Lorry firm boss tells of effect of cyclist's death on the driver and the company

custardy

http://road.cc/content/news/100358-view-cab-lorry-firm-boss-tells-effect-cyclists-death-driver-and-company-video

So parts I will mention

The company mention the effect this death has caused on them and the driver.
However they were sent a video 2 months before her death with regards to one of their trucks driving(with both cyclists and car drivers at risk)

‘He[the driver] didn’t actually know he’d done it when he had the accident. He thought he’d clipped the curb [sic] and pulled a wheel arch off.

So whether the cyclist performed a poor manoeuvre or not,the driver wasnt looking in the left mirror(s?) at the turn?
clipping a kerb doesn't pull a wheel arch off does it? So i assume they mean mounted the kerb and hit railings?


Im not really sure on the point of mentioning the drivers cancer and stress in the context,aprt from to garner sympathy?

He wrote to Mayor of London Boris Johnson, saying, “enough is enough,” adding, “the media was relentless. ELB Partners were written about in newspapers and on social websites. These reports were totally misleading, and this is often the trend.”

If the reports were misleading,what was the response to the video months earlier?

According to ELB Partners, safety measures introduced by the firm to its 30 HGVs include CCTV, side bars, warning stickers and top-specification blind spot mirrors, while audible warnings stating “caution truck turning left” are also being rolled out across the fleet.

“None of this is mandatory,” said Eason, but I believe cameras should be.”

Commendable,but why does it take a death to fit something as simple as side bars & stickers?

He also told the magazine: “I’m not against cyclists, I am a cyclist myself as well as a motorcyclist and we have to learn to live together. However, training would be top of my list for cyclists.”

and here we go. As his driver in the video was trained?

(insert story of seeing a cyclist doing something)

He urged that cyclists be required to undertake training, and said he didn’t think a ban on lorries being driven in London at rush hour would work.

So all we need is cyclist training?

An editorial on that topic is headed “Vote Labour and pay over £2k,” a reference to the estimated cost per lorry to fit the safety equipment the Labour Party wants to see on HGVs.

Am I the only one that thinks £2k isnt a lot for fitting safety features to a large vehicle?
How much does one tyre cost?

oh,and the video
turn the sound down if you have kids around

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8i9zVnXE8TA

hugheskevi

I think Boris' reaction has been extremely disappointing. His response here was:

The mayor replied that he too was concerned about the “damaging nature of media coverage both in terms of the impact this can have on those involved and in discouraging people from cycling.”

This is a typical politician's response - that it is important to manage the media. Taking action may or may not be politically convenient, but essential to control adverse media.

Boris' response to the recent media coverage was to highlight the problem of cyclists wearing headphones. Which has no statistical support or other evidence, but does serve to try to shift the debate toward blaming cyclists, despite clear evidence to the contrary. That shifts the focus away from taking meaningful action, and enables half-hearted statements about the need for better training and awareness, and more understanding amongst road users (ie, the 'do nothing' option) to suffice.

Perhaps Boris feels he cannot be seen to question the cycling arrangements in the capital, as he has been in office sufficiently long to be accused of not taking adequate action should he do so. Added to that his close personal association with 'Boris bikes' and he may also fear that he could be accused of irresponsibly expanding cycling without putting in place the required infrastructure.

So from the media management angle, it may be best to just try to divert attention when adverse media becomes particularly uncomfortable - put out lots of police on the street in a high profile but short-term clampdown, and then withdraw them once the media focus moves elsewhere. Once police go back to normal work, everything is back to normal and job done. Nothing changes, it will all happen again at some point, but hopefully that will be some other politician's problem to deal with adverse media by the time it does happen again.

Marco_Panettone

The response of 'doing nothing' is often the best approach, otherwise you have the "something must be done - this is something - therefore we must do it". When this involves infrastructure it is costly, and it's more important to do it right than to do it quickly.

What we have now in London with cycle infrastructure is the consequence of the long-term 'doing something is better than doing nothing'. This has led to councils painting ASLs and cycles lanes(especially at junctions) and then telling cyclists not to use them because they're dangerous. If you provide a painted message to everyone as to where cyclists 'should' be you shouldn't be surprised when cyclists obey it. Paint does not sort out the inherent problem on it's own, but can be used (alongside physical segregation, and time segregation) to ensure cyclists are safe at junctions.

[Deleted User]

At least nearside cameras should be mandatory for buses and HGVs, and for all foreign trucks on their offside. They are often involved in the shunting into the barriers of passing cars, killing many , as they dive out into the second lane.
how expensive can it be ? I ve just bought a camera for my house which only costs £15 and works very well, if its as much as 2k for all the safety features, that will put off the average haulier

esuhl

sacsquacco wrote: »

I ve just bought a camera for my house which only costs £15 and works very well...

You mean a CCTV camera?! I walked past Maplin the other day and they were selling a CCTV kit for £400! Do you mind me asking where you got it from or what the model number was?

dacouch

Having both driven and cycled in Central London it is unlike any other place.

The sheer amount of traffic and cycles especially during rush hour is unsustainable.

There are very good cyclists and very bad cyclists as there are with drivers, London tends to attract the very worst of both breeds.

Something clearly needs to be done and cycle training could possibly help especially defensive cycle training.

Eventually all traffic apart from commercial vehicles will be banned from all or parts of Central London. Once that's done the Central London will be such a nicer and much safer place.

[Deleted User]

esuhl wrote: »

You mean a CCTV camera?! I walked past Maplin the other day and they were selling a CCTV kit for £400! Do you mind me asking where you got it from or what the model number was?

Ebay.. about £15 quid, came with a power supply and gubbins to tune it in to your telly. A freind got one and I thought I d try it. I was surprised how well it worked. Not the worlds best resolution I admit but could easily get something like this to run on 12v/24 v and work ok for the vital nearside areas of HGVs/buses and of course the deadly foreign trucks. £100 quid all in should do it, including a small 10 inch monitor.
As a frequent mway driver I live in fear of foreign trucks( and ours ) when they suddenly give 2 seconds of indicator before pulling into to the second lane
I ll have a look in my Ebay history to get the item number

bugslet

It doesn't matter what training you do, you get numpty LGV drivers that don't take in what the trainer says, just as you get numpty car drivers and numpty cyclists. Because of one incident, you can't then say that there haven't been improvements, you can only say that is one incidence of bad driving.

What the deputy coroner said was that the truck involved in the fatality, was signalling to turn left, correctly positioned and said at some points Carey would have been visible. As I have said before, if you have between 6 - 8 mirrors to look into at 5 seconds per mirror, someone can flit easily in and out of blind spots. The depouty coroner did not say that the driver should have seen her. She went on to express concerns that Carey was listening to the raido via headphones and did not see or appreciate that the LGV was about to turn left. The coroner went on to add that this is a sharp left turn and the need for the LGV to position itself to the right to make an acute turn may have caused confusion. To me it sounds as if mistakes were made by both sides, but I've seen cyclists on this board point out that you don't undertake a vehicle that is turning left when it is clearly doing so.

If there are railings on the kerb, then that might catch a wheel arch.

I think the point of mentioning the stress and that the driver couldn't bear to get back behind the wheel is that there seems to be part of the population that seems to think that we, hauliers and drivers are reckless, heartless people who don't care. Of course you aren't going to compare the grief and stress of the ladies family with that of the driver, but that doesn't negate the trauma of killing someone. I'm not sure I could carry on as the boss of a company if that happened to one of mine.

What he means by the reports being misleading is that all you hear is female charity worker crushed by careless lorry driver. The only other thing that driver did wrong was to miss her in the mirrors and that is very easy to do as I said before; what is not easy to do is to miss 30' of wagon indicating left. Then cycle into it. The press invariably blame the truck and driver, sometimes it's right, sometimes it isn't and the cyclist has to hold some responsibility.

At the time of Carey's death the haulier had already started fitting cameras to his vehicles and thinks that all London hauliers should have them, so no, he isn't saying that cyclist training is the answer. He's saying that we all have to live together and it's important to understand each other's perspective. Unless you have driven a truck, you can't understand the issues surrounding it. In an ideal world I'd like to see all road users spend half a day in a cab, obviously unfeasible, but it would help explain things to non-truckdrivers. Truck drivers have usually been a cyclist at some point,even if a long time ago and they are car drivers, they understand that element of road usage.

[Deleted User]

bugslet wrote: »

It doesn't matter what training you do, you get numpty LGV drivers that don't take in what the trainer says, just as you get numpty car drivers and numpty cyclists. Because of one incident, you can't then say that there haven't been improvements, you can only say that is one incidence of bad driving.

What the deputy coroner said was that the truck involved in the fatality, was signalling to turn left, correctly positioned and said at some points Carey would have been visible. As I have said before, if you have between 6 - 8 mirrors to look into at 5 seconds per mirror, someone can flit easily in and out of blind spots. The depouty coroner did not say that the driver should have seen her. She went on to express concerns that Carey was listening to the raido via headphones and did not see or appreciate that the LGV was about to turn left. The coroner went on to add that this is a sharp left turn and the need for the LGV to position itself to the right to make an acute turn may have caused confusion. To me it sounds as if mistakes were made by both sides, but I've seen cyclists on this board point out that you don't undertake a vehicle that is turning left when it is clearly doing so.

If there are railings on the kerb, then that might catch a wheel arch.

I think the point of mentioning the stress and that the driver couldn't bear to get back behind the wheel is that there seems to be part of the population that seems to think that we, hauliers and drivers are reckless, heartless people who don't care. Of course you aren't going to compare the grief and stress of the ladies family with that of the driver, but that doesn't negate the trauma of killing someone. I'm not sure I could carry on as the boss of a company if that happened to one of mine.

What he means by the reports being misleading is that all you hear is female charity worker crushed by careless lorry driver. The only other thing that driver did wrong was to miss her in the mirrors and that is very easy to do as I said before; what is not easy to do is to miss 30' of wagon indicating left. Then cycle into it. The press invariably blame the truck and driver, sometimes it's right, sometimes it isn't and the cyclist has to hold some responsibility.

At the time of Carey's death the haulier had already started fitting cameras to his vehicles and thinks that all London hauliers should have them, so no, he isn't saying that cyclist training is the answer. He's saying that we all have to live together and it's important to understand each other's perspective. Unless you have driven a truck, you can't understand the issues surrounding it. In an ideal world I'd like to see all road users spend half a day in a cab, obviously unfeasible, but it would help explain things to non-truckdrivers. Truck drivers have usually been a cyclist at some point,even if a long time ago and they are car drivers, they understand that element of road usage.

I can definitely understand the pressures on HGVs and buses, thats why its crying out for video cameras for the near and offside by law. They are quick enough to buy in satnavs . Cyclists and drivers on mways are all getting killed too regularly because of half blind drivers having no idea whats going off on their inside/offside

Marco_Panettone

bugslet wrote: »

It doesn't matter what training you do, you get numpty LGV drivers that don't take in what the trainer says, just as you get numpty car drivers and numpty cyclists. Because of one incident, you can't then say that there haven't been improvements, you can only say that is one incidence of bad driving.

What the deputy coroner said was that the truck involved in the fatality, was signalling to turn left, correctly positioned and said at some points Carey would have been visible. As I have said before, if you have between 6 - 8 mirrors to look into at 5 seconds per mirror, someone can flit easily in and out of blind spots. The depouty coroner did not say that the driver should have seen her. She went on to express concerns that Carey was listening to the raido via headphones and did not see or appreciate that the LGV was about to turn left. The coroner went on to add that this is a sharp left turn and the need for the LGV to position itself to the right to make an acute turn may have caused confusion. To me it sounds as if mistakes were made by both sides, but I've seen cyclists on this board point out that you don't undertake a vehicle that is turning left when it is clearly doing so.

If there are railings on the kerb, then that might catch a wheel arch.

I think the point of mentioning the stress and that the driver couldn't bear to get back behind the wheel is that there seems to be part of the population that seems to think that we, hauliers and drivers are reckless, heartless people who don't care. Of course you aren't going to compare the grief and stress of the ladies family with that of the driver, but that doesn't negate the trauma of killing someone. I'm not sure I could carry on as the boss of a company if that happened to one of mine.

What he means by the reports being misleading is that all you hear is female charity worker crushed by careless lorry driver. The only other thing that driver did wrong was to miss her in the mirrors and that is very easy to do as I said before; what is not easy to do is to miss 30' of wagon indicating left. Then cycle into it. The press invariably blame the truck and driver, sometimes it's right, sometimes it isn't and the cyclist has to hold some responsibility.

At the time of Carey's death the haulier had already started fitting cameras to his vehicles and thinks that all London hauliers should have them, so no, he isn't saying that cyclist training is the answer. He's saying that we all have to live together and it's important to understand each other's perspective. Unless you have driven a truck, you can't understand the issues surrounding it. In an ideal world I'd like to see all road users spend half a day in a cab, obviously unfeasible, but it would help explain things to non-truckdrivers. Truck drivers have usually been a cyclist at some point,even if a long time ago and they are car drivers, they understand that element of road usage.

The only thing the driver did wrong was not to see another road user. Why was this? They were driving a vehicle that prevented them from doing so, or didn't look properly. None of these things is the fault of the other party. It is the responsibility of the driver and of the haulage company to ensure the vehicle is safe to be driven in the environment it is to be used in. There are many things hauliers can do to reduce the chances of these incidents affecting their drivers like this (not to mention the victim or the families), but apparently even the most basic of these isn't worth the £2,000.

There's a HUGE difference between 'has been a cyclist at some point in the past' and 'knows how it feels to cycle in this environment today'. The former may well have been 40 years ago, in a park in the countryside. This is not comparable to London's roads now. Put drivers on bikes. Make them learn first-hand how the actions of drivers make cyclists feel. Then people may become more careful with other people's lives.

bugslet

As I said Marco, responsibility lies with both parties. It is difficult to catch every area of a large vehicle, you need to check the front and the off-side as well.

Not seeing the cyclist for whatever reason is not the cyclists fault. But the cyclist is at fault for positioning herself in such a position that when a vehicle is turning left you are in its way. He was indicating to turn a sharp left, at what point would you place yourself in its path.

People want to berate a driver for not seeing a cyclist yet ignore the fact that the cyclist has taken no notice of something which is approx 30' x 8' by 14' with its left hand indicators flashing.

Indeed there is a lot of difference between cycling in a rural/suburban setting versus city centre London, but the point is there is some knowledge whereas the majority of cyclists have no knowledge of how to drive a LGV.

My position remains that we have to use roads together. I become defensive when blame is apportioned purely to one set of road users, when there are times when that blame can be placed on both parties.