Motorists, what to do about cyclists who constantly break the high way code???

kmb500

Head_The_Ball wrote: »

I suggest that you get your eyes or your car lights checked.

Perhaps both

I live in the countryside - the roads are 60mph, at night there's no light. There are cyclists who dress in dark colours and don't have any lights on their bike - or even if they do they're not powerful enough to make themselves visible. It can be pretty terrifying.

Strider590

kmb500 wrote: »

I live in the countryside - the roads are 60mph, at night there's no light. There are cyclists who dress in dark colours and don't have any lights on their bike - or even if they do they're not powerful enough to make themselves visible. It can be pretty terrifying.

As terrifying as driving in fog and watching all the morons come driving past with no lights on? There are so many of them, that I actually dread driving in fog purely because of this.

trinidadone

Strider590 wrote: »

Cyclists who are drivers, who have recently moved to cycling, they are actually the worst for running lights.

Try it yourself, get on a bike and ride toward a set of red lights and see how you feel about stopping. It's tricky because your head is saying "hey im not in a car, im a pedestrian and I don't need to stop, I can just take the footpath".

When I started cycling after a 10+ year break, that was exactly what was in my mind the first time I rode up to a set of traffic lights, it felt stupid sitting there with cars when I could just get off, walk along the footpath and carry on.

So when it comes to cyclist light jumping, the majority of them are also drivers.

thank you for your question. So sorry to disappoint, but i would never ride a cycle on a London street, really sorry. In regards to your head telling a cyclist to keep cycling through a red light, I can not really relay the thought processes to myself, because i am conditioned as a motorist to stop at a red light anyway, so i honestly do not think my thought process would change, but hey, you never know

boliston

kmb500 wrote: »

...

Its probably not the most productive measure but it's simply a matter of letting someone know when they're doing something wrong. Just as I would flash/beep a dangerous driver, and I would hope that if I did something very dangerous, someone would let me know!

you must be very busy flashing and beeping at other drivers who ever overtake you as you drive at 70mph on the motorway, or are motorist law breakers not worthy of being beeped?

kmb500

boliston wrote: »

you must be very busy flashing and beeping at other drivers who ever overtake you as you drive at 70mph on the motorway, or are motorist law breakers not worthy of being beeped?

Overtaking someone on a motorway is not dangerous... someone pulls out dangerously or whatever, yes I do beep them. I'm not the police, I don't care about most little things but if someone is genuinely dangerously driving I will beep at them, equally I will shout to a cyclist.

TBagpuss

Well that's what I mean, I do not encounter many cyclists but when I do, a much larger proportion of them are dangerous compared to cars.

I think this depends on how you are defining 'dangerous'

In terms of harm caused to others, drivers/motor vehicles are far more dangerous, but if you define it as riding/driving in a way which poss a risk to themselves or others' then I think that it is less clear cut.

On a personal level, I'd say I see more cyclists than drivers do things such as igniring red lights, one way systems or pedestrian crossings, and riding without lights, but that I see more drivers than cyclists do things such as speeding while it is unsafe to do so, overtaking dangerously, btailgating, and using phones while driving.

Cloudydaze

I think West Midlands Police sums it up nicely:

Cyclists don’t cause us, as an organisation, problems, that’s because they aren’t causing our communities problems, they aren’t killing nearly 100 people on our regions roads as mechanically propelled vehicles currently do. Yes we do get complaints of the “nuisance” variety, pavement cycling, some anti-social behaviour (usually yobs on bikes rather than “cyclists”), red light running etc. but you get the idea, most peoples interpretation of “1st world problems” or the “modern day blues”, nothing that’s a priority for a force like our own in a modern day society. Bad cycling is an “irritant” to the wider community rather than a danger, and maybe an improvement in infrastructure and policing may alieve many of the reasons that cause a very small minority of cyclists to be an “irritant”

https://trafficwmp.wordpress.com/category/traffic-blog/

Nasqueron

kmb500 wrote: »

Well I don't think there should be any pollution tax at all, all tax should either be flat, or increase based on monetary value.

Lobby your MP

kmb500 wrote: »

Maybe I am in a minority, but it's just what I see. And no I do not do "low mileage", I do ~15000/year.

Doing 15,000 miles a year on country roads with only a handful of traffic lights within 10 miles, it's perhaps not surprising. I suggest watching either of these 2 dash cam clip channels on youtube, you will be amazed at how your little bubble is nothing like the real world:

Exposed: UK Dash Cams
WelshDrive

kmb500 wrote: »

Well that's what I mean, I do not encounter many cyclists but when I do, a much larger proportion of them are dangerous compared to cars.

And again, I have proven with facts and evidence cars are vastly more dangerous and deadly, your anecdotes are lovely but meaningless

kmb500 wrote: »

Oh really? What changes next year?
And yeah it would be difficult to implement given that there are so many different cars. But the Valuation Office manages with houses, I'm sure it could be possible, if expensive. I mean very simply, you can set a level of expected depreciation, and just calculate it based on the list price new and how many years old the car is.

It was announced in July last year that there will be new VED bands for all cars registered after 1/7/17 with new bands for even low polluting cars, only the true zero emissions will get £0 (and that would include bikes as ever)

kmb500 wrote: »

Everything these days is to support the green agenda... or rather, to bankroll the big manufacturing corporations...

The "green agenda" is a scientifically accepted "theory" (in the sense that gravity is also a theory) that man's CO2 emissions are leading to climate change at a speed never recorded in nature.

Tax goes to the government, not manufacturers.

Car_54

Cloudydaze wrote: »

I think West Midlands Police sums it up nicely:

Cyclists don’t cause us, as an organisation, problems, that’s because they aren’t causing our communities problems, they aren’t killing nearly 100 people on our regions roads as mechanically propelled vehicles currently do. Yes we do get complaints of the “nuisance” variety, pavement cycling, some anti-social behaviour (usually yobs on bikes rather than “cyclists”), red light running etc. but you get the idea, most peoples interpretation of “1st world problems” or the “modern day blues”, nothing that’s a priority for a force like our own in a modern day society. Bad cycling is an “irritant” to the wider community rather than a danger, and maybe an improvement in infrastructure and policing may alieve many of the reasons that cause a very small minority of cyclists to be an “irritant”

https://trafficwmp.wordpress.com/category/traffic-blog/

Yes, in the overall scheme of things they are just an irritant.

Along with people who can't spell or punctuate, or who use txtspk; fat adults who wear replica football shirts; Diane Abbott; Alex Salmond; Liam Fox, and others too numerous to list.

However, unlike bad cyclists, none of these are an actual danger to themselves and others.

NBLondon

TBagpuss wrote: »

I think this depends on how you are defining 'dangerous'

In terms of harm caused to others, drivers/motor vehicles are far more dangerous, but if you define it as riding/driving in a way which poss a risk to themselves or others' then I think that it is less clear cut.

I think this gets distorted by some cycling advocates who insist on only counting actual injuries and there are no figures for "near misses". In 20 years of walking in London, I have been hit by a cyclist once [In a pedestrian area marked by a clear No Cycles sign]; seen another pedestrian hit by a cyclist [riding the wrong way down a one way street] once but I have to dodge or stop while crossing a zebra or pelican two or three times a week. The most recent of these being at 0815 this morning in Bloomsbury:- I arrive at a zebra crossing a cycle lane, 2 cyclists are too close to stop (fine), the next 2 stop so I start to cross and no, not a MAMIL, but a woman on a Boris Bike overtakes the stopped cyclists, makes eye contact with me (because I was actually looking where I was going as opposed to texting) and then accelerates across in front of me. Had I not looked and broken my stride, she would have hit me.

TBagpuss wrote: »

On a personal level, I'd say I see more cyclists than drivers do things such as igniring red lights, one way systems or pedestrian crossings, and riding without lights, but that I see more drivers than cyclists do things such as speeding while it is unsafe to do so, overtaking dangerously, btailgating, and using phones while driving.

I'd agree. No, I'm not counting the cyclists who start off a little early to get up to speed (that's understandable) but the ones who overtake already stopped traffic and cruise through between pedestrians. I have never seen a motor vehicle do this without using blue lights and two-tone sirens. I'm not objecting to those cyclist who get off and bypass the junction on foot but the ones who take to the pavement at speed - I have only seen a motor vehicle do this 2 or 3 times a decade.


And to reiterate - this is a minority of cyclists. In some cases, it may be the same arrogant gits that I see multiple times a week. Mostly I can forget them until I read an internet thread where someone responds to criticism of this type of cyclists by simplistically announcing it doesn't matter because motorists are worse and pollute the universe at the same time.