This page gathers together some of my older written pieces. Some of the earliest ones are pieces which I contributed to the Merseyside Cycle Campaign's publication "Pedal Press" between March 2008 and September 2010, when I lived in the area. Some of the later ones are pieces I have moved from pages on this blog, because they no longer seemed current. I don't want to lose these pieces of writing altogether.
Why Fragile Cyclist? is a link to a page on this blog which is an edited version of my first Pedal Press Article. It explains why I came into being!
Pedal Press Pieces....
Ride to work, work to ride - 12 May 2005
I have a stressful job, and this time of year is the most stressful period of all. But each morning I have thirty-five minutes of almost perfect peace before work and each evening I have a thirty-five minute wind-down which eases the stress out of my hair. I ride along the riverbank, where I witness nature’s ebb and flow and the seasons passing.
I am lucky to live where I do, so that the riverbank is my route. But to be honest, it’s hardly luck. When I relocated to this town I researched my new home carefully. In Winter it’s not so good as I must ride through the city, but right now it’s Summer and I shall cherish it.
Please forgive me if I enthuse. But to see and hear a huge flock of dunlin skimming over the mudflats and to see the cerulean sky reflected in the receding waters, just because I am travelling home from work, makes me feel utterly privileged. I see goldfinch and heron, blue, great and long-tailed tits, wheatear and an occasional grebe. And I see fishermen and dog-walkers, young lovers, old friends, boys having fun on skateboards and all manner of people just having a little time to think. River traffic, men at work, cargo ships heading up toward the docks on the other side, tugs scurrying back and forth, the ferry, and harbourmasters working the marina lock and guiding small yachts in and out all thrill me.
Sometimes I arrive at work so happy that my colleagues think I’ve had a bang on the head. In other circumstances I might be asked: “whatever you’re on, can I have some?” but I ride a bike, so this doesn’t happen. If there’s one thing I seem incapable of understanding it is the reluctance of people to get close to the world they live in, to see it and savour it first hand instead of from within a metal cocoon.
Cycling isn’t the only way to savour this wonder. There is a community of people each day on the riverside path who have their own way of doing it. But cycling is the best way by far to fit it into a busy work schedule, without any significant cost, and to get some exercise in the process.
So if you don’t do it already, try riding to work. And if you really love someone a lot, try to persuade them to do it too.
Why I started cycling - 22 May 2005.
People often ask me why I first started cycling, so here’s my best explanation.
It all starts back some 20 years ago when, following extensive surgery, for five days a week over thirteen weeks, I rode my old “shopper” bike to and from the hospital for physiotherapy. I had ridden to school on it previously but only because there was no direct bus service. Perhaps it meant freedom for me even then, because after my last ‘O’ level I rode away from school and just kept going, until tiredness made me head for home.
But the hospital was near to my old school and the bus service had never improved. And the only chance I had of walking properly again was to attend these daily hour-long physiotherapy sessions. They seemed easy, compared to the immense difficulty of cycling two and a half miles with the use of only one leg.
But things gradually got better. After thirteen weeks I returned to university, my hobble much improved, and my cycling speed almost doubled. My left leg was weak – too weak to depress a clutch pedal. But the fact that several of my leg muscles, wasted through nerve damage, had woken up and started to work, was more than I could ever have dreamed. And the fact that they hurt like hell when I turned the pedals made it clear to me what had caused them to work again.
Distances and speeds gradually increased, and in time, I began to feel the bad times receding. When I rode my bike I felt I was a normal woman, and that I could go anywhere and do anything I wanted. Cycling had torn away the ties that kept me near to home, too disabled to go far. It gave me a sense of freedom which to this day is my biggest motivation for setting out by bike, and it gave me the means to live the kind of life I wanted to live.
That’s why I started cycling, and it’s why today, if you get me a little bit drunk, I may tell you that cycling saved my life!
Poaching the Pavement – 4 December 2005
Some time ago I wrote about my trip to work along the Mersey riverbank, when I was full of the joy of Spring and my ride was pleasant and easy. But now I feel cocooned in Winter and the riverside path is interrupted by building work and construction. And I am reminded why I gave myself the name at the head of this article, for I have been feeling fragile indeed.
The city planners did not plan sensible cycle diversions during the works which have disrupted both of my potential routes to work. Whichever route I use, I end up in seriously major traffic, made even worse by the severe congestion which is itself exacerbated by the construction. I could rant incessantly about the lack of foresight of our council leaders (and there are few worse councils) but if I do that I shall only lose my rag, and others are likely to express my view better than I can. So I shall write about something controversial but pleasant, a discovery I have made which is contrary to my own strongly-held beliefs.
I have been forced to ride on the pavement. I dislike pavement cyclists because they give me a bad name and make it harder for me to convince the unconverted of the good and useful contribution cyclists make. So pedalling down the path was something I felt apologetic about and indeed, to begin with, I apologised to every pedestrian I passed. But after a few days, when I found myself wanting to use the same bit of ground a rather large man also wanted to use, I was shocked to hear him apologise to me. I apologised too, then he said something like “no, I should apologise”, and I said “no it’s me in the wrong, I’m sorry” and it went back and forth for a short time, all in good humour. I was in the wrong, of course, but perhaps he realised why I was there. And a half dozen times since then, a similar thing has happened. Not one pedestrian has been rude to me, which is more than I can say for when I’ve been using the riverpath.
So my conclusion is this. Whilst the city planners disrupt my cycle route, evidently wishing I would die on the highway, I shall carefully share the pavement with pedestrians in one or two places. And to any pedestrians who are reading this feeling aggrieved I apologise most sincerely, and I promise that I shall get back onto the road just as soon as it’s safe for me to do so.
Smoking and Health – 30 October 2006
I grew up in the sixties, in a household of smokers and a world where smoking was the norm. As an elective non-smoker myself I was in an unpopular minority, and I found many places to be no-go areas for the distasteful air and the stench left on my hair and my clothes. Most pubs and the upstairs of buses were out of the question, and I lived in fear of having to sit in the smoking carriage of a train for lack of seats elsewhere. I had colleagues who I hoped wouldn’t engage me in interesting conversation, for if they did, I might need to endure their ghastly offices longer than I would wish, unable to speak up for fear of offence.
I never thought that even in a million years it would ever change, and yet it has. Faced with overwhelming scientific evidence, the government has legislated against smoking. Pubs will soon be much more pleasant places, and trains, buses and my work environment already are. Those people who are half my age might not see my point, because they didn’t see it before. But the change is revolutionary, it really is.
Only there is still another foulness in the air. Rates of asthma soar and the lungs of the world breathe with increasing difficulty. Certain factions will hurry to tell us that car traffic is only a small part of the greenhouse gas problem, but as a cyclist, it is the part which concerns me most, as not only does it choke me, but it tries to run me down too.
I am in an unpopular minority again. Most cyclists, like me, would love to see the Stern report signal a turning point in public opinion which would challenge the government to adjust transport policy towards sustainability, not only through cleaner cars (which is all they talk about) but through cutting car journeys through a basket of fair measures, proof against hitting the poor hardest. Cycling is regular exercise which both contributes to a reduction in congestion and also benefits health. It has the potential to impact significantly on a range of government targets. And the fewer cars on the roads and the more cyclists, the less risky cycling would be and therefore (all research shows) the more popular it would become. Is there just a small possibility that in the not too distant future, I will cease to be in an unpopular minority of batty transport rebels?
Not too long ago I would have said no, not in a million years. But since the announcement of the smoking ban I have dared a new hope. Maybe I’m not so batty after all.
Evidence and the Law – 24 January 2007
Note: At the time I wrote this, the verdict was awaited in the trial of a driver who had killed a cyclist on a local road, his explanation being that he had been blinded by the sun. I have changed the names in this piece.
I work with the law and also with members of the public who have been financially wronged. I often hear them say “lock him up, he’s a villain” – and I feel the criticism when people think this should occur but find it does not occur.
People have a sense of justice, and they feel it most acutely when someone they know or love is a victim of crime. But justice goes both ways, and it is surely right that people should only be convicted of a crime when it is proved beyond reasonable doubt to an independent Court that they are guilty of that crime.
But between the sense of justice and the proof of guilt there is a wide chasm. It is the difference between belief in guilt and proof of guilt, and it is called evidence. As the burden of proof lies with the prosecution in all crimes, a lack of evidence means there is simply no case to answer. The defendant is deemed innocent, however wrong that feels to those who are affected.
I have been a victim of lack of evidence. On 22 May 2000 a truck ran over my leg. The driver said he never saw me, despite the fact that I was in an advanced stop line at a junction and dressed in fluorescent yellow. He turned left, caught my bike, and took me with him. I threw myself from the bike and was fortunate that he drove over my leg and not my head. My bike was shredded.
I was injured and shocked and it was the beginning of the Fragile Cyclist, for I have been petrified of heavy traffic ever since. But the driver suffered nothing more than a short interview with the police and perhaps a sharp word from his employer. It was even my insurer who picked up the bill for my new bike.
The driver said that he never saw me, and there were no witnesses to say otherwise. There were no witnesses at all. Witness testimonies are evidence, so there was no witness evidence and no other evidence. And unless there was evidence to prove he did see me or that he ought to have seen me, he had an absolute defence of any motoring crime, as intent is everything in motoring crimes (as it is in financial crimes), with the burden of proof currently being on the prosecutor to prove it.
David Donald and Andrew Palin and others may have to undergo the ordeal of giving witness testimony in Court in the trial of the driver who killed Mike Pritchard. We have all read about seemingly unjust sentences passed on drivers who kill, and I will be bracing myself for a verdict or sentence in this case which I may feel is unjust. But unless the burden of proof is changed so that it lies in favour of the most vulnerable road user in any collision on the road, then driver behaviour will sometimes go unchecked. And people who kill cyclists will continue to be inappropriately punished.
Post script: The driver pleaded guilty to driving without due care and attention and received a £400 fine and a 6 month suspension from driving. He also had to re-sit his driving test.
Forget-it-not – 24 January 2007
I never seem to remember everything when I go cycling. I set off on my bike, and a mile down the road I realise my water bottle is missing. Or my cape. Worse still, the lipsalve (I can’t be doing with chapped lips in winter) or my phone. I even forgot my shoes once when I started my ride with a short drive, wearing trainers. I’ve a memory like a sieve and there’s no cure – heaven knows I’ve tried all sorts.
Once I thought up a mnemonic to remind me what to take, but I forgot it as soon as I thought of it. I’ve pinned several lists to my garage wall but I always forgot to read them. I pinned one to my hallway wall, but it looked unsightly, so I left it on my bedside table, and threw it away next morning, forgetting what it was.
So I thought I’d turn to poetry (Andrew Motion, eat your heart out). My latest attempt to remind myself of what to take on a ride is intended to make me pack a cape, a handkerchief, lipsalve, loo roll, a spare innertube and pump, an allen key or two, water, a lock, bonk food, money, a mobile phone and my house/garage keys.
Maybe you don’t take all of that stuff, but I thought I’d share it with you anyway. Just substitute any name you like for “Paul”, and make sure you don’t nominate me for any prizes…
How long will my good luck last? Will it rain?
And will my nose run, as I sneeze again?
Will my lips be sore, or will I need the loo?
And if my tyres go down, will my saddle slip too?
I’ll need to drink but if I fade, I’ll need
To stop and lock my bike, and feed.
I’ll need to pay for food, and other things,
And take my phone for when Paul rings.
And if my cold’s so bad I find I just can’t ride,
I’ll head for home, to nurse my injured pride.
I’ll wipe my nose and have a final sneeze,
And hope I find my garage keys…
All I need to do now is to memorise it!
Maps and Society – 14 March 2008
Anyone who knows me will know that I am a bit of a map fetishist. So a gift of the Cassini Old Series map number 117 (Chester & Wrexham) was very welcome and appreciated, and it has given me hours of fun. But it has set me thinking too.
In case you don’t know, Cassini Old Series maps are cleverly reconstructed using old first series Ordnance Survey maps of between 1833 and 1843 which are cut, copied, pasted and cajoled into areas which are exactly the equivalent of the current Landranger series, so that they can be directly compared with the up to date map. This means of course that the landscape can be directly compared too.
Look out of your window at your own street, and try to imagine it in 1843. There would be no cars, no tarmac road surface, no telegraph poles, no electric street lights, no TV aerials or satellites, no block paving, no concrete roof tiles and no UPVC windows. It would look very different. But what of the road itself? Was it there in 1840? If it was, would there be people travelling down it? If so they would be walking, or perhaps (if wealthy) riding a horse. They would certainly be able to talk to one another.
As I cycled around area 117 comparing my old and new maps, I realised just how much the modern map excludes people. Progress came, and railways, then motorways and A-roads cut new routes, obliterating all in their path. Minor roads became dead ends; occasional specially constructed bridges favoured some villages and left others completely bypassed, so that they died. Some villages were simply obliterated, whilst others were cut in two. And Stoak, near to Ellesmere Port, was almost completely hemmed in by motorways and slip-roads - residents live there today with the noise of heavy traffic in every square centimetre of their village. Even if they were to stand in the street to talk, they would find it difficult to hear one another.
Many other roads have not been adopted in the intervening years, because they served none of the major routes between towns and so were considered unnecessary by the local or highway authorities. The have sometimes become bridleways, much more often footpaths, and more often still, they have disappeared from public use altogether. They are ploughed up or are private farm tracks. These are no-go areas for ordinary people.
The landscape on my old Cassini map was a reflection of people who lived, worked, and interacted with the town of Chester and the countryside around. The landscape on the modern map is a series of blue and red corridors through which people avoid Chester and the countryside around. The places between are fragmented, partitioned, swamped, or obliterated.
But I am not advocating a return to 1843, not at all. I would like to put people back on the map in a modern way. By giving space back to walkers and cyclists we would benefit the wider community, and the people, in a great number of unseen ways. And if we put people back into the landscape, the map could once again reflect the people that live and work in it, rather than the cars they drive. Surely, it is people that matter.
Music – 21 March 2008
“You’re living in the past…” - so said my husband, after an evening in the pub watching a “live” performer mime to music. Long ago I used to spend several evenings per week watching live music, real musicians playing real instruments to a pub audience; real bands with real weaknesses, and real strengths. It was incredibly good to see people performing their much rehearsed sets. I never fully appreciated it at the time, but now, after watching a man perform the odd vocal flourish in time with a tape recording of music which included the guitar solo his fingers failed to match, I see that when I was young, real talent had an outlet. Now, a performer in a pub seems to need to have courage, but little else. Talent lies dormant, no-one seeks it nor encourages it, nor is it financially worthwhile for talent to reveal itself. But this is progress, apparently, and if I am to be a forward thinking and modern person, I ought to accept it.
Is it always better to look forward in this way? Should I accept all change assuming it is better, because it is more modern? To say that I’m living in the past is only one way of looking at it. It could also be said that I am witnessing a change for the worse, and I liked it more how it used to be, when really it was better. I am old enough to have seen the “before” and the “after”. Some of the people in the pub have not seen what went before – they have only ever experienced mime and they probably wouldn’t want to see anything else. But I feel cursed by my experience – I find it difficult to enjoy an inferior performance.
Perhaps I am living in the past regarding cycling too, because I would like to see the roads full of cyclists as they once were. Am I failing to see the future, or could it be that the change I have witnessed on the roads is not for the better? Does the forward thinking person accept unfettered car proliferation as progress? Is it a sign of “living in the past” to see that things could progress another way?
I believe – indeed I believe fervently, that more people on cycles would lead to less congestion, less obesity, and less carbon emissions. Is it living in the past to think this way?
Sitting in the pub tonight, I thought of the Beatles. Arguably the greatest concentration of talent that Liverpool ever produced, perhaps the greatest band the world has ever seen, the Beatles were four lads who were live performers. In this day and age, if they were at the beginnings of their careers and unknown, they’d probably never even get a booking. Apparently that’s progress.
Other Writing...
Birthday Rides at Ellesmere 2012
I'm not good at staying home alone whilst my hubby is away having fun. So when it turned out that a cycling trip he had planned with his friends was to coincide with the CTC's 2012 Birthday Rides at Ellesmere, I sent my booking form off.
I like camping alone, but I prefer to do it amongst friendly people rather than strangers. So the Birthday Rides gave me an opportunity to get my “camping fix” and I picked a spot close to the loos. I arrived on the afternoon of Monday, 13 August, got my tent pitched, said hello to the people camped around me and set off to explore the facilities. These were fairly basic as the location was a school not a proper campsite, but they were quite sufficient for me as I’d booked and paid for my meals, so I wouldn’t have any cooking to do or any dishes to wash.
I like camping alone, but I prefer to do it amongst friendly people rather than strangers. So the Birthday Rides gave me an opportunity to get my “camping fix” and I picked a spot close to the loos. I arrived on the afternoon of Monday, 13 August, got my tent pitched, said hello to the people camped around me and set off to explore the facilities. These were fairly basic as the location was a school not a proper campsite, but they were quite sufficient for me as I’d booked and paid for my meals, so I wouldn’t have any cooking to do or any dishes to wash.
On the Tuesday, I set off for my first ride - a “B” ride to Acton Burnell. I was interested in how I would fare on this as it was an undulating rather than a hilly ride, and the area where I live is so hilly that it’s been a long time since I’d ridden so flat a route! Would I find it easy, or just the same? Would I find the mileage ok? It was all to be found out.
I rode alone at what felt like a cracking pace, and with a headwind too. But it was hot, and I ran out of water, so I stopped at a garden centre for a cup of tea (and a water bottle refill). There, I got in with three women riding together and I tagged along. But when I stopped for a mechanical, they got ahead of me. I caught them before the lunch stop though, so I must have been riding quite well.
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| Acton Burnell Castle (picture from the web) |
I woke up the next day with a splitting headache, probably due to de-hydration. Conversely the weather was very wet indeed so I forwent riding (missing out on the opportunity to tell long tales of woe in the process) and spent the day doing gentler pursuits, and in the evening I listened with absolutely no envy to tales of the simply dreadful conditions fellow riders had ridden through!
I found mealtimes to be my main social opportunities, during which I was able to chat and enjoy the company of others. On my rides however I was feeling destined to ride alone, which I regretted, as I can do that any time. This was largely because of the way the rides were organised. Normally there is a timetable of rides each day, an A, B, C and D ride. But for this year, there were 26 rides, any of which could be ridden any day. The result was that unless you’d brought friends with you, there was no group to ride with.
So I set out on my Thursday ride on my own with something of a heavy heart. Then, when feeling lost at a junction, struggling to find myself on a map, I found I was entirely surrounded by a friendly group of riders. To escape a car which came from nowhere I set off with them, got talking, and before long I’d decided to stay with them. They made me feel very welcome indeed, so why not?
It was a short ride, but very scenic and very interesting. We cycled along the Llangollen canal and rode (or rather, walked) over two aquaducts, Telford’s fabulous Chirk and magnificent Pontcysyllte Aquaducts. We also stumbled through two pitch black tunnels, on the wet and narrow towpaths. With two tea stops and a lunch stop I found it to be an easy day on the legs, and a very easy day on the socialising muscles. I had a lovely time.
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| Wet cyclists gather for the procession! |
On the Friday, I wanted a half day ride, as the Cyclists’ Procession was fixed for 2:00 pm and I wanted to be a part of it. But there was a very enticing short ride for me to do - years earlier I had passed Whixall Moss on a canal boating holiday, and I’d wanted to ride there along the canal bank ever since. Now was my chance.
The weather looked threatening and so I wore my waterproof jacket - a mistake, as I overheated terribly. And even though the ride was very short I had to rush it - I just didn’t allow enough time to use the binoculars I was carrying. So I’ll need another visit, and next time there’ll be no timetable...
I took my hot and stickly waterproof jacket off just as the rain began, so on it went again. Then I rode the short distance into Ellesmere to join in with the procession through town. A colourful spectacle, as CTC’s new Chief Executive noticed, saying he’d learned he must wear brighter clothing next year.
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| Pistyll Rhaeadr waterfall |
Each evening entertainment had been laid on, and the Saturday entertainment was a barn dance. I turned up, but was too tired even to stand for long, so I crept off for an early night.
Home the next day, I reflected on my time away. The CTC’s Birthday Rides have been running for almost 40 years and some people have been coming since the beginning. Inevitably it is mainly attended by retired people, which seems a shame, as it is within the school holidays and I would like to see more families attending. I believe the CTC must work to bring cycling to the younger generation and it may need to include mountain biking and sportive riding in order to do that.
But I had a fabulous time, and I will probably go again. This was my sixth time, and I will be intrigued to find out where the rides will take place next year.
But I had a fabulous time, and I will probably go again. This was my sixth time, and I will be intrigued to find out where the rides will take place next year.
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| Beautiful scenery, who knows where |
