‘Women and children are endangered by the cowardice displayed by cycle and e-scooters riders’

• IS there a responsible adult in charge of Islington Council?

It’s an unwritten contract that bike purchase moves the owner from the pedestrian pavement to the highway.

Pavement users are mainly women and children, the most environmentally friendly of travellers, and they are daily endangered by the cowardice displayed by cycle and e-scooters riders, treating the pavement as a road.

Unhelmeted, a pedestrian hit by a tractor-tyred cycle, can suffer fatal head injuries. I have never seen council representatives make spot-checks to reduce this anti-social behaviour.

If instead of the Israelites, our ruling Islingtonians had been wandering in the desert and decided to create an idol to worship, it would not have been a golden calf, but a golden cycle!

This Labour council is reckless with the environment, but parallel to this is their disregard for the safety of vulnerable children and women.

Although pavements are their responsibility they have consistently encouraged littering with discarded cycles rather than installing low-level, two- to three-bike, parking racks on the road near pavements and making it clear to suppliers that they will withdraw from the cycle schemes if pavements continue to be blocked.

Food delivery firms should be encouraged to agree to a good conduct pledge, to reduce their riders’ dangerous behaviour of seeing only their mobiles in heavy traffic; no front or back lights; endangering other road users by ignoring stop signs or jumping them; and riding through pedestrians on the pavement.

Concreting U-shaped bike stands into the pavement, where it is narrowest, needs to be rethought as it creates a forest of sharp bike pedals, injuring the visually impaired.

Since the creation of the pedestrianised area around Highbury station, the public have flagged up the danger of road-intended cycles, e-scooters and motorbikes cutting across this purpose-built safe space.

After rain this area also becomes a lake, reducing further the space available to pedestrians. Yet no large signs are imprinted on some the many paving slabs or attached to street furniture, telling cyclists, e-scooter, and motorbike riders to dismount and push their vehicle.

Huge firms like McDonald’s should be more proactive and reward delivery companies who respect these pedestrianised areas, by using their services.

In the May 5 elections it’s important to elect councillors from all parties to create a balance to middle class, hard-of-hearing Labour, and to restore voice to ordinary Islingtonians and their needs.

RÓISÍN NÍ ĊURRÁIN, N1