Another nice interaction with UK Police...

[Cerbera]

Just thought I'd pop in and report on a very nice and encouraging encounter I had with a female police officer I met whilst I was riding specifically over the 'no cycling' sign written in 3 ft letters on the ground in my main path through the town's main street thoroughfare / open air shopping centre. It was dusk, so I was riding my Master very slowly in the pedestrian bit, but lit up to the 9's, with all my aircraft grade strobe blinkers on the go, and maximum ATGATT - essentially looking like a moving Sith Holocron. I see Commnunity support Officers all the time, and sometimes stop for a chat with them - they are mostly pretty cool with the wheel, and my riding of it, providing they don't see me doing anything silly or dangerous on it, but quite rare that I meet an actual police person on foot.

I waved merrily at her and she didn't motion me to stop or anything, but I sensed that she wanted to say something, so I pulled up to her, raised my helmet, smiled warmly at her, and waited to see what she would say...

She began of course by questioning my decision to ride in the main shopping centre, but I was able to rebuff that with my written permission from the Property manager, and began to get my phone into the right mode to show her that, but annoyingly she believed me without seeing it, and didn't insist ! Honestly the amount of times I have offered to show people that, and they back out before I ever do leads me to believe I could probably get away without it if you only show enough confidence early on ! But anyway, joking aside, I do have it, and never get to show it to anyone !

Anyway, what then followed was very pleasant reasonable conversation in which I did my bit for EUC relations, explained that whilst our EUCs were once comparable to the silly little hoverboards and scooters the police tend to despise, they have now evolved into safe (cough), robust, road-worthy machines that can be ridden considerately, and nicely around other people. We discussed the law, and how slow it was to catch up with these cutting edge tech PEVs, and she said that her and her colleagues feel some dichotomy themselves about how best to enforce a law that either isn't there yet, or is still new and nebulous, unclear and non-sensical. We discussed the circular ridiculousness of wanting to get insurance but finding it was globally unavailable while the law hasn't caught up.

She understood and appreciated that i was trying my hardest to do it well, safely and considerately, and I was at some pains to point out that all this armour, and all these lights, and all this padding, and my choices about where I ride are primarily designed to make me a 'problem' that none of the authorities or emergency services have to worry about.

We are not (NYC excepted) charging around like nutters, and if we do have a spill, we are not likely to be tying up ambulances and police time if we are properly geared up. So, having packed as much of that sort of sentiment as I could possibly muster in a short 10 minutes, we parted company and she waved me on my way, and both of us left the encounter rather positive about the whole thing, which was nice.

And it's important that when that does happen we tell each other about it, because Lordy knows there's enough discouraging stuff in that department that makes it quite depressing if we only read about the negative ones !

Happy riding everyone, and long live the reasonable police people !

 

Edited September 15, 2023 by Cerbera

[Planemo]

Good work. I still wouldn't voluntarily stop for one though...life is like a box of chocolates!

[alcatraz]

Good work. Hopefully she can put in a good word for ypu in the locker room when Mr Literal there argues that euc riders need to be behind bars.

[skunkmonkey]

Glad things turned out all right for you. My only run-in with police was the 1st full day on an EUC. I was so excited to learn to ride it that I couldn't sleep, so at 4am I decided to go to the sound wall behind my house and practice. A police officer stopped, and asked what I was doing. I told him, and we talked a bit about EUC's. He had never seen one before, and he said the person who called in said that they saw a suspicious person on a monowheel. I'm not sure how many criminals would use an EUC as a getaway vehicle. That's like using a surfboard for a heist. We both laughed at how easily people get spooked, and how little thought they give to the situation before calling the cops.

He asked how long I had been riding, and I told him it was my first day. He just smiled, and said "yeah, I can tell." I had to laugh, because yeah, I was pretty terrible. Clinging to the wall for dear life as I inched along the sidewalk. He was pretty cool. He just thanked me for wearing full body armor, and went about the rest of his morning, coming back to check on me from time to time to see how I was progressing. I guess it was a slow morning.