The Speedhump Fairy

went to work this afternoon down my normal route and they wearnt there, Came home tonight turned into the side road pulled back on the throttle and nearly hit my jaw on the tank as I went over a speed bump. Take it easy down the road because there they are every 20 yards or so. Where do they come from when you been gone for a few hours.

H

May I please refer you to my Flu-induced description of Northampton, wherein I explain that they are caused by a single, bottomless lorry of tarmac that wanders the streets, lost and alone, spilling some of its load each time it haphazardly hits a pothole in the road.


Either that or the council contruction workers were being supremely efficient...

... nah. that's too far-fetched. It's the lost lorry.

The same happend to me. I went to work one day, came home, and found (unpainted) humps

To be fair, the did give warning though, by a couple of weeks

They also left a great big mess of tiny bits or tarmac all over the road for me to roll over on the bike

[northwind]

I can top that... When I got my Veypor, I decided to go and try the 1/4 mile timer. Best place I could think of was the main drag at my old uni, which is nice and straight, wide open, and long enough. Turned in, stopped, activated the box, nailed it. (my time was rubbish, incidentally). Slowing down after, and found they'd built one of those huge "speed cushions" at the end of the road- I was probably still doing about 60 when I hit it, nearly got thrown over the handlebars Landed back in the seat, now going a bit too fast for the approaching 90 degree lefthander bend, which I ended up taking so wide I hit the kerb on the other side and bounced back off.

Safety improvements my ass!

I turned into a side road I didn't know, got up to 30 or just under and smacked into one of those bevelled square tarmac speed 'lump' thingies. The paint on it had faded lots and to be honest I was paying more attention to finding my way around than looking at the road .

Nothing as fantastic as Northy's story but that nasty jarring and the split second of 'wha!!?!??!!!!!!!' when you're about to lose it really wakes you up. It's a good job my tongue hadn't been hanging out, that's for sure. :P

Since I got my "trail" style bike, I quite like speed humps. They're like little ramps

Originally Posted by Ping

I turned into a side road I didn't know, got up to 30 or just under and smacked into one of those bevelled square tarmac speed 'lump' thingies. The paint on it had faded lots and to be honest I was paying more attention to finding my way around than looking at the road .

Nothing as fantastic as Northy's story but that nasty jarring and the split second of 'wha!!?!??!!!!!!!' when you're about to lose it really wakes you up. It's a good job my tongue hadn't been hanging out, that's for sure. :P

The squares are spectacularly bad as they stop you altering your position within your lane as you're approaching them/going over them. Twice now I've nearly had an off as a result of them. Once I was going down the left hand side as car coming the other way had its rhswheels on the centreline so he could "straddle" the square. A pedestrian stepped out in front of me, forcing me to change path onto the hump. Unfortunately I was almost alongside it by this point, so the front wheel was clear, but the back clipped it (it sort of slid sidewards as it tried to follow the front wheel, but got "traintracked" by the raised edge of the hump) and stepped out several inches.

The second time was basically the same, but from the other side. Left hand side not an option as there were parked cars. I went on the RHS of it (in my lane, still not on the the centreline). A car coming the other way decides to try to straddle his, coming into my lane and clearly not intending to give way. I decide a bike isn't the best vehicle to play chicken in and move left. Same thing again. Rear wheel doesn't mount it properly and it misses the oncoming car by a cat's whisker.

Yes, these near misses were technically caused by other people's idiocy, but they wouldn't of happened had the "traffic calming" measures not been in place. I now tend to intentionally go over the top of them (stood up, offroad style), unless it's definately clear all round- easier to get off them than mount them sidewards.

The amount of times I have to dodge cars on my side of the road as they try to get their wheels either side of the middle hump is ridiculous.

On the way to my sisters in Bristol there was a big dual carriage way that had a set of four small unpainted humps. I had borrowed my sisters bike and was returning it and coming down the road for the first time, my sister have forgot to mention these humps on the directions. Coming down the road at a decent pace hit these bumps bounced of the seat and landed fairly uncomfortably on the tank. Had to pull over and have a few minutes to er recover.

a Couple of weeks ago the Speedbump Fairy deposited a set of the square ones three across on a one way street outside the local sixth form centre, talk about a waste of time the car drivers just drive down the middle of the road at what ever speed they like as the can straddle them with ease. But here in the socialist republic of Lewisham it seems they paid off the speed hump fairy to do every side road and some have even appeared on main roads.

H

You could try the New Forrest solution

Few years back now they infested the roads in the forest with "speed bumps". Some woman came blatting along in her transit camper hit one and managed to roll the van!!

The speed bumps came out PDQ as a result