Lynda Chalker

Photo: Victor Patterson

As we approach the 27^th anniversary of one of the first “road safety” conferences I ever attended, “Ways to safer cycling” , I recall the words of the key speaker there: Minister of State, Lynda Chalker: “To the  “Three Es” of road safety: Engineering, Education and Enforcement, we should add a fourth “E” – Encouragement – we should be encouraging cycling”. It serves as an introduction to a progress report on current campaigning for cyclists’ safety.

 In some ways, we have moved forward since 1985. At the same conference I also remember the words of the Chairman, Lord Nugent of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA), to the effect that the onus of responsibility was on cyclists when it came to cyclists’ safety , because “You’re the ones who are vulnerable”. These words seemed to upset the Department of Transport minders: he was off message then, and you wouldn’t get away with it now. Also, the notorious words of the Chief Engineer from Cambridge City Council: “If you are thinking of cycling in a modern city: don’t”. You wouldn’t get away with that either.

But how much has actually changed?

According to TSGB 0101, DfT 2011  and also TRA 0101/ TSGB 0701, we have had, since Lynda Chalker’s encouragement of cycling in 1985 until 2010, an increase in car, van and taxi vehicle passenger distance travelled of some 48%. All motor vehicle mileage (e.g. including lorries) has gone up by 57%. Cycling distance travelled nationally decreased by about 17%.

Not very effective on the encouragement front. And during this time we had other Ministers voicing support for cycling , such as Norman Fowler, Steven Norris (of the National Cycling Strategy), and of course, John Prescott.  I may have been unfair in exaggerating exactly how much motor traffic went up during his 10 years at the helm – it was probably only 12%, although he had promised to reduce it in June 1997(“I will have failed if in five years time there are not many more people using public transport and far fewer journeys by car. It’s a tall order, but I urge you to hold me to it”.)

I mention this because some people are very impressed by the apparent commitment of some politicians to The Times “Save Our Cyclists” campaign. In particular, Shadow Minister Angela Eagle  has won praise for her passionate words  in support of the campaign.

Angela Eagle

Photo: Telegraph

 In the Parliamentary debate  she said “What struck me about that was how obvious were the changes we need to see. This isn’t one of those issues that needs a major ideological debate to be won – just some common sense. And a renewed commitment to cycling safety. None of these things needs to be impossible – or even difficult – to deliver. It’s as much about will as money.”

This refers to the rather limited aims of The Times 8 point programme which we have commented on before But even with these limited aims, is it really good enough to say that this is “just common sense”? After all, as Einstein said , one person’s “common sense” is another’s “collection of prejudices”. Is there really no discussion of what transport policy we should have – or “ideological debate” that we should have. As Local Transport Today’s editorial suggests (LTT 591 02 – 15 March 2012): “although the ultimate objective of more and safer cycling may not be controversial, the means of achieving them certainly could be. A parliamentary debate on re-allocating roadspace to cyclists might not generate quite the same harmony as we saw last week“. Yet this is precisely the sort of issue which will have to be raised if we have large scale junction redesign to reduce danger to cyclists.

Political will is, of course, vital. Practitioners are familiar with difficulty in implementing projects due to lack of enthusiasm.  But it is the kind of policies implemented that we need to look at. Anybody reading through this debate would assume that danger existed for cyclists simply because some professionals and politicians were a bit distracted from what they were supposed to be doing. There is no kind of consideration of structural and, yes, ideological obstacles that might exist.

Consider Maria Eagle’s other thoughts on safety on the road: Firstly, she has made a commitment towards increasing the motorway speed limit. 

She has also said   she: “was preparing a radical overhaul of Labour’s motoring strategy”. She hopes the policy will “revive its reputation among drivers who accused the party of ‘waging war on the motorist’ while in government.” This includes possible incentives such as paying motorists (through discounts on VED) if they have not been caught by speed cameras.  

Is bribing motorists by paying them for not being caught speeding a good way to enforce road traffic law? The big hole in the Times campaign is , of course, that there is no mention in it’s key aims of law enforcement and sentencing with existing law, let alone consideration of changes like stricter liability legislation. And surely, the response to those who think that there has been a “war on the motorist” is, well, to show that this is just not true – rather than going along with that kind of prejudice.

This may be unkind. We have had the promise to oppose the longer lorries legislation that the current Government has passed against massive opposition from professionals and transport and environmental campaigners.

However, as noted above, we have been here before. And, unlike Angela Eagle,  people like John Prescott were actually in Government when they made their pledges.

Gary Mason;Eilidh Cairns; Tom Barrett; Photos from: The Times; RoadPeace; RAF

If any of the campaigns for cyclist safety are to actually achieve anything there is an absolutely central problem which needs addressing. This is the ability of the motorised to shift responsibility for their lethal behaviour on to their actual and potential victims – through the simple act of saying that they don’t “see” their victims. Below we look at two current and one recent case of cyclists killed in London .

While reading these cases, consider Rule 126 of the Highway Code:

“126: Stopping Distances: Drive at a speed that will allow you to stop well within the distance you can see to be clear.”

Gary Mason

The Times report of the  death of Gary Mason includes:-

• Collision investigators estimated the driver had been driving at between 25mph and 48mph at the time of the crash, and he had been going at between 36mph and 41mph in the lead-up to the collision.
•  He failed a police sight test on the day of the crash.
•  The light on his speedometer wasn’t working.

A useful commentary is here, and I quote one section in full:

The junction in Wallington where Gary was killed is a dangerous junction because of people like this driver. They turn from Woodcote Road into Sandy Lane South, and because the junction is at a gentle angle, if there is nothing in Sandy Lane South it’s possible to cut the corner and make the turn without slowing down. On a test track, that would be the ‘racing line’ and the correct thing to do – after all, you’re in a race and supposed to be going as fast as you can. Because this is a public road, you’re not supposed to do this: there could be pedestrians crossing the road, or cyclists in the road, and at 40 MPH say, you would have little chance of avoiding them if you saw them. And at 6AM on a drizzly, dark morning such as when Gary was killed, you might not see them. Especially if your sight was defective. The road markings at the junction encourage drivers to make a proper right turn and slow down, and there are hazard lines that you’re not supposed to cross. The driver in this case said he would cut across the road markings “eight times out of 10”.

Group Captain Tom Barrett

I emphasise some parts of this report from the Uxbridge Gazette:

 A van driver who mowed down and killed a senior RAF officer as he was cycling home along the A40 has been warned he faces possible jail after he was convicted of death by careless driving today (Weds).

Paul Luker, 51, claimed he was blinded by the sun when he hit Group Captain Tom Barrett, the 44-year-old Station Commander of RAF Northolt, in March last year.

Gp Capt Barrett served as an aide-de-camp to the Queen, as well as in Iraq and Afghanistan, and had been awarded an OBE.Described as an avid cyclist, he often used the journey from the base in Ruislip to his home in Beaconsfield, Bucks, as a training exercise.

He had travelled less than a mile when he was hit by Lukers transit van at 5.07pm on March 10. It took a jury of five men and seven women just two-and-a-half hours to find Luker guilty of causing death by careless or inconsiderate driving. Luker showed no emotion as the verdict was announced, while his wife wept in the public gallery. Fellow motorists told of a loud bang and a twisted wheel flying through the air after the crash.

The impact caused Gp Capt Barrett, a married father-of-two, to be thrown off his bicycle and he landed on the roadside. He was rushed to St Marys Hospital in Paddington but died from multiple injuries, Harrow Crown Court heard.

Prosecutor Adina Ezekiel said that Luker should have adapted his driving style if the conditions were poor. The prosecution are not suggesting that Mr Luker set out deliberately or maliciously to collide with Gp Capt Barretts bicycle. But the question is whether the driving was careless or inconsiderate said Ms Ezekiel.

Luker – who was driving at 50mph, under the speed limit – wept as he told how he simply could not understand why he did not see Gp Capt Barrett.

The self-employed delivery driver told how the crash had left him needing counselling and had stripped him of his happy-go-lucky personality.

Giving evidence Luker, who has been driving since 1984, said the sun had been quite low as he drove on the Greenford flyover.

“I was very short-sighted, I was struggling to see the brake lights of the car in front of me, so I decided I needed to slow down. At that point I was in the middle lane and the sun got worse, so I put a cap on but it didnt help much. The sun was as low that day as I have ever known. “The only way I could get the sun out of my eyes was to put the sun visor fully down, but I would have been blinded by that, so I put it on an angle. I could see people flashing me for going too slow so I decided to go into the inside lane and remember looking in my mirror for motorcycles. All of a sudden I felt a bump.”

Luker added: “I immediately slowed down and decided not to do an emergency brake because the car behind me was too close and stopping suddenly might have caused an accident, so I geared down. “I thought I hit a deer. I never saw anything. I saw the bicycle wheels along the road and then I realised I hit a cyclist. I remember shouting oh no, oh no, I was in some sort of shock. Mr Barrett was lying face down and I saw blood coming out of his ear and mouth and I knew at that stage it was quite a problem.”

“I just don’t understand why I didn’t see him,” he said.

“I would have done everything in my power to avoid any accident.  I think about it all the time. I was a pretty happy go lucky sort of fellow until that day.”

Bailing Luker until March 26 while pre-sentence reports are prepared Judge John Anderson said: “It is common ground in this case that this was a momentary lapse of attention.”

“Sentencing guidelines recommend a community order but you must understand that this offence carries a maximum of five years imprisonment and all options are open.

“You will be disqualified from driving but I have been persuaded in these exceptional circumstances for the time being to allow you to arrange your financial affairs so this does not devastate your family. “I do this more out of mercy than anything else, but you understand that you will be disqualified for a lengthy period.”

Luker, of Beaconsfield Road, Farnham Royal, Bucks, denied causing death by careless or inconsiderate driving.

++++++

Some specific comments here:

1. There is persistent reference, as in many road crashes, to the suffering of the person who was legally responsible for the death (e.g. stripped of his happy-go-lucky personality). Remorse – actual or alleged – plays a big part on affecting sentencing, which in most cases does not involve custodial sentences. While obviously an absence of remorse would be particularly anti-social, it is a feature of the legal systems treatment of road crash deaths that remorse and lack of willful intent to kill can play such a mitigating part in assessing the severity of the offence. “Road safety” is often an inversion of reality: in court it is sometimes difficult to see whether the person who was killed was the victim, or the person legally responsible for killing them.
2.  A persistent theme in excusing lethal driving is the “momentary lapse of attention” trope. But deaths are rarely caused by people who have been driving perfectly and just happened to have “lapsed” at the precise time when their victim happened to be in “the wrong place at the wrong time”. And in this case, according to the driver’s own account, driving while being unable to see ahead had been occurring for some time.
3.  The absolutely basic point here is made by the prosecuting lawyer: Luker should have adapted his driving style if the conditions were poor. This is just reiteration of the basic rule in the Highway Code, as well as simple common sense.  It is worth looking at this a bit more: despite having described his inability to see where he was going, the defendant could still say in court “I just don’t understand why I didn’t see him,” and “  ”I would have done everything in my power to avoid any accident” when all that was required was driving in such a way that he could see where he was going. If that was impossible, perhaps stopping driving for a while? Inconvenient, but within “everything in my power”. Some might see this simply as a psychological mechanism to deal with guilt. Cognitive dissonance or another process of defending the psyche. I think, instead, we should look at the culture which sustains these beliefs.

Eilidh Cairns

…Joao Lopes was fined £200 and had three points put on his licence after pleading guilty to driving with uncorrected defective eyesight, the only charge brought in connection with Eilidh’s death, and one that the driver had initially denied.

The magistrates sitting at Kingston Magistrates Court did not exercise their discretion to impose a driving ban on the 55-year-old from Dagenham.

However, just three months after the fatal incident in Notting Hill in February 2009, Lopes had failed an eye test and his driving licence was revoked. He got it back in April 2010, and returned to driving HGVs.

+++

We will look again at this case when reporting on the See Me Save Me campaign. Suffice it to say that there is in this, as the other cases, evidence of driving without being able or willing to see where the guilty driver was going.

But it is worse than that. I would argue that a key reason why motorists feel they can get away with justifying bad driving is the “Sorry Mate I Didn’t See You” (SMIDSY) excuse. (See the CTC’s campaign against SMIDSY).And this excuse is facilitated by precisely the kind of campaigns which put the onus of responsibility to “Be Seen” on the least dangerous to others, rather than requiring those who are dangerous to others to watch out for their potential victims.

The most basic rule of safe driving, in the Highway Code and elsewhere, has been to “Never drive in such a way that you can not stop within visible distance“. (In the current Highway Code this is expressed as

“126: Stopping Distances: Drive at a speed that will allow you to stop well within the distance you can see to be clear.”)

 But this is eroded, not just by failure to have proper speed limits and their compliance, but by the assumption that if motorists don’t “see” their victims, it is the victim’s fault. Whether by lengthening sight lines or other measures, the underlying belief system thrusts the onus of risk on to motorists’ actual or potential victims. It is not just a lack of speed control, or the failure to weed out motorists who can’t see where they are going. It is a cultural belief that you don’t have to fulfill a responsibility to properly watch out for those you may hurt or kill. And this culture is not just colluded with, but actually promoted by a “road safety” movement with promotion of “hi-viz” to be worn by those outside cars

I emphasise “watching out for” because what is required is a thorough process where drivers consider the possible positions of those they may drive into, think about their need to avoid doing so, and drive accordingly. The image of a pedestrian or cyclist on the retina of the driver is just the first part of this process. And the key element is searching – watching out or looking out – for these people in the first place. It is an active process which is far more effective than any amount of hi-viz, which may be irrelevant anyway. I am regularly told by motorists that they see plenty of cyclists without lights at night. Indeed: if they are driving properly (albeit in an urban area with street lighting) they will indeed see unlit cyclists.

With regard to promotion of hi-viz etc., let me be quite clear: my argument is not just that this is rather unsavoury victim-blaming and morally objectionable. It is that it exacerbates the very problem it claims to address.

Meanwhile, we have campaigns for cyclist safety which don’t seem to have offered any significant attempt to address this central issue. There is no reference to even the operation of existing law, let alone changes in it, in The Times eight-point campaign. Nor in Ministerial responses to it. As usual, the gorilla in the room – danger from incorrect use of motor vehicles – is ignored.

However the highway and vehicles are engineered, drivers are likely to have the potential to hurt and kill other road users ahead of them. We need a real road safety culture, based on the principles of Road Danger Reduction, which requires them to act accordingly and not shift responsibility on to their potential or actual victims.

 Photo: Jack Thurston (The Bike Show)

Last night RDRF Committee members Dr. Robert Davis and Ken Spence took part in the “flashride” organised to show cyclists’ presence to MPs ahead of today’s debate. It was a happy and peaceful event with hundreds (or more)  turning out to support ways to reduce danger to cyclists and others. We’re pleased to be part of this movement, not least with the joyful way it manifests itself.

Unfortunately, my view is that little of benefit will come from today’s debate. I hope this is wrong – but here’s why I’m pessimistic.

Let’s look at the motion:

That this House believes that cycling is an extremely efficient form of transport which is good for health and the environment; supports successive governments’ commitment to encourage the use of bikes and reduce the number of cyclist-related accidents; notes with concern that the number of cyclists killed on Britain’s roads rose by 7 per cent. between 2009 and 2010; further notes that a disproportionate number of cycling accidents involve vans and lorries; supports The Times’ Cities Fit for Cycling campaign; and calls on the Government to take further action to improve cycling infrastructure and reduce the number of casualties on roads.

Julian Huppert MP, who is behind it, can be counted on to say sensible things about cycling. But what exactly does the motion amount to? Consider the following:

• “…supports successive government’s commitment…” Yes, I have heard this since my first “road safety” conference in 1984: the government, then with Lynda Chalker MP as Minister, “supports” cycling. Except, is this “support” actually support?

 * “…reduce the number of casualties on roads”. Which can be taken – and will in the debate – to mean more or less whatever you want. There is a long history of “road safety” interventions which have no beneficial, or even a negative, effect. As we have noted continually, and most recently here, “fewer casualties” does not actually mean that the cyclist environment has become safer, or even if the chances of being hurt or killed (the rate per journey travelled) have gone down. If we had more civilised society, with (for example) three times as much cycling and half as high a chance of being injured or killed, we would have more casualties amongst cyclists.

• “…Improve cycling infrastructure…” First of all, almost all cycling will be carried out on areas where there is no “cycling infrastructure”. Secondly, what exactly is being referred to here? – what kind of “infrastructure” – off-road routes, segregated tracks, Advisory Cycle Lanes? It is rather worrying that the Editor of The Times, whose campaign has sparked off the debate, is talking about cyclists “not being a hindrance” to motorists. Is “cycling infrastructure” about getting cyclists out of “the way” of motorists?

• “…Government to take further action…” A cynic might note that it could hardly take less. The issue is of course that the current government is locked into a programme based on car dependence and unsustainable transport policy.

 As transport professionals we are used to politely working with other organisations and proceeding quietly with whatever incremental progress we can get. But ultimately we keep on coming up the same old problems which are likely to prevent us from moving forward after today’s parliamentary debate.

Essentially, the objective for cyclists – and for all road users – is to reduce danger at source: danger from the (ab)use of motor vehicles in general. It involves questioning the basic sense of entitlement involved in car culture. It involves thinking about the kind of transport system we have, and not just in cities – as if cyclists cease to exist outside them.

More specifically:

• There is nothing in The Times campaign about the kind of law we need and the enforcement of even existing law.
• While The Times campaign has back of the envelope figure for funding, there is no mention of financial commitment in the EDM. Should it be too difficult to talk about 1 or 2% levels of funding for cycle specific budgets out of the Transport for London budget, for example?
• Throughout, the whole discussion is exemplified by the Prime Minister’s comment that cyclists are “taking their lives in their hands” when cycling in London. We have commented on the “dangerising” of cycling  – suffice it to say that this will probably not help us to reduce road danger but continue the prejudice that urban cyclists are “asking for trouble”.
• Watch out in the debate for discussion of “mutual respect” which glosses over the difference in potential lethality to others of drivers on the one hand, and cyclists on the other.
• Watch out for discussion of “cycleways”, “cycle tracks”, cycle paths”, “cycle infrastructure” based on the idea that some (generally unspecified) engineering can sort out the problems created by motorisation – basically by getting cyclists out of the motorists’ “way”.

 I hope I’m wrong. But do watch out see if road danger is properly addressed, or absent from proper discussion. Yet again.

We signed this note since it states some very simple and basic points which any reasonable person or organisation should be able to support. The down side is that - precisely because it is so basic -we will need something a lot more forceful and detailed if we are to get a genuine commitment towards achieving a properly civilised approach to the safety and well being of cyclists (and indeed other road users). After all,  if it hadn’t been so basic the AA would not have signed it. (And don’t hold your breath for seeing the RDRF logo alongside the AA’s again!) 

Cycling Debate: Thursday 23rd February: 1430-1730: Westminster Hall

More than 25,000 people have so far pledged their support for the Times’ Cities Fit For Cycling campaign. A debate has been scheduled in Westminster Hall for February 23. A wide group of organisations now calls on all MPs to take this opportunity to make a real difference by standing up for more and safer cycling in Britain.

Cycling has a fantastic range of benefits: for our health, for our streets, for our economy, our environment, and our wallets. During the last decade, cycle use in Britain grew by 20% (and by more than 100% in some cities), while cyclists’ casualties fell by 17%. More and safer cycling can, and should, go hand in hand. Yet despite this, improvements in safety for Britain’s cyclists have not kept up with that of other road users, and lags well behind that of neighbouring countries with much higher cycle use.

Quite rightly, there is now a high-profile campaign calling for cycle safety to be improved in Britain. This briefing note offers headline information on the key issues which impact on the future of cycling in Britain and includes links to further information on the vital next steps.

The key issues

A. Commitment to cycling

Cycling is booming in Britain and said to be worth £3 billion to the economy. But while between £10 and £20 per head of population is spent annually on cycling in the Netherlands, the equivalent average figure for Britain is £1. Following the national government’s successful funding of the Cycling City and Towns programme 2005-2011, which spent at least £10 per head of population annually – national government and local authorities should secure commitments to match this level of funding.

B. Encouragement of cycling – Smarter Travel Choices .

National Government and local authorities must commit to supporting safe and active travel within a wider programme of ‘smarter choices’ investment. By committing to this policy direction, we are more likely to see a joined-up package of measures.

C. Slower speeds : in residential and built up areas.

There are significant road safety benefits with a 20 mph speed limit. National government must commit to supporting, encouraging and funding local authorities to follow many of their peers and make the change to 20mph.

D. Improved provision for cycling

: to include a commitment to reviewing major roads and junctions, prioritising dedicated space for cyclists where speed limits are not already 20mph and ensuring quality infrastructure which ensures safe reintroduction of cyclists to the highway where relevant.

E. A strategic and joined-up programme of road user training

: to include better information, provision and training for all road user types including cyclists from an early age.

F. A focus on HGVs: heavy lorries are associated with a high risk

of death or very serious injury to cyclists. Despite being just 6% of road traffic, lorries are involved in around 20% of all cyclists’ fatalities. Government policies must ensure a commitment to the roll-out of a comprehensive package of measures to reduce the risk of HGVs to cyclists.

G. Improved road traffic law and enforcement

: Traffic law must do more to protect the most vulnerable road users such as cyclists, pedestrians, children and older people. In addition, traffic policing teams much be given more resource to ensure that existing laws can be enforced more effectively and sentencing must be appropriate when drivers cause harm.

H. Improved data

: the information that records how many people are cycling is very poor at the national level and inconsistent at the local level. This makes it difficult to monitor what is happening and which interventions have greatest impact.

Why do we need more cycling?

Cycling has a wide range of benefits for our own health, our streets and neighborhoods, the economy and the environment:

Health benefits

Cycling in mid-adulthood typically gives the fitness of a person 10 years younger, and a life expectancy 2 years above the average. People who do not commute regularly by cycle have a 39% higher mortality rate than those who do. Thanks to these extra life-years, the health benefits of cycling far outweigh the risks involved.

Physical inactivity is estimated to cost the UK economy £8.2 billion a year, while obesity represents a further economic cost of around £3.5 billion.

Economic benefits:

Cycling makes extremely efficient and economical use of road-space. One lane of a typical road can accommodate 2,000 cars per hour – or 14,000 cycles.

Encouraging cycling also makes workers more productive and reduces the costs of absenteeism.

Climate and other environmental benefits:

A person making the average daily commute of 4 miles each way would save half a tonne of carbon dioxide per year if they switched from driving to cycling.

If we doubled cycle use by switching from cars, this would reduce Britain’s total greenhouse emissions by 0.6 million tonnes, almost as much as switching all London-to-Scotland air travel to rail.

Why do we need safer cycling?

A depressingly high proportion of short trips are made by car, 23% under a mile, 33% 1 – 2 miles, and 79% 2 – 5 miles. Many people in Britain would like to choose the bike as an alternative way to travel but often feel put off by a fear of traffic. As well as perceived risks which prevent take-up of cycling, there are many real dangers on the road which must be confronted everyday by cyclists.

The speed of motor traffic

has an effect on the severity of injuries suffered by cyclists – severity increases with the speed limit, meaning that riders are more likely to suffer serious or fatal injuries on higher speed roads.

The poor design of roads and junctions

increases the danger to cyclists. Almost two thirds of cyclists killed or seriously injured were involved in collisions at, or near, a road junction, with T junctions being the most commonly involved.

Irresponsible driver behaviour

has been shown to be the cause of many collisions with cyclists. In collisions involving a bicycle and another vehicle, the most common key contributory factor recorded by the police is ‘failed to look properly’ by either the driver or rider, especially at T junctions. ‘Failed to look properly’ was attributed to the car driver in 74% of injury collisions in London and to the cyclist in 26%.

Heavy goods vehicles (HGVs) present a particular danger for cyclists

, especially in London where around 50% of cyclist fatalities involve an HGV. These often occur when an HGV is turning left at a junction’. About one quarter of accidents resulting in serious injury to a cyclist involved an HGV, bus or coach ‘passing too close’ to the rider.

Safety in numbers

is the principle that the more people we get cycling, the safer they are. Given that we know that lots of people are put off cycling by the danger/perceived danger we need to work hard to reduce exposure to risk by reducing potential conflicts between cyclists and other road users. Governments have for too long failed to commit to sustained investment to promote cycling as a normal everyday choice of transport.

This briefing note was put together by members of the UK Cycling Alliance (UKCA) and has been supported by a wider group of organisations. For more information about UKCA members, please see: The Bicycle Association, British Cycling, Cyclenation, CTC, LCC and Sustrans

____________________

 and don’t forget the cycle ride on Wednesday 22nd in support of cyclist safety.

And …to write to your MP with the above briefing asking them to attend and support the EDM.

dangerous Pronunciation: /?de?n(d)?(?)r?s/ adjective    able or likely to cause harm or injury

Because what I think we need to do is examine the Paradox of Safety on the Roads: doing so should enable us to more accurately work out what the problem of safety for cyclists is about. Unless we do so, there is a very real danger (that word again…) that the current campaign will be fruitless.

IS CYCLING DANGEROUS…?

Excuse what may appear to be pedantic. But do bear with me. This discussion is absolutely vital to cyclists’ safety.

The first issue is the central one of considering danger on the road: who or what is dangerous to whom? The “road safety” (RS) industry has glossed over this question since its inception. After all, the RS movement was founded by and for the nascent motorist lobby, and it was important for them to point the figure away from the motorised. The road danger reduction (RDR) movement has taken the opposite point of view: there is a need to see this question as absolutely fundamental to achieving safer roads for all road users.

In terms of civilised morality and natural law there is a crucial difference between being endangered and endangering others. Perhaps more importantly, safety for all road users, particularly those like cyclists who are outside motor vehicles, cannot be achieved without grasping this distinction.

This does not mean that cyclists are incapable of hurting (or very occasionally, even killing) other road users. And pedestrians can hurt or kill cyclists, and other pedestrians. It is also the case that all road users will have responsibilities towards others as and when we share the roads. It’s just that the motorised have a massively higher degree of potential lethality. This basic point would be accepted by Health and Safety regimes in other areas of modern life, but hasn’t really taken hold when it comes to getting about on the road.

This might appear to be “stating the bleeding obvious”. But it isn’t properly accepted by the powers that be, and it has to be if we are going to get a civilised solution to the problems of road danger in general, and particularly for cyclists. We have to go with the transitive (danger to others) meaning of danger – as in the dictionary definition above – rather than the intransitive (danger to oneself) one.

Confusing these two meanings increases the tendency to see cycling itself as the problem. It can help if discussions referring to the chances of cyclists being hurt or killed should refer to how hazardous – as opposed to dangerous – it may be.

 THE PARADOX OF SAFETY ON THE ROAD

A paradox is an apparent contradiction. That is not an actual contradiction, but an apparent one. This may seem pedantic, but this is important – so please bear with me.

The issue is about how hazardous (as opposed to dangerous) cycling is.

The paradox is about how – one the one hand – we have an appalling problem of danger on the road for all road users, particularly those outside cars.

This problem is not simply dreadful because innocent people can get hurt or killed, or even restricted in their choice of the more benign modes of transport for themselves and their families. Or the possible discomfort or inconvenience for them due to road danger.

It is dreadful because it is not – at least not fully – seen as a problem of road danger. Those responsible, whether highway or vehicle engineers or individual motorists, are not held accountable for their danger. The persistent refusal to do this is the issue that concerns us, and it is a moral and political issue that is not expressed by statistics of casualties.

The difficulty of actually discussing it in these terms is, in my view, scandalous. The absence of proper discourse about road danger is in itself a grotesque problem.

That is one side of the paradox: it is not too extreme to say that there is a monster on the backs of cyclists and others – one which is made more difficult to combat by being hard to talk about.

The other side is that cycling is not that hazardous – at least not as many who are campaigning (or claim to be campaigning) for cyclists’ safety appear to think.

Lets’ look at these two sides in more detail – and why we have to do so.

Consider this passage commenting on the “Save our Cyclists” campaign:   “Motor-traffic in general, the haulage business  in particular, kills people. They (sic) kill people at a rate that would be a national scandal if any other source – bad food hygiene? enemy action? unmanned level-crossings? – were responsible. A more sensible headline could have been ‘Tame Our Trucks’. The story is of death and life-changing injury consequent on hyper-mobility of goods and people. Focusing only on the hazards of cycle-travel distracts from this.

If you take the trouble to ride in a considered and conscious style you are – in Inner London at least – super safe. The difficulty is how we campaign to make travelling by bike even less hazardous, even more pleasurable, without reinforcing the widespread misconception that it’s somehow lethal (my emphasis).”

Indeed. What do we know about the chances, albeit retrospectively calculated, of being hurt or killed while cycling on the roads of London (which is where the “Save our Cyclists” campaign originates”?

The table below is based on figures given by Green Party Member of the London Assembly Jenny Jones.

 Jenny Jones has used more recent figures, including the less reliable “Slight Injuries” statistics to show that the declining casualty rate among London’s cyclists has evened out or worsened over the last three or four years (under Mayor Johnson’s administration). However, the more reliable Killed and Seriously Injured line red line doesn’t show a significant dip in the last few years, which anyway would be relatively short term and difficult to draw conclusions from.

What we can say – and Jenny Jones has agreed on this point – is that there has been a significant decline in the chances of being hurt or killed as a cyclist since 2000. We can also say that – albeit allowing for the very rough estimation of a typical cyclist being a commuter making some 440 trips per year – is that the chances of having been reported as Seriously Injured (almost all KSIs are the Serious Injuries) run at some one every quarter of a million trips.

Or put it another way: in 2010 there were – allowing for 2.5 trips per cyclist per day – about 520 cyclists for each cyclist KSI. That means about one serious injury every ten lifetimes of daily cycling in London. With Slight injuries you can increase that to one in a lifetime. Of course, the majority of minor injuries are not reported – but then they are minor injuries.

Whichever way you calculate it, the chances of being reported as hurt or killed are pretty low.

But so what? What does this actually tell us? And – as explained above, there is still the monster of road danger out there.

 SO WHAT DO WE WANT?

 At this point it’s time to take a deep breath. Working out what the figures tell us has to be related to what we think the problem is.

 For the RDRF the problem is not cycling: focusing on cycling and its hazards tends to dangerise http://www.copenhagenize.com/search/label/dave%20horton cycling, cause problems and impede solutions. While this is not the intention of most campaigners, the culture of our society often reinforces its injustices while apparently aiming to be on the side of those suffering from them.

 For us the problem is basically the road danger presented to cyclists, primarily by (ab)use of motor vehicles. Anything that impedes getting to grips with this is bad not just for cyclists, but others threatened by road danger and those wanting a sustainable transport system.

 In this light, let’s see what the numbers can tell us – and how focusing on the hazards of cycling can do wrong:

1. SiN and Critical Mass.

The reduction in the KSIs per cyclist journey in London is key evidence for risk compensation/adaptive behaviour by the motorized road user. Let us take just one example of this: cyclists killed in collisions with HGVs.

 While this number is too small for high quality statistical conclusions, the fact remains that this number of deaths is roughly the same now as it was in 2000. Since that time, the number of cyclists in the areas where most of the deaths have occurred  has at more or less trebled, while the number of lorries has increased.

While there have been some campaigns to encourage cyclists to watch out for lorries and avoid undertaking them, particularly at junctions, it would seem right to suggest that most of the change has occurred due to changes in lorry driver behaviour.

Again, some of this is due to campaigns by RoadPeace , and cyclist-awareness training taken by about 2% of London’s HGV drivers, but this cannot account for more than a small part of the massive reduction in the chances of a typical inner London cyclist being killed in a collision with n HGV.

Any change can be seen as multi-factoral, but a principal cause is the change in behaviour by lorry drivers aware of the increased number of cyclists around them. It does not have to be an increase in friendliness or respect by drivers, simply an awareness of what they may regard as an increasing hazard. While courtesy and politeness may well be desirable, the crucial factor is the pressure exerted by the “critical mass” or increased amount of cyclist traffic. This is the force responsible for the Safety in Numbers (SiN) effect, rather than any polite requests through publicity.

This does not mean that nothing apart from an increase in cyclist numbers is required. But it does indicate that not increasing the numbers of cyclists increases the chances of cyclists being hurt or killed.

 2. Cycling and life saving.

Quite apart from the reduction in danger to others when moving from car to bike, and the reduction in noxious and other emissions when moving from most forms of motorized forms of transport to bike, cycling increases the chances of those doing it of staying healthy and alive. There is debate about how much this is – but we can say that you are more likely to die from not cycling than cycling.

 3. Patronising and victim blaming.

Cyclists may well wonder why they are supposed to belong to somebody else, and whom that may be – note the phrase used by the Times and a previous (fizzled-out) campaign by The Independent: “Save our Cyclists” (my emphasis). As Mae West once said:  “Men are always trying to protect me. I wonder what they are trying to protect me from”. The Times campaign doesn’t focus on the ordinary motorists who are the primary threat to cyclists and all other road users.This is not ungrateful or pedantic. It is trying to get to grips with the issues – and warning of how a victim-focused approach can turn into a victim-blaming one. The numbers tell us that people (in rather larger numbers than those of just cyclists) are killed and hurt in collisions involving all types of motorised road user. Who should be the focus of attention.

 4. Other road user groups -  motorcyclists.

If we are going to look at a group of road users in terms of their high tendency to get hurt or killed, the obvious choice is motorcyclists. We don’t seem to read headlines about “saving our motorcyclists”, however. Yet this group is far more at risk than pedal cyclists, with about 1/5 road deaths being those of powered two-wheeler users, with a similar proportion of trips to cyclists.

So why are motorcyclists not focused on? I suggest that this is partly because they are already seen as having their problems addressed by staples of the “road safety” industry – crash helmets and training. Yet despite – or because of – these “road safety” initiatives, motorcyclists are the most at risk group of road users. Of course, motorcycling is often seen as “dangerous” – but not because of the threat it poses to others – particularly pedestrians who are killed in collisions with motorcyclists rather more often than with cyclists, despite what anti-cycling prejudice might suggest.

 Yet again, the culture of “road safety” talks about danger to motorcyclists rather than danger from motorcyclists.

5.  Lorries or other motor vehicles.

The Times campaign focuses on HGVs. Obviously, since about half the collisions where cyclists die involve lorries – and a similar number of pedestrians are killed under the wheels of lorries every year. However, the vast majority of vehicles involved in crashes with cyclists are not lorries, but other motor vehicles, particularly cars.  Is it too much to suggest that – as usual with “road safety” – it is uncomfortable to point the finger at journalists and readers of The Times?

 6. “Reducing casualties”.

The early day Motion on Thursday   includes: “ That this House … supports successive governments’ commitment to …reduce the number of cyclist-related accidents; … calls on the Government to take further action to …reduce the number of casualties on roads”.

But is that what we want? Cycling casualties are among the lowest they have ever been.  If we had the cyclist casualty rate of the Netherlands which is so often quoted (about 2 or 3 times lower than in the UK or for Amsterdam compared to London) and 2 – 3 times as many people cycling (as in the Mayor of London’s targets), we would have the same number of cyclist casualties. If we had a cycling modal share of towns and cities in Northern Europe (not just the Netherlands and Denmark, but Germany, and Belgium. Or Switzerland. Or Sweden) there is no way that aggregate cyclists casualties would be reduced, particularly if there are significant proportions of elderly people among the cyclists.

 What the numbers show is that – it is not the numbers that are important.

 A civilised response to the issue of cyclist safety is to reduce danger at source and – not least as a key way of doing this – making those responsible for danger (highway and vehicle engineers as well as individual motorists and those charged with enforcing the laws supposedly regulating them) accountable. It means not “dangerising” cycling and focussing on the motorised: the next post addresses this in more detail.

After all, “safety on the road” can mean all kinds of things: from misguided and counterproductive fantasies through to getting the most vulnerable out of the way of the most dangerous. Public figures have signed up to The Times campaign – as they would to motherhood and apple pie. Below we analyse the campaign in detail: its potential for reducing danger on the road to cyclists and other road users, what will be required to pursue these objectives – and the problems that have already surfaced.

Let’s take a detailed look at The Manifesto,  “Cycling should be both safe and pleasurable. Ministers, mayors and local authorities must build cities that are fit for cycling.”

The Times has launched a public campaign and 8-point manifesto calling for cities to be made fit for cyclists:

Point by point:

1. Trucks entering a city centre should be required by law to fit sensors, audible truck-turning alarms, extra mirrors and safety bars to stop cyclists being thrown under the wheels.

Lorries are implicated in about half the deaths of cyclists in London, despite being a much smaller proportion of the traffic mix. It’s also worth mentioning that a roughly similar number of pedestrians are killed in incidents involving lorries every year in London.  As the superb blogger of weowntheroad.cc points out,  why not have “Tame our Trucks” rather than “Save our Cyclists“? It depends where you want to focus your attention.

Still, before getting too negative, it is obviously unacceptable that lorries should be driven with their drivers being unable to see pedestrians, cyclists or motorcyclists in close proximity to them. Such vehicles should be regarded as “unfit for purpose” for use on our roads. Of course, installing devices enabling lorry drivers to be aware of other road users around them is only the first step to reducing danger from such vehicles. Other technologies which can prevent human beings from going under the wheels of such vehicles need to be developed and installed on all such vehicles.

2. The 500 most dangerous road junctions must be identified, redesigned or fitted with priority traffic lights for cyclists and Trixi mirrors that allow lorry drivers to see cyclists on their near-side.

This still seems to be locked in to the lorries question alone, when the vast majority of cyclist casualties do not involve them. But let’s look further at what is meant by the most dangerous junctions – this is where discussion gets interesting. the most conventional way of doing this is to look at the aggregate number of those reported and recorded as “Killed and Seriously Injured ” (KSI).

However,  this does not tell you what the  have been of cyclists being reported as hurt in these categories – we would need a KSI rate (e.g. KSIs per journey or mile travelled, or at least the numbers of cyclists passing through a junction). After all, many junctions are so scary for even experienced cyclists that they do not travel through them – the KSI number may be low precisely because cycling through that junction is seen correctly as hazardous. In fact we would need to add on objective measures, such as the numbers of lanes needing to be crossed, the flows and speeds of motor traffic etc. Furthermore, we can prioritise according to likely demand from cyclists.

Hopefully these factors will be taken into account, as with TfL’s junctions review.

Of course – negativity alert – this is a focus on major junctions. The vast majority of junctions won’t be considered. Also, junctions attract attention because there are far more vehicular movements at them, which allow for more types of conflict. And a city like London is heavily junctioned. Yet the TfL Cycle Safety Action Plan points out that the main category of collisons involving cyclists is “close proximity” collisions not necessarily associated with junctions.

So there really is a lot more to think about in terms of the sites of cyclist involved collisions.

3. A national audit of cycling to find out how many people cycle in Britain and how cyclists are killed or injured should be held to underpin effective cycle safety.

That’s fine. A criticism is that , as with all statistical reports on cyclist casualties is just that – it is centred on the victim. And a victim-centred approach can often turn into victim-blaming. The simple fact of the matter is that those legally responsible for a good half of the incidents where cyclists get hurt or killed are implicated in hurting or killing  all other kinds of road users. And they are generally motorists.

4. Two per cent of the Highways Agency budget should be earmarked for next generation cycle routes, providing £100 million a year towards world-class cycling infrastructure. Each year cities should be graded on the quality of cycling provision.

Nice to see money being mentioned. If it were the Netherlands , the figure would be more like £1,200 million – that’s right £1.2 billion a year, twelve times as much at some £20 per head per year. £100 million would be about right for London alone, and is the sort of figure that has often been suggested by campaigners as it is (a) about 1% of the Transport for London annual budget and (b) it is the kind of money cyclists would get if each daily cyclist – at the moment, without the projected doubling of cycling by 2026 that both Mayor’s have argued for – would get if they got the kind of subsidy bus (and even more, tube or train) passengers get.

But what exactly are “next generation” cycle routes? Are we getting another fantasy of “getting cyclists out of the way”?

5. The training of cyclists and drivers must improve and cycle safety should become a core part of the driving test.

Let’s consider what “training” actually means. Often thought of as a means of regulating and controlling, actually it is – for motorists – a form of enabling and empowering. By contrast, cycle training, which can be enabling and empowering under the National Standards which have been promoted by RDRF members from the late 1990s onwards, is often something which is not. The point is to organise training so that it supports the more benign mode with a sense of rights in addition to responsibility: with motorist training the balance need sto be shifted the other way. We need a lot more of impressing motorists with the problems they pose to others. After all, as the motorist lobby constantly reminds us, motorists have had to “take a test” – e.g. drive properly once for 25 minutes – for over 70 years. Has that properly regulated motorist danger?

And would impressing the need to drive carefully on new motorists actually work? Apart from taking about 30 years before even most motorists had had the experience of once being advised to obey the law and Highway Code, it is hardly likely to have a significant effect. Of course, if motorists were to have to retake a driving test every few years – a slightly more difficult one every 4 years would be in tune with what might be expected with the kind of Health and Safety regualtions we see elsewhere  in modern life.

Let’s see the motoring organisations, backed up by The Times, go for that.

6. 20mph should become the default speed limit in residential areas where there are no cycle lanes.

20 mph on urban roads was argued for by the architect of motorised post-war urban Britain, Colin Buchanan. from the 1960s onwards. It is typical throughout northern Europe. It is not radical, but something with danger reducing benefits , mainly for pedestrians. But what (negativity alert) are “residential areas”? For people who speak English, as opposed to transport plannerese – as a transport planner I know how we speak – just about all of London would count as residential. But I doubt that this is what is on offer.

And when the AA offers its support, note that this is only in some residential areas. Which means that we are likely to have to deal with continued breaking of the 30 mph speed limit, and continued forgetting of people who have to walk and cycle in non-residential areas. Don’t they count?

7. Businesses should be invited to sponsor cycleways and cycling super-highways, mirroring the Barclays-backed bicycle hire scheme in London.

The “cycle super highways” have been an object of criticism since their inception. At present they cover some 0.3% of London’s roads. If sponsorship for CSHs - while not forgetting that cyclists will be on all London’s roads apart from motorways - helps making them reasonable, that’s fine.

8. Every city, even those without an elected mayor, should appoint a cycling commissioner to push home reforms.”

Would another layer of bureaucracy to get what should already be in place help?But that’s too much negativity: a Cycling Czar may help.

We hope The Times campaign does some overall good. We felt the need to give our support. But genuine support means honesty, and we will be pointing out to the Times where  – and why – things are going wrong with it. Our posts will try and do this.

 At this point I confess experience – I briefly held the honour of being the “National Rights Officer” for BC’s precursor, the British Cycling Federation (BCF). This post didn’t last long. The BCF and now BC are basically not geared up for addressing transport policy and safety issues involving cyclists in the way that the CTC has been over the last decade or so, let alone the various urban cyclists’ groups.

Some old letter head...

 The current campaign is based on 800 self-selected BC members giving their views. (An interesting feature of all membership organisations is the way that policy is decided by members opinions being collected in various ways).

 And these views have a lot to do with what is required to reduce danger to cyclists: reducing speeds from 30 to 20 mph in urban areas; trying to get drivers to be aware of the right distance required for safe overtaking; removing lorry drivers “blind spots”; and not having cycle lanes that end suddenly.

 The BC Chief Executive is also correct to echo the idea of Safety in Numbers put forward by the CTC “…evidence suggests that the more people who cycle, the safer it becomes.”. This is a notion based on the adaptive behaviour of road users to perceived hazards, explored by the road safety academic Reuben Smeed decades ago, elaborated here , and here and studiously ignored by the road safety establishment ever since.

Where it gets dubious is when it comes to our old friend “mutual respect”. We are, so we are told, All in This Together. The BC Chief Executive, Ian Drake, says:

“It’s essential that we get away from this sense of ‘them and us’ between motorists and cyclists. Most people who ride a bike also drive a car which suggests there should already be some mutual understanding. Now more needs to be done to build on this and create culture in which all road users can better respect each other.

“And it’s important to stress that cyclists have as much of a role to play in this as motorists, by ensuring they adhere to the rules of the road with regards to things like stopping at red traffic lights and signalling correctly.”

Let’s be clear about this: I’m all for courtesy and being polite to one another. It’s nice to be nice. If we all do the Right Thing (whatever that might be) then nobody will be hurt or killed. It will all be just peachy. To mix the fruit metaphors, life on the roads would be a bowl of cherries.

The only problem with basing on a strategy on this “even-stevens” approach is that it is at best rubbish and at worst a recipe for continuing danger wrapped up with victim-blaming. It won’t work.

Why, when I think it’s a good idea to be nice to people, do I say this? It should be obvious, but after 90 years of the “road safety” lobby, we need to explain.

The brutal fact of the matter is that we have a power differential on the road. This involves some road users (basically the motorised ones) having massive potential lethality and some others (generally speaking, those walking and cycling) having a lot less. This is apart from the fact that the latter – referred to as “Vulnerable Road Users” because, like the vast majority of travellers in the world, they happen to be outside cars – are particularly vulnerable to the danger posed by the former.

This absolutely fundamental feature of safety on the road has been systematically glossed over by the “road safety” lobby throughout its existence. We should all just try to be nice to each other. The fact that some types of road user are inevitably going to pose a threat to others, and that these others are going suffer however well they try and behave – whereas the converse is not true – is just left out of the picture.

But it gets worse. Far worse.

For at the same time as it advocates everybody being nice to each other, this same lobby has insisted that motorists are so inherently likely to break the rules and regulations – that they are inherently unwilling to and/or incapable of doing so – that their danger must be accepted and accommodated. It must be colluded and connived with.

Basically this comes down to engineering the vehicle and highway environment to idiot-proof motoring in the full knowledge that doing so will produce the idiots and exacerbate their idiocy. The relatively non-dangerous are urged to obey rules while the far more dangerous to others (let’s call them Dangerous Road Users, or “DRUs”) are actually being accommodated in their rule breaking.

This is then accepted by those claiming to be interested in the safety of their members: note the way in which a cyclist disobeying  traffic signal is put on the same level as far more lethal behaviour by motorists.

Or take the support for BC’s campaign by the representative of an organisation which came into being to pass through legislation (compulsory front seat belt wearing) based on the assumption that motorists are inherently likely to crash their cars. And which has been shown to increase danger to cyclists and pedestrians, actually being associated with more cyclist and pedestrian deaths immediately after it was introduced.

(The following is quoted without comment by the normally sensible BikeBiz site  “The findings were also welcomed by Rob Gifford, Executive Director of the Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety, who said: “This is very consistent with what we know about how best to further improve road safety and I think that the overall theme that measures should promote mutual respect and understanding between road users is exactly right.” )

Exploring these background issues may seem irrelevant, but I believe it is absolutely necessary in order to work out what may, or may not, be achieved. Take the “I’m also a motorist” trope: “Most people who ride a bike also drive a car which suggests there should already be some mutual understanding.” This may be true for adult BC members, but not necessarily the rest of humanity, but let’s leave that for the moment – let’s look at people who use different modes of transport.

Motorists who ride bicycles may – and I repeat “may” – be aware of some relevant problems for cyclists, such as overtaking too close, but that doesn’t mean they will become better drivers generally. Most of the problems created by motorists for other road users do not involve general bad intent towards others, and feature a general lack of ability or unwillingness to obey the regulations. Most motorists are pedestrians, but that does not mean they obey the regulations and laws whose infringement threatens pedestrians.  

In fact, it could make them more unlikely to support measures necessary for cyclist safety. Note that the measure to support 20 mph is qualified: “The reduction of urban speed limits from 30mph to 20mph would reduce the severity of injuries sustained in any accidents, although it was acknowledged that drivers might become agitated if they had to drive at that speed.”

So what will happen to this campaign? How exactly will it be pushed forward? I confess to having doubts about the best based of campaigns. And it is crucial that a campaign is based on a real understanding of – and willingness to confront – the power structures that underlie transport policy and safety on the road.

 I leave you with a new website which preaches a benign attitude by cyclists towards motorists – but, as its name implies, doing so from a position where cyclists claim a position of power and entitlement. This kind of claim is not evident in campaigns such as the one by BC.

RDRF is pelased to have supported Martin Porter in hisaction described below in his press release:

PRESS RELEASE:  HELMET CAMERA SECURES CONVICTION OF MOTORIST FOR A PUBLIC ORDER OFFENCE

Today at West London Magistrates Court, Scott Lomas was convicted of using threatening or abusive words and behaviour contrary to the Public Order Act 1986.  He was sentenced to a fine of £250, a victim surcharge of £15 and prosecution costs of £300 (a total of £565).

 The circumstances that gave rise to the conviction took place on the A315 near Hounslow in West Londonon 4^th November 2010.  Lomas had hooted at, and then shouted abuse at, a cyclist, Martin Porter, when he was unable to pass at a restriction in the carriageway width caused by a central traffic island.  The cyclist and motorist had passed and repassed each other several times with Lomas shouting abuse that culminated in a threat to kill Mr Porter.

 Porter recorded the incident on a helmet camera and later the same day reported the incident to the police who were disinclined to investigate.  After casual contact with the CPS in Hounslow the officer responsible for investigating the case decided upon ‘no further action’.  Mr Porter, who is a practising QC, wrote to the Director of Public Prosecutions and the CPS then required the police to investigate the offence and to submit the evidence to them.  Following an investigation, the same investigating police officer declined to defer the decision to the CPS and again chose ‘no further action’.    Only after a further complaint from Mr Porter, did a more senior Metropolitan Police Officer refer the file to the CPS, who agreed that a prosecution should take place.

 Lomas denied the charge against him until his submission that the case should be dismissed as an abuse of process, because the police officer had indicated to him that there would be no further action, was rejected by the Judge.  Thereafter he changed his plea to one of guilty.

 Lomas, who was aged 24 at the time of the incident, was in breach of a suspended prison sentence imposed by the Crown Court in April 2010 following his conviction on a count of malicious wounding.  It was decided not to refer the matter back to the Crown Court for possible implementation of his suspended sentence.

 Commenting after the verdict Martin Porter said

            “I am pleased that justice has now been done and that the Crown Prosecution Service had the moral fibre to reverse the Metropolitan Police’s attempts to drop this case notwithstanding the strength of the evidence.  It is sadly too much to hope that all mindless aggression and violence directed at cyclists will instantly cease but at least this conviction may help to discourage similar incidences of mindless ‘roadrage’ against vulnerable road users.”

            “I am very grateful to prosecuting counsel (a cyclist it transpires!) who dealt with the case efficiently and courteously. I am grateful too for the moral support I have received from the CTC, Roadpeace, The Road Danger Reduction Forum and the vast majority of cyclists who have contacted me.”

 Martin PorterQC is a leading personal injury lawyer practising at 2TempleGardens,LondonEC4Y 9AY and is also a keen amateur racing cyclist with Thames Velo.  All enquiries should be directed to his chambers on 020 7822 1200.  Martin is considering writing an article about his experience, as a victim of a crime, at the hands of the police and if you would be interesting in publishing such an article to a wide audience please contact him at mporter@2tg.co.uk

 ++++++++++++++

Dr. Robert Davis writes: A number of RDRF supporters have commented that this case only came to court because:

1. The victim was a practising QC with an interest in safety on the road.

2. This person was skilled enough in his knowledge of the law to write to the CPS and the DPP in a way which would make sense to them, and to persist after an investigating officer had twice declined to proceed.

3. He had to provide evidence from a camcorder.

Most people will not be in this position, although many will be members of cycling organisations like the LCC or CTC which can give the neccessary assistance.

The main point for me was that a police officer did not take this case at all seriously enough – an example of institutionalised discrimination against cyclists / for unlawful motorist behaviour - but that the police were pressured into doing so. Hopefuly this case will elad the Met and other Police forces to take this sort of incident more seriously in future.

According to Robert Halfon MP, families are being “crucified” by high petrol prices But should we see the Great British Motorist as Jesus nailed to the cross?

According to Halfon:

“High petrol and diesel prices are crippling our economy. Many motorists now pay a tenth of their income just to fill up the family car, and millions of families are suffering. Businesses are under immense pressure, especially the road freight industry. But petrol and diesel are now so astronomically expensive; it is COSTING the government money. This is because fewer people can afford to drive, leading to lower tax revenues. Therefore, this petition calls on the government to: 1) Scrap the planned 4p fuel duty increases, which are scheduled for January and August 2012. 2) Create a price stabilisation mechanism that smooths out fluctuations in the pump price. 3) Pressure big oil companies to pass on cheaper oil to motorists. 4) Set up a commission to look at market competitiveness, and radical ways of cutting fuel taxes in the longer term”…

So what exactly is actually happening? While a well organised campaign is orchestrated to present motorists as having the status of an oppressed minority, with little or no opposition, a quick fact check should be in order.

1. Over the New Labour years the costs of motoring fell dramatically.  While some price rises over the last few years may have slowed the overall reduction in the cost of motoring, overall the cost has fallen.
2. By comparison – and I’m talking about before the current government’s austerity packages were introduced – over the same period other financial problems became worse. For example: a massive increase in the costs of housing, both for sale (pushing a generation into money down the drain in renting, and in renting itself. Or the loss of private pensions. Or the need to pay far more for university education. More recently, the freezing of public sector workers pay – to take, again, just one example – is hitting many “ordinary families” just as much, if not more.
3. Then we have had numerous costings – using quite conventional methods of cost-benefit analysis, which normally tend to support the status quo - of the economic costs of motoring which far exceed the revenue raised from motoring.
4. A lot of the costs of motoring could be easily reduced – and should be – by more careful driving (to reduce insurance premiums) and more fuel-efficient driving. Most motorists could reduce some of the mileage they do. Then there is selecting more fuel –efficient vehicles. Or car sharing. Or walking and cycling short journeys.

But ultimately, rational argument is of limited value. Even the Daily Mail, in a typical rant has to quote that: “the relative tax take has been going down for a while: for every pound drivers spend at the forecourt, about 60p is now going to the Treasury compared to around 80p in every pound between 2001 and 2003”. It won’t stop the flow of inverted reality. Facts are not relevant.

But let’s examine the language:

• “Crucified”. Crucifixion was a particularly nasty punishment, quite apart from the iconic suffering of Jesus. Is being nailed alive to a cross really the same as having to pay as much for driving as you did a few years ago? Or having to drive in a more fuel efficient way? Or driving carefully to bring your insurance down? Or maybe working out a way to drive 5 or 10% less miles to bring your costs down? The self-pity is, of course, a special feature of car culture. As one blogger notes, train fares are rising rather more than the cosst of motoring: somehow train passengers are not being “crucified”.
• “Astronomically expensive”. Not compared to the costs it incurs, even by conventional cost-benefit analysis. And the costs of motoring have declined not just  compared with inflation over the years since New Labour came to power, but compared to vital areas of expenditure such as housing, or compared to the decline in pensions in the private sector, to take just one example.
• “It is COSTING (note block letters) the government money”. What is actually costing the government money is the usual billions of road building expenditure. Or the costs to the NHS of the adverse health effects of mass car use. Or not getting enough revenue in because the taxation on motoring is not high enough – massively raising the cost of petrol  would be a great way of pushing those still driving into far more fuel efficient cars with more revenue to government as well as the other benefits arising.
• “Crippling the economy”. That’s right: our disabled economy is in its wheelchair not because of the crises in finance capitalism, the collapsing Euro or any of that – it’s that motoring might not be getting progressively cheaper. That’s why “millions of families are suffering”.

But it isn’t. And this latest orgy of getting hold of the wrong end of the stick has to be seen for being just that. We do not have, “A War on the Motorist”. We have a war for the careless, rule and law –breaking motorist with a thoroughly inequitable system of funding transport choices

For if you have decided to become more and more car dependent – or just failed to question this process – anything that fails to fulfil ever more car dependency will disappoint.  Locked into the cycle of addictive behaviour, the feelings of victimhood – whatever the reality may be – are ever present.

I quote the blogger again: “Lowering fuel taxes may give a small amount of temporary relief to motorists who have no choice but to drive and are spending a lot of their income on fuel, but it will also disproportionately benefit motorists who are not very hard-pressed, choose to drive big thirsty cars and can well afford to fill them up. Also, taxes will have to rise elsewhere to compensate, at a time when there are calls to lower them to stimulate the economy.

Instead of debating the cost of fuel, which is largely out of the control of the Government, we should be debating how we manage down the use of fuel. Oil dependency is the underlying problem, and it’s what is delivering blows to the economy every time the underlying price of oil goes up”.

If your life, and your economy, is bound up with shifting more people and stuff further and faster, maybe the thing to do is to think about having different kinds of economy and ways of living. An abeyance of feelings of suffering and paranoia ( fed by endless descriptions of how you as a motorist are “hammered”, “punished”, “squeezed” etc.) would be just some of the benefits. Not to mention a rather more realistic view of the world, and less abuse of the English language.

I was interviewed by Jack Thurston about Road Danger Reduction and cycling for the entire July 4^th edition of the excellent “The Bike Show”  on Resonance FM. You can hear the interview here.