Those of you who have been reading some of my entries will know that I have an interest in cycling safety in London, bourne out of personal experiences of the potential dangers of cycling in the city. This article in the Guardian caught my eye this morning. The poll results did not surprise me but I would like to briefly discuss some of the points raised in the article.
Wholesale 20 mph on urban roads. Decreasing the speed of traffic whilst cyclists and motorists share the same roads would help but I don't actually think drivers stick that strictly to the speed limit in certain areas and that better monitoring of adherence to speed limits, and traffic regulations in general, may be just as important.
More cycle lanes. These would undoubtedly make cycling less stressful. However, recently there have been reports of deaths on cycle lanes that could have been better designed, so its not just about quantity but also about quality.
More considerate behaviour from other cyclists. We can be our own worst enemies. Some cyclists break traffic regulations because they believe their actions keep them safe from unreasonable drivers. This isn't sensible and provokes other road users into similarly unreasonable behaviour. Causing ill feeling between road users by antisocial behaviour is not the way forward.
I am glad that we are discussing these issues openly and hope that some good will come out of this in the long run.
This came to my attention yesterday. If you are interested in cyclilng safety and would like to help in a petition for the London Mayoral candidates, then check out:
ReplyDeletehttp://petition.lcc.org.uk/ea-action/action?ea.client.id=1745&ea.campaign.id=13331