A moment of shameful celebrity on social networks. This is what Toulouse cyclists, exasperated at having to play jumping cars on the cycle paths, have decided to offer, roundly or with mischief, to motorists who park shamelessly on these reserved lanes. They accompany their angry tweets or their Instagram posts with the hashtag GUCM for “Parked like a shit”. It was invented and popularized by a
collective motorists to scold the worst of them, but in the Pink City, it is cyclists who seized them.
The whole Créno-Apeupresq family made an appointment at the av de Lavaur bakery #toulouse. It is so convenient the bicycle lane that runs along the parking lots and delivery places. #gcum
2 minutes later, the cousin thing arrives on a scooter, all the same, balek. pic.twitter.com/vQ4dyZdNEB– François 🚲💉💉🔧 (@FrenchHamburger) November 30, 2021
Oh the beautiful GCUM! Rue du Faubourg Bonnefoy in Toulouse @ 2Pieds2Roues pic.twitter.com/lGAGAUJhH6
– Learned Sheep 🐐 (@Newmymy) October 12, 2021
Association 2feet2wheels, a very influential defender of soft fashions, does not hesitate to retweet #GCUMs on occasion but does not use it directly. “We have not adopted an official position but it must be done with humor, because we know that it can provoke reactions sometimes very violent”, underlines its president Boris Kozlow. If he is careful about the method, he applauds the diagnosis with both hands: “There are motorists but also delivery men or motorized two-wheelers parked in a row. It is a real scourge which in many areas puts cyclists and pedestrians in danger ”. The association points to “black spots”, in particular in shopping areas, such as avenue des Minimes, rue Bayard, avenue d’Albi, grand-rue Saint-Michel or the roundabout of the Patte-d’Oie where many smokers make stops to get their tobacco supplies.
“Video-tagging patrols” throughout the city
These conflict zones, Maxime Boyer, the new assistant in charge of traffic and soft modes, knows them. And for good reason, each stroke of blood is most often also notified to him. “Cyclists are experienced tweeters”, jokes the one who finds that #GCUM is an “original” mode of “civic-mindedness”. He ensures that he “studies with the services” all the reported situations. But it is not enough to report or to be a whistleblower, it is necessary to say “pass to the repression”.
And in this area, a plateau will be crossed in the next few days. The municipal police video over-tagging system until now confined to the octagon of the hypercentre will be extended to all of the city’s 450 cameras. “We have the approval of the prefecture, we still have to lay out the warning signs and organize ourselves internally,” says Emilion Esnault, the Security Assistant. Between 10,000 and 11,000 annoying or very annoying parking lots, including encroachment on cycle paths, are fined – 135 euros – for the hour every year in the city center. Once the system has been extended, the elected official plans to organize “video overbroadcasting patrols”, intensive viewing areas of places that pose a problem. Starting with the boulevard in front of the station with its double-parked cars, but also the places where the cycle paths are regularly used as parking lots.
As for the hashtag GCUM, Emilion Esnault is skeptical. “A tweet is not worth verbalization,” he remarks. What you have to do is call Allo Toulouse, we are very responsive ”. # 05 61 222 222, then.