Best way to identify a cyclist

MacPingu1986

saajan_12 said:

I predict licensing or something equivalent will come as cycling gets more prevalent. So far the priority is encouraging cycling as an environmentally friendly transport. However 10 years ago seeing the odd 1 cyclist is now 100s on busy city centre routes, with the minority stopping for traffic lights for example from what I've seen. Drivers and pedestrians could dodge 1 cyclist breaking rules, but its harder to dodge so many to ride erratically. The risk of so the risk of accidents including those causing damage, increases, and I think once it gets to a critical mass, then the need to ID and ensure compliance increases. 
-- a fellow cyclist. 

Very, very, unlikely, the risks and harms from cycling are well understood and tiny in comparison to motor vehicles. Cycling is much more popular in other European countries and they haven't found any need to create cycling license mechanisms, ditto cycling levels were much higher in the UK in & before the 1950s (c40% of *all* journeys travelled compared to about 2% today) prior to the adoption of mass motor travel in the 1960 & 1970s - again without any need at the time for licensing. 

A couple of countries used to have "cycling number plates" but they all shelved these schemes many decades ago because the costs far exceeded any marginal benefits

ThorOdinson

Herzlos said:

ThorOdinson said:

The point about trailers is that cyclists seem to be oblivious to their position, and as cargo bikes get more common it's getting to be more of a problem.

Having used both I'd agree, trailers face the same problem car trailers do in that they don't quite follow the same arc as the towing vehicle. It's made worse on bicycles because they are relatively long and pretty wide compared to the bike, so it's easy to take a corner too tight and clip the inside. Especially if the path isn't set up for them forcing tight bends. It's also a nightmare trying to adjust it once you're stopped as you can't get off easily.

Cargo bikes are certainly better with the wide part in front so you only get caught out by the relatively wide turning circle again made worse by bad infrastructure.

Both cause virtually no damage though, especially compared to, say, someone not use to driving a long wheelbase rental van or towing a trailer. On a bike you probably won't even damage the paint on the post whereas in the car/van you'll likely destory the post entirely.

Cargo bikes with the cargo in front are definitely a lot better. Hard not to be aware of them, although still possible if on your phone.

I see quite a lot of cyclists using their phones while on the road, but because of the hassle involved in identifying them and he lack of police action I don't generally bother reporting it. If they could be identified easily I would.

Herzlos

It's very difficult to ride a bike whilst using a phone, so they don't tend to get far or cause much damage. Different on a cargo trike because there's less need to balance. Still very few accidents or damage caused though.

I have to admit that I rarely see cyclists on phones, but drivers on phones is a constant occurrance, easily one every 2-3 miles travelled.  Both would be less of a problem if we had more police on patrol to stop them.

I can't see any figures on how many cars are damaged by cyclists, but about 16,000 cyclists are hit by cars every year (see https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/reported-road-casualties-great-britain-pedal-cyclist-factsheet-2022/reported-road-casualties-in-great-britain-pedal-cycle-factsheet-2022). That is with injuries, we've no way of knowing how many non-injury accidents were caused.

Anecdotally I'm finding virtually nothing for "cyclist hits car", so I posit the figure is much lower.

Do you report the numerous drivers you see on phones or is it just a campaign against cyclists?

ThorOdinson

Exodi said:

Just from my layperson perspective, I'd ask why you needed a courtesy car at all. Was the car undrivable, I'd be suprised by that? You mentioned public transport would be inconvenient, but what is the cost of your convenience? Why was the car in the garage for many days/weeks?

It took them 4 days to fix everything, dropped it off Monday morning, got the call Thursday afternoon that it was finished but couldn't get there before they went home for the day so picked it up on Friday. Walked to/from the garage that fixed it.

Getting around for work would have been impractical without a car. There is public transport but it would have added extra hours a day for me. If he had got some insurance then they might have argued that I could have done it, but he didn't. It would have been unreasonable anyway. The cost was mainly the parts and labour anyway.

If the damage that a bike can do is limited then insurance should be cheap. I haven't looked but it's probably an idea to get some if you ride on the roads.

PocketWatchMan

MacPingu1986 I disagree totally that some form of licencing for cyclists would only provide 'marginal' benefits; in the last year alone I have been made aware of two fatalities in my area as a result of cyclists manically veering onto pavements and knocking people down. 

Herzlos no shortage of police. Just ask the couple who criticised something that happened in their child's school in a whatsapp message; they were faced with 4 police vehicles and 6 officers who stormed their house. the crime in question was, being critical of a school.

Herzlos

PocketWatchMan said:

MacPingu1986 I disagree totally that some form of licencing for cyclists would only provide 'marginal' benefits; in the last year alone I have been made aware of two fatalities in my area as a result of cyclists manically veering onto pavements and knocking people down. 

Herzlos no shortage of police. Just ask the couple who criticised something that happened in their child's school in a whatsapp message; they were faced with 4 police vehicles and 6 officers who stormed their house. the crime in question was, being critical of a school.

Do you have links for either of those?

There are certainly some police available, but you rarely see them out and about where they'd normally be stopping dangerous drivers and riders. Higher visibility is also likely to result in less people driving (or riding) whilst distracted. Given that it's been illegal for driving using a mobile phone for years now, the only reason so many people still do it is that there's almost no risk of being caught.

Edit: this is the whatsapp one? https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/parents-arrest-school-whatsapp-complained-cowley-hill-b2723751.html
Because it sounds like they were already banned from visiting and communicating with the school except for via email due to existing harassment. It wasn't just a case of being critical of the school in whatsapp. If that's all it was I'd be typing from jail too.

MacPingu1986

PocketWatchMan said:

MacPingu1986 I disagree totally that some form of licencing for cyclists would only provide 'marginal' benefits; in the last year alone I have been made aware of two fatalities in my area as a result of cyclists manically veering onto pavements and knocking people down. 

Re the fatalities you mention, where you live is an *incredibly* extreme outlier as the yearly average of the total number of pedestrians killed by cyclists (whether on the pavement or otherwise) is almost always between 0-3. In the very rare cases when this happens it almost always makes the national press, the rider is quickly identified and charged - licensing wouldn't add anything here. For comparison around 350-440 pedestrians are killed by motor vehicles each year and a quick run of the numbers shows over 98% of all pedestrians killed in collisions on pavements are by people driving motor vehicles on the pavement - unfortunately this is even *with* licensing.

Decades and decades of risk analysis from the UK, Europe and beyond informs why countries don't require bicycle licensing - motor vehicles do because they conceal the identity of the driver in a metal box and more importantly are at least 15x heavier than a bicycle and rider with 300x the power, creating an exponentially greater risk to the public (again unfortunately born out by many decades of collision statistics and risk analysis) Different regulation to reflect the much, much higher risks.

HillStreetBlues

Exodi said:

Honestly when I first opened this thread titled "Best way to identify a cyclist", I was convinced the post was going to be a gag like "Don't worry, they'll tell you."  or "By the 5 miles of traffic behind them" or something like that.

 When I see this thread I think "It's the person with a bike between their legs"

ThorOdinson

Cyclists are constantly on their phones around here. One or no hands on the handle bars.

There is seemingly no enforcement because it's very common.

sand_hun

ThorOdinson said:

Cyclists are constantly on their phones around here. One or no hands on the handle bars.

There is seemingly no enforcement because it's very common.

There is no enforcement for drivers texting at the wheel either. It's remarkably common. I live in a flat on a main road and when I look out the window it's astonishing to see how many motorists are holding a phone in one hand. 

I was in a mate's car a few months back. He had a couple of pints in the pub, then drove home whilst tapping away on his phone. Worst of all, it wasn't anything important, he was checking his fantasy football scores. Fair to say I had a go at him, but I doubt he's changed his behaviour. 

Most infringements of the law (whether cycling or driving) are not enforced. Police resources in the UK are incredibly stretched. Consider the fact that there are a million uninsured drivers on UK roads and many using ghost or cloned plates to avoid detection.