Another cyclist death: left-turning lorry

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kwackers
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Re: Another cyclist death: left-turning lorry

Post by kwackers »

thirdcrank wrote:
landsurfer wrote: as a 100k a year driver ... .


I could well imagine that driving some 2,000 miles a week would influence somebody's world view. It does not justify implying that anybody holding a different view is a humbug.

I wonder how many miles bus drivers and taxi drivers do and they rank as some of the worse drivers around IMO.
AlaninWales
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Re: Another cyclist death: left-turning lorry

Post by AlaninWales »

beardy wrote:As a driver I can cope with watching my front, my back and my right hand side but I have not managed to watch everywhere successfully, the left side is traditionally the one that you feel safe about. It is after all against the highway code to overtake on that side.

Frankly that is very worrying and I urge you to take further driver training in observation skills. RoSPA are very good at this.
As for the Highway Code:
Highway Code UK wrote:88

Manoeuvring. You should be aware of what is behind and to the sides before manoeuvring. Look behind you; use mirrors if they are fitted. When in traffic queues look out for pedestrians crossing between vehicles and vehicles emerging from junctions or changing lanes. Position yourself so that drivers in front can see you in their mirrors. Additionally, when filtering in slow-moving traffic, take care and keep your speed low.

Highway Code UK wrote:160
Once moving you should
...
be aware of other road users, especially cycles and motorcycles who may be filtering through the traffic. These are more difficult to see than larger vehicles and their riders are particularly vulnerable. Give them plenty of room, especially if you are driving a long vehicle or towing a trailer

Specific permission for motorcycles to filter, specific instructions for others to watch out for cyclists and motorcyclists filtering: You should indeed be expecting them on all sides; I certainly do.

I find it really, really sad that others here are still playing a 'blame game' (that's you landsurfer). Given the discussion direction that is a particularly vicious, nasty and disrespectful type of 'straw man'. :(
beardy
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Re: Another cyclist death: left-turning lorry

Post by beardy »

AlaninWales wrote:
beardy wrote:As a driver I can cope with watching my front, my back and my right hand side but I have not managed to watch everywhere successfully, the left side is traditionally the one that you feel safe about. It is after all against the highway code to overtake on that side.

Frankly that is very worrying and I urge you to take further driver training in observation skills. RoSPA are very good at this.
As for the Highway Code:
Highway Code UK wrote:88

Manoeuvring. You should be aware of what is behind and to the sides before manoeuvring. Look behind you; use mirrors if they are fitted. When in traffic queues look out for pedestrians crossing between vehicles and vehicles emerging from junctions or changing lanes. Position yourself so that drivers in front can see you in their mirrors. Additionally, when filtering in slow-moving traffic, take care and keep your speed low.

Highway Code UK wrote:160
Once moving you should
...
be aware of other road users, especially cycles and motorcycles who may be filtering through the traffic. These are more difficult to see than larger vehicles and their riders are particularly vulnerable. Give them plenty of room, especially if you are driving a long vehicle or towing a trailer

Specific permission for motorcycles to filter, specific instructions for others to watch out for cyclists and motorcyclists filtering: You should indeed be expecting them on all sides; I certainly do.

I find it really, really sad that others here are still playing a 'blame game' (that's you landsurfer). Given the discussion direction that is a particularly vicious, nasty and disrespectful type of 'straw man'. :(


Well this is just plain insulting to suggest that somebody should take extra training because they do not see things the same way as you do.

You know from other posts that I am a very experienced high mileage road user with an accident free record decades long. I can not watch four screens simultaneously adequately well at the same time as performing a function, it is about time more people admitted to their human limitations.

Yes motorcycles are allowed to filter but it doesnt say they are allowed to filter on the inside.
Vorpal
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Re: Another cyclist death: left-turning lorry

Post by Vorpal »

Highway engineers put silly narrow cycle lanes on the inside. They put ASL lead-ins on the inside. They put access points to shared infrastucture on the inside. And they do these things on streets where congestion is normal. That implies not only permission, but an *expectation* that cyclists will filter on the inside.

On every ASL, I've ever seen, the only legal point to enter it is on the inside. If cyclists can't do that, as the law currently stands, there is no point in ASLs.
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meic
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Re: Another cyclist death: left-turning lorry

Post by meic »

How about this one

https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=Carmar ... 9,,0,22.76

though this one could be called on the inside

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@51.85510 ... BbIK1Q!2e0

One thing that they both have in common is that you could not possible ride in them if there were cars there for you to filter past as the cars would be filling the space themselves.

edit: some link problems now fixed.
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mjr
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Re: Another cyclist death: left-turning lorry

Post by mjr »

beardy wrote:
mjr wrote:
Rule 163 wrote:stay in your lane if traffic is moving slowly in queues. If the queue on your right is moving more slowly than you are, you may pass on the left



My comment was about undertaking within the same lane, I have repeatedly said it could be different with separate lanes. Your quote from the highway code is about traffic in separate lanes.

So please cut out the condescending "Please reread it" comments.

That quote from highway code says queues not lanes. As others have pointed out, there are other places where filtering is expected. I'll stop suggesting rereading it once people stop appearing to reword it to mean what they think.

The closest we've currently got to an official rider training manual is the Bikeability Delivery Guide and Level 3 includes filtering, opening with "Upon encountering queuing traffic, the trainee may pass it (on the right or left) or may choose to wait in the queue" and there is a later caution against passing long vehicles on the left.

Another official publication, Cyclecraft, includes filtering on chapter 11 if you've got a copy. It's not online, but http://www.cyclescheme.co.uk/community/how-to/filtering references it and contains similar advice - there is a big warning about left-hand overtakes, but basically advice on how to do it.

In short, left-side overtaking is normal and widespread and has been taught to people for years, as well as the associated infrastructure encouraging it with narrow left-side lanes. Even if outlawed immediately (which I think is politically improbable as described before), it wouldn't stop overnight because it would take ages to retrain people (including changing all the official publications) and the afflicted junctions won't be rebuilt any quicker than if we rebuild them with proper infrastructure... so let's just redesign and rebuild them to make it unnecessary. It'll be quicker and fairer.
MJR, mostly pedalling 3-speed roadsters. KL+West Norfolk BUG incl social easy rides http://www.klwnbug.co.uk
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beardy
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Re: Another cyclist death: left-turning lorry

Post by beardy »

That quote from highway code says queues not lanes


That quote says queues and lanes and in the context of the whole clause it reads to me that those queues are in different lanes which is why lanes are mentioned at the start of it. To back that up look at the clause just before it.
Now how can that be interpreted differently?

:only overtake on the left if the vehicle in front is signalling to turn right, and there is room to do so
:stay in your lane if traffic is moving slowly in queues. If the queue on your right is moving more slowly than you are, you may pass on the left
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Re: Another cyclist death: left-turning lorry

Post by Vorpal »

mjr wrote:That quote from highway code says queues not lanes. As others have pointed out, there are other places where filtering is expected. I'll stop suggesting rereading it once people stop appearing to reword it to mean what they think.

The closest we've currently got to an official rider training manual is the Bikeability Delivery Guide and Level 3 includes filtering, opening with "Upon encountering queuing traffic, the trainee may pass it (on the right or left) or may choose to wait in the queue" and there is a later caution against passing long vehicles on the left.

Another official publication, Cyclecraft, includes filtering on chapter 11 if you've got a copy. It's not online, but http://www.cyclescheme.co.uk/community/how-to/filtering references it and contains similar advice - there is a big warning about left-hand overtakes, but basically advice on how to do it.

Cyclecraft is a TSO publication, and the official DfT guide on cycling.
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beardy
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Re: Another cyclist death: left-turning lorry

Post by beardy »

Interestingly there is nothing I can spot in there that directly challenges my interpretation of the rules

http://www.cyclescheme.co.uk/community/how-to/filtering

In some circumstances, you can even pass on the left

Yes when the car infront is indicating right.

Overtake on the kerb side only if the traffic is stationary and there's no room on the right-hand side.

Is overtaking a stationary vehicle subject to the same rules as a moving vehicle? There are exceptions to overtaking stationary vehicles compared to moving vehicles all through the highway code and law.
Approaching zebra crossings, double white lines.

My impression is that cyclists have taken a "right" to overtake on the inside despite the law forbidding it and hope to eventually win it through government acquiescence. They are nearly there but I dont accept they are there yet until it is put truly to the test. That advice rather cleverly keeps within the written rules yet doesnt challenge the cyclists assertion either.
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[XAP]Bob
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Re: Another cyclist death: left-turning lorry

Post by [XAP]Bob »

Yay - we've gone back to the wrong end of the H&S debate again.

Can someone chop a load off the bottom of this thread and then lock it.

Cycling down the left of a long vehicle isn't a good idea, I think we all agree on that.
However the general cycling public, which may not be native to this country, should not suffer death for following the advice from our traffic planning professionals as seen commonly painted on the roads.

So let's actually address the source of the problem, and that's not the lady in question.
A shortcut has to be a challenge, otherwise it would just be the way. No situation is so dire that panic cannot make it worse.
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Re: Another cyclist death: left-turning lorry

Post by Edwards »

[XAP]Bob wrote:So let's actually address the source of the problem, and that's not the lady in question


And while you do that another person might be killed because a simple piece of advice that corresponds to the roads as they are now is ignored by some. That advise is

Do not cycle down the same side of vehicles that are indicating that direction. Especially the side opposite the driver.
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danhopgood
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Re: Another cyclist death: left-turning lorry

Post by danhopgood »

[XAP]Bob wrote:Yay - we've gone back to the wrong end of the H&S debate again.

....the general cycling public, which may not be native to this country, should not suffer death for following the advice from our traffic planning professionals as seen commonly painted on the roads.

So let's actually address the source of the problem, and that's not the lady in question.


Um, and where's the evidence that anyone's died as the result of "following the advice from our traffic planning professionals as seen commonly painted on the roads."?
AlaninWales
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Re: Another cyclist death: left-turning lorry

Post by AlaninWales »

Oh ****!
As far as we can presently tell, this cyclist (and possibly others who have ended up KSI'd) has cycled past the left hand side of a large vehicle, possibly as it was about to move. This is a Bad Idea.

95%+ (made up figure from m experience of cycle lanes over 50 years) of on-road cycle lanes take cyclists up the inside of vehicles - whether or not they are moving / about to move. Clearly then people have " died as the result of "following the advice from our traffic planning professionals as seen commonly painted on the roads."".
Last edited by Vorpal on 27 Feb 2015, 5:39pm, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: remove thinly diguised profanity
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[XAP]Bob
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Re: Another cyclist death: left-turning lorry

Post by [XAP]Bob »

Edwards wrote:
[XAP]Bob wrote:So let's actually address the source of the problem, and that's not the lady in question


And while you do that another person might be killed because a simple piece of advice that corresponds to the roads as they are now is ignored by some. That advise is

Do not cycle down the same side of vehicles that are indicating that direction. Especially the side opposite the driver.

And the people who still do this will listen next time because?

H&S has a clear process for preventing recurrent accidents and in this environment that process is routinely ignored - you are proposing the same error.

I'm not saying that we promote the manoeuvre, but that's not the correct focus.
A shortcut has to be a challenge, otherwise it would just be the way. No situation is so dire that panic cannot make it worse.
There are two kinds of people in this world: those can extrapolate from incomplete data.
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661-Pete
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Re: Another cyclist death: left-turning lorry

Post by 661-Pete »

Vorpal wrote:Highway engineers put silly narrow cycle lanes on the inside. They put ASL lead-ins on the inside. They put access points to shared infrastucture on the inside. And they do these things on streets where congestion is normal. That implies not only permission, but an *expectation* that cyclists will filter on the inside.

On every ASL, I've ever seen, the only legal point to enter it is on the inside. If cyclists can't do that, as the law currently stands, there is no point in ASLs.

While we're on the topic of ASLs with left side feeder lanes .... I've posted this pair of pictures before:
Before
Before

After
After

The ASL has been painted out. Pffft! Gone! I originally took the second picture about 4 months ago and thought at the time it may be only a temporary painting-out, the road had just been re-surfaced. But no: it's still like that now, appears to be a permanent change.

So are ASLs falling out of favour with the powers-that-be? Has anyone else got any similar examples? Admittedly the road in question is not particularly busy.

My feeling is that a dangerous bit of 'infarcestructure' has gone, and good riddance! I tend to avoid using the feeder lane anyway - for reasons that have already been discussed at great length in this thread.
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