast for the bread machine and a few other bits and bobs. Then we took a round-about route home to see if there might be the first of the wild blewit mushrooms of the year. There weren't - but still, worth a look, they won't be long. Again, while I normally wouldn't even think about this it just wouldn't be possible to combine that with a shopping journey by car.

Then out to the local shops in Arbury for other stuff and to put our Christmas order in with the butcher in plenty of time, for local gossip (and celery) from the greengrocers, and to the supermarket for more bits and bobs. Not a lot to get but, again, by being on a bike we weren't tied to where we could easily park a car, so we can far more easily get to the smaller shops with no loss of time. 

Sunday was, for me, a toss up between going out looking for mushrooms or going down to the Allotment in the morning before meeting some mates - I chose the former largely because I fancied a bit more of a ride in the sunshine. That means I'll have to harvest some veg from the plot one morning on the way to work - which isn't a big deal. My better half went in to town in the afternoon for a bit of Christmas shopping and I gather met a friend for a tea, while I spent the afternoon gaming with the lads at a mates house.

All in all, a chilled, relaxed weekend - I wouldn't say riding my bike defined the weekend in any way, but it did enable it.

Normal Everyday Cycling - Day 5

The weather forecast for Saturday was looking grim, so I took the Elephant Bike again on Friday to get some of our shopping on the way home, and go to the market at lunch time. There are a couple of little farm shops in Cambridge, but at opposite ends of the city centre and I wanted to visit both. That means either a long walk or riding a bike between them (goodness knows where you'd park a car if you were trying to get to one shop on Lensield Road and another on Mitchams Corner).

Crazy mad traffic on the way in to town again - thats every day this week. Might have been the worst of all on Friday morning. I tend not to think about it, but I suppose for the most part its the same people stuck in the same traffic every single day and I can't imagine how long it must take them all to get to work. I don't feel smug or superior at all when I pass them, just a lack of understanding as to why they choose to travel that way. Surely the park and ride or the park and cycle has to be better than spending that long getting in and out of the city centre every day.

So I managed to get to both of the farm shops on the way home, and the market at lunchtime, and loaded up the pannier bags and basket with a box of clementines, a brace of pheasant, a chicken, two bottles of Fentimans and plenty of cheese and assorted impulse buys from the farm shops too without really having to make another trip - being able to stop and lock up a bike en route wherever I'm going provides a huge advantage over pretty much any other way of getting around. 

With any luck there might be at least a few moments of dry weather and time to get out into it over the weekend...

Normal Everyday Cycling - Day 4

Another wet morning, but more cold than moist so scarf and hat this morning.

Struggling to think of anything exciting to say about riding to work and back today - the only thrilling thing to relate is that, as ever, when the weather is wet the roads are more rammed full of cars than at other times. I thought I'd go a different route to avoid the worst of if, but there's no getting around it, when the weather is bad some of the people who'd walk or cycle drive, and the result is carmageddon. And with that comes a delays to the bus service.

So another day of commuting faster, easier and really enjoyably by bike. 

The only question I'm left with on a day like today is why me riding a bike is held somehow definitive of me, whereas all the people spending way longer in their cars are not defined thus instead. My way is faster, easier, simpler faster and lower stress than the other options, its the sensible option. So why is it seen as the odder choice?

Normal Everyday Cycling - Day 3

Day late with this one, did't have time to put this up last night.

Raining this morning so had to don an extra garment - waterproof over-trousers. Cheap and cheerful things from an Army and Navy place on Ebay, I don't need them very often but once in a while they're handy.

Traffic was crazy again this morining as ever, cars queued up at the road works and the traffic lights, and as ever, didn't delay me by much.

Wasn't raining after work, so the waterproofs were stuffed into the pannier back, rode out to the shops to pick up some snacks for my partner and I. We were going to the pictures to see Dr. Strange and meeting there at the cinema. Handy to be able to lock up the bike right outside both the cinema (the Light, rather than the Vue, which really needs to sort out its bike parking at the Grafton Centre urgently) and the shops up on Fitzroy Street, so I had time to do that while she booked tickets. Car traffic was bumper to bumper on Hills Road, with long streams of angry motorists getting into bike lanes, clogging junctions, etc. Managed to avoid much of that by taking a back route along by Fenners, but there's no way to avoid Hills Road bridge.

Not such a bad film, got home about nine-ish on rather queiter roads. One sticky moment with a car accelerating fast on the wrong side of the road on Gonville Place heading towards the traffic lights at the Catholic Church junction, a seemingly mindless manevore that couldn't hope to gain him anything. Don't know for the life of me what it was about, was he just frustrated by being stuck there?

I don't immediately see how we could have done any of this by car or bus - two of us coming from different places to meet at the cinema and get home together? I don't get how people who rely on cars manage any kind of social life, at least during the week!

Normaly Everyday Cycling - Day 2

A colder morning today, with neighbours spending what seemed an eternity warming up cars and scraping ice prior to driving off. The traffic news was all about crashes here and delays there, but nothing that ought to have been a problem for me.

Traffic was again heavy on the main roads, with road works on Arbury Road to make things even more unpelasant. I filtered past on the outside both at the road work lights and at the end, and I'll confess I gave the guy in the shiny white SUV that passed me way above the 20mph limit to be stuck in traffic in front a bit of a dirty look.

Was surprised to be undertaken by a lady on a road bike going around the roundabout on Milton Road, and I did shout a warning at her (the bike-rider package I represent doesn't have the turning circle she does). We were in danger of both coming off as she turned into the space I was heading in to. She didn't approve of that! But I'd rather an exchange of a few harsh words in response to yelling a warning than come to grief on a the roundabout.

City Centre was rammed again, but I could console myself that my neighbours were probably still scraping ice off their windscreens...

Rode in to town from work at lunchtime, picked a few things up at the shops.

And as ever at this time of year the trip home was in the dark. Again, coming out of the city centre the car traffic was heavy, especially on Magdalene Street where the one-way section was backed up in both directions with cars filling the space and preventing oncoming traffic. Again, everyone on the road seemed angry except fot the cyclists. Milton Road was likewise a bit crazy, and coming off Mitchams Corner I was a bit concerned by the taxis blocking the cycle lane - but it wasn't a problem, the traffic wasn't so bad I couldn't get around them.

So not as uneventful as yesterday, but basically humdrum.

Normal, Every Day Cycling - Day 1

It was cold this morning, winter is well on the way now, so I was wearing a good jumper and a coat and gloves today. And as Monday is game night, I've not normally got time to cook much so today I took this bike to pick up pizza on the way home - the flat basket really helps for things like that. Didn't need a rucksack, could load pannier bag up with work laptop.

Ride in was uneventful, other than that there seems to have been something happening on Milton Road somewhere - cars were queuing all the way along it and on Arbury Road too, so I found myself filtering past traffic most of the way. I also hit the 9 o'clock lecture rush when I got to the city centre, which means the commuter-peloton with hundreds of other bikes. Hair raising stuff until you're used to it. 

The bus from home goes a different route to the way I ride, but I was talking to a chap who commutes that way later on and apparently it took him three quarters of an hour to get to work. It took me less than 20 minutes through horrible traffic, and I consider that rather slow for my normal 3 mile trip.

Stopped off at the supermarket on the way home for pizza. The most eventful thing that happened to me on the road today was a pedestrian sprinting out across in front of me as the lights changed while loudly apologising - I suppose she must have been in a heck of a hurry.

And thats it for today. Looking at the traffic, its fairly obvious to me that my bike riding made up less of my day and contributed less to my stress levels than all the folk stuck in lines of cars! More tomorrow...

A week of normal, every day cycling

I'm often confronted by the implication that because I cycle I must be somehow doing things differently to everyone else, that my life is more complicated or difficult somehow. Perhaps this is because most people don't get that riding a bike isn't a preoccupation or a hobby in itself (although it can be), its just a way of getting about. Cycling seems to be what makes us stand out, its how those who see us doing it define us, and they're rather unable to deal with the fact that we don't define ourselves by it in the same way.

Riding bikes isn't my hobby. I mean, yeah, it might seem like it is to you because this blog is all about riding, but really this place is more a reaction to being treated as if I'm weird for what I consider to be a background activity. So I thought maybe I could get across some of what riding a bike is all about by describing my riding for a week - maybe if non-cyclists can see that we're just folk getting around, maybe in some small way this will contribute to us no longer being seen as two-wheeled weirdos. 

I'll put the first post up tonight sometime. What kind of thing about daily cycling do you want to hear about?