People expect cyclists to bend over backwards

I cycle around town and country for recreation and commuting.  It is faster, more reliable and/or less faff than the alternatives, but I am tired of getting a bad rap.  I respect other path/road users where it matters, but I do not like to waste my time and pedalling effort for no good reason.

Why should the law make me stop for red lights?  Obviously if the junction is occupied because it is the turn of other traffic or pedestrians then fair enough, but otherwise it's stupid.  Why should I sit like a lemon at an empty junction while traffic builds up behind me, waiting to squash me in the free-for-all when it goes green?  All concerned are better off if I am already out of the way!  Also numerous non-UK places permit inside-turn-on-red, giving way to other vehicles and pedestrians of course. It is even easier for a cyclist than a car to nip left.  I get honked but the car drivers are cross because they are stuck waiting, not because I am actually causing them or anyone else any inconvenience.  So it is a daft law and I am pleased that the police cannot ever be bothered to punish me in any terribly onerous way.

Also pedestrians whine about being "nearly killed" on cycle/footpaths when all that has happened is that a cyclist (me) has gone past at a perfectly safe, stoppable speed, but the pedestrian jumped out of their skin because I have "appeared out of nowhere" (i.e. they weren't paying attention and ignored the ringing and clicking sounds of my approach).  Is it really too much to ask that people are aware of what is going on around them?  I have to keep a look out for cars on a road or I'd get squashed, why shouldn't they keep a look out for cycles on a cycle path?  When there is a whole gaggle of them, or a pair of pushchairs, or a dog on a lethal extendable lead, it would be no harder for them to keep to one side of our nice three-metre-wide purpose-built path and routinely leave a bicycle-sized gap than it is to block the entire width, and then they wouldn't have to be coaxed out of the way in the first place.  Even on the bits which have a big picture of a BICYCLE on one side and a PEDESTRIAN on the other, they still walk wherever and tut at me.  I am usually nice about it, slow down, say thank you, but they are a pain.  To keep myself harmlessly amused I have a mental fantasy in which my bicycle is equipped with heat-seeking Sidewinder missiles which home in on dogs' rears from fifty yards back, and imagine their looks of canine surprise at the moment of impact.

And neither pedestrians nor car drivers like it when I cycle over a pedestrian crossing.  Why not?  What possible difference can it make whether I am pushing my bike or sitting on it, except that the former is less convenient for me?  As far as I am concerned if I am going slower than 5 mph then I am a pedestrian and if faster then I am a vehicle.  A wheelchair is more of an obstacle than I am!  All I want to do is cross the road to turn right, I wouldn't have to use the lights at all if there weren't cars zooming past ignoring my "please let me into the middle" hand signal (and then, sometimes, turning sharply left having "forgotten" that I am there).

I think that being a cyclist has made me a more alert and considerate driver and pedestrian and I don't value anyone's opinion about cyclists unless (a) they are both a cyclist AND a driver/pedestrian, or (b) the cyclist they are whining about has actually done something which violates safety or common sense rather than just broken some rule designed for a ton of high speed killer metal, not a bike.

By: Grumbleweed