Moving Target,1991
Just over a year ago Alexander Walker, (possible spelling mistake),a man overly concerned with the vast accumulation of obstacles on the footpath,wrote an article entitled "Dodging the Desperados." Here it iswith MT Comment.
Not long ago I wrote a column above the vast and still growing accumulationof obstacles on the footpaths. The outcome is that my own progress alongthe pavement is additionally impeded these days by the congratulationsof people who are as angry as I at the build-up of bins, traders’ signs,rubbish bags, parking meters and even stationery cars.
The only thing to do, I tell them, is do something. Kick, shove or movethe obstruction out of your way, if you can. Unfortunately, there is onekind of pavement pest on whom this won't work -the mobile kind that seemshell-bent on moving you out of its way. I refer to the bike couriers, thoseurban desperados of our city centres.
"Cecil Parkinson's placebo to the footsore of London - the always-overlookedfolk who move under their own steam - made mention of more cycle tracksto compensate for the abandoned road schemes. Fine, if the cyclists willkeep to them. But, more and more; wheels are taking over our footpaths.
"In the past couple of years we have been afflicted by swellingpacks of messengers on bikes who break every written and unwritten trafficregulation. By their recklessness in ignoring red lights, swerving on andoff pavements at road junctions and slaloming along crowded footpaths,they have added to the impression that Central London is a lawless place- not so much a no-go area as a go-as-you-please one.
I have sympathy with these youngsters who want to earn money by workingflat out for it, not simply holding out a hand to you as you pass and saying"Gizza pound". But they have unwisely been made into folk heroesby the media. They are admired for their speed, fashionable. cycle gear,air of streetwise derring-do. This flattery has given many of them theconviction that they are glamorous social outlaws who can get away withany and every act of anti-social behavior.
"They are not. Many provide a useful service in a lawful manner.Too many are now behaving like hooligans.
Even worse are those on motorcycles as big as armoured cars. As roadcongestion grows, these are veering on and off footpaths to get aroundtraffic jams - the pavement on the part of Wardour Street between ShaftesburyAvenue and Leicester Square is notorious for this kind of dangerous misconduct.
"There will be tears one of these days if the law doesn't quicklycrack down on these marauding Mercuries and put them where they belong.'On yer bikes' - on the road."
Being the ignorant git that he seems to go out of the way to prove heis, Walker writes that there is no way of dealing with CC's on pavementand that every CC is 'hell bent on moving you out of its way. What uttercrap. CC’s generally speaking are fully aware of the fact that they havea moral code to observe whilst on the pavement (eg. moving slowly, givingample warning of movements etc). Walker misses the whole reason why CC'sand other cyclists are on the pavement in the first place which is avoidinguseless traffic systems based around cars which lead to a hostile environmentin which to cycle, and the courier's necessity to get from A to B as quicklyas possible. If we were on the pavements as often as he would have peoplebelieve, then we might as well just forget using bikes and bloody run.
If Walker had more experience of riding in Central London, then he wouldrealise just how abused cyclists and cycle paths are. It only takes a coupleof ignorant fools to leave their prized piece of planet destroying machineryin our cycle paths for us to be forced back into the path of main streamnasty traffic.
As for jumping lights, the high pressure nature of couriering meansthat clients put despatch companies under pressure to be prompt (everythingis 'urgent'). This pressure is passed onto the controller and finally thegood ol' courier, who then has the unenviable task of delivering the packageat speed through London’s poisonous streets for a pittance. If at the endof the day a few red lights have been ignored for a better-wage then sobe it.
We will go where we like, why not? Who does this city belong to?
Your 'sympathy' is an insult to the homeless many of whom are in thatposition as a result of existing in a culture of greed and self-indulgence.It is also insulting to CC's as it seems our choice is to redeem ourselvesby slogging our guts out or begging. Thanks for the choice. Some life!
Forget the media image, your article only goes to reinforce this stereotypein its own self- indulgent manner. Youngsters - as you call us - who workunder such diabolical conditions need something to aspire to, why not asocial outlaw?
Finally Walker, a choice {undoubtedly an improvement on the one youseem to give us). You are invited to experience the exhilarating and adrenalinepumping excitement of cycle couriering 10 hours a day, 5 days a week fora month while we lounge in your office writing about moral standards andniceness in the 90's. Failing that you could always try sleeping roughand trying to beg up enough money to survive. We're sure these optionscan only improve your appreciation of life and death in the cycle lane.To quote from a New York courier:
"We owe nothing to a society that would burn out its youngon danger ridden streets in an envelope of polluted dirty orange haze nomatter how 'hip' our job may appear to be".
On your bike Walker, before you cause any more damage.
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