"And make no mistake, cyclists are criminals"

[david143]

If you have traffic lights that can be ignored by some but not others, what do you think is going to happen? Answer = everyone will start ignoring the lights and so goes the whole point of having lights in the first place.

I think thats taking it to an extreme that is quite unlikely. Drivers don't feel like they can jump the lights and escape unpunished in the way cyclists do so they will continue to obey the rules and become frustrated with cyclists.

When you get to the point where ALL cyclists ignore lights, why is it difficult to think that others wouldn't as well?

Things is, if we don't all work from the same rule book, then nobody is ever going to be on the road safely.

[workhard]

I forgot we live in the land of the motoring pedant (at least when the law is being applied to cyclists).

I shall offer myself to the front wheels of the nearest BMW on my cycle home >;o)

Gazza

Don't do it; and don't forget most of the motoring law pedants are your fellow cyclists and CTC members

[workhard]

There may be nothing competing with your path to prevent RLJ'ing, but if everyone did the same, I bet there would be accidents as a result.

If everyone did the same and only RLJ'ed when there was nothing competing with them there would be no extra accidents at all surely, short of them driving into the traffic lights themselves, and not much need for the lights.

Many modern traffic calming schemes seem to revolve around removing all the road signs and light and kerbs and other clues that cause Mr Driver to think he is king. As a result drivers feel as if they are in an alien environment and slow down and take care - it is a wonderful thing to behold when a driver enters our town centre for the first time and literally does not know where the road is anymore, they give way to pedestrians, wave cyclists across their path etc.. Brilliant.

But 100 yds away they are jumping red on the confusing lights, turning right across, and often into, oncoming traffic thanks to a baffling filter lane signal and driving at 50 on a 30 mph dual carriageway. Dreadful.

I find it fascinating how smoothly the traffic flows, and carefully and courteously every one drives when our local urban crossroads traffic lights fail. (which they do regularly) and I find it fascinating how much post accident debris there always is at the same set of lights when they are working.

Something is broken on our roads. It isn't me.

[kwackers]

When you get to the point where ALL cyclists ignore lights, why is it difficult to think that others wouldn't as well?

Things is, if we don't all work from the same rule book, then nobody is ever going to be on the road safely.

Cars are cars, bikes are bikes. I've never felt compelled to follow a cyclist through a set of red lights when I'm in my car.
(I have on the other hand followed another car through a set of red lights (road works) after being sat at them for 10 minutes with no indication they were ever going to change.)

It seems to me some of what we're doing is trying to appease car drivers, well sorry, it won't work.
The problem is they hate us! They also hate lorries, buses, vans, pedestrians and when there are none of those around they hate each other!
It's human nature - we don't belong to the same social group and aren't paying our fair dues. They have to tax, insure and put petrol in their cars. They feel pressured and villified. Then to top it all someone cycles past them whilst they're stuck in traffic FOR FREE! Oh the nerve... And if the traffic is moving, well b****** me if that's not a cyclist going slowly and in the middle of the road!

We may as well accept it and move on, obviously there's no reason why we shouldn't try and reduce the amount of ammunition they've got, but it seems most of the cycling problems near me are yoofs on bmx's and nobody is ever going to be able to fix that.

[david143]

workhard,

Not saying the system is perfect, but the way you are going about it is wrong. Change the law first, then act. Not the other way around.

BTW- If everyone observed where they were going all the time with consideration for all others, there would never be any need for any traffic management signs or systems. Not the case though, especially when bigger means more right currently.

[david143]

When you get to the point where ALL cyclists ignore lights, why is it difficult to think that others wouldn't as well?

Things is, if we don't all work from the same rule book, then nobody is ever going to be on the road safely.

Cars are cars, bikes are bikes. I've never felt compelled to follow a cyclist through a set of red lights when I'm in my car.

and we are ALL road users. As road users we should all abide by the rules of the road, like it or not.

[workhard]

When you get to the point where ALL cyclists ignore lights, why is it difficult to think that others wouldn't as well?

Things is, if we don't all work from the same rule book, then nobody is ever going to be on the road safely.

But surely we are a long way from there, on this thread there are two and a bit mild RLJ'ers and many many more telling us NO! Even I don't ignore all the red lights all the time, maybe 5% of the time max, when I judge it safe, I RLJ.

Our safety on the road is surely relative at best, I certainly don't regard it as a safe place to be and can't see that changing any time soon even if cars were banned tomorrow and everyone took to cycling. Road use is inherently risky, every CTC member (see I'm not calling myself a cyclist anymore! ) knows the statistics about how many people die or are seriously injured on our roads. So nobody IS going to be on the road safely EVER.

So we manage our risks. RLJ'ing does not necessarily directly decrease my safety but I don't buy that it increases it either. I agree it may well be very bad manners and quintessentially un-English. (In fact if someone just said. "Forget the Law; just don't do it because it is bl**dy rude!" then provided I could establish who, at say 03:00 am I was actually being rude too, then I'd probably buy that argument. A bounder and a cad I am not.)

I can accept the argument that it may indirectly decrease my safety by encouraging a general decline in standards. But I'd like to see the science and the numbers and understand how it compares with the influence of say Top Gear, Clarkson and motoring correspondents, and Matthew Paris and other commentators, on drivers attitudes to other road users.

[david143]

When you get to the point where ALL cyclists ignore lights, why is it difficult to think that others wouldn't as well?

Things is, if we don't all work from the same rule book, then nobody is ever going to be on the road safely.

But surely we are a long way from there, on this thread there are two and a bit mild RLJ'ers and many many more telling us NO! Even I don't ignore all the red lights all the time, maybe 5% of the time max, when I judge it safe, I RLJ.

So is it ok for a few to break the law, but not all? or to only break the law a small percentage of the time?

Isn't it a little arrogant to place your judgment above the rules of the road when you see fit?

[workhard]

workhard,

Not saying the system is perfect, but the way you are going about it is wrong. Change the law first, then act. Not the other way around.

BTW- If everyone observed where they were going all the time with consideration for all others, there would never be any need for any traffic management signs or systems. Not the case though, especially when bigger means more right currently.

Show me the petition to get the law changed, I'll sign it. Show me the party to vote for who will deliver this and I'll vote for them. Give me a placard and I'll march..... but for now I'll just sometimes ignore that particular law becuase my doing so harms no one, and has no potential to harm anyone. Therefore it may well be a stupid law but hey I'm no lawyer.

So traffic management is needed to deal with the flaws in human nature. We agree on that. Q. Was the traffic management introduced to control the people on bikes, or the people in horsedrawn carriages, or the people in horseless carriages? Did they build a wopping dual carriageway through my home town centre with traffic lights and roundabouts and all sorts so I could ride my bike on it? No. They built if without giving cyclists a second thought. Traffic management is aimed squarely at the control of motorised vehicles because they represent the main risk and we are asked to fall in line - largely, I suspect to stop the drivers and their lobby from crying foul and bleating on about the unfairness of it all. (Look at the motorcyclists who complain because they can't ride in bus lanes "S'not fair the cyclists can")

Car drivers hate us because we share their space, and most of it is/has been built with their needs in mind so it is largely de facto their space whilst being de jure ours too, as of right and for free. It kills them and they want us to be regulated and taxed and held to account in the same way as them, and if we were they would still hate us and would drive accordingly.

I do not believe that people on bicycles should be subject to exactly the same laws and held to account with the same expectations of behaviour as other motorised road users because we do not represent the same level of risk to other road users and each other that the motorised folk do.

[workhard]

So is it ok for a few to break the law, but not all? or to only break the law a small percentage of the time?

Isn't it a little arrogant to place your judgment above the rules of the road when you see fit?

Do I now need to pass some sort of humility test to be in the cyclist gang? You call it arrogant I call it self-confidence... (ok so now I'm baiting you)

From the perspective of someone who appears to place the Law above their own judgment, thus abrogating their own responsibilities, I can see that it could appear arrogant.

But I am hardly unique in this am I? Millions of other road users do exactly the same placing of their judgement above the rules of the road hundred of times a day. When I do it on my bike no one dies or gets hurt. When the car drivers do it people do die.

Two wrongs do not make a right but not all wrongs are equal, either in the eyes of the law or the eyes of rationality.

I can't respond to your is it OK question because it is not founded in reality. People break laws all the time and society, the one that elected the government that made the laws, allows them to escape unpunished time after time after time until we reach the point where we think that law can't really matter after all and it becomes something of a dead letter. 70 mph speed limit on motorways - yeah right! Then a few vocal types will have a moral panic and there will be a clampdown and that law will be enforced for a few weeks and then when the fuss dies down the status quo returns.

The UK is governed with and by the consent and co-operation of its population and only by their consent and co-operation. Not by force, not by rule of law despite what you might think. The police are generally bright enough to realise when they don't have consent and wont get co-operation and then make value judgements about risk befiore deciding to act or not. Saves Joe Taxpayer a fortune.[/i]

[workhard]

Perhaps CJ could tell me for how long I was a criminal for riding with an LED rear light instead of one with an incandescent bulb and when this excellently stupid law/rule/regulation was changed to decriminalise my actions.

as we are talking about red lights.......

[JQ666]

So is it ok for a few to break the law, but not all? or to only break the law a small percentage of the time?

It's against the law to use excessive force when apprehending someone who breaks into your home........sometimes the law can be an ass!

However, I would say that the laws of the road are mainly for the good and safety of us all, and we should all stick to them, whether in car or on a bike.

But different people will choose which laws to keep and which to break - if caught then the judicial system will decide if / how to punish them. I would hope that someone jumping a red light during a very busy period (and so putting lives in danger) would get a bigger fine than someone jumping a red light during a quiet period (and so less danger), and that someone breaking the leg of a burglar would get a medal.

Unfortunately, what I think is acceptable law-breaking will be unacceptable to others, and what I think is a safe situation will be a dangerous situation to others, and so with regards to RLJ I think it's only fair to have a consistant punishment if caught.

With regards to giving the burglar a good kicking, hopefully a sympathetic policeman will do the investigating

[david143]

It is easy to dismiss some rules when it is thought they should not apply. The right path is obviously to abide by the rules....

nothing said here makes any excuse valid for RLJ'ing.....

and the more people do RLJ, the more it will become an issue.

Yes, it is for the law to be enforced, but it is also each persons duty to abide by the rules.

[workhard]

It is easy to dismiss some rules when it is thought they should not apply. The right path is obviously to abide by the rules....

nothing said here makes any excuse valid for RLJ'ing.....

and the more people do RLJ, the more it will become an issue.

Yes, it is for the law to be enforced, but it is also each persons duty to abide by the rules.

David, how far into one's life would you expect the right path of abiding by the rules to extend exactly? Taken beyond the trivia of RLJ'ing it smacks of a reactionary conservatism of the highest order in my view.

Such a "right path" is certainly the a path to the right as far as I'm concerned as a state which requires mindless unquestioning subservience to a higher power from its subjects is a fascist state surely? I can hear James Brine, James Hammett, George Loveless, James Loveless, Thomas Standfield, and John Standfield spinning in their graves. Rules, as the saying goes, are made to be broken.

My original post on RLJ'ing was in response to charlieandjody's question Do you always stop at lights, and if not why not? It is not my intent to excuse my RLJ'ing - Indeed I see no need to excuse it as I cannot recognise the wrong in what I do. I do not claim to speak for anyone but myself, if others RLJ recklessly it is for them to explain their actions not me.

As I said law and order are maintained in this country by consent. Perhaps I should have said 'and not duty'. I have sworn no oath of allegiance to crown, flag, state, nation or highway code so I owe no one the duty you claim. Nor does the current constitutional situation in this country require such a duty of obedience from me.

Anyway Godspeed to you and your cycle and your cycling, we've clearly bored the pants off everyone else on this thread and I've no more energy for the debate. you've made your case, and I've made mine - time to agree to disagree before we start hurling brickbats at one another.

I cannot claim to completely understand or agree with your point of view nor do I think you can comprehend mine but I do respect your opinions and I'm darned glad I live in a country where the rules don't prohibit us both from expressing them freely.

[Wildduck]

Okay, I don't know whether this is coincidence or somebody has elevated it to a news story but BBC news is showing this story this morning on BBC1 (and debating it) and on their website...

Cyclists flout law 'to stay safe'

Chance to leave a comment. I know you all wouldn't fail to take up that opportunity![/url]