Jeremy Vine highlights grim reality of gridlocked London route where cycle lane was ripped out... as council due in court over early removal; Chilly commutes; Manchester to host 2023 Tour of Britain Grand Départ + more on the live blog

pretty sure they dont salt the road surface on most steel bridges, salt/water/steel/rust etc.
I think they have to spray the surface with something else which comes in a differnet form on a different truck, not sure if it performs as well either

In other places they don't use salt on cycle paths but brine instead - cycles aren't as good at dispersing the salt as cars.

However it works to some extent and I'm glad to see my local council has been round the paths already.  Now if they could only find a way to do the access ramps / paths onto the main one (those tend to be steep also)...

EK Spinner wrote:

pretty sure they dont salt the road surface on most steel bridges, salt/water/steel/rust etc.
I think they have to spray the surface with something else which comes in a differnet form on a different truck, not sure if it performs as well either

Cow piss. Might want to give the water bottle nozzle an extra wipe...

“If it snows we get called out to shovel all the snow off. The weight of the snow would stretch the bridge. You can’t use salt on the bridge because it will rot the metal. We have a van with a load of urea pills in the back – crystallised calf urine. We just tow it across the bridge and it sprinkles out, like a miniature spreader, but on the back of the van. When it goes off it smells of ammonia. You put it on and it doesn’t do anything until someone walks on it or drives on it and it crushes the crystals. Then it works.” – Don Midlane, Bridge Attendant

https://cliftonbridge.org.uk/workers-at-the-bridge/

AdBlue is pig piss aka urea too.

I think that in general urea is made in an industrial process using ammonia as a raw material these days. Purifying urine to a sufficent level that you could use it an exhaust treatment system would be fiendishly expensive.

Of course, urea is fiendishly expensive at the moment, because ammonia is made from methane using the Haber-Bosch process, which could explain why the bridge isn't being treated. 

IanMSpencer wrote:

AdBlue is pig piss aka urea too.

As is heel balm - a pharmacist told me that to treat cracked skin, the urea concentration is important.

Most bridges also ice up first (and more) because they are a bridge and has the freezing air above and below it. I remember a drive across the US and the remote bridges (even in the desert areas) had "Beware, Ice on Bridge" or Beware, Bridges Ice First" signs permanently staked next to them.

Same here.

I'm sure it what makes him look a spectacularly incompetent cyclist.

You can't fix stupid.  They've been taught that all problems with drivers are solved by hi viz and helmets...

Hi-vis and helmets aren't primarily to help you be seen and protect you from impacts. They're to help you not be seen as "one of those cyclists" and protect you from scorn.

Until you're in the way that is.

Because you were not in front of their headlights then any reflective you might have been wearing would not be reflecting anything.

Idiot motorists.

What was it about your tirade that you believe was lacking? How do you think you may have made it more effective?

ktache wrote:

What was it about your tirade that you believe was lacking? How do you think you may have made it more effective?

I wish it had been a bit less sweary, and not outside my child's nursery...

It would have been far more effective if I'd calmly made the point made here - that a reflective would be academic given he admitted he wasn't looking.

To your good point about headlights, I suppose he might argue I'd have reflected his reversing light. But still academic if he's not looking, and arguably less visible than the SON Edelux I was running at the time.