Truth be told, it is safe to cycle on the road here, as long as you keep your cool and are a confident rider. But there lies the problem. The average cyclist dares not ride on the road, and sticks to pavements instead.
The government is adressing this issue by introducing whole network of park connectors, which just goes to show the patronising attitude of everyone in parliament. The park connecto network is fine.....if you want to cycle for leisure, NOT for the person who is seriously using his bike as a form of transport.
But i'm not gonna blab on about bike lanes and pavement widening. I find it pretty fine to cycle about in the city. I do have a major issue with the folks from SMRT. Somehow they don't quite get the whole bike friendly issue.
The cycling community has clamoured for longer trains with special carriages at the ends to cater for bikes, but we get the , "SMRT has to deal with the grime and mud etc from bikes".
Ok fine, understood. The least you could do is NOT harass us when we disassemble our bikes and bring it in a large bag onto the trains.
But no.
We get threatened with fines and the SMRT employees give us dirty looks. It really defeats the purpose of a bike when u can't use it beyond 20 clicks for an average rider cause of fatigue. I tried to bring my disassembled 19 incher Jamis to Boon Lay yesterday to test the claims of biker forums which if given the chance would tie all the SMRT buggers to their fork suspensions and go careening down the Bukit Timah trail.
I was stopped and told, "Eh, cannot bring that in, go go!"
I mean dude, you could be more polite to a chap taking the whole, "Cycling is good!" campaigns by the government seriously.
I won't be deterred. Thiong Hin (bike shop in Upper Serangoon with apparently the cheapest and best deals in town according to Roomie) is stocking up on bike bags at the end of this month.
If any SMRT person tries to stop me then, he'll get the finger.
Cheers from a rebellious,
Matrix
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