HGVs in towns and cities

[zimzum42]

When some numpty cyclist swerves into the middle of the road for no reason, they can cause a perfectly law-abiding motorist to swerve into oncoming traffic

you really are showing yourself up to be a retard dondare, did you even read badger.brad's post properly?

 

[dondare]

This thread was not predicated on the proposed banishment of HGVs from towns and cities - it was about trying to raise awareness of a serious issue.

I naively thought we might have a constructive dialogue - instead, we have people playing the blame game, making crude generalisations, decrying the notion of shared responsibility and simply squabbling.

The clip you posted came to the conclusion that lorries should be banned from cities. They even showed a clip of a sort of three-wheel cab pulling a little trailer as the sort of thing to replace them, even I thought that a bit silly.

 

[dondare]

When some numpty cyclist swerves into the middle of the road for no reason, they can cause a perfectly law-abiding motorist to swerve into oncoming traffic

you really are showing yourself up to be a retard dondare, did you even read badger.brad's post properly?

I may not have read the post with very small writing properly. In any case I pick up on the points that I disagree with and respond to them rather than the whole post.
Two points from your post: How many deaths are caused by numpties forcing law-abiding motorists to swerve?
Motorists do need to drive more carefully when there are cyclists about, it's when they ignore them and keep on driving too fast that they get caught out. Piloting a ton of metal at 30 mph (pah! as if) carries with it a much greater level of responsibility than piloting 30 lbs of pipework at half that speed.

 

[hulver]

This thread was not predicated on the proposed banishment of HGVs from towns and cities - it was about trying to raise awareness of a serious issue.

I naively thought we might have a constructive dialogue - instead, we have people playing the blame game, making crude generalisations, decrying the notion of shared responsibility and simply squabbling.

Origamist, this is the internet. It's serious business you know.

To use a completely non-PC analogy.

Arguing on the internet is like competing at the special Olympics. Even if you win, you're still retarded.

 

[Origamist]

The clip you posted came to the conclusion that lorries should be banned from cities. They even showed a clip of a sort of three-wheel cab pulling a little trailer as the sort of thing to replace them, even I thought that a bit silly.

That was their conclusion, not mine. I made that clear in post 10.

I didn't think I needed to put "the views contained within this link are not necessarily those of the poster" alongside every post in this thread - I assumed people would have the brains to work that out.

The banning or partial banning of HGVs is worth discussing, but as it is very unlikely to happen, I'd rather discuss more practical measures.

 

[Origamist]

Origamist, this is the internet. It's serious business you know.

To use a completely non-PC analogy.

Tell me about it.

http://www.cyclechat.co.uk/forums/showpost.php?p=418695&postcount=104

 

[dondare]

That was their conclusion, not mine. I made that clear in post 10.

I didn't think I needed to put "the views contained within this link are not necessarily those of the poster" alongside every post in this thread - I assumed people would have the brains to work that out.

The banning or partial banning of HGVs is worth discussing, but as it is very unlikely to happen, I'd rather discuss more practical measures.

The air quality in London falls way below the requirements set by our European masters. Brussels can fine us because we breathe poisonous air, and may well do so. A ban on heavily polluting vehicles within the M25 could effectively act as an HGV ban for the city.

Some large vehicles have a good safety record and some have an atrocious one, and the differences are down to the design of the vehicle and the training of the driver, not the behaviour of cyclists. HGVs could be designed to operate safely in the city in the same way that London buses are; that would make sense. Continuing to run the most dangerous vehicles and suggesting that cyclists should be trained for their own survival does not, since there is no mechanism for training cyclists up to a standard, testing them and then keeping unsafe cyclists off the road until they pass the test. Introducing such a mechanism would simply stop a lot of people cycling which would lead to increased congestion, pollution, and high levels of unfitness and would so be disasterous. Allowing untrained cyclists onto inherently dangerous roads is immoral. Keeping the roads safe for everybody by identifying and reducing hazards is the only sensible option, and in this case that means keeping HGVs out of cities.

 

[BentMikey]

LOL, the irony of Origamist's call for constructive debate, when I originally killfiled you for some of your more trollish and combative posts.

 

[Origamist]

The air quality in London falls way below the requirements set by our European masters. Brussels can fine us because we breathe poisonous air, and may well do so. A ban on heavily polluting vehicles within the M25 could effectively act as an HGV ban for the city.

Some large vehicles have a good safety record and some have an atrocious one, and the differences are down to the design of the vehicle and the training of the driver, not the behaviour of cyclists. HGVs could be designed to operate safely in the city in the same way that London buses are; that would make sense. Continuing to run the most dangerous vehicles and suggesting that cyclists should be trained for their own survival does not, since there is no mechanism for training cyclists up to a standard, testing them and then keeping unsafe cyclists off the road until they pass the test. Introducing such a mechanism would simply stop a lot of people cycling which would lead to increased congestion, pollution, and high levels of unfitness and would so be disasterous. Allowing untrained cyclists onto inherently dangerous roads is immoral. Keeping the roads safe for everybody by identifying and reducing hazards is the only sensible option, and in this case that means keeping HGVs out of cities.

The LEZ is in place and stricter regs are being phased in - it means that 1000s of vehicles are not coming to London due to non-compliance with emission standards.

I have sympathy with your view as I'd like to see HGVs vanish from London too, but it's not going to happen as there is not an alternative transport strategy. What's more, in the bigger picture of RTAs on the UK's roads, cyclist pressure groups only have limited sway. That's just realpolitik, DD.

Sadly, the roads have been an amoral, liminal zone since they came into existence.

 

[Origamist]

LOL, the irony of Origamist's call for constructive debate, when I originally killfiled you for some of your more trollish and combative posts.

That's because you misrepresented my arguments and would get in a huff when your views were challenged! But by all means, put me back on ignore.

 

[Rhythm Thief]

Some large vehicles have a good safety record and some have an atrocious one, and the differences are down to the design of the vehicle and the training of the driver, not the behaviour of cyclists. HGVs could be designed to operate safely in the city in the same way that London buses are; that would make sense. Continuing to run the most dangerous vehicles and suggesting that cyclists should be trained for their own survival does not, since there is no mechanism for training cyclists up to a standard, testing them and then keeping unsafe cyclists off the road until they pass the test.

Perhaps we need some kind of mechanism for training cyclists up to a standard and testing them to ensure that they meet it? Disregarding for the moment your (good) points about the downsides of such a scheme, I think my stance on this whole debate is this: no matter how well trained the driver of a lorry, or how many mirrors, cabside cameras, cyclist alarms or other in cab gadgetry s/he has, there is always the possibility of not seeing a cyclist. Perhaps the driver is looking ahead at the time he moves off, or is watching the front offside corner of the trailer, or is keeping an eye on the other cyclist positioned next to the driver's door, or whatever. The point is that the only way to be sure the driver isn't going to squash you is to keep away from his truck. (Or her truck, of course.) I can see the logic of the argument that the lorry driver is the one bringing the danger to the roads - I even agree with it, to an extent - but ultimately, no matter what training drivers receive regarding cyclists, you won't catch me sailing blithely down the inside of a moving artic, thinking "it's OK! The driver's been trained to look for me and he's got at least three rearview mirrors!" because you can never legislate for every move a driver makes, specially in the real world where many drivers have been at work (legally) for over ten hours before they've arrived in your town. And where they may never have been before, and where looking at an A-Z while at traffic lights is actually a rather safer option than driving up the wrong road and having to reverse a 45' trailer out of a dead end into a busy main road.
So whatever happens, I'll be keeping out of the way of trucks when I'm on my bike, and I'd recommend that everyone else does too. If there are people out there who don't understand this, it's about time we devised some way of getting the message across to them before more of them ride into danger.

 

[BentMikey]

That's because you misrepresented my arguments and would get in a huff when your views were challenged! But by all means, put me back on ignore.

LOL, you can believe that if you like. Regardless, some of your posts are good, which is why I'm no longer ignoring you.

 

[Rhythm Thief]

That's because you misrepresented my arguments and would get in a huff when your views were challenged! But by all means, put me back on ignore.

I thought this was cyclists vs. truckers?

 

[Origamist]

I thought this was cyclists vs. truckers?

I thought it was DD vs cyclechat...

 

[Origamist]

LOL, you can believe that if you like. Regardless, some of your posts are good, which is why I'm no longer ignoring you.

Why, thank you. Some of yours have been known to pass muster too.

Right, I'm off on the bike...