Cyclists beware sign on HGV

[Little yellow Brompton]

I work near a busy ready-mix depot in SW8 and see a lorry or two nearly every day. Nearly all of them have a yellow warning sticker on the back warning cyclists not to sneak up the inside. Good thing too.

I wonder if this will sort of idea will be extended soon to short skirts, to warn women of rape, or are cyclists the only victims that can be blamed beforehand ?

 

[Rhythm Thief]

I don't think it's about blame (and in fact, I find this "chip on the shoulder" attitude remarkably unhelpful). It's just about making other road users (actually not just cyclists) aware that the driver of a lorry doesn't have great visibility down the inside of a lorry and with the best will in the world, may easily not have seen you. You may think that no one in their right minds would cycle down the inside of an artic indicating to turn left, but I can tell you from first hand experience that there are plenty who do. Anything at all that makes these people aware that just possibly this might not be a good idea is to be applauded. After all, if a cyclist isn't there to be flattened by the trailer wheels that's a whole lot better than being seen by the driver just in time to avoid an incident, or not being seen by the driver at all.

 

[subaqua]

I don't think it's about blame (and in fact, I find this "chip on the shoulder" attitude remarkably unhelpful). It's just about making other road users (actually not just cyclists) aware that the driver of a lorry doesn't have great visibility down the inside of a lorry and with the best will in the world, may easily not have seen you. You may think that no one in their right minds would cycle down the inside of an artic indicating to turn left, but I can tell you from first hand experience that there are plenty who do. Anything at all that makes these people aware that just possibly this might not be a good idea is to be applauded. After all, if a cyclist isn't there to be flattened by the trailer wheels that's a whole lot better than being seen by the driver just in time to avoid an incident, or not being seen by the driver at all.

good post. there are still a huge number of cyclists who persist in cutting into the death zone

 

[benb]

I wonder if this will sort of idea will be extended soon to short skirts, to warn women of rape, or are cyclists the only victims that can be blamed beforehand ?

That might be the most bizarre comment I have ever read.

Tell me, are signs warning you to use head and eye protection on a building site also blaming the victim beforehand?

 

[Little yellow Brompton]

I don't think it's about blame (and in fact, I find this "chip on the shoulder" attitude remarkably unhelpful). It's just about making other road users (actually not just cyclists) aware that the driver of a lorry doesn't have great visibility down the inside of a lorry and with the best will in the world, may easily not have seen you.

With every other piece of industrial plant the operator would not be allowed to use the equipment if he coudn't see that it was afe to do so. "It's got blind spots" doesn't cut it even if the only people arround are trained, expereinced employees, if mmebers of the public are involved it's even less tolerated. Why is the haluage industry allowed to be an excpetion?

 

[Rhythm Thief]

But there are blind spots, as there are with everything on the road (even bikes). You can usually work with them as a lorry driver - I've never failed to see a dozy cyclist bimbling up the inside of my trailer as the traffic lights change, hemmed in on the other side by a pedestrian fence, while I'm indicating left (happened in Cardiff last year) - because you constantly scan the mirrors, you're aware that you overtook a cyclist not half a mile back and are looking for him, or whatever. Not all lorry drivers are as cyclist aware as me, though, even though they should be.

But ... start driving around urban environments on a dark winter evening, when your mirrors are spattered with rain and it's rush hour and every car has two bright lights which are refracted by the rain on your mirrors and which are much brighter than the average bicyle front light (and I'm being charitable and assuming that the cyclist is lit in the first place; again, there are plenty who don't bother) and you can perhaps start to see why I believe that anything which educates vulnerable road users as to why it's not a good idea to put themselves next to a lorry is a good thing. Yes, ideally road vehicles wouldn't have blind spots, and ideally all freight would go on the railways and canals and everyone would use bikes. But that's not how it is, and personally speaking I'd sooner deal with one artic driver than 40 transit van drivers any day of the week.

 

[BentMikey]

How's this little truck interaction?


View: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HDjd41BXKr8


The truck was indicating left which is more visible if you watch the video in HD/fullscreen. btw., Willie is a RAAM rider.

 

[Angelfishsolo]

I've seem rear mud flaps with "Overtakers" on the right had side and "Undertakers" on the left hand side. Quite clever I thought.

 

[dellzeqq]

............ personally speaking I'd sooner deal with one artic driver than 40 transit van drivers any day of the week.

absolutely. 3 to 1 would be nearer the mark.

Here's my take on it. The people who put the stickers on the back of lorries worry about these things. It's probably the people who don't put the stickers on the back of lorries that should worry us the most.

Of course the lorry driver should check, and, of course he or she should be able to see what's going on, but I don't take offence when somebody is bringing a risk to my attention, and, sad to say, I see a lot of terrifying left filtering going on......

 

[Tynan]

20 years ago when was a young tyro of a rider I was about to start passing a HGV on the left at the approach to a crossroads, in those days no-one cared about that sort of thing when I saw and puzzled over a 'Warning - this vehicle uses rear steering' sticker on the back of itat that moment the whole bloody hgv moved sideways like it was on rails giving me quite a fright

do they still have those in London, it struke me then as something designed to crush smaller things on narrow South London roads (I worked in Wimbledon for a while, it was all I cold get after a short period of being out of work)

I find truck drivers to be almost uniformly outright zealous in their care around cyclists and nearly all the buses

 

[Rhythm Thief]

Rear steer trailers are ... interesting, to say the least. I've driven a few, back when I was doing outsize loads, and you expect them to behave like a normal HGV trailer. But they don't: they follow the tractor unit very closely indeed, almost to the point where it's like driving a car. However (as you observed), the back end kicks out much more than a normal trailer, and this can lead to problems if the driver isn't used to it. Such as scraping the rear corner of the trailer all down the side of the trailer parked next to it, to pick an example entirely at random ...

 

[3tyretrackterry]

in the past i have seen in America one mudflap saying SUICIDE on it i think that may have some effect

 

[joebingo]

I wonder if this will sort of idea will be extended soon to short skirts, to warn women of rape, or are cyclists the only victims that can be blamed beforehand ?

How can you blame a driver of an HGV for doing what he's indicating? It's simple. You're on a bike, don't go up the inside of a big vehicle (with big blind spots) when it's going to turn left.

 

[Rhythm Thief]

in the past i have seen in America one mudflap saying SUICIDE on it i think that may have some effect

You see them here sometimes. "Passing Side" on the right mudflap, "Suicide" on the left.