Understanding Cycle Lanes

[Pete Owens]

Thanks. Is there a reference to this in the Highway Code? Or some legislation or suchlike.

Rule 167
DO NOT overtake where you might come into conflict with other road users. For example

approaching or at a road junction on either side of the road

[thirdcrank]

I often find it useful to see what it says in Cyclecraft. (I'm referring to the Fifth edition here.)

Apart from anything else, he's recognised as an expert witness. I think it would be a fair summary of just about everything John Franklin writes is "don't ride how the rider did in the vid." That's by no means any sort of exoneration of the van driver, just his advice on how to avoid being endangered.

I've not dug out anything in there which exactly covers the layout at this junction - cycle lane interrupted by the bus stop, not marked out across the junction but continuing beyond it - but a couple of chunks seem appropriate:

If there is a cycle lane marked across the mouth of a side road, always ignore it. (p 119)

At side roads, always leave a cycle lane if there is any possibility that a vehicle might emerge .... (p225)

There are several pages about filtering including this:

You are also vulnerable to vehicles turning at junctions, including those that a driver in the queue ahead allows to turn right across your path (p 187)

[mjr]

I often find it useful to see what it says in Cyclecraft. (I'm referring to the Fifth edition here.)

It is however, mostly bunkum on anything to do with cycleways because of the author's political views. I don't have my copy with me right now, but I believe his bad advice even includes an instruction to ride in the centre of a cycleway, instead of on the left! If the author is regarded as expert on cycle lanes despite his avoidance of them, then something is seriously wrong with the evaluation of expertise.

There's enough counsel against the actions of both road users there in the Highway Code alone IMO.

[thirdcrank]

From the linked report, it seems that the rider was misled by the police explanation that there would be no prosecution of the driver without independent witnesses into assuming that tracing witnesses or similar evidence would ensure a prosecution.

Setting aside a lot of my hobby horses, I'm amazed that watching the CCTV footage he had traced himself that he doesn't seem to have reflected on his own contribution to this crash, as demonstrated by his dashing off to the cyclists' friend, the Daily Wail.

[Jdsk]

The cycle lane continues through the zebra, that's why the zigzags are offset from the pavement.

Playing about a bit with streetview, here's what another rider thought about approaching this junction in the gutter
https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@51.47287 ... 384!8i8192

Is there a cycle lane up to the junction, through the yellow boxed "Bus Stop"?

Is there a cycle lane across the junction?

Thanks

Jonathan

[thirdcrank]

By playing about with the streetview I linked above, it appears that on this rider's approach there's an advisory cycle lane - broken marking line - which starts at the previous junction (Coniger Road.) That's not marked through the bus stop marked out just before the site of the collision, which is hardly surprising, as buses normally stop at the kerb. IME, around here, they put up an "end of cycle route" sign at locations like that but it's just more signs. Immediately after the "bus box" and right on the junction is the start of the zig-zag lines for the zebra crossing ahead and as has already been pointed out, they are set out into the road, ie at some distance from the kerb. They run across the junction and the implication is that they form a cycle lane, which is marked as such after the zig-zags on the other side of the zebra. I don't know if that is an official way of marking a cycle lane ie in the TSRGD because I've not looked, or just a way of ensuring that the route intended to be taken by cyclists is not part of the crossing "approach" delineated by the zig-zags.

Sorry for waffling but the answers to your questions are

(a) No
(b) Sort of.

[Pebble]

If either one of them had been riding/driving carefully then that collision would not have happened. Both are examples of poor road craft.

[Postboxer]

He's in cloud cuckoo land if he thinks he's getting £40k out of the van's insurers, I reckon it will be 50/50 at best insurance wise, given many of the arguments already stated above.

The van is allowed to start to turn right, but given the restricted view, should have done so slower because of the risk of cycles, that said, there doesn't appear to be anything to show the van driver there is a cycle lane there but even without a lane there is a risk, the van driver should manoeuvre at such a speed that he can stop should a cycle emerge, the cyclist should cycle at such a speed that they can stop, should a van emerge turning across his path, neither does so. Cycling at 20mph up the inside of a big van, that has stopped before a keep clear box, is reckless. Would any of us on the forum do that?

A more clearly marked cycle lane going across the junction, instead of the zig zag line, would make much more sense.


Edit to add - I remembered my dad once either lost, or had to settle 50/50 an insurance claim, possibly similar to this one, I think he was in a car, in the position of the cycle but the road was wide enough for two lanes of traffic in his direction. He fell foul of -

191
You MUST NOT park on a crossing or in the area covered by the zig-zag lines. You MUST NOT overtake the moving vehicle nearest the crossing or the vehicle nearest the crossing which has stopped to give way to pedestrians.

In the video it appears though the stationary van would have been partly or wholly within the zigzagged area and as the crossing is immediately after the junction, it could be argued that the stationary van has stopped to give way to pedestrians.

[wjhall]

A more clearly marked cycle lane going across the junction, instead of the zig zag line, would make much more sense.

Good point, although the cycle lane design is fairly poor, on the other side certainly too narrow, and probably only marginally acceptable on the side in question.

Like most incidents this one arises from a number of factors all lining up, usually including everyone involved not doing things properly. We have noted the careless van driver and the careless cyclist. As a cycling forum it is probably the cyclist's failings that we should learn from. However, it is probably most useful to look at the infrastructure contribution.

Underlying this, as pointed out, is the invisible cycle lane. It seems to be standard practice for other road markings to take priority over cycle lanes, without obvious practical reason. A cycle lane could be continued through a bus stop marking as an advisory lane, or, better, as a mandatory lane with a legal change to make the restriction on motor vehicles entering it 'except buses', when a bus stop is marked.

Other lane markings on the main road normally continue across a cross roads if there are no traffic lights, so it is not clear why the cycle lane does not. There is a short gap before the zigzags start. The zigzags supposedly mark the lane, but are a rather obscure way of doing so. It would help if it had been the type with coloured surface. Cycle symbols would also help. Again these are frequent before the zigzags on the other side, but have been omitted within the zigzags. Without cycle markings the zigzags could easily be interpreted as similar to the type of white lining that is intended to narrow a carriageway without creating an additional lane on the left.

The whole thing reeks of both poor national design standards and randomly incompetent implementation. (See remarks in another post about timing camera markings replacing all junction markings at the Savile Road-Stoke Road junction in Bristol.)

I see that there is one of those new dual zebra crossings across the main road beyond the junction. I can only see those as another class of ambiguous road markings that will cause problems. Not using some kind of zebra stripes in the cycle part makes it difficult to grasp that it is part of the crossing.

[thirdcrank]

I think it's certainly the case that problems can arise if attempts are made to cram too much into one bit of road: sharing out carriageway so each class of user has its own space cannot work if it's limited space causing the underlying problems. eg Marking the cycle lane through the protected area of the bus stop seems to be an example of that.

Some, including me, feel that restricting cyclists to the gutter is not ideal. In legal terms, the HC encourages cyclists to use farcilities, in that ignoring HC advice can be used in proceedings.

The relevant advice on cycle lanes is in Rule 63 which concludes [quote]... Use of cycle lanes is not compulsory and will depend on your experience and skills, but they can make your journey safer.[/quote

I don't know what evidence there is to support that assertion but it didn't make the journey safer for this rider.

[Pete Owens]

[quote="Postboxer"]A more clearly marked cycle lane going across the junction, instead of the zig zag line, would make much more sense.
{/quote]
Do you imagine that a more clearly marked cycle lane would make the cyclist somehow less likely to blast through the junction, hidden from crossing traffic, at high speed?

At least the zig-zag markings are a warning of an approaching hazard (even if that hazard is the crossing rather than the junction) - an an inherent part of crossings and a direction not to overtake.

And of course not only could the cyclist not see the turning vehicle as they approached the junction (ie a place where crossing vehicles are to be anticipated), they would also would have been out of sight if a cyclist had started to cross the parallel crossing from the other side of the road.

[thirdcrank]

Although the quality of the CCTV footage is not perfect, it's good enough to show what happened, and arguably better than what ivor ting-ting (?) used to refer to as witlesses. There seems to have been a suggestion that a bolder cycle lane across the junction might have helped in making the turning driver more aware of the possibility of a cyclist emerging. On the contrary, I think it might only serve to give riders a false sense of confidence to ride as he did.

Beyond the general duty to dive carefully, drivers at this location seem to have plenty of clues to alert them to the likely presence of cyclists eg there's a prominent rack of boris bikes (?) and it looks as though the main drag here is a numbered cycle route.

From the vid, it looks as though the turning driver took the opportunity to turn - given by the considerate driver of the big van - with the usual alacrity, without checking for an emerging cyclist. Given the apparent speed of the rider, It's impossible to be sure that crawling forward would have meant the driver would have seen him. It does appear that the rider hit the nearside of the van. That's not to excuse the driver, it just seems to illustrate that the rider was going too fast in relation to his view ahead.

Whatever, the fact that the rider did his own accident investigation to trace the CCTV is a bit of a guide to the standard of investigation into what was a serious injury crash.

Contributory negligence has been mentioned and this case seems relevant.

viewtopic.php?p=1100473#p1100473

[Postboxer]

A more clearly marked cycle lane going across the junction, instead of the zig zag line, would make much more sense.
{/quote]
Do you imagine that a more clearly marked cycle lane would make the cyclist somehow less likely to blast through the junction, hidden from crossing traffic, at high speed?

At least the zig-zag markings are a warning of an approaching hazard (even if that hazard is the crossing rather than the junction) - an an inherent part of crossings and a direction not to overtake.

And of course not only could the cyclist not see the turning vehicle as they approached the junction (ie a place where crossing vehicles are to be anticipated), they would also would have been out of sight if a cyclist had started to cross the parallel crossing from the other side of the road.

That depends on the markings, which could include warnings to cyclists about the hazards associated with junctions, maybe SLOW on the road or a warning to watch out for turning vehicles. It might not make the cyclist less likely to blast through the junction, something I already wouldn't do, but it may highlight to the van driver that there is another lane of traffic that they are crossing.

[Jdsk]

The cycle lane continues through the zebra, that's why the zigzags are offset from the pavement.

Playing about a bit with streetview, here's what another rider thought about approaching this junction in the gutter
https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@51.47287 ... 384!8i8192

Is there a cycle lane up to the junction, through the yellow boxed "Bus Stop"?

Is there a cycle lane across the junction?

I think that the answer is "No" to both...

Jonathan

[thirdcrank]

I answered the second question as "sort of" since the there seems to be an intention to provide a "route" for cyclists which is outside the "approach" area to the zebra crossing, which AFAIK is defined as the area of the carriageway bounded by the zig-zags. I say "AFAIK" because I've not dug out the relevant bit of the TSRGD. The previous regs included a diagram showing this and in the probably distant past I've posted it in a discussion with cunobelin about a private hire firm whose vehicles often parked two wheels on the footway, two wheels in an area apparently intended for cyclists like this.

Somebody else may find my earlier link to the old diagram or better still what the regs say now.