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news
Mansfield Market Square (CC licensed by DncnH via Flickr).jpgCyclist fined almost £600 for ignoring Mansfield’s bike ban
A cyclist caught riding his bike in Mansfield town centre, where cycling is banned under a Public Space Protection Order (PSPO), has been ordered by a court to pay almost £600 in fines and costs, with Cycling UK saying that it reinforces the perception that “people on bikes aren’t welcome” there.
Christopher Cobb, aged 22, was spotted by a council neighbourhood warden heading on his mountain bike from Market Place to the Nottinghamshire town’s library, reports the Mansfield Chad.
He got off his bike after being told to do so, but 10 minutes later the same warden saw him riding on West Gate and given a fixed penalty notice in the sum of £100.
After failing to pay it, Cobb was summonsed to appear at Southern Derbyshire Magistrates’ Court but failed to appear and, with no plea entered, was fined £440 plus £100 costs and a victim surcharge of £44.
Mansfield District Council’s portfolio holder for safer communities, Councillor Bill Drewett, commented: “Cycling has been prohibited in the pedestrianised area of Mansfield town centre to protect pedestrians.
“There are alternative routes around the town centre or cyclists can act in a responsible fashion and get off and push their bicycles through the town centre.
“This cyclist had the opportunity to pay a much lower fixed penalty of £100 but chose to ignore it which is why he is now facing a much higher penalty as a result of the case having to go to court.”
Introduced last year in a bid to combat anti-social cycling, Mansfield’s PSPO received national attention in August after road.cc reported that Stage 4 of last month’s Tour of Britain was scheduled to start in the part of the town where cyclists are banned, with BBC News among the outlets that subsequently reported on it.
> Council that bans cyclists from town centre … hosts Tour of Britain stage start in town centre
Last year, Cycling UK, acting through the cyclists’ defence fund, said it was supporting an appeal by six cyclists against the PSPO in what is believed to be the only legal challenge yet brought against a local authority in connection with the controversial legislation.
That appeal has not yet been heard, with the charity telling road.cc that the case has been adjourned since the Home Office were revising their guidance on PSPOs, and the circumstances in which they should be made, and because Mansfield Council were prepared to consult again, with a view to varying the PSPO.
That consultation has now been launched in response to the revised Home Office guidelines. It remains open until 25 October and Cycling UK is currently drawing up its response.
The council proposes changing the times the PSPO is in effect from 24 hours a day to between 6pm and 7am, as well as reducing the area to which it applies.
Duncan Dollimore, head of campaigns at Cycling UK, told road.cc: “A fine of nearly £600 for cycling in the town centre sends a very simple message: people on bikes aren’t welcome in Mansfield, unless of course the Tour of Britain’s coming to town for a stage start, when all of sudden cyclists aren’t a menace and a danger to pedestrians, but can be welcomed with open arms.
“Hopefully Mansfield Council will reflect on the reputation they’ve created for themselves as the town that doesn’t like cyclists, and consider the revised Home Office guidance on PSPOs during its new consultation on proposed variations to the existing bicycle ban,” he continued.
“They might like to ask themselves whether they’re really tackling anti-social behaviour, or just imposing a ban because they think they can.”
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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81 comments
Which is sensible, and actually follows the (home office ?) guidance brought in a decade or more ago.
He was probably a chav on a BSO so I'm not too bothered about this.
Unless you actually gave your real name how would they get you unless you were known to them anyway?
If I got stopped by 'warden' for a triviality I wouldn't tell them anything and just ride off. What would they do about it? I doubt they are allowed to physically retrain you anyway.
Why not just go round the town square ? Is that too tricky to ride somehow ?
I think the cyclist is being a bit silly.
The correct headline should be: Arrogant Twat Accumulates Fines of £600.
And it can be published everywhere - it wasn't a cycling-specific story until road.cc made it one.
Mansfield - about 4 miles from Sherwood Pines MTB trails and a million miles away from welcoming cyclists.
In Leicester, just down the road, all our main city-centre shopping streets are either shared use or have purpose built cycle lanes. We have a few moaners, but I doubt very much that the accident rate is any higher. It just feels like a modern European city.
Leicester may be a modern city, but it has a disinterested police force.
I have exchanged several letters with Lord Bach, Leicestershire Police and Crime Commissioner to try and figure out how I can submit footage of close passes. During this exchange, I was told I could report online. This is not true as when I tried, I was told "this is not classified as a crime under National Crime Recording Standards" so they ignored the report.
I was also told that the close pass initiative was carried out during the summer because there are more cyclists on the road. They seemed to have missed the point that it's not cyclists but traffic that carry out close passes, and during the summer traffic levels drop significantly. They didn't find a single instance of a close pass so have concluded that there isn't a close pass problem in Leicester and so won't allocate any resources to policing the problem.
So the videos I have of motorists getting too close, going on the right-hand side of keep left bollards to overtake me, emerging from junctions into my path, and swearing at me for simply existing (many of whom drive without MOT and/or Tax) must be a figment of my imagination then
Uninterested. Having a disinterested police force is pretty important.
Yes, really. Roughly speaking:
Uninterested = don't care.
Disinterested = making decisions unbiased by the prospect of personal gain.
You have fallen into the common misconception trap. As the OED will reveal, Distinterestd also means "Having or feeling no interest in something; uninterested."
Not good.
Well well well. Interesting, if you'll pardon the slightly weak pun. I didn't know that. I was of course writing originally without the benefit of the OED in front of me, but I just went and looked it up and you are indeed correct.
However, my copy (it's the Shorter OED, but that will have to do) also has a footnote pointing out that the meaning you have given is now (ie in modern times, not historically) commonly regarded as incorrect. I think in light of this I'll stick to having it my way. But amusing to know that nothing is ever as clear cut as you think.
Have a nice day.
I find the "NFI" generally covers all angles of the Dibble.
U2
Misleading- there was initially no penalty for cycling where not permitted. For the second offense within minutes he was fined £100. The larger fine was only for not appearing at the magistrates court
This.
There are areas we can't ride, we can't drive, we can't walk. Fact. He was warned.
He clearly has no respect for the laws and deserves the fine.
Because the law is ALWAYS right, as Mrs Pankhurst used to say.
What harm was he ACTUALLY doing by riding his bike in that area? Probably none.
Did he endanger the safety of any other people or cause any inconvenience whatsoever to other road users or pedestrians? Probably not.
Just senseless enforcement of a blatantly anti-cyclist local order devised by petty-minded bureaucrats who have never and will never ride a bicycle themselves. All they know about bicycles and cyclists and all they want to know is that they don't like 'em.
What harm would a car travelling down a pedestrianised street at ~5mph do? Probably none.
Would it endanger the safty ofany other people or cause any inconvenience whatsoever to other road users or pedestrians? Probably not.
Should it be fined for not following the ban on vehicles in pedestrianised areas? Yes
Same rules should apply to all
Nobody brought cars into the argument, except you.
This has nothing to do withcomparisons between car drivers and cyclists or who has the rougher deal as a road user.
It's all about petty rules loved by petty-minded people, includng yourself it would appear.
Petty rule? Why is it a petty rule? I do not know about the circumstances around this order being put in place and what antisocial aspects it was supposed to resolve and if it has or has not resolved these issues. I am happy to be educated in these circumstances and whether the order addressed the route cause or not though
Oh the Jeremy Clarkson approach. "What harm does a little speeding on an open road ACTUALLY do?"
I don't agree with this rule, but it is the rule and legally and properly in place. He was warned. He was given a FPN then he played more silly buggers. Since we are vulnerable road users I think it would be better if all road users obeyed the rules and the laws. I am fine with drivers being fined for any number of infringments that they could easily argue aren't doing any harm and they do claim that all the time.
If you want the roads to be a free for all with everyone deciding for themselves which laws and rules they do or don't want to follow then I suggest a bike isn't the strongest suit in that game.
Home office guidance. Helps if you read it, it was released when fixed penalty fines for riding on the pavement were brought in.
Why did he even bother to stop, should have just kept going or refused to give the cockwomble warden any details. I suspect the wardens don't have the power to detain. Stop for the police but not for these numpties.
So you're suggesting he flout the law, and a previous poster suggested he run the warden down (hopefully that was a 'joke') ???
And we wonder why cycling is getting a bad rap at the moment!
In my view, he disregarded a law he found inconvenient, then ignored the legal process that follows. What an idiot.
Motorists are not going to treat us with respect if some of us behave so irresponsibly.
Why should anyone treat motorists with respect, using your logic?
Did you even read the linked news item on Scouser_andy's post?
Are you seriously suggesting motorists would all behave perfectly towards cyclists if all cyclists miraculously became perfectly well-behaved? What colour is the sky on your world?
And what's with the 'we'? There's no 'we', certainly I don't agree to being a member of any group with anyone as clueless as you.
You seem to be treating cyclists as a collective group and suggesting that we'll all get punished (close passes? "get off the road and use the cycle path" taunts?) if any one of us behaves improperly.
However, that kind of collective punishment is actually considered a war crime and I'd like to direct you to article 33 of the Geneva Convention as to why punishing "cyclists" is illegal.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourth_Geneva_Convention#Article_33:_Individual_responsibility.2C_collective_penalties.2C_pillage.2C_reprisals
New around here are you ?
Look, as much as RLJer's annoy me to a minor degree for the same reason, the fact remains that the same usual twats will find the same usual shite to throw at cyclists despite how few offenders there are. Likewise the same old 'road' tax, insurance, blah fecking blah. I've had arguments on my local area forum with these same sort of knobbers and all they see is 'arrogant' cylsts for daring to be cluttering up 'their' road.
*sigh*
Whereas if we rode around like drivers do ie speeding/tailgating/using phones etc/and jumping red lights they would?
What exactly did this Warden do to deserve you calling them a "cockwomble" and a "numpty"? As far as I see it they were perfectly reasonable as they gave a warning first and did not resort to a fine until the cyclist was later discovered to be ignoring the earlier warning. From what I have read, the only person deserving of the labels "cockwomble" and "numpty" is the cyclist who ignored warnings and court summons.
1) They are a jobsworth warden 2) enforcing a stupid rule.
They probably have other attributes, but cockwombliness and numptiness can be assumed with some confidence.
There is no indication that this warden was a jobsworth, in fact he did not fine initially which would actually indicate that they were not a jobsworth.
As for the rule itself, I do not agree with it but equally having never lived in the area and have not researched it so I do not know what sort of issues they were having to deal with that led to this order being put in place. Until either of these 2 criteria are met then I will try and keep an open mind. If, for example, they had issues with bag snatchers on bikes operating in the area then it would make as much sense as installing bollards at each end of a pedestrianised area to stop ram raiders. If they were just doing it because they are all backward and have issues because they feel children should hibernate between the ages of 12-20 and not be seen hanging out in public space on their skateboards and bikes it is another matter....
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