On Sun, 15 Jun 2014 19:37:53 +0100, JNugent
wrote:

On 15/06/2014 18:28, Bertie Wooster wrote:

JNugent wrote:
On 15/06/2014 16:50, Bertie Wooster wrote:
JNugent wrote:
Bertie Wooster wrote:
JNugent wrote:
On 14/06/2014 14:21, Bertie Wooster wrote:
JNugent wrote:
Bertie Wooster wrote:

[ ... ]

So you would encourage the police to have zero tolerance to all road
traffic offences, including cyclists on the footway and speeding
motorists?

As has been observed before, cycling along the footway is an offence
which is easily identified. If the cyclist is cycling along, and he's
cycling along a footway reserved for pedestrians, he's breaking the law.
There are no other considerations - it's absolute.

"Offences" of gradation, eg, moving along a 30mph carriageway at 30.1
mph, are rather more difficult to detect, even for the driver
information equipment of the vehicle concerned. For that reason, a
certain amount of marginal leeway is allowed as a matter of legal
expediency - and as a matter of justice. Driving along Colchester High
Street at 29.9mph is permissible, doing the same at 30.1 is
theoretically not, but only those with a screw loose would claim that it
ought to be punished or even that any effort be made to detect it.

It is not very kind of you to suggest that MrCheerful might have a
screw loose.

I suggested nothing of the kind with the above. My reference was very
clearly to whoever wrote: "So you would encourage the police to have
zero tolerance to all road traffic offences, including ... speeding
motorists?".
Many writers lose perspective on that issue and start comparing apples
with oranges.

No such leeway is needed with absolute offences such as:
- driving with a defective tyre, or
- driving with no insurance, or
- driving with no road tax, or
- driving with no MOT certificate, or
- cycling along a footway, or
- cycling the wrong way along a one-way street, or

What is a legally allowed distance to reverse into a parking space on
a one way street?

Whatever is reasonably necessary. It's provided for in law, as you
probably know.

Is reversing 2m ok? what about 2.01m? 3.59m? 10.67m? 40.154m?

Offhand, I would say that any of those except the last, depending on the
exact circumstances. 10 metres is less than the length of a stationary
lorry or bus, for instance.
Forty metres, or, as the British call it, 131 feet 9 inches, seems less
likely, except in peculiar circumstances, to be viewable as
"reasonable". It's not out of the question, though, I have reversed
further than that in a one way street, with the permission of a police
officer on the scene.

You get the idea?

Of course I do. You are trying to make the weasel case that because
drivers are allowed to reverse park in one way streets, it's OK for
cyclists to disregard one-way working completely.

Not my point at all.

Of course it was. It's transparently at the base of the whole sub-thread
(which you started). You must be pretty stupid if you really "think"
that it can't be seen a mile off.

You are wrong.

I don't think so. You were trying to "justify" blatant selfish
law-breaking on the basis that motorists reverse-park on one-way streets.

My initial point was that if Cheerless wanted rigorous enforcement of
road traffic laws, it needed to be rigorous for all road users.

Fair enough.

You then made the invalid point that speeding motorists were a special
case.

No, I did not.

I made the absolutely valid point that "speeding", being an offence of
gradation, which cannot be detected (let alone proven) without
scientific measurement technology, is a *different* case from an obvious
absolute offence which can be detected by the Mk I Eyeball.

And as I patiently pointed out, speeding isn't unique in this.
Detecting a bald tyre similarly needs measuring - unless you think
that you can determine the difference between 1.61mm and 1.59mm.

Your reasoning being that it was difficult to detect a speeding
offence which was marginally over the speed limit.

That was an illustration. It cannot be detected *at all* without the use
of a technology. Your "witnessing" a vehicle being driven at 35mph (in
your opinion) in a 30mph limit is meaningless. Not so your witnessing
someone cycling along the footway, which needs only to be witnessed and
attested to be proven.

I then pointed out that speeding was not a special case by
demonstrating that offences, such as driving the wrong way down a
one-way street could be equally difficult to detect, or having
defective tyres.

Some such offences may indeed only be provable by measurement, but that
merely puts those particular offences in the same category as alleged
speeding. It doesn't shift the selfish offences that cyclists commit
into that category. They remain absoluite and provable without measurement.

So what do you suggest? That the police are less rigorous with
offences such as speeding and driving with bald tyres, and focus their
attention on absolute offences, such as an eight year old cycling on
the footway alongside a busy road on their way to school?

You then made the incorrect assumption that what I was trying to say
was that as motorists could legally reverse for short distances along
one-way roads, that it was OK for cyclists.

But you were trying to say that.

If you weren't, you can make that clear.

Simply copy and paste the following:

"I, Tom Crispin, aka Bertie Wooster, hereby give notice and wish it to
be known that I do not seek, and do not wish to seek, to justify the
selfish offences committed by cyclists (eg, cycling along
pedestrian-only footways, cycling through pedestrian-only precincts,
cycling the wrong-way along one-way streets or disobeying traffic
lights), whether on their own demerits or by comparison with any faults
I might imagine or perceive in any other class of road-user.".

Do that and omit the inverted commas and I might think about taking your
testy protestations seriously.

Why are you trying to scrape the bottom of a bone-dry barrel? Surely you
are not being so stupid as to try to claim that because a driver may
reverse a few feet or yards into a parking space, that means it's
acceptable for a cyclist to cycle the wrong way in a one-way street?

Perhaps it depends how far?

Maybe. But whether one is parking, or just trying to evade the rules
(like a cyclist) will be crystal clear to an observer.

- driving or cycling through a red traffic light, or
- driving or cycling at night without use of mandated vehicle lights.

There are no measurement difficulties with these offences. If they have
been witnessed, they have been committed. And the driving offences
mentioned in that list - absolute offences - are the correct comparators
for "cycling along the footway" (a particularly mean-spirited,
self-centred, anti-social and absolute offence).

I'm glad you agree.

I felt I'd proved the converse already. But perhaps you can answer my
questions above.

You claim not only that cycling along a footway is NOT a particularly
mean-spirited, self-centred, anti-social and absolute offence, but also
that you have proven that assertion?

What colour is your local star?