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ABC Radio National: Background Briefing – On road cycling (31 January 2010)

Image of Marcel courtesy of ABC Background Briefing

With a dramatic increase in cycling, comes a plethora of new safety issues on the roads. Doctors, politicians, planners and cyclists agree it will mean changing the way we design, govern and use our roads. Reporter Diane Martin.

Di Martin: Marcel Lema works a section of Australia’s on-road cycling mecca, called Beach Road.

Hugging the east side of Port Phillip Bay, Beach Road can carry 25,000 cyclists a weekend. It’s known for its groups of lycra-clad cyclists. A bike breed apart, they train to race, or for fitness. It’s known as bunch riding.

They’re entitled to take a lane of traffic as long as they’re only riding two abreast. But the sheer volume of riders has made for hostile relations with some drivers. Sitting beside the famous roadway, Marcel Lema describes his own brush with driver frustration on the way to this interview.

Marcel Lema: I had one incident even just coming here, where a car actually swerved from the right-hand lane onto the left-hand lane, to actually make a point that I was in the road, I was in the way. Now when you’re getting a car coming at 60 ks an hour towards you, it’s basically like somebody putting a putting a gun to your head and playing Russian roulette. So as Cadel Evans said, the worst places to cycle in the world are here and America because of the attitude of the general motorist population.

Di Martin: Paramedic and cyclist, Marcel Lema.

But this is not a one-way street of emotion and adrenaline.