Cycling UK Forum

That said, thank you Chris for an interesting insight into the procedure and reasons behind the decisions made.

BSRU wrote:Drivers often just plough through zebra crossings without a hint of stopping for pedestrians, that is why traffic light controlled crossings are so much more common and popular with pedestrians.

You get the odd idiot but they're mostly okay, always faster than waiting forever for signalled crossings to change. There does seem a big difference between different signals so I'm sure there is much room for improvement if priorities were changed. But no, I'm a big fan of zebras but they aren't much good for cyclists.

I do actually think this is better than what was there before but I'm not sure it's sufficiently of benefit to cyclists to warrant cycle safety funding. Surely if the pot is indeed small, it could be spent on a few important locations with high quality infrastructure which could act as a showcase for what could be done with future funding.

Nice to see the police offering cyclists a 1 week 'amnesty' allowing them the same terms as the much less dangerous motorists found with lights out.

Suffolk Constabulary wrote:Sergeant Mark Shipton, of Newmarket Safer Neighbourhood Team, said: "Cyclists riding without lights are not only putting their own lives at risk, but are a danger to other road users and pedestrians who are not able to see them.

Really? I seriously doubt they are a significant risk to pedestrians, who will normally have the time and their sight adjusted to low light in order to spot them coming, and as for other road users, how? (OK to motorcyclists possibly, but IME they pay very close attention to what is in front of them when riding down the road).

I've been hit from behind by an unlit cyclist whilst walking along an unlit shared use path at night. Think he just saw me at the last minute (must've been doing some silly speed into the darkness in front of him) so managed to just clip my elbow instead of ploughing straight into me.

Does anyone else use the Cyclecraft 'primary, signal, move to one side of the lane, cross the line as near to 90 degrees as possible' technique? Works for me. I think the drivers behind tend to be confused by the signal so tend to hang back and allow space. It probably helps that my local crossing requires a move right, I think a left signal could be interpreted as 'I'm pulling in' and result in unwanted overtakes.

Cyclists Dismount is advisory only regardless of the category of highway. Iviehoff makes a good point that extreme care is needed where railway lines cross the road at an angle or even travel along it http://goo.gl/maps/aRQ2l so it is not always unwise to dismount.

crossroads wrote:Is it not the case that the reason for having Reflectors as a legal requirement (especially when purchasing a bike) is that if the rider is on the road at night having chosen to use lights (like children/youths or foolish adults) they at least stand a chance of being spotted - assuming they haven't removed them of course.

(this may have been mentioned but I haven't viewed all 15 pages of the post.....)

Definitely, IMO this is the main reason we should keep insisting upon reflectors fitted to new cycles. Reflectors are required by law to be fitted to cycles when sold. This is completely separate to the law requiring reflectors to be fitted to cycles ridden at night. I don't think anyone is suggesting that we change the first law so that cycles are sold without reflectors, merely alter the latter law to allow cyclists to make themselves visible in other ways when riding at night. What many keen cyclists do want is to be able to use clipless pedals, panniers or recumbents at night without falling foul of the law. For the vast majority of people this would make no difference as they use the cycle as it came from the shop. Alright, a law change would prevent " children/youths or foolish adults" being prosecuted for not having reflectors but this probably happens very rarely anyway as most would be prosecuted for not having lights.

I'm sure someone on here cited research showing cyclists were no more endangered than drivers. Logically it makes sense as the air is the same. Anyone got a link?

Is a rear shunt really a common problem for cyclists at lights? Any figures on that one?

SA_SA_SA wrote:Can a driver really see a cyclist on zebra / tiger, and although able to stop just as for a pedestrian, argue they thought the cyclist shouldn't be there and therefore deliberately ran them down?
Surely a stop sign (red octagon) for cyclists approaching the crossing as crossing users and priority to cyclist once on the crossing would have solved that?

Once you're on to people deliberately running down or threatening people there's no defence. No priority on the road is absolute and priority should be ceded rather than cause a collision. The HC includes words to that effect. A cyclist crossing a zebra is in the same situation as a cyclist crossing a street anywhere else; should give way to the road traffic but should not be mown down if they don't. Far more likely than a provable act of driving at a cyclist is an inattentive motorist who hits a cyclist on a crossing like in Alan's case. Depending on the claims made by the motorist it may or may not make a difference to a 'careless driving' prosecution but it would almost certainly class as 'contributory negligence' if the cyclist sought compensation.

A STOP sign means stop and give way so it wouldn't denote any additional priority once in the carriageway. Though I think that a 'give way' sign (a STOP would be unnecessary at quiet times) on the cycle path would be a good idea if the roundabout is installed. There is a danger when connecting two cycle paths that some cyclists may think that this gives them priority and this could cause a collision.

One problem with cyclists having priority on zebra crossings (I take it that is a 'tiger crossing'?) would be the speed and visibility of approaching cyclists. Pedestrians travel at walking pace, are easy to spot next to the crossing and even then only have priority once actually on the crossing, so are expected to wait for the traffic to stop. Problems aplenty could be caused by cyclists proceeding at speed over crossings at junctions where they have priority so maybe some kind of "cyclists wait for traffic to stop before crossing" sign could be useful.

Nareloc wrote:

KazzyTI wrote:

Nareloc wrote: So you'd suggest continuing on the A65 past Kirby Lonsdale and catching the A6 before Kendal? )

I would suggest avoiding the A65 altogether, it's not a good road for cycling on! If you have to go so far east to Slaidburn, I would suggest going over Lythe Fell to Bentham and then on to Kirkby Lonsdale from there, avoiding the A65. You are going into some very hilly country though around there. If you want a good alternative, look below at 'notlobgp14' route to Carlisle. Like I said earlier, the A6 north of Preston isn't bad with traffic. the only variation I would make to that route is to turn off the A6 at Garstang and take the Cockerham road and the A588 road towards Lancaster, then taking the NCN route 6 from Glasson Dock right through to the north side of Lancaster - almost all traffic free on good riding surface.

I agree with Nareloc that a route roughly following the A6 would be an easier and quicker route from Preston to Kendal (Sedbergh). That said, I wouldn't want to discourage you from the more easterly route if you are after a quiet/scenic route and don't mind some hills. Bowland, The Lune valley and The Howgills are lovely parts of the world. If going this way, again I'd second Nareloc's suggestion to avoid the A65 as much as possible by using the Lythe Fell Road from Slaidburn and travelling on to Ingleton (if you're stopping at the YHA) or Kirkby Lonsdale via Bentham. Both this and your original route ( http://goo.gl/maps/nryQL ) involve one fairly long exposed climb/descent up and over the Bowland fells.

Agree entirely. We can't have a junction which by design necessitates disobeying the Highway Code.

mjr wrote:Even if that's right - and I haven't seen that about most of them and I was looking - there's still the distinct possibilities that the lorry turned next to the bike and the witnesses misinterpreted, or that the bike was following the evil bike lanes that encourage riders to die.

Yep, Imagine if we applied the same rule to any other form of traffic. Eg. a forward travelling bus lane to the left of a left turning general traffic lane. It wouldn't take us very long before we were blaming the road layout rather than the mangled buses. If a lane is provided the implication is that you should be able to use it. Nowhere else would we route forward travelling traffic on the inside of left turning traffic. It's stupid.

Si wrote:Thankfully it doesn't necessarily have to be one or the other - we could build high quality, Dutch standard facilities without forcing people to use them. However, we'd probably end up with most people choosing to use them and leaving James free to mix it with the cars....so everyone would be happy, eh?

+1 I don't see the need for compulsion, in fact if we did need to force people to use them I'd question the quality of the facilities. Also, the last thing we would want is to discourage certain groups of cyclists. I don't know what the design speed or effective maximum speed of such paths is when used by many users but I suspect high speed cyclists, time trialists etc. will always be better served by the carriageway

Mark1978 wrote:Yes, some of the segregated facilities in London - they aren't perfect, but NL wasn't perfect overnight.

Great. Does this mean there are now UK design standards others can point to when faced with proposals for the usual 'blue sign on footpath' layout?

Agree wholeheartedly. Though I wasn't trying to defend unhelpful traffic calming measures; speed humps, pinch points and so on, I'd happily see a suitable speed limit imposed, observed and enforced. We really do need to get away from the idea that lower speed limits are designed to impede, frustrate and extort money from drivers. I don't think many realise how little difference the 30/20 limit change makes to urban journey times and how much they have to gain if more people choose alternate transport methods