Tag: uk

First hand report: Olympic bus vs cyclist

From Reddit:

As I was cycling home from work tonight a guy, maybe in his late 20’s, was cycling level with me and as we approached a bus he went inside while I held back. The lights changed as he was in the buses blind spot and as he was attempting to go straight the bus turned left. He didn’t really have anywhere to go and no time to do anything anyway… he got pulled under the wheel and dragged around 10 feet or so. As soon as the bus was definitely stopped i crawled under to him from the other side and i was immediately aware that i didn’t think he’d make it.

Discussion and more: Just sat down with some poor bloke for his last few seconds. Be safe out there guys.

New UK Prime Minister commutes by bike

UK Conservative Party leader David Cameron today was selected as the new Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. The 43 year old Cameron, who is Britain’s youngest prime minister in almost two centuries, regularly rode his bicycle to parliament. It’s unknown if Cameron will continue riding his bike from his new official residence at Number 10 Downing Street.


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What other world leader gets around by bike?

In his campaign, Mr Cameron threw a few bones to the motoring lobby, though he also promotes high speed rail across Britain and green initiatives to encourage walking, cycling, and mass transit use.

Like the United States, the UK is increasingly dependent on imported oil for its energy needs. North Sea oil production fueled economic growth from the Thatcher era onwards. Although production peaked in 1999, the national government continued to receive substantial revenue from North Sea production, allowing lavish spending on social programs.

North Sea oil has not cushioned Britain from the worldwide economic turmoil of the past two years, leading to the dissolution of Gordon Brown’s Labour Party government. The Conservative Party plans to cut some taxes to stimulate economic growth, but with declining energy supplies economic growth is impossible though, to his credit, Cameron has resisted most tax cut proposals in favor of plans to cut government spending.

The UK’s 2009 oil revenue was half what it was in 2008, and 2010 will likely be even worse. Cameron and his coalition government with the Liberal Democrats will need to deal with the realities of physical resource constraints, climate change issues, economic recession, and lower tax revenues. It should be interesting for them and for all of us.