More than seven years have passed since we published the first version of this article in December 2016, under the title 10 of the most hysterical anti-cycling Daily Mail headlines, and a fair bit has happened since then. Enough to double the number of gems in our listicle from your favourite cycling-unfriendly tabloid, and that was after a lot of narrowing down.

In the context of this topic, we’ve had a pandemic that led to a huge rise in the number of people getting into the saddle, accompanied by the rollout of temporary infrastructure, which in many cases was made permanent, for people not just riding bikes but also walking to get around; in part, that was due to the need for social distancing, but it is also a reflection of how cycling campaigning now forms part of a wider drive for safer spaces for active travel generally.

We’ve also had the changes to the Highway Code introduced two years ago and aimed at protecting vulnerable road users, whether on foot, on bikes or on horseback, although misunderstandings about the current rules persist, not least due to the way they were represented in some parts of the mainstream media.

Some things don’t change, however. The good old Daily Mail, or sister titles Mail on Sunday and the website Mail Online, still appear to lay into cyclists at the slightest opportunity. So with a new year beginning, we make no excuses in expanding this article to what are now 20 of the most hysterical anti-cycling Daily Mail headlines (including the original 10, now renumbered 11-20).

As before, we've included links to our own coverage of the same stories here on road.cc (other than number 10 – that link goes to the Daily Mail, so consider yourself forewarned).

https://road.cc/content/feature/20-hysterical-daily-mail-anti-cycling-headlines-305993