Cyclist Misdemeanours

Is it me, or are more people using pavements as cycle paths when they are not designated as such? And the Boris Bikes while wonderful are only adding to the idiots who only too happy to flout the law. Don't get me started on the even bigger idiots who cycle the wrong way down one way streets!!!  It's the innocent in all this, the law abiding pedestrian or motorist who has to deal with the extreme results of such folly: broken limbs of the unfortunate pedestrian or the trauma of the car driver who has, through no fault of their own, injured or, even worse still, killed a cyclist flouting the law......

I remember that I was taught on my cycling proficiency course, which I took at age 12 or so, that one shouldn't cycle on the pavement, or across zebra or pelican crossings for that matter. Indeed, Highway Code Rule 54 states: "You MUST NOT cycle on a pavement." Rule 64 states: "Do not ride across a pelican, puffin or zebra crossing. Dismount and wheel your cycle across."

Another part of the Highway Code that is frequently flouted by cyclists is: "50: You MUST obey all traffic signs and traffic light signals. Laws RTA 1988 sect 36, TSRGD reg 10(1)" So why do I see so many cyclists blatantly weave through the traffic and proceed across a red light?

If the police wish to increase their revenue in these fiscally stringent times as they are doing with the proliferation of speed cameras, why do they not tackle this area of abuse?