Jeremy Vine busted for speeding

[WinstonWolf]

http://road.cc/content/news/136571-radio-twos-jere...

Seems like Jeremy Vine has been busted for speeding in Hyde Park. His heinous crime, doing 16MPH in a 5MPH limit.

[MKnight702]

If he was doing over 90 in a 30 would you ask the same question?

Speed limits are limits, they may be stupid (and often are) but that doesn't mean you can ignore them.

[WinstonWolf]

MKnight702 said:

If he was doing over 90 in a 30 would you ask the same question?

Speed limits are limits, they may be stupid (and often are) but that doesn't mean you can ignore them.

WT effin F?

You do realise he was on a bicycle? There are *no* posted speed limits in the park and speed limits do not apply to bicycles on the road.

[Rob_T]

WinstonWolf said:

speed limits do not apply to bicycles on the road.

i don't believe he was on the road. i believe it was a shared path

either way i don't much care for the fact that speed limits on the road don't apply for bicycles but that's a debate for another (rainy) day

[Vocal Minority]

WinstonWolf said:

You do realise he was on a bicycle? There are *no* posted speed limits in the park and speed limits do not apply to bicycles on the road.

I'll double check that but I am not sure they don't (I have never been fast enough to really test the issue!)


Edit: Apparently not. Every day a school day.

[WinstonWolf]

Vocal Minority said:

WinstonWolf said:

You do realise he was on a bicycle? There are *no* posted speed limits in the park and speed limits do not apply to bicycles on the road.

I'll double check that but I am not sure they don't (I have never been fast enough to really test the issue!)


Edit: Apparently not. Every day a school day.

Yup, that's why I'm always trying to set the buggers off when I'm cycling

[SteveSteveson]

Going fast (but not flat out I know) on a shared path, in a park? Dumb thing to do. 5mph may be a bit slow, but 16 mph is too fast for a shared path. Want to go fast? Get on the road. It just pisses pedestrians off and gives more drivers the idea that we should be using cycle lanes even if they are inappropriate.

There is no speed limit on bicycles in the road traffic act, but the 5mph limit is most probably a bylaw, and cyclists can be done for due care or dangerous cycling if they are going at an inappropriate speed (Which depends on where you are)

WinstonWolf said:

Vocal Minority said:

WinstonWolf said:

You do realise he was on a bicycle? There are *no* posted speed limits in the park and speed limits do not apply to bicycles on the road.

I'll double check that but I am not sure they don't (I have never been fast enough to really test the issue!)


Edit: Apparently not. Every day a school day.

Yup, that's why I'm always trying to set the buggers off when I'm cycling

This is one reason cyclists should have number plates or some identifier. So we can ask the police for a copy of the camera photo proving that we managed over 36 MPH on the road

Edited by SteveSteveson on Thursday 20th November 14:12

[GrumpyTwig]

Why shouldnt push bikes keep their speed low on a shared path? I imagine if I hit someone at 16mph it'd bloody hurt.

[Type R Tom]

I think there are a number of by-laws in Royal Parks, speed could be one of them.

https://www.royalparks.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_fi...

[S10GTA]

I'm not sure I could do 5mph without falling off sideways

[donfisher]

GrumpyTwig said:

Why shouldnt push bikes keep their speed low on a shared path? I imagine if I hit someone at 16mph it'd bloody hurt.

Early or late at night when they’re aren’t many people around you can get up to quite a good lick through and round Hyde park without being a danger to anyone.

It’s a pretty 5hit place to ride the rest of the time though. I’ve no idea what the rules actually are on this but on the weekend you get a lot of frantic bell ringing by people charging past on the shared paths. I always feel that in the case of shared use, it’s cyclists that are allowed on the pavement rather than the other way round.

But then you get people on foot weaving in and out of the designated cycle lanes.

Going round on anything other than a Dutch bike or a Boris bike is a frustrating experience.

[Type R Tom]

I think the point is not to ride at 5mph but to be considerate and if you need to go faster use alternative routes. I don't know the particulate path but maybe you could argue, in this location, that 16mph is too quick hence being pulled by the cops.

[Soop Dogg]

The reason there isn't a speed limit for bikes is because there is no compulsion in law for bikes to have a speedometer fitted. If they really wanted to enforce a speed limit, bikes would have to have a speedo fitted at point of sale and it would have to conform to some sort of standard to ensure it was accurate to within a specified tolerance. Then they'd have to alter the law to ensure that bikes had to keep the speedo fitted after purchase. Then there's the question of retro-fitting with speedos, all the bikes already on the road.

To tell someone they were exceeding a speed limit on a bicycle (under the current laws) is ridiculous. They could just turn round and tell a police officer that they thought they were doing 'x' mph and say 'sorry - I did my best'. At the end of the day it's going to be a best guess by the cyclist and you can't reasonably demand any more than that.

[47p2]

I was stopped for speeding on my bike when I was 14 years old, a massive big downhill road on which I was doing 45mph in a 30 zone. Cop had a hand held laser and zapped me as I approached. I was pulled over and given a lecture about how much damage I could do to myself if I had fallen off.

[Soop Dogg]

Yes, but you can't actually be 'done' for speeding.

There is an old offence (which is still valid today) of something like 'Furious Cycling'. This is similar to dangerous driving. It could be used if the speed at which you were travelling was so obviously above that which would be deemed by a reasonable person to be safe, however that is not the same as being prosecuted for excess speed. i.e. it's a different offence.

[Kell]

I know Hyde Park pretty well and recognise that spot he was pulled over.

Technically the path is shared but clearly delineated, and along that stretch it's very wide. At other parts the entire path is about as wide as a three lane road, and at times it's barely wide enough for two bikes to pass each other.

So while that stretch is wide I don't like using that particular bit of the park as it's where you run into the most problems with pedestrians.

I can understand them stopping people to ask them to slow down or consider their actions, but a fine and a radar gun is fking ridiculous.

If they wanted to have a go at dangerous cyclists, the best place would be the bit where you cross from Kensington Gardens onto the path that Mr Vine was on. There's a speed hump and a pedestrian crossing which is clearly signposted with a big blue sign saying Cyclists Please Dismount, yet in 7 years of cycling the road it crosses most days, I could count on one hand the amount of cyclists I've seen pushing their bike across the crossing.

Of course that won't be policed, because it's only the cyclists themselves that would come to harm if a car fails to stop to let them cross.

Edited by Kell on Thursday 20th November 17:55

Edited by Kell on Thursday 20th November 17:57

[Dammit]

This story is about the wrong thing- it should be about the police using absolutely nothing appropriate, or indeed existent within the law to tell people off.

There is no speed limit for a shared path, it's like stopping a motorist for having the wrong colour seats - a nonsense.

Putting it on a sign doesn't make it real.

What they could have done was to say that some pedestrians had aired concerns about cyclists travelling too rapidly, and could Mr Vine please make sure to pass slow and wide.

But they didn't - they invented a speed limit which doesn't, and indeed could not exist, and now it's in the public eye as yet another click-bait "naughty cyclist" story when it should be about the police being ridiculous.

[sidaorb]

From the Royal Parks info sheet...

[i]Always observe the speed limit of
the track you are on - that may be as low as 5mph! Our
pathways are not suitable for fast travel; if you are in a
hurry, you may wish to use another route.[/i]

And the comment about the police chasing real criminals, these are the parks police, they are there to enforce the rules of the park.

[Dammit]

And the legal basis for the 5mph limit would be?

[sidaorb]

Dammit said:

And the legal basis for the 5mph limit would be?

Parks bylaws