Cyclists are generally the quickest off the mark with complaints against other road users.

It is easier, for example, to wing off a quick letter to one’s local paper than it is to acquire the skills necessary even to gain a motorcycle licence – never mind to navigate one and survive the frenzy of Oxford cyclists without suffering or causing an accident.

Some, I admit, are noisy, but at least you can hear them coming – unlike the young woman cyclist who nearly knocked me off the pavement into the road last week.

My own motorcycle is relatively quiet (in traffic, I can hear the engine of a car next to me), and I do not rev it at traffic lights because it would waste fuel.

And I never ride on the pavement, nor have I ever, in 40 years in Oxford, seen another motorcyclist doing so.

Perhaps critics were frightened by a motorcycle as a child?

Or do they simply not realise that it takes an awful lot of motoring to support the lifestyle of even a dedicated cyclist?

PHILIP CRESSWELL
Wentworth Road
Oxford