This story makes me so angry

downfader

http://www.dailyecho.co.uk/news/5029673 ... s_witness/

http://www.dailyecho.co.uk/news/5030033 ... tal_crash/

When it happened everyone at work commented on it as it was a month after my own accident. Sadly this fella came off a lot worse. Now the thing that really p***es me off about this is that both the Police and the Council knew this junction was bad for drivers jumping the lights and very little seems to have been done.

Cyclists are "advised" to use the pavement.. er I mean cyclpath (just a 3 foot wide shared pavement imo) as the traffic is pretty hectic up that way. IIRC its a 50 limit too. It seems from comments orginally left on the website that the cyclist was trying to cross the main carriage towards or away from the texaco garage. I am unclear exactly on that, but at the time many "motorists" joined in the debate online and basically blamed him for his own downfall. It appears now that this is nowhere near the case.

If one tragic incident can show people how vulnerable cyclists and pedestrians are, and the hyperbole thrown out there, I beleive it is this. Things like this just seem so pointless in that they should never have happened.

deptfordmarmoset

Christ, that must give you a chill down your spine!

Is there any chance of mounting a campaign with the help of the local cycling campaign group (if there is one of those CTC-affiliated groups) to get something done? I remember reading about your accident - as a survivor you might be able to join up with Mr Dear's family and get things improved.

Slightly off at a tangent, I'm becoming more and more convinced that road planners should be made criminally responsible for dangerous (in this case fatal) road design. Of course, I have no idea whether this junction is badly designed per se but clearly there is inadequate traffic-calming when it comes down to the safety of all road users. A real fear of prosecution might make highways people have a good think about road safety.

Eau Rouge

Seems there are three separate stories there of three separate witnesses all being very clear in saying she was flying and went through a light that had been red for a while. It's hard to see how the jury wouldn't find her guilty, but unless she's got previous convictions she'll get an 18 month sentence at most. Is she the driver that was charged with something like "gbh with intent" at the time?

It's not really a "cycling" incident is it? He was walking across the junction at the pedestrian crossing as a pedestrian, he just happened to have a bike with him. It doesn't change anything, just saying he could just as easily have been a mother pushing a pram.

zanes

downfader wrote:

Things like this just seem so pointless in that they should never have happened.

Same with 95% of road accidents IMHO. Poor bugger, never stood a chance (assuming those two/three witnesses are typical of all of them, not just the newspaper being selective). RIP

downfader

deptfordmarmoset wrote:

Christ, that must give you a chill down your spine!

Is there any chance of mounting a campaign with the help of the local cycling campaign group (if there is one of those CTC-affiliated groups) to get something done? I remember reading about your accident - as a survivor you might be able to join up with Mr Dear's family and get things improved.

Slightly off at a tangent, I'm becoming more and more convinced that road planners should be made criminally responsible for dangerous (in this case fatal) road design. Of course, I have no idea whether this junction is badly designed per se but clearly there is inadequate traffic-calming when it comes down to the safety of all road users. A real fear of prosecution might make highways people have a good think about road safety.

Oh my own accident was no where near as bad as this. I managed to walk from A&E and hobble on a bus home (albeit in a fair bit of pain)

I beleive that the local cycling campaign did comment at the time but I cant find any info to regurgitate here. I'm not a member of the SCCamp but of the CTC. I might contact them when the trial ends and see if they want to use the info in some way or add it to their own studies.

Eau Rouge - Appears you were right, orginally GBH:
http://www.dailyecho.co.uk/news/travell ... oad_smash/

chuckcork

DF, I reported a number of weeks ago about a driver I saw steer around the car in front that had stopped for a red light, the woman driver ran the red and just about took out a woman crossing (on green pedestrian signal), all so she could advance 20-30 metres down the road to join the highly obvious queue of traffic going nowhere fast.

The response of the Police Sergeant was underwhelming to say the least. Numberplate, description of car and driver and they could not have cared less. While it was in the catergory of "dangerous driving", there was so much they couldn't possibly act on every case (or any it would seem).

I also reported seeing considerable numbers of drivers also speeding along a stretch I ride along 3-4 days a week, at times well over the 40 mph speed limit, and which never has any speed detection in place other than one of those useless signs that flash that the speed limit is (and which are ignored by everyone) to which the response was they couldn't introduce mobile speed cameras there due to H&S reasons. Having been nearly taken out myself by speeding drivers on that stretch again I was again underwhelmed by this.

Until road policing is seen by the Police (and apologies to Mithras et al) as a worthwhile activity that should be as much a part of the policing role as keeping the peace, and the public at the same time see road safety as something other than an excuse to gather taxes but as a real issue that can leave families grieving at tragedies like this, and maybe their own, nothing will change.

rolf_f

deptfordmarmoset wrote:

Slightly off at a tangent, I'm becoming more and more convinced that road planners should be made criminally responsible for dangerous (in this case fatal) road design. Of course, I have no idea whether this junction is badly designed per se but clearly there is inadequate traffic-calming when it comes down to the safety of all road users. A real fear of prosecution might make highways people have a good think about road safety.

Not really very fair. The road planners aren't sitting in offices trying to work out how to get people killed. Ultimately, they are just people trying to do a job with probably rather limited resources. If you go and make fairly averagely paid and under resourced people criminally responsible for this sort of thing then you won't get anyone to do it. The problem here seems to be speeding motorists - maybe the real issue is the lack of police on the roads enforcing speed limits, non use of mobile phones while driving etc. But that's another tax raising problem.

Eau Rouge

Rolf F wrote:

The problem here seems to be speeding motorists - maybe the real issue is the lack of police on the roads enforcing speed limits, non use of mobile phones while driving etc. But that's another tax raising problem.

Pretty sure the problem here was that she drove through a light that had been red for a few seconds already. There is nothing to suggest she was speeding.

I know that junction. It isn't badly designed. It's a 3-lane dual carriageway and the main route into and out of Southampton. It's pretty obvious the junction is there, and there is nothing at all to suggest anything in the road layout was in any way a contributing factor to either the accident or her ignoring the lights.
In terms of cycling I've not had to go anywhere near it (I've used the bit from the M271 to Totton and back a few times) but from what I can see there are 30mph side roads that will get you anywhere you need to along that road up to the M271 roundabout. I'm not sure what a cycling group would be campaign for on that road really. She hit someone using the pedestrian crossing, who happened to have a bike with him. Crossing 8 lanes of traffic and having to negotiate with the last lane as they merge into the road your on as you go from Regent's Park Rd to Third Ave might not be fun if the light sequence doesn't give you time, so you might choose to walk instead, but thats about it, unless someone else knows it better and can see I've missed something.

N0bodyOfTheGoat

Sounds very much like the driver was in the wrong. I'm seeing more and more drivers blatently go through red lights, especially up by Lances Hill in Bitterne, probably due to the impatience created by the quick light change cycle letting vehicles onto the A3025 by the by-pass.

I used to use that stretch of road to cycle commute to First Avenue, before SCRATCH moved. The shared cyle/ped path was not too bad to ride on, but the side roads running parrallel were a nightmare for PF visits, due to broken glass and alike from the ajacent stores, as much as they got me away from 50mph (or above, as speed limits don't exist until within sight of speed cameras) traffic.

As for crossing over to the other side of the carriageway, there is a subway that comes out by Hargroves, the next road down from Reagents. Or better yet, at that very junction where the accident happened, cycle across the carriageway when the traffic lights are green.

downfader

I have to be honest.. I dont consider myself a pedestrian when I walk the bike but a walking cyclist. You've all made me think about that one.

Anyway, I think it would be wrong to make road planners responsible for deaths in that way. She clearly drove through red. I used to ride up near there when I was about 14, 15.. has been too long to rememember what the side roads or that junction is really like as I've only passed through in the car as an occassional passenger.