Dangerous Drivers

[SheldorAFK]

As a relatively new member to the EDF and until now more of an observer than a contributor to the forum, might I add a view without being scorned too much by the indigenous inhabitants?!

As far as I can see there have been some valid points made by all but also some rather outrageous ones too based on one off scenarios. My experience as both a driver and cyclist, as well as pedestrian is that there are as many badly behaved cyclists as there are motorists. The fact that there seems to be more incidents now than previously probably has a lot to do with there being more of both on the roads than there ever has been before (stating the obvious I know). The road system cannot cope (incident free) with that much traffic. As Otta put it;

Most cyclists are fine. Some are dicks and dangerous.

Most motorists are fine. Some are dicks and dangerous.

Or perhaps;

Some motorists have a sense of entitlement and prejudice towards cyclists. Most don?t.

Some cyclists have a sense of entitlement and prejudice towards motorists. Most don?t.

You can?t tar them all with the same brush LadyD. Take those blinkers off.

[LadyDeliah]

No DJKQ, I'm trying to raise awareness after having had to read so much anti-cycling rhetoric on this forum.

The Highway Code specifically states that they should leave enough room to overtake and must consider vulnerable road users, therefore, motorists passing extremely close to cyclists or cutting them up really close are failing to observe the Highway Code and committing the offence of driving dangerously.

[binary_star]

DJKillaQueen Wrote:

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> At least drivers have number plates to identify

> them when things do go wrong......cyclists on the

> other hand?

Boris bikes are 'registered' in the sense that they all have a unique number to identify them (and thereby the cyclist). In 2010 the IPayRoadTax guy (via a Freedom of Information request) asked TfL how many Boris Bike users had been reported as "transgressors of any sort?"

The response:

"TfL has received two reports that a third party has contacted the Barclays Cycle Hire Scheme contact centre about the behaviour of scheme members."

Wow, a whole two.

"The bicycle serial numbers were not reported"

From: http://ipayroadtax.com/no-such-thing-as-road-tax/bike-licensing-doesnt-work-just-ask-boris/

[DJKillaQueen]

You are right LD regarding anti-cycling rhetoric....but I've never seen the forum as being a benchmark in balanced debate anyway, I think few people do :) (except that is, within the confines of the drawing Room).

Raising awareness is a good thing when done effectively.

[binary_star]

@SheldorAFK - all valid points but I thin the main issue is that one type of dick is more likely to seriously injure or kill than the other. So maybe they shouldn't be so dickish?

[LadyDeliah]

Sheldor:

Some motorists have a sense of entitlement and prejudice towards cyclists. Most don?t.

Some cyclists have a sense of entitlement and prejudice towards motorists. Most don?t.

This is true, but a cyclist having a sense of entitlement, prejudice or hatred towards a motorist does not put the motorist in mortal danger.

[LadyDeliah]

DJKillaQueen Wrote:

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> You are right LD regarding anti-cycling

> rhetoric....but I've never seen the forum as being

> a benchmark in balanced debate anyway, I think few

> people do :) (except that is, within the confines

> of the drawing Room).

>

> Raising awareness is a good thing when done

> effectively.

This is a twitter account which retweets some pretty serious and offensive tweets against cyclists @CycleHatred. In my experience, this is a widely held viewpoint and one which I have encountered many times whilst commuting on my bike. I commute all year round, every day. I rarely use public transport or drive, so maybe that is why my experience of these kinds of incidents is as frequent as it is.

I wear hi-viz, cycle defensively and always indicate my intention to change lane or turn into a road by putting my arm way out into the road to make sure drivers can see it. I make sure I am well in front at traffic lights so they can see me and I can keep up with the traffic in most London roads but still i get vehicles squeezing past me with inches to spare only to have to stop a couple of meters in front.

Their behaviour is dangerous, but they see it as justified because I am a cyclist. I've had enough and hope that the links I've put up will change a few people's perceptions in the cyclist v motorist debate.

[DJKillaQueen]

Boris bikes might have numbers but thousands of cycles on the roads up and down the country don't so ridiculing the low number of Boris bikes reported as some kind of indication that cyclists don't break the highway code in any kind of significant number is a poor example.

However take a look at the number of cyclists fined by Police for jumping red lights.....2008, 536 cyclists in the Metropolitan Police area...2008/09, 1,085.....2010, 1,872.....and those are just the ones caught and fined in Metropolitan London.

Or this report that shows around 15% of cyclists on average jump red lights....

http://www.tfl.gov.uk/assets/downloads/traffic-note-8-cycling-red-lights.pdf

[DJKillaQueen]

I've always found the worst abuse thrown at me when cycling, to have been when riding in central London. I don't seem to find the same level of antagonism elsewhere. It could just be that congestion raises intolerance. But I also think that some drivers behave like idiots so cyclists hate all drivers, and some cyclists behave like idiots and drivers then hate all cyclists. Cycle couriers have a terible reputation for example with taxi drivers..and vice versa. So it becomes a battle of perception and attitude. The problem is how to break that.

[LadyDeliah]

Do you have any reports on the number of motorists who jump red lights or use their mobile phone whilst driving?

At junctions where there is no space to wait in front of the traffic, or where vehicles are blocking the advanced stop box I will go past the stop line of the junction and start cycling just before the lights change to green, because it is unsafe to cross the junction any other way. Vehicles turning left in situations like that regularly hit cyclists who don't go right up front.

I think the law should be looked at to make this aspect of cycling safer and prevent unnecessary deaths. I don't have the answer, but I know what I have to do to keep myself safe in that situation.

[binary_star]

DJKillaQueen Wrote:

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> Boris bikes might have numbers but thousands of

> cycles on the roads up and down the country don't

> so ridiculing the low number of Boris bikes

> reported as some kind of indication that cyclists

> don't break the highway code

It was an indication that people wouldn't bother reporting it. I mean really - breaking the higway code?

> However take a look at the number of cyclists fined by Police for ...

I've asked time and time again for people to pick a parameter for danger. Then prove that cyclists are particularly dangerous. They're not.

[*Bob*]

LadyD, the problem with your 'campaign' is that in your opening post, you lump all drivers together - making no distinction between bad and good, talking simply about 'motorists sense of entitlement and prejudice towards cyclists'. There's no qualification.

This immediately puts the backs up of anyone (ie, the majority) of people who don't purposefully drive like a tw@t. I don't even drive a car, but found it annoying. Even those car drivers who 'could' drive better don't do it out of a sense of entitlement and prejudice ffs!

If you want to change perceptions and behaviour then I'm afraid irritating virtually every mind you hope to influence with one broad, antagonistic opener - is a complete non-starter.

[DJKillaQueen]

More motorists than that are fined for jumping red lights. Police point out though that motorists are more likely to be fined for that offence than cyclists (who often may just get a warning) and CCTV helps to identify offending drivers too, which I'm not sure is particularly helpful in trying to evaluate the size of the problem and make comparisons.

What I would say is that almost 2000 cyclists being caught and fined in a year for jumping red lights in inner London is a big enough number to worry about. And equivalent numbers of motorists and higher is also a big enough problem to worry about. Because for all those caught, there are many more who are not.

[Annette Curtain]

Otta Wrote:

> That could be written "Every road user except

> cyclists cause problems for cyclists".

No, other cyclists are a menace for cyclists

I often stop at the lights and will the one who's broken the red light to get bumped off their silly/racer/mountain bike/wreck

"Yer - that'll learn ya"

[binary_star]

Ok look it's really a very simple question...what is it about cyclists that we need to "worry about". What is it that makes them so much more "dangerous". Because as a matter of FACT, rather than opinion, it looks like motorists are far more dangerous than cyclists. Except perhaps to themselves. Lucky for them they have a ton of metal, airbags and all those other forms of protection a car provides.

Prove this wrong. I've asked anyone who asserts any different to pick any parameter for danger they like, then choose any study, any data set, from any date range. And demonstrate that cyclists are more dangerous than drivers. Even getting fined (less often than drivers) for jumping red lights doesn't mean cyclists are posing more danger. Why do the Police even bother targeting cyclists who jump reds??? Because: "Police forces are now obliged by central government to tackle issues flagged up by local communities. In the City, this tends to bring complaints about rough sleepers and law-flouting cyclists."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/apr/16/police-cyclists-red-lights

...Which is exactly why such sting operations are often in The City (there is literally nothing else for the 'community' to complain about).

EVEN IF it were demonstrated that cyclists jump more reds, this in itself is not always dangerous (left turns on some reds is legal in some countries for all vehicles for instance and Boris campaigned for cyclists to be able to legally turn left on a red here also). What IS dangerous is causing an accident, killing or injuring someone.

No-one is denying that SOME cyclists can be dangerous. And no doubt some pedestrians are too. But when people say "cyclists are dangerous" they want to mean in comparison with motorists, but what they really mean is: "I personally find cyclists annoying."

LadyD I wouldn't worry about looking obsessive, I too am obsessive about this (and not in a good way either). And I couldn't give a toss how that comes across.

[binary_star]

If you believe the stereotype portrayed, it's almost as if all those cyclists with their red light jumping, recklessness and law-flouting behaviour are actually trying to be more dangerous than drivers...and even still they're managing to kill less people than are accidentally killing themselves by either falling off ladders (or cliffs) or by accidentally suffocating themselves in bed. More pedestrians alone are killed in collision with motor vehicles than the number of people killed by all of these 'dangerous' activities combined.

[Otta]

These threads always make me laugh. LD has her agenda, all the cyclists are on board wearing their blinkers, and nothing anyone else ever says will convince them that cyclists are anything other than 2 wheeled angels.

There was a thread a good while back about some dick who chased after a bus that he felt had cut him up. He rode along side it banging on the bus until the driver stopped, got out, and punched him.

I felt that given his behaviour it was an understandable reaction, but no cyclist would even admit that he'd been remotely in the wrong (distracting a moving bus with passengers on board).

As I said earlier, there are idiots on this planet. Some of them drive, some cycle, some push buggies and let kids run around in pubs. That doesn't mean that the other 90% of people are all bad.

[DJKillaQueen]

Let's look at it a different way.

One of LD's main points is regarding the animosity shown towards cyclists by some drivers, and by animosity we are talking the kind of road rage that endangers lives (I have no disagreement with her on the danger such drivers pose to others).

So if a person has a skewed view of a group of people, and some of that group of people deliberately break the rules of the road, then it gives validation to the skewed view, in te mind of the holder.

In other words, you get this circle of hate, validated in the minds of the haters by the unlawful, or dangerous, or selfish or whatever, acts of the few.

So for me, and bear in mind I cycle more journeys than I drive, if cyclists run red lights, they are just giving fuel to the kind of driver that might one day hate me enough to cut me up and cause me serious injury. So it matters. It's that people in glass houses shouldn't throw stones kind of thing.

Now when it comes to a good integrated road policy I have some ideas. I have often cycled in central Paris for example and am impressed with just how much more enjoyable it is. Why? Well there is an active network that supports the seperation of cycles from the busiest roads. Many bus lanes are kerbed, so not only can cars not use them illegally, but busses can not 'squeeze' past cyclists to make the next stop and cut you up, either. I think in London the thinking has always been of how to integrate cycling (and public

transport) into traffic flows. I think the opposite needs to happen. How to create a network of safe routes that are seperate from dangerous traffic flows.

[binary_star]

"Cycle of hate". Perpetuated by saying things like "cyclists are dangerous".

I don't jump reds because it pisses other road users off. It's THE ONLY reason I don't do it when I think it would otherwise be safe to do so. I obey traffic laws and the Highway Code within the infrastructure we've got. Still not enough, people want my bicycle to be registered or for me to pay road tax (God knows what for cycles don't produce any emissions). It's ridiculous, ill-thought out and prejudice founded on stereotypes that should be challenged.

Cyclist angers driver. Driver drives at cyclist. Cyclist dies.

Driver angers cyclist. Cyclist cycles at driver. Cyclist dies.

The odds aren't exactly evenly stacked. If anything, cyclists have a right to be angrier at bad drivers than the other way around.

[LondonMix]

What I think most people mean when they say cyclists are dangerous is that they can cause an accident either endangering their own lives or cause an accident between two vehicles (one car swerving to avoid a reckless cyclists and accidentally hitting another car/ bus/ etc). It happens. How often I can't say but my husband who cycles to work every day says he sees a cyclist doing something very reckless multiple times a day. He sees more cars doing things that are dangerous but there are more cars on the road so that makes sense. There are bad road users of every ilk!

[LadyDeliah]

Bob, I may have appeared to start this thread with a generalisation about all drivers and I apologise for that. The reason I was so pissed off was because to and from work yesterday I had five incidents of motorists endangering my life and then I read that appalling report of the stupid cow bragging about hitting a cyclist. I was pissed off and I admit it was wrong of me to tar all motorists with the same brush, I am sorry.

Otta, at no point have I said all cyclists are angels. I have accepted that cyclists can be arseholes and prejudiced towards other road users. That is not the issue.

My points of contention are as follows:

1. Arsehole drivers are far more dangerous than arsehole cyclists so both should be cracked down on commensurate with the damage per year caused by each of them to people and property. The hatred of cyclists by some drivers is dangerous, but appears to be condoned by the wider community. I think this needs to be challenged and I hope it will become just as unacceptable to joke about killing cyclists as it is about killing any other minority.

2. Many motorists feel that they are entitled to dominate the roads and other road users are just in their way, including slower driving cars. I accept that some cyclists also feel like this, but again, the danger to others posed by motorists with road rage is far greater than the danger posed by cyclists.

3. The amount of public space taken up to accommodate motorists by way of widened roads, motorways, car parks etc is too much in my opinion and should be reduced for use by other members of the community to share.

4. Planning has prioritised the needs of motorists over everyone else for the past 50-60 years. This has reduced the quality of life of other members of the community and has even destroyed some communities because they have become so pedestrian unfriendly.

5. The issue of vehicle excise duty and fuel tax always seems to be reeled out as a reason that cars should have priority on the roads. Roads are paid for out of general taxation so we all pay for them, including cyclists, but motor vehicles cause far more damage to roads than bicycles ever could. Also there are many miles of roads that cyclists are not allowed to cycle on, there are vast car parks paid for by local taxes and widening of roads to accommodate increasing numbers of cars; so in effect cyclists are subsidising motorists, not the other way around.

6. Motorised vehicles produce CO2 and other harmful pollutants. The pollution from these vehicles causes many health problems that cost all of us money to treat in the NHS. Global warming from the CO2 is another good reason to try to reduce the priority given to motorists and plan other ways to do things.

7. The oil needed to drive the vehicles is finite and by all accounts peaked in the 1970s so there is a need to look at how we use this finite resource in addition to the other compelling reasons to re-assess our attitude to cars.

8. My life should not be in danger everytime I cycle to work. I should not have to feel like I am travelling through a war zone when I am cycling in London. I want to live a long and healthy life, to watch my granddaughter grow up. I don?t want some impatient psycho in charge of a tonne of metal to mow me down on my way to or from work.

There are more things I could say, but I think I've pretty much covered all I can think of right now.

[woodrot]

I ride but also drive so am aware of both sides. I did nearly cream a bike a few weeks back when he came through on the inside on the other side of the road as I was turning right, as a car had stopped to let me across. I was fucking mortified and embarrased.probabaly my fault for crossing, but scared the shit out of me.I ahve been on the other side of this when it has happened to me when riding.

oh yes. lets bring cats into this. I was zooming along the old canal path through peckham ( always best to zoom along here, as the yoot soemtimes target you ) when a cat ran out in front of me. being a cat i.e stupid, it stopped right in front of me and I went over the bars, temporarily dislocating my shoulder ( I am big, so the momentum was pretty serious ).luckily my shoulder popped back into place as I chased the fucker through the bushes, but it escaped into someones garden.

vermin.

[LadyDeliah]

I think if you accidently commit any driving (or cycling) faux pas, then it would be normal to apologise and that should dissipate any anger.

Similarly, when a motorist is nice to my when I'm cycling (or walking), I always acknowledge it.

I wish it was like that all the time, but unfortunately a large proportion of people, once they get behind a wheel, seem to turn into ill-tempered, selfish arseholes who are a danger to everyone else.

[binary_star]

LondonMix Wrote:

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> What I think most people mean when they say

> cyclists are dangerous is that they can

> cause an accident either endangering their own lives or

> cause an accident between two vehicles (one car swerving to avoid a reckless cyclists and

> accidentally hitting another car/ bus/ etc).

Aha ok now this makes sense!

But still no evidence to support that. Quite the opposite: http://road.cc/content/news/12065-report-dft-casualty-stats-says-cyclists-not-blame-93-cent-cases

Next?

[DJKillaQueen]

You know the ony way to have accident free roads is for ALL road users to show consideration to and awareness of all other road users. There really is no 'a cycle weighs less than a car and therefore is less likely to kill' leeway to that.

LD I have sympathy (or is it empathy) with all 8 points of your post and I do think London suffers from that centuries old issue of poor town planning. Whilst other major European cities benefitted from an overview of wider cohesive town planning (including infrastructure) London has continued to be a planning nightmare of borough pitted against borough, and the mangled mess of ad hoc road networks that we see today. Again I will refer to Paris with its seperated transport infrastructures, where lorries are not allowed witihn the inner orbital and cyclists enjoy a network of protected routes that keep them away from the designed main arteries and orbitals. It's efficient transport planning with minimal impacts on residential and pedestrianised areas. Helped also by a well run subsidised public transport system making for a promoted affordable alternative over the car.

Obviously the issue of fuel and energy use is a difficult one. Whilst electric vehicles will improve environment in urban areas, they won't do much for the burnng of fossil fuels. Electricity is less efficient as an energy source than petrol, and still requires the consumption of energy to produce it.