Cycling: How to make it safer?

[maniacmartin]

There is a huge problem with the way this country is not geared up for cycling. Roads are not designed with cyclists in mind, and cycle lanes especially are not designed with cyclists in mind. Shops don't have the right cycle parking facilities either.

Here's how cycling usually ends up for me:

1. Ensure I'm wearing appropriate clothes
2. Find bicycle lights that I detached to stop them getting stolen (because I don't have the Poundland infinitesimal-lumens ones)
3. Remember to carry a backpack
4. Get helmet
5. Maneuver bicycle out of twisty corridors of flat block
6. Navigate roads whose signage is designed solely for motorists
7. Find secure place to lock bicycle, which may not be nearby.
8. Remove lights and put in bag
9. Remove locks
10. Lock both wheels and frame
11. Remove GPS/Odometer/Whatever
12. Put helmet somewhere?
13. Return to bicycle, which may be damaged
14. Reattach lights
15. Reattach GPS/whatever
16. Unlock locks
17. Reattach locks

What a faff! I think I'll just wedge on a train instead or just do my shopping online.

I used to own a car, and most of my car journeys were well-suited to cycling, but due to the above, it just wasn't worth the hassle.

 

[edwin_m]

Anyone have the stats for how many motor vehicles there are on the roads compared with the number of cycles ?

Numbers of vehicles aren't really relevant as so many people have cycles rusting away that are hardly used. Distance travelled is more important.

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/243957/nts2012-01.pdf

Page 5 shows that 50% of the average person's travel distance is as a car driver and 1% as a cyclist. This implies that cars travel 50 times more miles than cycles, which on the fact of it evens up the previous figures somewhat. However these figures ignore mileage by HGVs and other vehicles (there are doubtless some better ones somewhere but I don't have time to find them now). A proportion of the car mileage will also be on motorways and other major roads where pedestrian accidents are unlikely.

The fact remains that even if all cyclists behaved perfectly and never caused accidents, only about two pedestrian lives per year would be saved. Far better to concentrate on improving motorist behavior which has the potential to save several hundred lives per year (and not just in pedestrian collisions).

 

[gordonthemoron]

1. Work I use full cycling gear (6 miles), pub I just use hi viz jacket
2. only if it's going to be really dark as my built in lights are pretty good
3. Panniers for luggage as can carry more and don't hurt my back
6. MK is pretty good for cycle lanes, only cyclists with a death wish cycle on the grid roads
7. MK is not that bad, pubs are an exception

 

[jon0844]

The statistics I quoted were fatal accidents - for which I suggest under-reporting isn't an issue.

I doubt deaths caused by cyclists are ever going to catch up with, or overtake, accidents involving motorised vehicles.

However, I doubt the few people who have been seriously hurt by cyclists are particularly bothered by the fact that it's quite rare.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

And you don't need lights if you're only out cycling in the daytime - although I'd argue that if you're cycling on a road then you should fit lights as they'll provide you with some more safety (we can argue how much, but anything is better than nothing, no?).

Safety measures are always a balance. My own perception is that in broad daylight, any safety benefit from having lights is likely to be so small that it's probably not worth the effort to have them. Obviously, at night or even at twilight, it's a very different story.

Why are some people so against doing things that might help save their life. Surely not everyone wants a Darwin award? It's not that 'the man' is out to spoil your fun, or force you to do something, but rather that people can see what offers a safety benefit - lighting, helmets, protective clothing, reflectively clothing, a bell/horn or whatever.

But remember, there is a difference between choosing to do something and *forcing* other people to do the same thing. There are many safety measures I personally take in everyday life, often automatically without even thinking about it, and which I think it would be wise for everyone else to do, but where I'd regard a law forcing everyone to do so as a violation of people's right to choose how to live their own lives.

I have no problem with safety regulations that prevent obvious and overwhelming risks (such as the law requiring lights on cycles at night), but at some point you have to respect people's right to decide for themselves the level of risk they are prepared to tolerate in their own lives. When people propose safety laws that would impose a burden on people, have at best controversial or negligible safety benefits for them (and no significant benefits for 3rd parties), then I'd say you're interfering in people's lives way too much. In this context remember, we're discussing a proposal to force all cyclists to carry lights even in situations where they can be seen perfectly well without them.

 

[455driver]

After narrowly missing a winker (misprint) of a cyclist who flew out of a side street doing about 20mph (and needing 80% of the road to make the corner) wearing no protective clothing except the earphones I would say ban them off the road!

If I had been 20 feet further forward he would have gone into the side of my car, if I had been 15 feet further forward he would have been under it.

We will never reach a concensus simply because these are the type of cyclists some of us are talking about rather than the sensible, law abiding ones the other posters are using as their examples.

Note-
This was a 20 odd year old not a kid.

 

[ExRes]

I can guess you'll get the same answer as I did to a previous post 455driver, it was a chav who'd stolen the bicycle ..........

 

[PermitToTravel]

I saw one today use the two nearside lanes to take a left turn as though he were driving an artic, found it quite hilarious

It doesn't make sense, though, to say that because some cyclists ride like complete morons, everyone should be banned from cycling on the road, in much the same way that it wouldn't make sense to say that as some people undeniably drive like complete morons, everyone should be banned from driving on the road.

I've seen it hypothesised elsewhere that the people who cycle like idiots and drive like idiots are the same people. Are these also the people that don't move down inside a busy train, leave bags on seats in rush hour, etc, etc?

 

[radamfi]

Cycling in the UK has been marginalised to such an extent that almost all people have been scared away from it because of the failure to build proper cycle infrastructure. Therefore, the few people who still cycle are inevitably going to comprise of a lot of confident or reckless people. They are labelled as 'cyclists', as if they are some kind of cult or association. So they are an easy target for attack from the general (i.e. non-cycling) population.

In the Netherlands, they don't have 'cyclists', they just have people (i.e. almost everyone) who happen to use a bike for transport, like they might also use a car for transport. This thread would not exist on a Dutch forum.

Maybe if the UK got round to building proper, Dutch-style, infrastructure, this ridiculous state of affairs would end, but I don't have much hope for this country. I've lived my whole life here and now I am in early middle age and things still have barely changed. If anything, the rhetoric against cycling and cyclists has intensified over time. I'm learning Dutch now and planning to move to the Netherlands at some point.

 

[ralphchadkirk]

I don't get your point about not calling people who cycle 'cyclists'? It's the same as calling car drivers 'motorists', or plane drivers 'pilots'.

Unfortunately there are some very dangerous, reckless and stupid cyclists. There are also dangerous, reckless and stupid car drivers. I do however find the "cyclists = God, motorists = Satan" rhetoric from the cycling lobby infantile and unconstructive.

 

[Nick W]

Great idea, so after the motorist has caused a massive multiple vehicle pile-up he would have the satisfaction that he'd done the right thing.

If you're not prepared for any car to spontaneously brake for no apparent reason, you're a danger to road users! [I did this about five times when I recently hired a car, as it was a semi-automatic not a manual. (On the local roads, I'd got accustomed to it before I went on anything busy and never made the mistake.)]

If you assume that you can't slam on the brakes because of a car behind, you're allowing the car behind you (who may be a danger) to turn you into a danger.

(Plus, I'd sooner cars piled into each other than multiple cars into a cyclist in terms of the chances of death.)

 

[radamfi]

I don't get your point about not calling people who cycle 'cyclists'? It's the same as calling car drivers 'motorists', or plane drivers 'pilots'.

Cyclists are an identifiable section of society in the UK because they are a small minority, and thus it is easy to be derogatory about them. David Hembrow calls them an 'out-group', and explains this phenomenon well in his blog post:

http://www.aviewfromthecyclepath.com/2013/10/a-toot-and-wave-dutch-cyclists-are-not.html

I still tense up a little if I hear a car horn when cycling. I still glance around for escape routes.

This is a learnt behaviour which comes from many years of cycling in Britain, where car horns are used quite often by drivers to send an unpleasant message to cyclists supposedly committing some ill or other. The sound of a car horn would commonly be accompanied by that of squealing tyres, a revving engine or abuse through a car window. None of those things has happened to me in six years of living in The Netherlands, but I still cringe when I hear a horn.

In The Netherlands, cyclists are not an out-group. That is to say that we're not an easily identifiable group on the edge of society. Because cyclists are not an out-group, we don't suffer from homogeneity bias where each member of a group are blamed for behaviours which part of the group may have. There is no discussion here about "cyclists" going through red lights, riding on the pavement etc. Cycling is mainstream here. There is no "us vs. them" antagonism between drivers and cyclists because the same people ride bikes as drive cars.

 

[jon0844]

Maybe if the UK got round to building proper, Dutch-style, infrastructure, this ridiculous state of affairs would end, but I don't have much hope for this country. I've lived my whole life here and now I am in early middle age and things still have barely changed. If anything, the rhetoric against cycling and cyclists has intensified over time. I'm learning Dutch now and planning to move to the Netherlands at some point.

You keep saying this, and it's a nice thought and commendable to think this way, but it's not likely to happen.

Given I'm half Swedish and travel there a lot, ever since I was a child, cycling has also been very easy and popular there too (although I hated bikes where you pedal backwards to brake!), and taken seriously by the authorities, but London has no easy solutions due to the lack of space*. Proper cycle lanes, junctions designed for bikes, proper bike crossings (with low level lights, now being trialled here despite being in use for 30+ years in Sweden) and so on. Many towns, especially University towns are much like places in the Netherlands.

What happens in new areas of development is a different story (there's no excuse there), but for most of London - especially central London - I think you need to accept that we're not going to ever see such changes in our lifetimes.

That's me just being realistic.

* I don't believe that banning motorised vehicles as suggested by some is workable either.

 

[radamfi]

Most people think that the Dutch have always had their cycle paths but that is not strictly true.

The Netherlands has had cycle paths in the countryside since at least the 1930s, but generally not in towns so cycling fell into dramatic decline as cars dominated towns by the 70s. Because of the protests against children being killed by motor traffic, they decided to retrofit their towns to accommodate the bike, so by the 80s the decline in cycling was stopped. They didn't stop there and continue to continuously improve cycling.

 

[90019]

Safety measures are always a balance. My own perception is that in broad daylight, any safety benefit from having lights is likely to be so small that it's probably not worth the effort to have them. Obviously, at night or even at twilight, it's a very different story.

My perception, as someone who spends his working day driving buses in a city, is that the benefit of having a decent front light on a bike during the day are most definitely worth the effort, as they make you much more visible and noticable than those without them.

 

[DownSouth]

My perception, as someone who spends his working day driving buses in a city, is that the benefit of having a decent front light on a bike during the day are most definitely worth the effort, as they make you much more visible and noticable than those without them.

That's basically because the human eye works much like a video camera, updating the brain with a new image multiple times each second according to eye movements called saccades, rather than the brain getting overloaded with constant input.

Where this becomes relevant for a cyclist is that a driver fixating their vision in one direction will not see a small change (e.g. a cyclist growing in the field of view as they get closer) for up to a few seconds. It also applies in the opposite direction, a driver shifting their gaze rapidly (instead of deliberately scanning their surroundings) will see only large objects and only with coarse detail and a cyclist will go unseen.

A cyclist can counter this to some degree by using flashing lights on the front and rear - these will attract the driver's attention towards that direction, forcing them to shift their gaze and update their brain's image of that area. It was previously thought that hi-vis clothing was also helpful in this, but it has since been proven that hi-vis makes no difference during the day and may actually be detrimental for cyclists at night due to the reflection dazzling drivers and making them look away. A non-reflective shirt/jacket is a better choice.

 

[gordonthemoron]

I don't agree with flashing bike lights, I always have mine on as bright as possible

 

[Jonny]

Great idea, so after the motorist has caused a massive multiple vehicle pile-up he would have the satisfaction that he'd done the right thing.

I thought that when driving on the road, one of the golden rules is to be able to "stop in the space you can see to be clear". A mass pile-up can only happen when that isn't being followed. My view is that motor vehicles should be fitted with AEB (autonomous/automatic emergency braking) once the technology is there. The potential of AEB technology to reduce the death and injury toll from accidents - affecting pedestrians, cyclists and even motor vehicle occupants is quite high although it isn't completely foolproof (yet?).

 

[Johnuk123]

I thought that when driving on the road, one of the golden rules is to be able to "stop in the space you can see to be clear". A mass pile-up can only happen when that isn't being followed.

Yes I agree, unfortunately if you travel regularly on motorways you will notice this golden rule is almost universally ignored.

The point is even if you're the best driver in the world and leave a suitable gap in front of you the drivers behind you probably won't do the same.
A point was made that a multiple pile-up of vehicles is preferable to an accident with a solitary cyclist which is plainly stupid.

 

[gordonthemoron]

my gf persuaded me to wear a cycle helmet. This was because a colleagues husband had fallen off his bike and landed on his head. However the circumstances she described of the accident lead me to believe that the bloke is a moron, i.e. cycled over a large branch which had fallen onto cycle path and went over the handlebars, indicating to me that either the bloke was going to fast, wasn't looking where he was going or didn't have working brakes (none of which apply to me).

Personally I am not a fan of helmets. Lights, hi-viz, bike in working order and not doing anything stupid are a much better way of avoiding accidents which can be bloody painful.

 

[radamfi]

I don't agree with flashing bike lights, I always have mine on as bright as possible

They are illegal in the Netherlands. Explained here:

http://bicycledutch.wordpress.com/2012/11/15/i-want-to-see-you-use-your-lights/

Illegal under Dutch law are flashing lights. This may surprise you but there is a good reason. Flashing lights are only permitted to indicate a direction change but especially to mark a dangerous situation and if there’s one thing cyclists are not, it is dangerous.

 

[maniacmartin]

Flashing lights used to be illegal here too as they were deemed to cause a distraction.
The law was changed with The Road Vehicles Lighting (Amendment) Regulations 2005, presumably as being noticed was deemed more important than being distracting.

 

[chris89]

my gf persuaded me to wear a cycle helmet. This was because a colleagues husband had fallen off his bike and landed on his head. However the circumstances she described of the accident lead me to believe that the bloke is a moron, i.e. cycled over a large branch which had fallen onto cycle path and went over the handlebars, indicating to me that either the bloke was going to fast, wasn't looking where he was going or didn't have working brakes (none of which apply to me).

Personally I am not a fan of helmets. Lights, hi-viz, bike in working order and not doing anything stupid are a much better way of avoiding accidents which can be bloody painful.

Even if not a fan of helmets use one. It will do/ give some form of protection if you come off, If own fault or not.

My brother and i used to get picked on alot when younger for wearing one for some reason, as was considered 'Uncool'.

Sadly a lot of cyclists are being branded all the same, by those who run red lights, take stupid risks etc which is a major issue (Although not just cyclists who take risks, such as running red lights etc)

From OP's post, i would without question ban headphones when cycling, so many people use them and how can they possibly hear what is around them? Same goes for motorists as well who appear to use them for some reason.

Decent lights are always required and some light is better then none at all. Flashing lights can be annoying (Especially if the front one)

Overall for me, when cycling on the Road, HGVs, Tractors and most Bus drivers give you the most respect and will give plenty off room when they overtake you.

@Jonny: Some Mercs & Volvos have that already on them, not sure if it is standard or not though.

 

[gordonthemoron]

I agree about banning headphones as I mainly use my ears to detect things behind me or out of sight to the side

 

[meridian2]

They are illegal in the Netherlands. Explained here:

http://bicycledutch.wordpress.com/2012/11/15/i-want-to-see-you-use-your-lights/

I visited the Netherlands once.

Found it flat, boring and soulless.

Remind you of anyone?

 

[radamfi]

I visited the Netherlands once.

Found it flat, boring and soulless.

Remind you of anyone?

There are hills in the south east, over 300 metres above sea level. There are also small hills in the centre and east of the country. There are attractive water features throughout the country.

Compare these countries:

Country A:
Encourages cycling
No pressure to wear a helmet
Almost everyone goes to school by bike
Parents don't need to ferry around kids in the evening
Healthy, open attitude to sex
You can smoke soft drugs if you want

Country B:
Discourages cycling by having a hostile road environment
While helmets aren't compulsory, society puts on pressure to wear one
The school run by car is very common
'Dad's taxi' is the norm, because parents are scared for their kids' safety
Prudish attitude to sex
Cannabis banned

Which country is more 'boring'?

 

[gordonthemoron]

plus, the Dutch speak better english

 

[Emyr]

A cyclist using flashing lights may be more attention grabbing, but their direction and speed will be more difficult to predict as the viewer's visual system has to lock-on again after each gap.

 

[meridian2]

Healthy, open attitude to sex

Do me a favour; your country is the prostitution capital of Europe. Since when has that profession ever been 'healthy'?
If we needed more evidence of your obsession with Holland, we just got it.

 

[radamfi]

Do me a favour; your country is the prostitution capital of Europe. Since when has that profession ever been 'healthy'?
If we needed more evidence of your obsession with Holland, we just got it.

Actually prostitution is similarly (if not more) prevalent in the UK, it is simply not as visible or safe because of the legal situation. Although the internet has largely made the UK's prostitution laws moot. Sex tourists would have more choice visiting London rather than Amsterdam.

I am referring more to the fact that Dutch children are taught the facts about sex from an early age. Having sex and losing your virginity is not such a big deal there. As a result, Dutch children have sex later than British ones and teenage pregnancies in the Netherlands are far lower than the UK.

By the way, 'Holland' strictly speaking only refers to the provinces Noord-Holland and Zuid-Holland. There are 10 other provinces in the Netherlands.