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@dominicsayers
Created May 31, 2018 14:23
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The consultation document cites several design manuals and guidelines.

These need to be enforced.

I see anecdotal evidence every day of new road schemes that do not deliver the sort of safe cycling and walking environment that these documents describe.

There is no evidence in the design of these schemes that the documents you mention have been consulted or that the designers are even aware of their existence.

Regarding road junctions with traffic lights, where a large number of people on cycles have been killed by HGVs turning left: often there is an Advanced Stop Line for use by people on cycles. I believe the only offence committed by a motor vehicle driver who obstructs this area is that of going through a red light. No statistics can be found on how common this is because it is not classed as a separate offence. When the offence is committed (with extremely high frequency in my experience) it is never punished. The ASL is there for a reason, and obstructing it affects the safety of vulnerable road users. It is ridiculous that no statistics exist for how often this happens, and no enforcement is attempted when it does (often).

Much educational material focuses on

  1. sharing the road, i.e. putting the onus as much on vulnerable road users as those who operate from within a safe cocoon of metal. This is a false equivalence: motor vehicles are the threat. It should be made clear to the drivers of those vehicles that a road or street is a public, open space that they are granted permission to use only on condition that they do not endanger other users of the space.

  2. Defensive measures for vulnerable road users (e.g. hi viz and helmets). While such defensive measures are not necessarily a bad idea there is no evidence that they significantly reduce the risk to vulnerable road users. Concentrating on this in much educational material diverts attention from the real issue: the threat represented by drivers of motor vehicles to vulnerable road users. It encourages the police, the CPS and juries to blame the victim of a road incident if she wasn't complying with ideas that have zero affect on actual safety.

The visibility from the cab of an HGV operating in an urban environment must allow for seeing people on cycles and other vulnerable road users all around the driver. The vast majority of HGVs currently do not allow this. These should be made illegal and phased out within 5 years

The Highway Code should ensure that drivers understand that they are guests on the road. The road is a public, open space where they must always give way to vulnerable road users of any kind. Many drivers currently operate their vehicles in the false belief that the road is for cars and that they pay for it with something called "Road Tax". This common belief has been allowed to perpetuate for too long. Roads were there long before motor vehicles.

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