My take on it…would you design a road system that has cyclists and lorries sharing the same tarmac? Course you wouldn’t - it is, unfortunately an accident waiting to happen. As good as the bus / bike lanes are, in taking bikes /cyclists away from cars / lorries - they do nothing for junctions and roundabouts - which seem to be the place where most of the accidents happen.
I can only see continued carnage until we get serious and redesign our junctions and give the cyclists a different route (time or space or both) from the other traffic.
Plus (Not to wind anyone up - I really believe) I would always be giving these cyclists priority at these junctions. As much as we all moan about them - I read 20%+ of vehicles in central london now are bikes (unpowered) - can you imagine if they were all in cars? No we should do everything we can to encourage cycling - including giving them priority at junctions.
+1 for the compulsory training. One 5 minute video during my CBT on the dangers of undertaking lorries near junctions - and I have never done it. Not once. It was a very effective “eye opener” and improved knowledge can not be a bad thing.
I think it’s all down to human behaviour.
Take a box of various sized marbles and fill two wine bottles with them. Hold the first bottle upside down and the marbles will just get stuck in the neck and only some violent shaking will allow them to pour out in staggered gulps over a long period.
Tip the second bottle gradually and a stream of marbles will pour out rapidly one by one without getting stuck.
Unfortunately we all seem to believe that our journey is more important than the person’s in front, so we push, and keep pushing, despite the fact that the net effect is to create a dam of marbles that nothing can get through.
Somewhere in the neck of that bottle are lots of small marbles, motorcyclists, cyclists and pedestrians, who are constantly compressed by the weight of traffic fighting to get out of the bottle.
I blame car drivers more than anyone, given that they sit in insulated steel boxes, and can afford to bully the rest of the traffic and take risks without putting their own lives in danger.
I don’t see that ever changing, human beings are really crap team players in that respect.
Safe cycling in traffic will only happen if cyclists are completely separated from the rest of the traffic IMO.
The one thing that keeps being missed is there is a need for a change of attitude… I think the whole ‘rush rush’ and ‘I use a cycle to constantly improve my time to work’ is very detrimental. It’s a London thing (and perhaps a british thing) to just be in a constant rush everywhere and all the time.
Combine that with a lack of road awareness skills and poor road deisgn and it’s a lethal combo (as has been proved). My impressions is that this is the most difficult, yet most crucial to fix… especially when it’s unlikely that all roads will become cycle friendly (London is a big place) and I doubt there is enough money to teach all interested cyclists…
As a HGV driver and occasional cyclist I would have to say that when on a cycle I tend to not undertake larger vehicles (buses,lorries) as I don’t have the ability to get out of the way fast.
On my motorbike I have the speed to get clear of most problems (when braking isn’t an option) on my cycle I try to steer clear of putting myself in unnecessary dangerous situations.
Its shocking how many cyclists will come up the inside of my lorry when i’m at the lights with my left indicator on.
“The one thing that keeps being missed is there is a need for a change of attitude… I think the whole ‘rush rush’ and ‘I use a cycle to constantly improve my time to work’ is very detrimental”
Spot on. When I used to cycle, I just saw the traffic as an obstacle course. Everyone else was slower & unnecessary to be there. I rememeber laughing my t1ts off when they introduced the £5 congestion charge.
Often cycles will just look for gaps as their focus is on getting through. If the outside is blocked, they will instinctively go inside or even along the pavement.
Trouble is we’re all human and we all make mistakes/ bad judgements. We all have bad days at work, too little sleep, worries about things, getting home for the kids etc. A small lapse in concentration can mean a cyclist might assume they have an opportunity to nip up the inside, only to find the lights change.
Add in a similarly affected driver, add the two together and it will only end in tears for the cyclist.
The roads system is ancient. It presumably takes a huge amount of time & money to redesign layouts.
A lot has been made in the press about the recent deaths. How many more cyclists are there compared to previous years? How much more building work is going on. Crossrail, high rise buildings going up.
So we have, more traffic, more cyclists and no more space. It goes without saying there will be more deaths unless cyclists take it upon themselves to take every precaution they can.
Btw - can anyone spot the cyclist in my photo???
Black and white helmet and white shirt . Tough to notice mate and a interesting picture.
The one thing that does worry me and more and more cyclists on the outside of traffic. I simply feel they are a extra danger for me and often leave me in situations i don’t want to be in. I understand why they do it but i think it just encourages us to go on in the cycle lanes more, i mean why bother with cycle lanes if there just going to go down the outside of the traffic??
Ninja, you would get that impression from the media,
Go read the inquests and the coroners reports, you find a very didferent story. Seems media types like to tell a tale about cyclistst, but the reality is that those deaths were usually the fault of the cyclist.
To give an example, rather than an empty statement, the last guy that died on Bow roundabout, he jumped the light…only time I seen that mentioned is by a TFL guy and the coroner.
Bear in mind the lorry also jumped the light, but if either one had obeyed the rules a tragedy would have been avoided.
Why do we need to spend more money on protecting cyclists, when in reality they should have a licence, insurance and tax. Thus ensuring they are trained and traceable.
Everyone forgets that around 100 pedestrian die on London’s roads every year. Most often they are killed by lorries, buses and vehicles that fail to stop at crossings. But pedestrians don’t have a vocal lobby so everyone ignores that most pedestrian deaths are avoidable.
BTW, the detailed study TfL did on cycle deaths and serious injuries in London found cyclists to blame 43% of the time. Most often it was failing to stop at junctions and coming off the pavement into traffic.
Good thread. I’ve been cycling for several years in London, no problems for several years, but last week had 4 incidents in 4 days! (None my fault at all, I’m not a lycra lout and cycle at a leisurely pace obeying the rules of the road).
Had it not been for the fact that I had just completed a Bike Safe day (motorbike) a week before hand, I think I may have come off much worse in each incident, so plus 1 for a days training for cyclists (like cbt). (The bike safe day was superb and opened my eyes to look out for things before they happen due to a better understanding of events)
The best one last week on my bicycle was when a car suddenly pulled over hard left without checking his mirrors and knocked into me. Errr he was trying to make extra room for an Ambulance coming the other way…
Yeah I see that - most of my info is anecdotal and comes from reading Guardian articles on the subject - which carries a cycling blog and has a pro-cycling bias.
I’m seeing pretty shoddy cycling all the time when driving buses, especially as I’m currently working a lot of lates. I think the changing of the clocks has aggravated the situation as cyclists who might have cycled home in the daylight 3 weeks ago haven’t quite clicked that IT’S NOW DARK(!) when they leave work/college/uni. Seriously, what is the point in going to the effort of buying & wearing a helmet only to put yourself in harms way by cycling around on a dark night in dark clothes on a bike with no lights? Changing lanes without looking because you ASSUME every other road-user has seen you and will look after your safety because you are incapable of doing it yourself? I won’t go through the list of stupid sh1t I see cyclists doing all the time as we’re all unfortunately very familiar with it. Occasionally a passenger will point out to me that it’s very hard to see a cyclist who is unlit and there’s all the reflections from the interior lights of the bus reflecting off the windscreen etc. I always reply that the cyclist must have far more confidence in my eyesight than I have, as I certainly wouldn’t cycle in front of ‘me’ with no lights on. You want to add in rain, passengers wet clothing steaming up the bus windows and any other myriad of distractions and you can see why accidents happen. My biggest fear is wiping out a cyclist as so many of them act like complete idiots.
I realise that plenty of cyclists run the gauntlet of knob-head drivers every day (I saw a couple of close calls today), but come on cyclists… give yourselves a f**king chance out there!!!.. I’m sure there is more to your life than being on a mission to win a Darwin Award.
Having seen some of the dangerous risks cyclists take, I’m actually surprised the number of deaths isn’t higher. Saying this, it’s never good when someone’s life is cut short and hope they RIP.
Because they are vulnerable. We all make mistakes when we cycle / ride / drive. But when they things go wrong at city speeds - cars / lorries are surrounded by a load of metal. Cyclists aren’t.
We spend an absolute fortune on our roads - and that should be spent with regards to all our road users.
Another argument Kaos - is to encourage cycling. It is better for the environment, better for peoples health and better for congestion - to get them out of cars.
Hold up BL. We, as motorctclists, are just as vulnerable arent we?
Ok, we have an advantage in then we have additional speed to escape from danger. However we are self aware of our vulnerability and we also take precautions.
If we, as motorcyclists, rode around in dark clothing (lets say jeans and tshirts), no high viz, no lights on, no helmet, no protection, stick ourselves in potentially dangerous situations and then got hit by another vehicle, we wouldn’t automatically point the finger at other drivers, the poor road layout, the govt etc. I’d say more fool you as youve only got yourself to blame.
I was going to add in that we also have training & are tested on the highway code but in fairness I guess some cyclists may also be car drivers. This all goes back to Rixxy’s original post.
Most cyclists are sensible but too many are not. Taxing/insurance and registration would be a logistical nightmare. Even compulsory wearing of a helmet would be virtually unenforceable.
Yes, cyclists pay taxes, which goes into a central pot which pays for road maintenence (just the same as any other road user) but there needs to be a balance. Cyclists already get a lot. I would rather see extra money go towards training then road design. (How about a 5-10% levy on all new adult bikes, which would go towards a govt backed, free days training inc a trip sat in a hgv?) Doing the latter serves only to treat the symptom, not solving the problem. Look at the mess the superhighways have caused. Created a false sense of security with fatal consequences.
My wife operates a cycle training company offering cycle road safety for Schools, families and employees. Already serving the Borough of Havering and parts of Essex, we’d like to see the business grow and in so doing saving lives. If you would like to see change with regard to competent and safe cycling, please spread the word.
The gentleman in the middle with the grey hair and moustache is my father in law. The founder of the company. Unfortunately he died just over a year ago of a heart attack. The family wanted to include him in promotional material. Unfortunately, its the only usable shot they had, minus helmets I’m afraid.
Jeff was one of us. He used to race the TT in the early 70’s, coming 6th on a Suzuki 500 I believe.
