A Dublin Cyclist Writes…

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The Luas works outside Trinity College Dublin in late December

Finn Murphy writes:

“Just a heads-up to the cyclists of Dublin this morning. I was coming around by Trinity where they are laying the new Luas tracks and have temporarily filled them back in, well filled in all of it except for a few tiny bits of track that they seem to have forgotten about and I think you can guess what happened next.”

Sitting in work now with a huge bruise on my face and scraped-up hands and legs. Great way to start the week!”

Sam Boal/Rollingnews

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32 thoughts on “A Dublin Cyclist Writes…

  1. VinLieger

    Ahh don’t worry sure it wont take long till Owen Keegan has his way and turns the entire city into a bikes only dystopia and anyone who wants to use cars will be sent to re-education camps

    1. ahjayzis

      What kind of hyper-individualist, lazy mentality doesn’t think a car-free city with decent public transport would be absolutely wonderful?

      1. VinLieger

        Itd be grand if that part about decent public transport was a reality and not fiction. They are putting the cart before the horse by trying to force people onto our overcrowded overpriced unreliable bus and dart services.

  2. Shane

    Man the feck up and pay attention whilst cycling through a building site. You should be avoided the track even when it is filled in because the steel is a shite surface for cycling on, and will make the back wheel lose traction if you’re accelerating. I’m a cyclist too, you can expect to come off your bike about once a year, more if you’re doing stupid things

    1. timbot

      GREAT advice man, you should talk over from Danny Dyer in Nuts magazine advice column for real ‘ard men who just talk common sense innit.

    2. Nigel

      You misspelled ‘Thanks for the heads-up, Finn. Sorry you had to take a dive but appreciate taking the opportunity to try to ensure it won;t happen to anyone else. Hope you feel better soon.’

    3. EM

      For some reason Broadsheet didn’t post my earlier comment from my phone, so apologies if it shows up twice.

      To sum it up.. just stop using the phrase “Man up”.

      “I’m a cyclist too, you can expect to come off your bike about once a year” What are you talking about here. I have been cycling as my only form of transportation for about 16 years. Every day. I have come off my bike about 3 times in this time. I’m not sure you should be giving anyone advice on safe cycling.

      Finally, I cycle this route everyday and last week they had suddenly changed it into a two lane system with a barricade and the tracks open. I was very wary of the tracks until I realised they had filled them in. I wouldn’t have thought twice about being careful around them after noticing that last week. It’s pretty clear that they either didn’t fill them in properly or the buses torn up the tarmac. It is incredibly dangerous when you are jammed in between two buses and suddenly your bike gets stuck. If one of them was going a little too fast you would be lucky to get out the way on time, which isn’t really an option with the barricades.

  3. Owen

    Finn, are you sure you don’t need to go to A&E? Perhaps you had not noticed the back pain, and traumatic stress?

    This could be the last day have to ever work Finn.

  4. Termagant

    Have you considered looking where you’re going? As a cyclist this attitude of Cyclistic Infallibility offends me deeply.

    1. Nigel

      You also misspelled ‘Thanks for the heads-up, Finn. Sorry you had to take a dive but appreciate taking the opportunity to try to ensure it won’t happen to anyone else. Hope you feel better soon.’ It’s actually quite a common spelling error so don’t feel too bad.

        1. Nigel

          You misspelled ‘Thank you Nigel for your kind and considerate and tactful correction of my unfortunate error I will go and sin no more.’

    2. timbot

      Did you even read the article? Road was not filled in correctly so looked fine.
      Have you considered pausing to think before you type?

      1. Termagant

        I don’t need to pause to think it’s a constant process. He clearly states they had forgotten to fill them in, they weren’t filled in at all.

        1. timbot

          Did you read that account and think that a cyclist spotted some well marked up road works and cycled straight into them?

          1. Termagant

            No, I thought (correctly, since I’m not an idiot) that he’d omitted a comma and was using “well” in the declarative case, to exempt the latter clause from the former clause in which he’d stated that the tracks had been filled in. I don’t understand where you’re getting the idea that the tracks were filled in to the point where they were perfectly disguised as road surface but not to the point where a bicycle could pass over them without untold destruction raining down on the rider.

        2. EM

          They were filled in. They were just done very badly. I hit that section with the tracks open last week was very careful to check if they will filled in or not, we are all aware of what cycling on the tracks will lead to.

          But after cycling on it last week and seeing they had filled them in, I wouldn’t have thought twice about having to be careful on an early Monday morning with high winds and awful rain. I imagine what happened is they have done it badly and the buses have torn up the tarmac already. Seeing as how that street is full of potholes, they fill them in and they are back again within a few days.

  5. Joss

    College Green is entirely terrifying for cyclists while the Luas works are going on. They’ve not been considered in the least and have to compete with buses for space. Best avoided entirely if you can.

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