LOL, totally know what you mean around Hyde Park corner! My favourite part of the commute is heading home around Hogarth roundabout on the A4 westbound heading out of town. Approach the roundabout on the green light - left lane for the long way around right knee down watching over your 4 for the inside traffic, flick hard left close to the inside barrier, throttle to the stop, push up the bike keeping it low, and control the front wheel towards the Porsche dealership on the oppo side of the road! In the past years, been knocked off a couple times, had my feet run over by caged twats, had the last laugh with a couple of morons, needed my arm rebuilt over 8 days with the awesome NHS, and had one bike written off when whitevanman realised I was underneath the front of his van and stopping his progress against the centre island (outside of Harrods)... but it's all life affirming stuff tbh. Love it. Certainly better than the sewer called TfL...
Some roads in Central London have lots of traffic CCTV cameras these days, quite apart from a few Gatsos. If your riding style is too extravagantly progressive and is caught on camera (which it may well be round Hyde Park corner), I'm afraid you always risk receiving an unwelcome visit from some men in blue early one morning.
Given the average traffic speed in London there are many more dangerous places to ride. Perhaps its exactly this low danger level that's allowes people to take such massive risks in London..
You get quite comfortable riding very close to other vehicles in London. TfL is also expensive and horrible.
I find the best thing for driving around London is a 7.5 ton truck, you don't notice if you total a cyclist and it's great for filtering. :biggrin:
