TV and radio presenter Jeremy Vine says that he’s done with sharing his hugely popular and divisive videos of cycling incidents in London – because the level of hatred he gets in response has ‘worn him down’.
The 59-year-old Radio 2 and Channel 5 star has attracted a combination of praise and derision for his social media clips shaming the capital’s worst drivers – which have become more elaborate in their edits over time.
But after years of enduring foul-mouthed comments calling for him to be crushed under lorries – and others suggesting that his wife was committing infidelities with car drivers – he’s calling it a day on his crusade.
‘Small announcement. I’m stopping my cycling videos. The trolling just got too bad. They have had well over 100 million views but in the end the anger they generate has genuinely upset me,’ he wrote on X, formerly Twitter, on Sunday.
That being said, he has vowed to continue reporting drivers he captures breaking the law on his cameras – and to continue encouraging people to have a dialogue about keeping cyclists safe.
Speaking to MailOnline, Vine said that the recent theft of his £620 bicycle from outside his home in Chiswick, west London gave him pause for thought on whether he ought to continue making himself a target for online vitriol.
He is still bikeless – and admits he has driven into work to present his Channel 5 and Radio 2 shows today in between promoting his new book, Murder on Line One.
‘There’s just so much anger,’ he says of the response to his videos.
Jeremy Vine says he will no longer share videos of his cycling on social media because of the hatred he receives in response
Vine became infamous for his videos documenting some of his worst experiences on the road – such as this close-pass by a bus driver
But he says he’s had enough of the vitriol he gets in response to each video after his £620 bike was stolen from outside his home in Chiswick on Tuesday (pictured)
‘The problem with Twitter is that the (number of) views are incredible – but so is the level of hatred.’
Vine has shared videos of his close shaves with drivers – and occasionally, clips of examples of ‘good’ motorists – on his social media for years, all bringing in similar responses.
For every reply congratulating him on shaming a bus for driving too close, or a car driver turning left in front of a cyclist, there are five calling for him to be killed in traffic, or using less elaborate insults than that.
Some – including one that claimed his wife, the journalist Rachel Schofield, was being ‘f***** left right and centre by a car driver’ – actually made him laugh, he says.
But the torrent of abuse he faced for sharing videos of his experiences on the capital’s roads eventually proved too much – compounded by the theft of his bike.
‘It’s all just the c-word, the f-word, the w-word – it wears you down eventually,’ he continued.
‘Even if you look at the responses when I said I wasn’t going to do it anymore, people on there are still wanting to see me squashed under a truck.
‘Whether it’s because their mum hasn’t made their breakfast yet, I don’t know. You can only laugh it off for so long.’
He isn’t wrong: one tweet, addressed to another account sharing videos of dangerous driving, noted: ‘Shame he (Vine) is stopped as won’t get so (sic) see him squashed.’
‘Try not being such an obnoxious p**** in future, you’ll find the hatred lessens,’ reads another.
In a thread of tweets detailing his decision to stop sharing videos, Vine posted CCTV of a pair of thieves cutting through the locks on the bike at his home in the early hours of Tuesday. He was awake and the lights were on in his house at the time.
‘It was the theft that triggered me,’ he admits.
He maintains that he shared the videos to start a conversation about cyclists sharing the road with drivers – and to make those behind the wheel think again the next time they see someone on a bike.
And he will miss the ‘creative freedom’ that he had in making the videos – which became more elaborate in their edits as he got better at making them.
Vine has been cycling for London in years and estimates he covered 25,000 miles on the bike that was stolen last week
Some of the edits became increasingly elaborate over time as he made more videos – using a 360 degree camera to capture footage from all angles
Vine said yesterday he would stop sharing videos of his cycling on Twitter, citing the abuse he received (above)
‘Some of the biggest videos were actually about the smallest incidents, like someone turning left in front of me,’ he said.
‘People are happy to discuss it and I actually think that we’d all be safer if we all understood each other.
‘People are going to drive 4x4s in Kensington and whatnot but they need to have a bit of care for me on a bicycle.
‘You might be in total control when you pass close by but the person on a bicycle doesn’t know that. I just hope I was part of a dialogue about it.’
But some of his language when describing car drivers has proved divisive – even as he freely admits to be a driver himself.
He once labelled car lovers ‘petrosexuals’ and earlier this week appeared to suggest to presenter Gaby Roslin that angry drivers weren’t ‘getting enough’ sex.
When Roslin suggested on her podcast that angry drivers were rushing to help a poorly relative, Vine replied: That’s how lovely you are because I’m different. I just say that’s what they call small d*** energy. That he’s not getting enough.’
He added: ‘What happens is, all the people who are not getting enough sex lock themselves in small metal boxes and drive around London. That’s fundamentally what’s going on in our society. It’s so lovely of you to take such a positive view of it.’
Vine says he will continue filming and reporting incidents of dangerous driving and mobile phone use to the police – but he won’t share them online.
And he does think that the level of cycle awareness in the capital has actually improved in the years since people began shaming drivers online – likely because more and more people are taking to the roads on two wheels.
‘It’s a remarkable thing, and London has made astonishing progress. In the City of London there are more cyclists than drivers,’ he said.
a recent official Corporation study that found bikes make up 56 per cent of peak time traffic.
One in six of those bicycles are dockless hire bikes, such as those operated by Lime and Forest.
The upturn means the City smashed a 2017 target to boost cycling by 50 per cent by 2030. It has already increased by 70 per cent as of 2024.
Despite this, Vine does think that there will still be arrogant drivers who see the roads as theirs and theirs alone.
He joked: ‘The key thing to remember is that there is no amount of bad driving anywhere that can’t be blamed on a passing cyclist.’
