Daytime running lights

[Shoogle]

If, like me, you're against the use of motorists using daytime running lights, I urge you to sign the petition at http://www.lightmare.org. There's plenty of info on there about the dangers to cyclists.

[mjr]

I cannot sign this because of the eyetest masquerading as a CAPTCHA. Eyetests are not CAPTCHAs - see this from the World Wide Web Consortium, http://www.w3.org/TR/turingtest/#problem

[RickH]

Love 'em or hate 'em, it seems a bit like the proverbial trying to shut the stable door after the horse has bolted! The EU regulations for them was adopted in 2008 and all new cars since February 2011 have had to have them (buses & trucks since August 2012). Anyone driving a car less than 3 years old doesn't have a choice. (AA link)

Rick.

[mjr]

The regulation appears to allow manual deactivation before the vehicle moves as one of the permitted times for the lights to be off and I've driven cars less than three years old where the lights could be switched off, so I have because I feel they're an energy-consuming menace to walkers and riders.

[Mark1978]

Love 'em or hate 'em, it seems a bit like the proverbial trying to shut the stable door after the horse has bolted! The EU regulations for them was adopted in 2008 and all new cars since February 2011 have had to have them (buses & trucks since August 2012). Anyone driving a car less than 3 years old doesn't have a choice. (AA link)

Unfortunately correct, it's already law and cannot be changed now.

[squeaker]

Unfortunately correct, it's already law and cannot be changed now.

Except by repealing the law?

[Mark1978]

Unfortunately correct, it's already law and cannot be changed now.

Except by repealing the law?

Which is virtually impossible once it's in place.

[kwackers]

Which is virtually impossible once it's in place.

Virtually? Has it ever happened?

Seems to me that no matter how misguided a law is once it's been enacted then it's here to stay. Nobody is ever willing to admit they wrong.
For daylight running lights to be removed from law there'd need to be a massive increase in causalities. Even a 50% increase would be written off as due to some other as yet to be determined effect and even then the likely outcome wouldn't be to remove them but to try to force cyclists to also run them.

[reohn2]

I now always run daylights when cycling in traffic and all the time when it's dull/overcast or raining.
I take the view that the law won't be changed and so make myself as prominent as possible.

[661-Pete]

I certainly see no sense in them in daylight, in good weather. It seems absurd that Sweden was the first country to introduce DRLs - 'cyclist-friendly' Sweden, much of which enjoys some 20 hours of daylight every day in summer, and parts of the country 24 hours! All right, I can understand in winter when the situation is reversed...

Motorists must be conditioned to see - and that means see everything and everyone on the road, not just brightly lit other vehicles. Perhaps the only saving grace is that there are now a wealth of relatively cheap, high intensity LED lights for cyclists, which was not the case a few years ago. But of course they limit your range. Will we arrive at the day when cyclists have to have DRLs on?

[BeeKeeper]

I despair sometimes of the thinking processes of other people. The title of this thread refers to daytime running lights (DLRs) which seems to infer we should be banning them. However, the petition, whilst a mixed bag has a theme about over-bright lights. I don't have a problem with controlling dazzling headlights but I have yet to see any DLRs which dazzled me. Eye-catching yes, but that is what they are supposed to do. That is how they work. This "I am being dazzled" argument which I first heard from people complaining about drivers who used dipped headlights in daylight (which I do frequently) is reactionary rubbish. Dipped headlights cannot dazzle more in daylight than they can at night. If you are dazzled by them in daytime how on earth do you cope at night? Wrongly adjusted lights are of course a different matter but the correct use of lights in daylight is a great safety benefit.

What on earth is wrong with DRLs? Anything which helps motorists not to run into each other can only be a benefit. They work in good visibility but come into their own when the light is poor and experience tells me you simply can't assume motorists will turn on their headlights in such circumstances. How often do you see cars driving on sidelights in rain and fog? Exactly, too many motorists simply don't think or adopt the view "I can see where I am going so I don't need better lights". An outlook which rather ignores the example of lighthouses, which have a great big light on them but don't have to see where they are going at all.

The sooner they are fitted to all vehicles the better and if that includes bikes good. There was a link someone posted last year about what cyclists could do to make themselves more visible, flashing lights and DLRs were suggested. They are not a panacea but they help.

Of course the above does not apply to the owners of old MG sports cars, the ownership of which give powers of night vision which put the average cat to shame. Most recently observed by me the last time I was boarding the Plymouth/Roscoff ferry at night. A fleet of old MGs were tearing round the car park lit only be glow worms tied to the front of their vehicles. They were visible in sense, you could tell where they were by the dark patch where there were no headlights, this was where they were, invisible against the headlights of the cars behind them.

Rant over. Feel better already!

[axel_knutt]

The only advantage is in being more visible than everyone else, so it just creates a pointless arms race with everyone competing to have the brightest lights.

[kwackers]

Eye-catching yes, but that is what they are supposed to do. That is how they work.

I'd suggest you've answered your own question.

They're eye catching. Other motorists will see them, why do you think they'll then find it as easy or easier to spot a bicycle/pedestrian in the visual noise?
They present a short cut to seeing other vehicles. That quick glance that currently seems to have problems spotting bicycles because they're looking for things that are dangerous to them will become even quicker because the lights will make it easier (because they're "eye-catching") to see other vehicles.

I fail to see how they improve the lot of cyclists at all.

[AlaninWales]

I despair sometimes of the thinking processes of other people.

So do I

Of course the above does not apply to the owners of old MG sports cars, the ownership of which give powers of night vision which put the average cat to shame. Most recently observed by me the last time I was boarding the Plymouth/Roscoff ferry at night. A fleet of old MGs were tearing round the car park lit only be glow worms tied to the front of their vehicles. They were visible in sense, you could tell where they were by the dark patch where there were no headlights, this was where they were, invisible against the headlights of the cars behind them.

Rant over. Feel better already!

So you understand that the brighter modern lights make the older dimmer (less dazzling) lights less visible; yet somehow you don't understand that this logically leads to an 'arms race' of brighter and brighter lights? Or don't tink that brighter lights create more dazzle?
The natural result of putting DRLs and brighter headlights lights on all vehicles (as you advocate) is to reinforce the SMIDSY claim of "I looked for lights and didn't see any" (already in use) and to make those unable to carry a massive generator around with them effectively invisible (like those old MGs).

[Ayesha]

"all new cars since February 2011 have had to have them".

I have a 2012 Ford Focus EcoBoost 1.0 litre.

It doesn't have daytime running lamps.