A Cyclist and Rough Justice

[Oldjohnw]

I have to say that being a long experienced driver has, I believe, helped my cycling instincts. I understand how the road works and possibly the mind of the motorist. I see too many cyclists with limited road sense.

[Tangled Metal]

Kids riding their mountain bikes in the dark last night with no lights and against the traffic flow. Indeed one came from one direction straight across the road to ride against the traffic, on the road. I got further on another rode through a red light at a narrow, single lane bridge without clear views of what's coming. They met up then rode off somewhere.

That was observed while walking the dog. I see it a lot round here.

[Mike Sales]

I have to say that being a long experienced driver has, I believe, helped my cycling instincts. I understand how the road works and possibly the mind of the motorist. I see too many cyclists with limited road sense.

When I began driving after many years cycling I realised I did not need to be so wary of motors. I did not need to do quite so much of their thinking for them. I did not need to "take the road."
For instance, that driver, waiting to join the road I was on, was much less likely to pull out in front of me. That pedestrian could hear me coming so I did not need to watch them quite so closely. The impatient man behind was not going to overtake at such a stupid place.
I found that I seemed to have an accepted place on the road and I was not expected to defer to motors.

[reohn2]

"Always expect the unexpected!"

One mate of mine could have done with that ability. Still one time he hit a cow round a bend on a dual carriageway. It somehow got out if the field and ran straight in front of him. That can't ever be expected.

Another time after a long spell not driving and a very gradual reintroduction to driving he got hit from the side by a bus. Predict that if you can!

With this guy anything can happen. He's just very unlucky when driving. Last I heard he gave up driving again and rides his bike everywhere. I hope he's still ok with his superpower for encountering the unpredictable on the roads.

If course a ped on a phone at a junction or other lights is probably more predictable. Just remember sh1t happens. It could still be you getting used for damages.

Obviously there are freak incidents that no one can do anything about,these are true accidents,which can as you've illustrated can happen to anyone however skilled and safe a driver they are.
The term 'always expect the unexpected' refers to observation of the road and it's users and potential users some of which can and do stupid and unpredictable things.
As for the OP,it was the cyclists duty to watch out for idiots,to assume anything about pedestrians especially if the pavements are crowded is a recipe for disaster,groups of teenagers more so.

[Tangled Metal]

If freak accidents always happen to one person it could be considered if it was really something this person did that allowed these accidents to happen. Like in the case of this former friend. He was very accident prone whether on foot, on bike or driving a car.

We used to joke about him having season tickets for the A&E department of the local hospital. A lot of his stories about mountain biking (his passion at one time having picked it up in USA when it first took off over there) ended with the phrase "and I woke up in A&E"!

Personally, and this might seem unfair bias, but when I read another defence if cyclist thread on here I first suspect it's not as clear cut. If looked at closely there would have been something the cyclist didn't do or should have done. Unfair? Probably but ends up being true. There's too much looking at what others did wrong and were should be looking at what we should be doing. Change what you can for the better.

Sorry if you think that's victim blaming. It's really not.

[robing]

If this is a genuine situation and all your facts are correct, then the cyclist is largely to blame:

Highway code rule 195
Zebra crossings.
As you approach a zebra crossing, look out for pedestrians waiting to cross and be ready to slow down or stop to let them cross.

If you are referring to the recent case in London discussed at length in this thread, there was no zebra or even a pedestrian phase on the lights, but even so the cyclist should still have slowed, if only for the sake of self preservation - the cyclist is just as likely to be hurt as the pedestrian. I ride regularly in city traffic and learnt long ago to be wary of them, with or without phones.

The rough justice occurs rather in the many car + bicycle collisions when the driver gets off scot-free even though he is to blame.

If the OP is referring to that much publicised case, there was a key witness - another cyclist whose testimony was largely ignored by the media. He said that the crossing in question had a lot of pedestrians on it, and the cyclist involved in the collision overtook him and didn't appear to slow down and instead sounded his airhorn, which startled the pedestrian and made them jump - unfortunately in to the path of the cyclist.

[The utility cyclist]

Today I was cycling to go get some extra large tubes for a 29er, a ped on his phone stepped out without looking on a busy high street road, if I had been a standard moton he would very likely have being mown down, however I'd done the std hazard perception, seen that the dozy twonk wasn't going to pay any attention so I simply carried on but gave him a wide berth and was going at a speed I could stop if he did something really out the ordinary. I doubt that he even noticed me he was so fixated, my thinking is that a shouted warning/ringing bell is already too late and as we've seen too often this induces all sorts of actions by the other persons and scenarios one cannot extricate yourself from, certainly not easier than the original scenario.

The thing is though that people on bikes are given a whole lot of earache and worse in these situations, yet the group that kill and maim with ease and great regularity are not held to the same standards despite posing a massively greater threat of harm.