Mathew Briggs article in the guardian

[SilverBadge]

It seems to me that we need to decide which campaign we are fighting and this has been brought to an unexpected and unwelcome head by this case.

I'd say our long-term goals have been and should remain better "traffic" laws (especially the definition of "dangerous driving") and effective enforcement.

On Monday 18 September, Mr Alliston will be sentenced and then the controversy will be highlighted again. Even if he gets the max two years, there will be many expressing outrage at "only" two years for taking away a life; more interviews with the bereaved etc. Even if he gets substantially less, there will be others who consider his treatment by the legal system oppressive.

OK. Equal laws for all, including pedestrians. And equal treatment for all victims. This can only start when Jesse Norman and others at DTp start being honest about current accident, prosecution and sentencing stats for various categories of road users.
My bet is that when Alliston is sentenced, general media reaction will be "not enough", blissfully (or wilfully) oblivious to how high a percentage of convicted cyclist killers have been sentenced more leniently.

[Wanlock Dod]

We'll have to take his word for it that it's not about anti-cycling, but one thing that we can all be certain it isn't about is pedestrian safety.

Overall it has been a very effective diversion of popular attention away from the increasing toll of road kill by motor vehicles.

[Steady rider]

Bicycle Science has some info, max g that can be achieved by braking a bicycle is about 0.5g, otherwise you probably go over the bars. Rear wheel braking alone is wholly insufficient to take care of emergencies. It also depends on the time to deal with the situation, if too short it would not matter what brakes you had on.

In some ways the focus should be more to trying to ensure pedestrians look both ways.

[Tangled Metal]

Is it fair to ignore the inconsistent prosecution options for cyclists compared to motorists on the grounds of it being less common, less likely or result in injury to the offender? Put simply a death on the roads due to the actions of one user resulting in death of another should receive equal treatment no matter how the offender and victim traveled to that collision.

I find it illogical to argue that the offence is less because the offender is 80kg with a 10kg carriage over a 1000+kg carriage. No matter how heavy the carriage / driver or rider total weight is the death is the same end result. Duty of care does not stop below a certain weight or if the risk is lower. It's there for all the times your taking that mode of transportation. If you don't exercise it then you should be equally liable for prosecution for the resulting offence.

[bovlomov]

We'll have to take his word for it that it's not about anti-cycling...

It may not be, but his campaign is becoming a focus for anti-cycling sentiment. He has spent some time on his Twitter account, telling people what his campaign isn't about, e.g. registration. But, of course, most of those opinions aren't posted on his Twitter page, and will spread with or without his approval.

I think he is rather naive if he thinks he can control the message and keep it to the narrow change in the law he is suggesting.

[Bez]

Is it fair to ignore the inconsistent prosecution options for cyclists compared to motorists on the grounds of it being less common, less likely or result in injury to the offender? Put simply a death on the roads due to the actions of one user resulting in death of another should receive equal treatment no matter how the offender and victim traveled to that collision.

I find it illogical to argue that the offence is less because the offender is 80kg with a 10kg carriage over a 1000+kg carriage. No matter how heavy the carriage / driver or rider total weight is the death is the same end result. Duty of care does not stop below a certain weight or if the risk is lower. It's there for all the times your taking that mode of transportation. If you don't exercise it then you should be equally liable for prosecution for the resulting offence.

Speaking in general rather than strictly legal terms, the difference is one of reasonably foreseeable risk to others.

Example 1: I'm walking along the pavement and for a couple of seconds I look overhead at a passing aircraft. I continue to walk and fail to notice an elderly lady whose path crosses mine. I bump into her and she stumbles and falls to the ground, sustaining a head injury which proves to be fatal.

Example 2: I'm driving along the road and for a couple of seconds I look overhead at a passing aircraft. I continue to drive and fail to notice an elderly lady whose path crosses mine. I hit her and inflict fatal injuries.

The latter carries greater responsibility because of the reasonably foreseeable risk to others: hitting someone with a car is quite obviously far more likely to cause serious or fatal injuries than is walking into someone, even though the distraction and the result were identical in each case.

A pedal cycle falls somewhere between these two cases. Where in that range it falls is a matter of debate.

I don't think anyone's arguing that we should "ignore the inconsistent prosecution options". But in the perfectly valid debate about them, there is a reasoned argument that inconsistent prosecution options are actually the right approach; there is another argument that if consistency is the goal then it is better achieved by statute other than the current Road Traffic Act; and from those evolves the point that if consistency is the goal then consistency of legislation does not equate to consistency of justice.

[MikeF]

Put simply a death on the roads due to the actions of one user resulting in death of another should receive equal treatment no matter how the offender and victim traveled to that collision.

But that's not what's happening. A cyclist kills someone and it's headline news with calls for changes in the law and so on. The fact that someone is killed by a motor car and an everyday occurrence, it goes almost unnoticed. The culprit may not even be charged eg Michael Mason, and there are cases where banning someone from driving would cause unnecessary hardship, so punishment is minimal, and he/she is given just a fine. If, as appeared happened, the woman had stepped out in front of a car and been killed, would the response have been the same??? No!

There isn't equal treatment and I'm not sure there should be, but there needs to be equal treatment for similar situations.

[[XAP]Bob]

Having a fixed wheel bike, with one front brake, tested for how well it brakes compared to a standard two brakes bike, may tell us if requiring all bikes to have two brakes is worthwhile. I don't think the science will show much benefit to adding a rear brake to a fixed wheel bike in stopping distances. Perhaps some university could do the tests?

In the dry and in a straight line it's trivial: maximum braking is achieved when the rear wheel is completely unweighted, so the rear brake is redundant.

It's only when front wheel grip is the limiting factor, ie when it's possible to lock the front wheel, that the rear brake has any outright benefit.

Assuming that you are braking progressively then there is also a benefit as you apply the front brake...
So both brakes are applied, but as the deceleration unweights the rear then the braking force to the rear is reduced whilst the front continues to increase.
Of course most people can't control brakes to that extent, but there is a theoretical benefit in there.

[thirdcrank]

Some of the issues here go much deeper than safety on the roads.

Our policing tradition is of deterrence by visible patrolling, with offenders caught in the act risking prosecution. Detection was second best, although detective work - CID - was generally seen as somehow superior.

There's been a fundamental change in that policing priorities have been switched to dealing with things which tend to occur in private and ipso facto are not deterred by patrolling in public. There's also an emerging backlog of allegations to be investigated. These changes involve a massive switch of effort from patrol to detective work. Other changes intended to prevent miscarriages of justice have meant that any police investigation must be more thorough than was once the case. This is why much visible patrolling is now entrusted to PCSO's and Highway Officers.

The discussions about this fatal crash and the aftermath have understandably concentrated on detection - ie the gathering of prosecution evidence - and on prosecution policy. How much better would it be if visible offending in public were either deterred or routinely prosecuted, rather than only taking action following fatal crashes or when a casualty looks to be close to death. At one level, this is just saying that prevention is better than detection, but it's further complicated by the fact that if openly offending becomes the norm, then when that "normal" conduct kills somebody, punishing them can seem oppressive, especially to a jury and even more so if the jury is asked to decide on an offence whose definition is based on that norm.

[Bez]

Assuming that you are braking progressively then there is also a benefit as you apply the front brake...
So both brakes are applied, but as the deceleration unweights the rear then the braking force to the rear is reduced whilst the front continues to increase.
Of course most people can't control brakes to that extent, but there is a theoretical benefit in there.

True, although you can take a decent front brake from zero to ejector seat so quickly that there's nothing in it really. But that's where we get to the reasoning behind not only the value of a rear brake even in a straight line, but the problem with bicycle collision forensics focusing too heavily on just retardation rates. Emergency braking on a two wheeler of any kind is not the trivial matter that it is in a four-wheeler with anti-lock brakes. People quite rightly won't immediately respond to a hazard by applying maximum braking because small errors or changes in road surface lead to things like going over the bars, jacknifing, and so on, all of which may increase risk not only for the first party but also for the third. To slam on the anchors is generally the safest approach in a car, where the width of the vehicle not only prevents loss of control but also makes swerving a far less viable option, but it's rarely the safest on a bicycle, especially when faced with a pedestrian. Obviously it's hard to know exactly what was said in court but I've seen enough evidence of poor understanding of cycling behaviours and physics from collision investigators (private and public) to know that people often come to these things with the mindset of operating four-wheel vehicles, and that just doesn't work.

[thirdcrank]

... Obviously it's hard to know exactly what was said in court but I've seen enough evidence of poor understanding of cycling behaviours and physics from collision investigators (private and public) to know that people often come to these things with the mindset of operating four-wheel vehicles, and that just doesn't work.

All very true, and I wish I knew more detail of the evidence. It must be quite clear from my earlier posts on the subject that had I had the misfortune to have been involved in the investigation of a crash like this, one line of questioning would have been whether riding a fixed-wheel bike made the suspect more reluctant to brake and more likely to resort to repeated shouts to get out of the way. There's been discussion of the expert evidence in this case but AFAIK, it's concentrated on purely technical aspects rather than the effect on a rider's decision-making. Also, you don't need to be an accredited expert to suggest that the answer to "it's harder to stop on a bike" is "all the more reason to be careful."

I do know that there comes a point when a vehicle is so close to a pedestrian stepping off the pavement that only a solid wall would stop them. Although that point - without reference to a wall - was made by the defence, it doesn't seem consistent with what we know. It appears to me that a rider with inadequate available braking power - possibly motivated by that lack - chose to rely too much on shouting warnings until it had become impossible to stop. I suggest there's evidence for this view in one of his social media posts.

[Steady rider]

When I was doing about 24 mph down a 1 in 12 hill on fixed wheel, a child ran into the road near to parked cars- following his ball, this was a long time ago. I think my reaction was to try and back pedal - brake and swerve, little time if any time to use the front brake, I came off and almost hit the kerb. The child was basically OK, very light glancing, 4 -5 weeks for my recovery. It is these types of situation where it is very difficult to avoid an impact.
I think Thirdcrank is right about having to have all the details. Cyclists may assume pedestrians will hear a warning but they may well not hear such a warning or be detracted and with hindsight the cyclist modify there reaction by assuming a pedestrian may not know they are coming. This would come in time with experience. It is partially about educating cyclists to know what to expect from pedestrians, some are alert, some are not and reactions can vary.