Please look at the video of a Lorry knocking me off.

[meic]

The situation is certainly a mess. If you take the white line as a border then you can not even enter the cycle lane in the first place.
However there is no other reason for having that white line on the road if it isnt for the purpose of showing that cycles can use it to overtake cars who are the other side of it.

IF the collision took place due to the cyclist crossing the white line when it deviated onto the footway, I think his case would be much weaker. However that does appear to be discrete from the collision by a fair distance and time.
The defence offered by the truck's insurers is that he wobbled during a very close overtake, that isnt acceptable.

[kwackers]

The defence offered by the truck's insurers is that he wobbled during a very close overtake, that isnt acceptable.

+1

[thirdcrank]

I've only just looked at the video, which is irrelevant to the advice I've given so far.

Purely in connection with the causes of the collision, I'm at a loss to understand why people have commented so much about the admittedly long lead in, which really only shows the cyclist's line being within the lane where there is one.

As far as can bee seen from the video, the cyclist had been in front of the lorry for some distance just prior to the collision which occrred where there was no cycle lane. We don't know how far in front of the lorry the cyclist was at any stage, but the insurers don't seem to be saying that by passing on the nearside, the cyclist had put himself out of the view of the lorry driver, so I can only assume that the driver accepts he saw the cyclist. Indeed, having alleged that the cyclist swerved to avoid the grate, he can hardly then claim not to have seen him. There's a bus layby where the collision occurred and my assumption is that the driver, who had remained behind the cyclist until that point, decided that this "road widening" was adequate for overtaking because he assumed that the cyclist could and would take evasive action by using the layby until the lorry had completed the overtaking manoeuvre.

And this is still irrelevant. If the aim is to get compo rather than generate a lively but ultimately meaningless discussion, then proper advice is needed. IMO.

[horizon]

Purely in connection with the causes of the collision, I'm at a loss to understand why people have commented so much about the admittedly long lead in, which really only shows . If the aim is to get compo rather than generate a lively but ultimately meaningless discussion, then proper advice is needed. IMO.

With the greatest respect, thirdcrank, I haven't found it meaningless. In fact I've found the difference in perception over the role of the cycle lane very illuminating indeed. It may not help the OP but it may help others in the future. A new CTC campaign along the lines of "Don't trust the cycle lane " may be in order.

[Si]

Please can we -

1/ go easy on the rude words. Our swear filter is American and so won't pick them all up. And I have better things to do than go through editing all these posts - especially when the offending text has been quoted a number of times.

2/ stop taking umbridge at each other what seems to be very minor issues.....if you feel that someone has sinned against you then take a choice of
- just ignore it on the assumption that everyone else can see how silly it was as easily as you can,
- or point out in polite terms exactly what they have done wrong, thereby taking the moral high ground and not appearing like an angry ranter,
- or report it to the mods.
Likewise, please reread your posts before pressing submit, and do your best to check that you've worded things in a way that won't wind people up unnecessarily.

I thank you for your cooperation.

[horizon]

Likewise, please reread your posts before pressing submit, and do your best to check that you've worded things in a way that won't wind people up unnecessarily.

I'll have to take some flak for that. In my defence I was searching for some way of describing my incredulity. I'll be more circumspect in future.

[thirdcrank]

On a wider issue, from time to time we have threads about drivers who have been in fatal collisions with cyclists being acquitted by a jury - on a recent thread one was described as an idiot jury.

If this thread is representative of the opinions of cyclists when a lorry overtakes a cyclist with what appears to be insufficient room, what does anybody expect from a jury more representative of society as a whole?

[horizon]

thirdcrank: are you saying that you felt that the forum was relatively unsympathetic to the cyclist?

[thirdcrank]

I'm saying that in a criminal trial the jury has to be satisfied beyond reasonable doubt, of the guilt of the defendant. In certain circumstances, that can be by a majority of 10:2.

I'm saying that within the above posts there are enough doubters to explain why "idiotic" verdicts are sometimes reached.

As I tried to get across before, a lot of the early part of the vid is IMO irrelevant to the way the driver was driving. eg If you watch the sequence of the lights right at the start, the cyclist appears to set off at red/amber rather than waiting for the green. It's not clear if he actually crossed the STOP line then but so what? It doesn't affect the driving of the lorry one bit. Things would have been no different, IMO if the cyclist had overtaken the lorry on the offside or even if the lorry had simply caught up with the cyclist and then attempted to overtake him leaving insufficient clearance.

The reason I said my own analysis was irrelevant was that the ultimate decision will depend on civil procedures and standards, about which I know little.

[irc]

As I tried to get across before, a lot of the early part of the vid is IMO irrelevant to the way the driver was driving.

I'm not sure anyone has claimed the lorry driver was not at fault. Most of the discussion has been whether the cyclist could have avoided the crash by riding differently or taking avoiding action if he had been aware of the proximity of the lorry by use of a mirror. From that point of view the inclusion of some time before the crash is useful.


While there has been criticism of the OPs riding style I think it has been constructive. Ideally everyone should learn as much as possible from other peoples mistakes rather than learning the hard way by making the same mistakes themselves.

[thirdcrank]

I'm not suggesting that what has been said is wrong or not valid in the context in which it was said. eg that ultra-narrow cycle lane is pretty symptomatic of much of what is wrong with provision for cyclists in the UK. The technical term is "rubbish" and I'll not add to the controversy by saying anything about the people responsible for it being there, but there was no cycle lane at the place where the collision occurred nor was the cyclist "undertaking" the lorry when it occurred.

I can only come back to my point that the OP seems to be looking for a payout and IMO this isn't the way to go about it, for the reasons I've already posted.

[snibgo]

Lorry driver admits to seeing cyclist and attempting to overtake so closely that a small wobble (so small that I can't see it on the video) causes a collision.

Lorry driver should know that this isn't the correct way of overtaking a cyclist. Guilty of careless (or maybe dangerous) driving. Next case please...

Assuming the lorry driver did see the cyclist, the rest (narrow cycle lane, undertaking, etc) is irrelevant.

[Pete Owens]

If I came across a forum where I was accused of trying to kill people, I'd be extremely <inappropriate term removed> off, and would at the very least demand a retraction. You might not find false accusations like that a serious issue, but some people do. It was far from obvious to me that Horizon was joking.

Seriously. Lighten up dude, either that or admit you were trying to make a point.

I mean come on! How can anyone take the claim that the highway agency are deliberately setting out to kill anyone!
To believe this you've got to have serious issues.

I used to think that stupid farcility design was simply down to incompetence - and whenever I made this accusation in the presence of highway engineers and they took offence I would point out that this was the generous explanation. In consultations on highway design projects I have frequently pointed out to them the dangers of the designs they are proposing - yet they go ahead regardless. Indeed I do this so frequently that they know in advance the points I am going to make. They have given up even attempting to claim that what they are doing is in any way safe but that it acts as an encouragement to people who don't cycle and thus don't understand the issues.

These are intelligent, well qualified people.They are perfectly competent when it comes to designing road layouts to suit the needs of motor traffic. They have had the issues explained to them and clearly understand them, yet continue to implement clearly dangerous facilities - specifically targeted at novice cyclists who are least likely to realise the dangerous situations they are being led into.

So "deliberately aiming to kill people" might be a bit of an overstatement - but not by much. More accurate would be "having a reckless disregard for the consequences of their actions".

[Pete Owens]

Getting back to the original question. I think the Lorry driver does have a legitimate case - just not the one proposed by the insurers.

Drivers should allow sufficient space when overtaking cyclists - and this means very very much more than swerving to avoid a drain (which in this case didn't happen anyway). Their defence is ludicrous. In mitigation the cycle lane leading up to the incident does lead them to conclude that cyclists only need an absurdly low amount of road space (I notice Richard Mann is keeping a low profile on this one). The fact that the cyclist himself has just used that same space to overtake reinforces that conclusion. But, all this assumes that the cyclist has at any point been in a position where it would have been possible for the driver to see them.

It is not at all clear from the video that the cyclist had completed the overtake. The traffic appears to speed up at about the time the cyclist is reaching the front of the cab (about 1:27) look at the taxi in front. I don't know how wide the angle of the lens is, but it will be at least another second or two before the rider gets in front of the lorry (if at all) - and the drivers blind spot extends about 5m in front of the cab. My guess is that the lorry will be keeping pace with the taxi - just outside the webcam field of vision - and moving left because that is what their lane markings tell them to.

[RichardPH]

I don't consider myself a timid rider, but the speed of the OP's undertaking of the vehicles had me cringing, I'm quite sure Highway Code advice that you may pass queues on the inside did not mean at this differential speed. At most times he was riding above the speed of the traffic and should have looked for opportunities to pass other vehicles on the right, in the manner that other road users do, it's lazy thinking and dangerous to lurk near the kerb hoping others have seen you. This is an occasion where taking the dominant position on the road feels safer because it leaves the rider with choices instead of being squeezed by traffic, but of course you have to work harder to avoid holding the flow up and incurring angry reaction as a result. As you ride faster and faster the normal rules change and to use the cycle lane to dodge the slower moving vehicles is asking for trouble.

My feeling is that the truck driver never even saw him, there was no reaction I could detect to either move in or move out, speed up or slow down, the OP was in the blind spot the whole time.

Life is all about experience and the OP has just had one of the harsher ones, luckily with no serious injuries, where he stands legally I've no idea, but from a common sense viewpoint in future I'd think twice before riding in that manner again.