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<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 18px; font-style: italic;">knobs in all walks of life, don’t take it personally.</span>
Amazed at how many of them are on here, it's depressing.
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 12px;">Thing is, it is a little more than annoying. someone pulling alongside you within arms reach when you are riding pretty quick and giving you verbal and looking at you rather than the road is dangerous.</span>
Next time (there will be one) get his number and report him for a close pass. That's getting some attention these days.
Or even report him for all 4 (5) close passes.
(Camera would be better obviously)
A big problem is the state of the cycle paths. I got abuse on the weekend for not riding one that was empty. The problem is that they simply painted it on a wide pavement and put in give way markers at every junction so it’s a total pita to use.
</span><span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: #eeeeee;"> </span><span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: #eeeeee;">(I’d be tempted to see if you can get him to also threaten you if you really want the police to take action).
and that is my problem with cyclists wearing cameras. Rather than trying to capture what would have happened anyway there seems to be an incentive to either make great YouTube footage or goad people into committing a (further) offence.
in this instance a camera seems like a good idea if you can keep your cool and simple ignore him. He may get bored, he may get worse in which case you’ll have the evidence - and “this guy does this to me every week, or this guy gets 3” closer every time” will likely get more interest than a one off where it’s arguable if an offence has been committed.
id suggest you also capture footage of exactly why that path is so bad as it will save you a lot of time with people who haven’t ridden a bike since they were 12.
</span>The best step would be presumed liability as in most of the rest of europe. We might get a bit more respect then
I’m not a huge fan of presumed liability*, and this is one of the reasons. Drivers with an attitude problem don’t suddenly become drivers with an enforced respect for cyclists because the law changes - they become drivers even more convinced that cyclists are self righteous cocks in their way intentionally hiding them up with their legal shield.
Now presumed liability will only come into play after an accident (too late for the cyclist). I don’t know if you’ve noticed but most of the arrogant drivers believe they have superior skills and so won’t have a crash (none of them are keen to scratch their paintwork) and so inconsiderate, poorly thought out, rude, or malicious close passes don’t stop because the muppet behind the wheel either has no idea it is threatening or wants it to be threatening but believes they have the skills to stop it actually being an accident.
Given how many people drive on our roads without insurance, MOT, and or the correct driving license I’m not sure presuming liability achieves anything other than pushing up premiums for drivers who follow the rules. Now a presumption of prosecution for any collision involving vulnerable road users — that could achieve things and wouldn’t even need a law change.
*the main reason I don’t think it’s a great idea is I see some fairly attrotrious cycling and giving those guys any extra belief in their invincibility seems like a bad idea.
Because, as any social historian will tell you, if you provide crap facilities for a minority group and force them to use them against their will by shouting abuse at them or assaulting them if they refuse, that group clearly has no grounds for complaint and it really works out well and everyone gets on just fine.
Bez for king of the internet!
I’m not sure presuming liability achieves anything other than pushing up premiums for drivers who follow the rules.
The main aim thing it achieves is ease of access to compensation for victims, many of whom face an uphill and combative task: either a serious crash can become emotionally traumatic and financially expensive on top of physically harmful, or minor crashes are things that people simply resign themselves to rather than attempting to be rightfully compensated.
I agree that it's probably completely impotent on most other issues that people cite in relation to it, though.
http://singletrackmag.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/bez-selling-a-dream-at-the-cost-of-reality/
I see some fairly atrocious cycling and giving those guys any extra belief in their invincibility seems like a bad idea.
I see some really atrocious driving and even when people are in charge of 100 times the weight of a bicycle and an engine with 300 or so times the horsepower, society is happy to give them airbags, impact bars, crumple zones and various other things that mean they practically are invincible—never mind just the feeling of being so. We're so keen to divorce them from the fact that moving that sort of vehicle at up to 70mph or so is inherently dangerous that we even give them somewhere to rest their hot coffee, a graphical map to look at, and a microphone so they can talk on the phone.
I think, in the grand scheme of things, presumed liability for the people with 0.3hp and a 15kg pair of wheels isn't going to precipitate a sharp rise in the billions of pounds we spend annually mopping up debris and bodies from the roads.
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: #eeeeee;">Bez for king of the internet!</span>
TBH I thought the later "women-only carriages" analogy made the point better 🙂
[i]and that is my problem with cyclists wearing cameras. Rather than trying to capture what would have happened anyway there seems to be an incentive to either make great YouTube footage or goad people into committing a (further) offence.[/i]
I wonder if your personal problem with camera users is as big as my problem with dickheads who think this is the case with all camera users...
I've got 2 defences against people who shout things at me on the bike - 1) I don't hear them and 2) I can shout louder and more sweary than they can if I do hear them due to a drop in the music volume.
I constantly struggle with this subject when driving along the A283 near Shoreham in particular, only to be held up by one or several cyclists during rush hour. Its roughly a 4 mile stretch, with virtually no safe passing points as the traffic is so heavy in both directions during this time and the actual single carriageways aren't particularly wide. Despite this many cyclists insist on battling the headwinds and trudging along, meaning a frequent queue of traffic directly behind them, sometimes stretching back for a mile itself!
And all the while, there is a dedicated cycle path following the river, not 50m to the side of them on the road. Yes its darker on the path, yes there might be leaves or a rabid rabbit on the path - maybe they'd even have to ride a bit slower to safely traverse this stretch - but surely thats the safer, and more considerate option all round?
I'll always try to defend cyclists but we make it very difficult for ourselves at times.
"And all the while, there is a dedicated cycle path following the river, not 50m to the side of them on the road."
sorry to be pedantic and overly specific but this isn't actually a dedicated cycle-path, it's a shared route gravel track that's quite off-road in places, potholed and frequently puddly and muddy in Winter months.
i use it a lot, and if i'm on my CX or MTB i'll ride it because it's a nice quiet corridor, but if i'm on my road bike i'll avoid it for all but the driest months, and then i'll use the pleasingly meandering road on the other side of the river to the A283, but that's out of personal choice rather than to be 'considerate' to the heavy traffic on the main road so it can go about its business without other people 'getting in the way'
Also, as far as I can tell from Streetview, this is the entry point. It's a gap in a hedgerow in a layby, with a wooden "South Downs Way" finger post pointing down an unsurfaced track. Hardly easy to spot even if you knew it was there, and it doesn't tell you where it's going (unless you know the SDW goes west, and that's unlikely to be appealing if you're riding south), so it's a bit off to expect people to find it even if they're open to the idea of riding down whatever crappy path was available just to placate some people who get upset when they have to lift their right foot.
https://www.google.co.uk/maps/ @50.8721675,-0.2993918,3a,54.9y,205.76h,85.5t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1snUnw45bwQrdXiEm9IZHsoQ!2e0!7i13312!8i6656
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 12px; background-color: #eeeeee;">I’ll always try to defend cyclists but we make it very difficult for ourselves at times.</span>
No we dont since it isnt "we". In the same way drivers arent held responsible for all other drivers I aint for other cyclists and I dont expect them to be held responsible for me.
Your description of the cycle path doesnt quite match JoB's description. Do you often ride it since it seems a rather large discrepancy?
Also you seem to be missing a major part of the problem. How many of the cars in that heavy traffic just have a single occupant taking up a massive amount of road room?
[b]poly[/b] wrote:
(I’d be tempted to see if you can get him to also threaten you if you really want the police to take action).
and that is my problem with cyclists wearing cameras. Rather than trying to capture what would have happened anyway there seems to be an incentive to either make great YouTube footage or goad people into committing a (further) offence.
Is that all cyclists wearing cameras? Do you therefore think cyclists shouldn't use cameras, or maybe we should even ban them?
Or given (having taken a minute to reflect on how sensible you normally are) I'm sure that's not your opinion, maybe you should just rephrase that. I'm guessing you actually consider it's a minor side effect of cyclists using cameras - because there are dicks everywhere and some ride bikes and have cameras. Clearly the use of cameras by cyclists is a massive positive - the vast majority of us don't have youtube channels to publish stuff on, the vast majority of footage (even that of drivers breaking the law in some minor way) is discarded.
I note that in no way am I suggesting goading the driver - TBH I'm not sure what I am suggesting the OP does other than wait, because IME that sort of driver is the sort who will end up issuing threats if challenged (I wish I'd had a camera for the incident where a driver got out of his car to confront me when all I'd done was suggest calmly that he give me more room). Though it's a comment based upon how the system is currently broken - if the police were more prepared to take action on the sort of motoring offences where drivers deliberately* endanger other people's lives then there would be no need to provide evidence of an offence they are prepared to take action on.
I should point out that my personal experience of the police on the ground is very positive, it's just the system which is broken.
* the vast majority of the time where drivers endanger cyclists, it's not a mistake or a momentary lapse of attention, it involves a deliberate choice to ignore the safety of other road users for the convenience of the driver.
From September to around March, a leaf covered cycle lane or shared use path is a major hazard for cyclists, especially if using slicks and tyre widths under ~40mm. You have absolutely no idea what those leaves are obscuring from view...
Mud
Ice
Potholes
Puncture causing debris etc.
Why the hell would I choose to expose myself to such dangers when I'm entitled to be on a road?
If you want cyclists like me to choose cycle lanes and shared paths over using the road when we are typically travelling under 18mph, get councils to make them fit for purpose and keep them properly maintained, free of potholes and other hazards like mud and leaves.
Too many motorists seem to think that all cyclists want to treat every ride as if we are riding unfamiliar off-road trails, because sadly, the current state of most cycle lanes offered to us are are in this condition at best (and a fall onto tarmac has a higher potential for serious damage compared to a typical bit of off-road singletrack). It would be similar to telling a standard car driver to hurtle down a rally stage with standard road tyres fitted.
"I have a mountain bike for mountains, a track bike for the track and a road bike for the road. I don't have a pavement bike". That's my stock answer. A max speed limit on shared use pavements would be nice too, as I'm always travelling much faster than anything that is likely to be proposed.
And it's not cyclists holding you up, it's oncoming traffic.
I’ll always try to defend cyclists but we make it very difficult for ourselves at times.
I'll always try to defend myself as someone who doesn't make fundamentally stupid generalisations but apparently we make it very difficult for ourselves at times.
I always try to avoid defending the indefensible.
Well, quite, but in this case it's completely defensible.
The discussion does appear to have moved on to generalities though. The point is, why should we treat any category of road users* all the same, or even "try to" do so? Why not just take each situation as it comes and praise good road conduct, call out bad conduct?
*eg Deliveroo riders, some of whom carry lights and stay within the law and everything.
Yeah, absolutely agree. The idea that someone's behaviour has to be defended because they're "a cyclist" is absurd, as is doing the same about anyone associated by anything other than an organisation which actually has a duty or responsibility in regard to its members' behaviour. And if you try to defend things on that basis you end up hoist by your own petard of believing yourself to be one and the same.
But at the same time let's be clear that people really shouldn't think that simply riding on a road is something where angry people in cars are right.
only to be held up by one or several cyclists during rush hour.
Wow. Just amazing that this would appear on a cyclists forum. This is exactly the turn of phrase the drivers in my office use. And I always ask why is the cyclist "holding them up" - because there is traffic coming the other way? So that's what's holding them up then, not the cyclist.
And "rush hour". What ****ing rush hour? This mythical time-zone seems to last about 11 hours a day round here.
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 12px; background-color: #eeeeee;">the traffic is so heavy in both directions during this time and the actual single carriageways aren’t particularly wide. Despite this many cyclists insist on battling the headwinds and trudging along, meaning a frequent queue of traffic directly behind them, sometimes stretching back for a mile itself!</span>
So the queues are the fault of the cyclists and not the heavy traffic in both directions?
[b]poly[/b] wrote:
I’m not a huge fan of presumed liability*,
*the main reason I don’t think it’s a great idea is I see some fairly attrotrious cycling and giving those guys any extra belief in their invincibility seems like a bad idea.
Wow. I'm normally with you on stuff like this, but (and I know I'm mostly just repeating Bez here) given the level of invincibility most drivers seem to have, that seems like a fairly minor price to pay. You're in danger here of repeating all the usual tabloid bile about cyclists making the roads dangerous etc. - we know it's actually the drivers encased in their ton of metal who are doing the atrocious things. Though the real irony here is that you've just explained why you don't think it would make any difference to driver's behaviour, so why exactly do you think the same argument doesn't apply to cyclists? Clearly if these cyclists think they're invincible they don't expect to be in an accident any more than the drivers do, so I doubt it would even enter their thinking!
Given how many people drive on our roads without insurance, MOT, and or the correct driving license I’m not sure presuming liability achieves anything other than pushing up premiums for drivers who follow the rules. Now a presumption of prosecution for any collision involving vulnerable road users — that could achieve things and wouldn’t even need a law change.
Oh look, a squirrel!
I'm not sure what any of those things has to do with the issue of presumed liability. If by "drivers who follow the rules" you simply mean those who have insurance etc., then that still includes plenty of drivers who have collided with cyclists where the cyclists have found it difficult to claim compensation. Bez also partly covered this already, but the main result will be a redressing of the balance and allocating liability more accurately - because like many other things it is clear that whilst on the surface the current lack of presumed liability seems fair and balanced, it's actually a bias towards motorists.
The thing is though, I do agree with one of the main thrusts of your post - and meant to post something myself. I doubt presumed liability will make any significant difference to attitudes or road safety in general. Though Bez's article does all of this far better than either of us - I think we're all in agreement on this general point. As usual I'm in full agreement with Bez here - the absence of such imaginary benefits doesn't mean presumed liability isn't a good idea for the real reasons I just mentioned.
Worth reporting surely, video or not.
Try and remember the plates next time.
Damn you all - I was going to rip slimjim apart, but whilst I've been busy replying to poly most of it's been done already. There's still this one though:
[b]slimjim78[/b] wrote:
a frequent queue of traffic directly behind them, sometimes stretching back for a mile itself!
#slimjimfact
Yes its darker on the path, yes there might be leaves or a rabid rabbit on the path – maybe they’d even have to ride a bit slower to safely traverse this stretch – but surely thats the safer, and more considerate option all round?
It seems it's the latter point you're more bothered with - so you're expecting cyclists to take a longer, slower, more awkward, possibly actually less safe route in order not to inconvenience car drivers a little bit? Presumably the convenience of the drivers is more important than the convenience of the cyclists - I mean it's no problem at all for a cyclist to ride an extra mile or so.
[b]DezB[/b] wrote:
Wow. Just amazing that this would appear on a cyclists forum. This is exactly the turn of phrase the drivers in my office use.
I've long since ceased to be amazed by that. I'm sure we're far more balanced* on here than society as a whole, but it's an interesting reflection on society that driver centric views are so entrenched that even cyclists believe them.
* by balanced I mean biased towards cyclists, but given the huge societal bias towards drivers that does result in it being close to even handed.
DezB / Aracer,
No indeed I did not mean to suggest that cyclists should be precluded from wearing cameras or that those who do are all problematic. The sentence structure could perhaps have been better. Indeed my initial gut feel was the OP should probably get a camera, and I think I did say something like that in the following paragraph. What I was objecting to was the suggestion that once you have a camera you should try to exacerbate the situation so that there was something the police were more likely to take action on.
Aracer,
"it involves a deliberate choice to" - I think you are overestimating the amount of thought the average driver makes during their journey! I do agree though that the complete lack of thought is culpability similar to intent.
Bez,
I don't have a feel for how difficult most insurers are at paying out on claims by vulnerable road users? For the lower end of the claim spectrum (ie. the minor injuries, bent bikes etc) I'd have assumed they were fairly cooperative. At the life changing injuries end, does presumed liability help? I'd still expect them to fight it, because its not absolute liability and so avoiding the odd really expensive claim would be worth it. How often has a civil damages claim reached court for the driver to be found 100% faultless? (and would that case have been any different even with presumed liability). I take your point about the relative risk of an impact between a metal box full of cushioning and an unprotected person. I'm not sure you shift anything by reassigning the default financial responsibilities, "thats what I pay insurance for". Indeed given that most cyclists are probably not insured for 3rd party damage there is already an imbalance towards the risks to their precious car. I'm also not convinced that the apparent cultural difference in Europe towards cyclists has anything to do with presumed liability. Correlation does not equal causation. Was that difference introduced to overcome a problem, or is it just a consequence of the different jurisprudence?
It is funny that these sort of questions always blame the cyclist for travelling at 15mph, rather than the car driver for sitting in a vehicle +6' wide.
[b]poly[/b] wrote:
What I was objecting to was the suggestion that once you have a camera you should try to exacerbate the situation so that there was something the police were more likely to take action on.
My bad then, I obviously wrote that wrong - I certainly wasn't suggesting goading the driver or exacerbating the situation, simply that for drivers like that there doesn't seem to be a line between abuse and threat (or indeed physical action).
“it involves a deliberate choice to” – I think you are overestimating the amount of thought the average driver makes during their journey! I do agree though that the complete lack of thought is culpability similar to intent.
Not at all. There is very little which happens on the road which doesn't involve deliberate choice. Whether that choice is to overtake whilst there is oncoming traffic, to overtake just before turning left or simply to check out a text on their phone. Sure, the driver might not intend to pass too close, to cut up the cyclist or to run into the back of them, but that's not the deliberate decision. A challenge for you - or indeed anybody on here - find me a report of a road incident involving a cyclist which didn't involve a deliberate decision.
I don’t have a feel for how difficult most insurers are at paying out on claims by vulnerable road users? For the lower end of the claim spectrum (ie. the minor injuries, bent bikes etc) I’d have assumed they were fairly cooperative.
Just my anecdotal experience, but when I was knocked off (minor injuries and a bent bike - total claim ~£2k IIRC) the driver's insurance company were extremely awkward and only paid up on threat of court action. Had I not engaged a solicitor I might have given up. That was exactly the sort of claim presumed liability would likely have made a lot simpler.
Indeed given that most cyclists are probably not insured for 3rd party damage there is already an imbalance towards the risks to their precious car.
That's simply not true - the vast majority of cyclists do have 3rd party insurance (I suspect the proportion of uninsured drivers is actually higher). I'm not sure of the relevance though - in the majority of collisions between cyclists and vehicles the cyclist isn't at all at fault, so drivers don't tend to need to claim from cyclists.
one from earlier I meant to reply to:
Now a presumption of prosecution for any collision involving vulnerable road users — that could achieve things and wouldn’t even need a law change.
A great idea*, but I don't understand - under what law would you be prosecuting and how would that be possible without a change in the law? The only laws I can see currently covering that are dangerous driving and driving without DCA etc., which have the usual problem of the jury comparing with their own driving standard (as they are instructed to do).
*I've never quite gone that far, but do consider that killing a vulnerable road user who is doing nothing wrong should be sufficient proof by itself for a DBDD conviction, whatever excuses the driver might have - though that would require a change in the law.
Mm, "presumption of prosecution" doesn't make any sense. Is it suggesting that a prosecution is always undertaken? (Would be prohibitively expensive and in a great many cases futile.) Is it proposing a presumption of criminal guilt? (Not a hope, runs contrary to the most basic premise of our justice system.) Or something else?
On the question of how PL helps claimants, rather than go trawling for stuff I'll lazily point to the pro-PL campaigns who list case studies. All anecdotal, but fairly compelling.
presumed liability is used in almost every other european country. Its not a panacea but what it does do is demonstrate legally that bicycles are on road as of right.
Its just a part of the re balancing of road use away from cars and towards the majority of road users who don't use cars
[b]tjagain[/b] wrote:
presumed liability is used in almost every other european country. Its not a panacea but what it does do is demonstrate legally that bicycles are on road as of right.
I'm not sure it even really does that in any useful sense. Were you expecting the DM readers to stop going on about how cyclists don't pay road tax etc.? I'm afraid I have some bad news for you...
It does what it does, which makes it easier for cyclists to get compensation when they're hit by a driver, but that's about all it does. I very much doubt it would make the slightest difference to the driver the OP encountered.
not immediately aracer but over time perhaps it might just change attitudes. Its one piece of the jigsaw bu IMO a critical one
The idea of presumption of prosecution is not something I made up. It’s already applied in other areas, eg. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7436141.stm
There are usually two tests to meet for a prosecutor to instigate proceedings: 1. Sufficient evidence to have a reasonable prospect of conviction; 2. It is in the public interest to prosecute.
why does every minor car v bike not get prosecuted? It must be because one of those tests was not met. It could be there isn’t evidence, but even in Scotland where corroboration would be required sufficiency isn’t a very high bar - if you know the identity of the driver (s172 request), the cyclists says it was careless and there is any evidence of a collision (damaged bike, injury, admission by driver, damaged car) there is probably sufficiency. Reasonable prospect of a conviction doesn’t necessary follow from sufficiency - and that gives prosecutors a “get out”. Reasonable prospect is often interepretted to mean more likely than not (and for trivial RT matter probably higher than that) - but it needent be as high as that - the reasonableness of the prospect varies with the harm to society; in rape cases it is <50%. Then we have the public interest test - and for minor incidents where no injury occurs the current CPS guidance means it is not always in the public interest. That is where the biggest change would come - you simply remove that advice that minor incident don’t need pursuing.
a presumption of prosecution would require prosecutors (or the police) to record and justify (and be subject to challenge/review) the reasons for not prosecuting. Simply saying not in public interest would not be enough - the presumption would be that it IS in the public interest to make the roads safer for vulnerable road users.
of course not every prosecution would result in a conviction, and neither should it (and prosecutors could still review the evidence and conclude that it was not the drivers fault, but that should be the exception, and subject to challenge/review). s3 RTA prosecutions (no injury or death) are normally summary prosecutions and so no jury to complicate the prospects, and of course fixed penalty alternatives to prosecution could be used if people admit guilt.
It doesn’t require new laws because it is just a change of policy by the DPP / Lord Advocate.
Thanks, hadn't come across the phrase before.
The difficulty is that, whereas carrying a knife is a single party act which is binary (either you had a knife or you didn't), most collisions involve two parties and a massive grey area.
I think when it comes to multiple-party crashes, a policy of presumption of prosecution for one party and not the other would be seen as implying guilt. I think that would (probably rightly) make it dead in the water, politically.
The other issue is the low prosecution success rate and the astonishing examples of cases that fail. It's hard to see presumption of prosecution being viable in that climate.
I assume that knife carrying is a strict offence (ie has no technical defence, like jumping a red light or speeding). It's quite different to something like careless driving.
They are lethal - don't use them!!
OK not quite this but...
I had my worst bike accident ever about a month ago on a cycle path on my commute home from my new place of work. Crashed headlong into another cyclist coming the other way at a combined impact speed of over 30mph. Hurt like hell and the poor chap I crashed into broke his collar bone!
The cycle path is just not fit for purpose. Its only 3 feet wide and full of holes so you have to look down a lot of the time instead of where you are going. Its also totally unlit and next to a busy main road with bumper to bumper traffic at rush hour. Consequently all you can see out of your peripheral vision is hundreds of bright white lights, which makes picking out another dimmer white light really difficult in all that noise. At least this is the excuse I have made to qualify what at first sounds like an impossible mistake on a dead straight and flat piece of road 🙂
Even since the incident with head up and full on concentration I have nearly had the same thing happen again - cyclists literally come out of nowhere. The chap I hit said it happened to him before.
My commute has turned into a death trap because of cycle paths!
I can't believe some the crap I'm reading, on a bloody cycling forum! For those suggesting to ignore it, suck it, it happens, don't let it bother you etc., I get that approach to verbals, but did you all miss this bit of the OP?
..Car will pull along side, very close..
That is not acceptable, shouldn't be ignored, is absolutely lethal and imho (IANAL) must be illegal in one of several possible ways.
The one near me where drivers "politely draw my attention" to the cycle lane is very frustrating since it's a road I've used without any particular fear or problem for many years, until the council painted a shit cycle lane onto the pavement - now drivers are apoplectic with rage although I'm still doing exactly what I've always done. I have tried the cycle lane - it's shit and dangerous so I won't be repeating the experiment.