You may recall my observations about cyclists last year. My particular gripe is that many of them seem to believe that they are some sort of hybrid, enjoying the benefits of being both a pedestrian and a motorist. With that belief they can progress the wrong way down a one way streets, use the pavement as cycle tracks, pedal across pelican crossings, ignore traffic lights and weave across traffic flows at will.
Last week returning home from an evening in Edinburgh, a cyclist was hit by the bus we were on. Now it’s not for me to apportion blame as I didn’t see the incident as we were on the top deck but the comments passed by the cyclist give an insight into the attitude of these urban menaces. He had no lights on his bike which, when I pointed this out, prompted the cyclist to retort that he had a 'HiVis' jacket and that his lights had been stolen days earlier so ‘what was he supposed to do?’ My friend (a cyclist of some endurance himself) then continued the dialogue by saying “You should have got some more lights then Sunshine”. It may have been the shock of being challenged but he then became very abusive, threatened to larrup my 75 year old friend and let it be known, loudly and in no uncertain terms, that he did not wish to be called ‘Sunshine’. (Regrettably I was giving my details to the bus driver so missed the once in a lifetime opportunity to say "Leave it alone Dave, he's not worth it"). I must say that I thought the name "Sunshine" particularly apposite given that he clearly imagined that it radiated from his 'HiVis' jacket.
In our final conversation he claimed the bus driver had deliberately swerved to knock him off his bike and that he had nearly been killed earlier that week in a similar incident. Now I’m no expert in cyclist psychology but I would have thought that following that previous incident he might have redoubled his efforts to be visible at night.
We decanted from the bus and a posse of investigators arrived to sort things out. Normally I apply the Darwin Principle to this sort of incident – anyone so willfully stupid as to cycle around a busy city centre, in the dark without any lights deserves whatever he gets. My problem is that as a society we can't be certain that he won't breed and pass his selfish, stupid genes onto another generation.
