The tone is dreadful of course, designed to attribute no agency to anyone involved. No, Raymond, the car did not flip. The driver somehow managed to overturn the car in a 20mph section of straight road with good visibility in dry, warm conditions. I'm fairly sure that the car did not flip itself over like an amorous terrapin sliding off a chip shop pie.
But this is only half of the story. The top end of Arbury Road, a section close to Kings Hedges Road, is currently closed to put in bike lanes and make some other improvements, as the first part of a disappointing upgrade. This upgrade, it transpires, stops some distance before this incident. We're due to get the other end of Arbury Road improved, somewhat, but there are no plans to make cycling to the Milton Road junction more appealing. If you're trying to get to the Behhive Centre to work or shop, tough, you'll be left on a long, straight, allegedly 20mph race track where somehow or other cars magically invert themseves, parked cars block lines of sight, and close, aggressive overtakes are the norm. Do you live off that end of Arbury Road and want to cycle to school? Tough titties, cyclist scum, we don't care about your welfare.
In all of Cambridge there is not a better example of the scorn our local authorities show to cyclists than this abysmal plan to make half of a major throughfare safe for cycling - this supposed improvement that does nothing to make whole journeys safer can not and will not encourage more people to ride in to Cambridge.
A bike trip is only as appealing as its most terrifying part - and you plan not to improve this section where motorists flip their cars over. Why, dear road planners, do you even bother with this nonsense?
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