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| Pete. |
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Pete.
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Joined: 22 Aug 2006
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 Posted: 08:03 - 09 May 2015  Post subject: Sun brings out the Kamikazes |
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In the past week or so at least three cyclists have ridden straight into the side of turning vehicles on the stretch of road where I am working right now. It's from the lights at Big Ben heading East along Victoria Embankment. There is a slight down-hill slope on the stretch so the cyclist get a fair clip on making it difficult enough for any vehicle turning left into side accesses especially in the morning rush hour. It's a bit of an accident hot-spot and I've even nearly collected one on my bike. I line up with a gap in the cyclists well ahead of time, get over into the cycle lane matching speed but then I simply HAVE to slow down for the turn-in and this one guy kept pedalling full pelt and tried to go around my left as soon as the kerb receded, then got all outraged at my 'stupid' riding.
Anyway, Boris is putting into place a new east-west cycle superhighway which is supposed to separate the cycles form the traffic and to do so they have closed the cycle lane and reduced the width of the road to one lane only in order to dig up the islands in the middle of the road. There's big signs saying 'Cycle lane closed' and 'Do not overtake cyclists' but that doesn't stop the cyclists squeezing down the inside at speed and then planting themselves into the side of vehicles as they make a left turn into properties. So far no-one's been squished but I fear it's only a matter of time.
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a.k.a 'Geri'
132.9mph off and walked away. Gear is good, gear is good, gear is very very good  |
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| yen_powell |
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yen_powell
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Joined: 22 Jun 2008
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| sickpup |
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sickpup
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Joined: 21 Apr 2004
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| yen_powell |
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yen_powell
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| Posted: 21:27 - 09 May 2015 Post subject: |
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| sickpup wrote: | | yen_powell wrote: | In the traffic engineering industry we call cyclists 'donors'. |
Do traffic people see a way to cure the problem?
Had an incident cycling on Hackney Road a few weeks back. An Audi a few cars ahead was turning left so I slowed down, part way into the turn he stopped dead so I slowed some more coming to a complete stop and he still didn't move. I fell over sideways as I couldn't unclip, got up laughing and he explained that even though he had right of way and I was several cars back he still stopped as so many cyclist would just try and undertake anyway hitting him in the process. I explained I ride Motorbikes, he laughed, I laughed all was good but it made me think. Is driving going to get worse as we are being overly careful around retard cyclists? |
The current push is for the separation of cycle traffic from motorised traffic, mostly due to the cyclists killed since about 2012, a bit of a knee jerk reaction which is causing all the roadworks on the A11 at the moment and the constant fiddling with Bow roundabout.
The problem is many parts of London don't have the room to separate the traffic types easily. Move cycle routes too far from where cyclists want to actually go and the confident ones will still take the direct route, the less confident (who I think are less likely to get hurt because they take less risks) will be the only ones to take the longer more tortuous routes which in the end will change nothing.
I think that the only way to really solve the problem and lower the accident rate is to educate both the vehicle users AND the cyclists to watch out for each other and have a bit of patience and courtesy, but realistically there will always be the 10-20% of both groups who don't give a monkeys about each other till it's too late.
I designed a scheme for a contra flow cycle route somewhere near Columbia Road a few months ago, it made allowances for pedestrians (children going to school in this case), cyclists and motorised traffic, in that order.
It got sent off to a cycling organisation who moaned about a slight kink in their route at one part because the footpath and road narrowed significantly and I don't trust some of the cyclists to slow down when passing a blind corner where children will be popping out on their way to school. I want both groups to have a decent chance of seeing each other. I suspect that some of my bosses (I have many) will pander to this cycling group and change the layout, increasing the risk (in my opinion only it seems) of a cyclist hitting a child or a car/lorry hitting a cyclist.
I'm not really a fan of mollycoddling road users, I think they should be given the chance to be safe if they pay attention and don't play silly buggers, but swamping everything with over the top guard rail, bollards and signage is no substitute for being aware if you do something stupid there may be consequences.
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| Seb |
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Seb
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Joined: 19 Jul 2007
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| Posted: 21:52 - 09 May 2015 Post subject: |
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It's kind of catch 22 in my eyes.
I had a motorcyclist of all people giving me stick for riding on the road (On my road bike doing quite a respectable pace I'll add) when there was a cycle path alongside the road. I wasn't using it because I didn't know it was there, but quite frankly I still won't use it now I know about it, the surface is bad, it's shared with pedestrians and it ends pretty randomly spitting me back out into the road anyway. Useful for nervous riders and family rides, not really of any relevance to someone like myself on a road bike though.
It's all a compromise though, have the path alongside traffic and you get cars and bikes colliding on junctions. Separate them and you end up with unswept paths and potentially sub par surfaces. Add in such joys as ever present manhole covers, parked cars and such and yeah, it's a tricky one to win 
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| sickpup |
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sickpup
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| Seb |
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Seb
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| Posted: 23:10 - 11 May 2015 Post subject: |
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I honestly think it's more of an attitude thing on both sides of the coin that some people will never absorb no matter how much you try to train them up.
I like to think that my standard of riding is pretty high, I position aggressively when required and considerately when it's not whilst also generally being quick enough not to be too much of a nuisance for the most part. Yet I've still had plenty of close calls and situations I'd rather not think about for too long 
Both Cyclists and Motorists would do well to realise that it isn't the end of the world if you end up at your destination a few seconds later for the sake of giving someone else a bit more space or waiting for a safer opportunity to take that junction.
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Old Thread Alert!
The last post was made 10 years, 73 days ago. Instead of replying here, would creating a new thread be more useful? |
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