another cyclist killed by a lorry in London

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beardy
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Re: another cyclist killed by a lorry in London

Post by beardy »

You could wrap it up in fancy words and it may not be true but it is an obvious starting point and no answer anywhere near as convincing has been offered.
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[XAP]Bob
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Re: another cyclist killed by a lorry in London

Post by [XAP]Bob »

661-Pete wrote:With regard to cement mixers, there is the additional problem that they have to get to their destination and deliver their load before the cement sets. If it sets in the lorry, it's a nasty and time-consuming job cleaning it out. Hence there's an added incentive to make extra speed on the road. I've often felt a bit uneasy about this. Anyone in the construction business care to elaborate?

Not in the construction industry, but I was under the impression that they did clever things like regulate water in the mix to prevent that...
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iandriver
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Re: another cyclist killed by a lorry in London

Post by iandriver »

So, one of the deaths in 2013 was actually a pedestrian at the time:

http://road.cc/content/news/155028-wido ... iver-found
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pwa
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Re: another cyclist killed by a lorry in London

Post by pwa »

Valbrona makes two comments I would like to challenge. Firstly, that tipper truck drivers are the "bottom feeders", cowboys of the haulage industry. That may well be true of some of them, and it may well be an important factor in these cases, but it is not true of all tipper truck drivers. I have known a few and they have been decent, hard working people who took a pride in their work and (from what I saw) drove with skill and patience. I don't doubt that there are some bad ones out there, but it does no good to make out that every tipper truck driver is a menace.

And secondly, identifying female cyclists as the most vulnerable, on the face of it, makes no sense. Any cyclist (or pedestrian) crushed by the wheels of a lorry is equally vulnerable. I don't understand why females would be more at risk of this sort of accident.
kwackers
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Re: another cyclist killed by a lorry in London

Post by kwackers »

pwa wrote:but it is not true of all tipper truck drivers. I have known a few and they have been decent, hard working people who took a pride in their work and (from what I saw) drove with skill and patience. I don't doubt that there are some bad ones out there, but it does no good to make out that every tipper truck driver is a menace.

Some years ago a friend of mine drove tippers (the 8 wheeled variety) when he first got his HGV. He has nothing good to say about either the job or the folk doing it.

I appreciate that doesn't mean they're all bad but they are massively over-represented and whilst it may do no good to paint them all neither does it do any good to ignore an obvious truth no matter how bad it smells.
Personally I can't see how it's possible to ignore the fact that the whole tipper industry is in dire need of an overhaul. This to me is self evident both from experience (hello; Grundy Skip Hire of Widnes) and from statistics.

I don't believe that the tipper issue is actually related to the female thing other than whatever it is that's getting women killed a poor standard of driving seems to be a major factor.
Valbrona
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Re: another cyclist killed by a lorry in London

Post by Valbrona »

pwa wrote:And secondly, identifying female cyclists as the most vulnerable, on the face of it, makes no sense. Any cyclist (or pedestrian) crushed by the wheels of a lorry is equally vulnerable. I don't understand why females would be more at risk of this sort of accident.


Six of the cyclists killed so far this year in London were women, and lorries have been involved in seven out of the eight fatal incidents. from here: http://road.cc/content/news/154989-prot ... on-hgv-ban

If women are disproportionately more highly represented amongst the casualty figures I think it is a reasonable analysis to say that they are more vulnerable.

Women are perhaps at greater risk because they have less awareness of dangers on the road and are also less able to perceive these dangers. And also your average female cyclist might just be less experienced on the roads than your average male cyclist that might have been riding longer and that might clock up more miles in any given period.
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pwa
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Re: another cyclist killed by a lorry in London

Post by pwa »

Valbrona, your suggestions about why females are over represented in casualty figures are worth investigating. They are just speculation at the moment, but you have to start somewhere. Another possibility is that this bias is just a weird statistical blip. Not likely, but possible.
thirdcrank
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Re: another cyclist killed by a lorry in London

Post by thirdcrank »

I'm no statistician but even I can see that if there are countless unrecorded "damage only" accidents which would be "KSI" if they involved a pedestrian or a cyclist, then the tragically high number of dead cyclists represents only a tiny part of a much wider issue. On that basis, I suspect that the numbers of women killed as compared with men is statistically and only statistically, insignificant.

We have huge trucks on busy, often narrow streets, driven by often young, inexperienced people - largely men, I suspect - rewarded by piece-rate rather than the hour. They are physically safe, with no worries about their own bodywork or that of the vehicle they are driving, and practically immune from prosecution in the present dismal state of traffic policing. I'll speculate for many of them, being in the cab of a truck is the only time they experience any sort of power. Against that, there's a search for some sort of suicidal tendency among female cyclists.
landsurfer
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Re: another cyclist killed by a lorry in London

Post by landsurfer »

thirdcrank wrote: rewarded by piece-rate rather than the hour.

Is there a professional driver out here that can confirm the "piece rate " basis of tipper or any other drivers remuneration ?
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pwa
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Re: another cyclist killed by a lorry in London

Post by pwa »

I have heard that a lot of HGV drivers are currently on low wages and have to work long hours to pay the bills.

I don't think anyone on this thread has suggested that female cyclists are more "suicidal" than male cyclists. It has been suggested that they may be less experienced or skilled, but even that was just expressed as speculation, not as statement of fact. The gender bias is a legitimate area for investigation. There may be something there that helps inform a properly thought out package of solutions.
thirdcrank
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Re: another cyclist killed by a lorry in London

Post by thirdcrank »

landsurfer wrote:
thirdcrank wrote: rewarded by piece-rate rather than the hour.

Is there a professional driver out here that can confirm the "piece rate " basis of tipper or any other drivers remuneration ?


I'll put my hand up to not remembering correctly what was said by hexhome on a similar thread:-

... Enforce the law on the illegal practice of paying tipper drivers a load bonus.


viewtopic.php?p=655499#p655499
pwa
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Re: another cyclist killed by a lorry in London

Post by pwa »

Having just watched a clip on the YACF site showing how some cyclists behave around a stationary bus close to where this fatality happened, I would not jump to the conclusion that the lorry driver was entirely to blame. Riders squeezing up both sides of the bus waiting at the lights, with the bus driver having to choose which wing mirror he / she checks last before moving forward and hoping no silly bugger has sneaked in unobserved. We don't know what happened in this particular case, but to assume that the lorry driver was at fault (if anyone does) would be wrong. It could indeed be down to bad driving, but other explanations are plausible.
Flinders
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Re: another cyclist killed by a lorry in London

Post by Flinders »

Okay, for those who think the stats may reflect women being more likely to go up the inside of vehicles in general, why is it one particular type of HGV that is over-represented? Do women, for some strange reason, only go up on the inside of tipper trucks? Or does that sort of truck have worse arrangements for mirrors?

I'm female, and I don't go up the inside of trucks, but I have seen men doing it. Trucks also overtake me, sometimes close to/on junctions, however far over I am. Do they never overtake men or something? Do all men, or even most men, take the centre of the lane? I honestly doubt it.

There is something else going on here, and we need to know what it is. Speculation has gone on long enough, we need hard evidence.
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661-Pete
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Re: another cyclist killed by a lorry in London

Post by 661-Pete »

As it happens, today we came up behind a cement mixer lorry, which had just stopped in the road. Its reverse lights then came on and it was evidently trying to back into a building site beside the road. Both my wife and I stopped and hung well back. The road is fairly narrow, and to do anything else - to try and squeeze past - would have been idiotic and suicidal. Once the lorry was partly off the road, the driver waved us on with a gesture of thanks. Cooperation and courtesy between road users counts for so much - and saves lives! And evidently not all truckers are anti-cyclist! I just thought I'd say that.
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Pete Owens
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Re: another cyclist killed by a lorry in London

Post by Pete Owens »

Flinders wrote:Okay, for those who think the stats may reflect women being more likely to go up the inside of vehicles in general, why is it one particular type of HGV that is over-represented? Do women, for some strange reason, only go up on the inside of tipper trucks? Or does that sort of truck have worse arrangements for mirrors?

There are certainly design features of construction vehicles that are likely to make them more likely to crush people. They are higher with bigger heavier wheels so there is a greater chance of being dragged under and run over, rather than being pushed over to the side.
http://lcc.org.uk/articles/lcc-challenges-construction-industry-to-adopt-its-safer-urban-lorry-to-reduce-lorry-cyclist-deaths

However, I'm not sure that a particular type of HGV is that grossly overrepresented when you allow for exposure. The figures I have seen compare the overall milage of different types of truck - typically trucks will do most of their milage on motorways between distribution depots away from town centres so will rarely encounter cyclists. London is a vibrant rapidly growing city with a lot of cyclists and a lot of building work going on so if you are a cyclist in London and encounter a truck it is more likely to be a construction vehicle than say a livestock transport vehicle, and vice-versa if you are riding on a country lane.
I'm female, and I don't go up the inside of trucks,

And neither have you been killed by one
but I have seen men doing it. Trucks also overtake me, sometimes close to/on junctions, however far over I am. Do they never overtake men or something? Do all men, or even most men, take the centre of the lane? I honestly doubt it.

A greater tendency for females to do X doesn't mean that ALL females do X while NO males ever do - or even the majority of females do X.
If say 1% of male cyclists regularly undertook left turning trucks and 3% of females then that would be sufficient to account for the difference in the casualty rate.
There is something else going on here, and we need to know what it is. Speculation has gone on long enough, we need hard evidence.

While most of the discussion on this thread is indeed speculation (mostly based on stereotypes), the tendencey for women to overtake on the wrong side is base on evidence:
See: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22931179
Bicyclist fatalities involving heavy goods vehicles: gender differences in risk perception, behavioral choices, and training.
Frings D1, Rose A, Ridley AM.

Abstract
OBJECTIVES:
Females are typically involved in fewer collisions when pedal cycling than males. However, female cyclists appear to be overrepresented in the number of fatal collisions involving heavy goods vehicles (HGVs). These collisions often involve cyclists passing HGVs on the side furthest from the HGV driver (nearside). It is hypothesized that this pattern of fatalities may be partly due to differences in how males and females perceive the risk associated with various cycling maneuvers. It is also hypothesized that this difference may be overcome with advanced training.

METHODS:4,596 UK cyclists completed an online questionnaire in which they reported their level of cycle training and rated the risk they perceived to be associated with various cycling maneuvers, the likelihood that they would engage in them, and history of collision involvement.

RESULTS: Females perceived a slightly greater level of risk to be associated with cycling. However, males differentiated between the risks involved in nearside and offside overtaking to a greater extent than females. Risk perception was significantly correlated with the reported likelihood that participants would engage in risky maneuvers such as overtaking on the nearside and also with past collision prevalence. Advanced cycling training was correlated with higher levels of perceived risk associated with overtaking on the nearside; however, basic cycle training was not.

CONCLUSIONS: Cyclists who do not correctly differentiate between the risks associated with nearside and offside overtaking may be more at risk of being involved in HGV-related collisions. Advanced cycling training is linked to more accurate risk perception. To reduce fatalities, public awareness campaigns should focus on the increased risk of nearside overtaking and encourage cyclists to take advanced training.
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