Ronde Van Vlaanderen 2014 *SPOILERS*

Tom Dean

Your first point seems to assume JvS would want to pay x amount now, but no more, without accepting any responsibility.

On the second point I don't know how you can say 'I would sue the organisers' without knowing all the safety measures that were and were supposed to be in place, and the specifics of how the crash happened. At the end of the day, this person was standing in the middle of the road when there was a bike race. The organisers did not put her there.

frenchfighter

FYI she was standing on a traffic island with no marshal in front.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKVKVG66IT8

So the organizers should have put a marshal there and JVS should have looked where he was going.

Tom Dean

I am aware of that.

Should there be a marshal at every island or everywhere a spectator might choose to stand? I assume you don't have access to the risk assessments for the Tour of Flanders.

Anonymous

Wouldn't there be a marshal for the riders' safety to stop them crashing into the islands?

frenchfighter

Tom Dean wrote:

I am aware of that.

Clearly you are not. Re-read what you posted and you will understand that you are wrong.

ddraver

coriordan wrote:

Wouldn't there be a marshal for the riders' safety to stop them crashing into the islands?

In the Benelux that would require more marshals than there are people

Road furniture is just another hazard for the spring classics. Amstel Gold especially!

Think of that crashes on the bike paths and that poor bloke that t-boned a sign at P-R. It's at least a yearly thing. Have to say that a traffic island is not exactly the safest place to be stood

Tom Dean

frenchfighter wrote:

Tom Dean wrote:

I am aware of that.

Clearly you are not. Re-read what you posted and you will understand that you are wrong.

Whatever you think I'm wrong about (I can guess but I don't really care), neither you or anyone else on here has enough information about this incident to apportion blame.

frenchfighter

She wasn't in the middle of the road. She was standing on a piece of road traffic in the middle of the road. The two are pretty different.

If you use the former then she is to blame. If you use the later JVS is to blame for riding somewhere riders are not supposed to ride if they are paying attention and you can blame the organisers for not having marshals (legally) yet I understand the constraints for marshaling every single piece of road traffic (even if this looked like a very busy area). Hence why my ire is directed at JVS.

Tom Dean

You don't think choosing to stand on an unmarshalled traffic island means accepting a certain risk?

The real world is not as black and white as the one you live in.

ddraver

I strongly suspect that if the same had happened in Yorkshire during July there would be an awful lot of "stupid British people not understanding cycling, what a fool to stand in the middle of the road"etc etc going on...

frenchfighter

Tom Dean wrote:

You don't think choosing to stand on an unmarshalled traffic island means accepting a certain risk?

The real world is not as black and white as the one you live in.

Ok you have lost so deflect. Fine.

You could argue it is more dangerous, sure. You could also argue it is less dangerous also as 1. riders are supposed to look where they are going and not ride into traffic islands and 2. on the side of the road you are leaning out in front of the next person to try and catch a glimpse and have nothing in between you and the riders.

My points hold. You can try again if you want but i dont think I can be bothered to reply any more.

frenchfighter

ddraver wrote:

I strongly suspect that if the same had happened in Yorkshire during July there would be an awful lot of "stupid British people not understanding cycling, what a fool to stand in the middle of the road"etc etc going on...

You suspect wrong, which wouldn't be a first for you.

If an individual in Yorkshire was paralyzed in the exact same circumstances then I would feel for them in the same way and have the same opinion. Not one that some people hold where it seems she deserves what she got. Must be the same people that lost their moral compass in their first bowl of Shreddies.

bigmat

I don't see how you can argue that it was a good place to stand, particularly with the benefit of hindsight. Was it JVS' fault? I think that is harsh - these sorts of crashes happen regularly and are part of cycling. He was presumably travelling at speed in a bunch - it is all too easy to hit road furniture in such circumstances. Were the organisers at fault, or whoever was charged with controlling the crowd? I'm not sure it is reasonable to expect a marshall at every single traffic island. However, I wonder whether somebody should have told the people standing there to move (in the Tour you'd be moved by a Gendarme, but from my experience the police at de Ronde were a lot more relaxed). However you look at it, I think the victim here has to accept a degree of responsibility for being in that position in the first place.

ddraver

frenchfighter wrote:

ddraver wrote:

I strongly suspect that if the same had happened in Yorkshire during July there would be an awful lot of "stupid British people not understanding cycling, what a fool to stand in the middle of the road"etc etc going on...

You suspect wrong, which wouldn't be a first for you.

If an individual in Yorkshire was paralyzed in the exact same circumstances then I would feel for them in the same way and have the same opinion. Not one that some people hold where it seems she deserves what she got. Must be the same people that lost their moral compass in their first bowl of Shreddies.

Don't be a d1ck frenchie, it doesnt become you

It wasnt a sensible place to stand does not equal "deserves what she got"

It's a sh1tty thing to happen, doesnt mean that any one person is to blame.

Tom Dean

frenchfighter wrote:

Tom Dean wrote:

You don't think choosing to stand on an unmarshalled traffic island means accepting a certain risk?

The real world is not as black and white as the one you live in.

Ok you have lost so deflect. Fine.

You could argue it is more dangerous, sure. You could also argue it is less dangerous also as 1. riders are supposed to look where they are going and not ride into traffic islands and 2. on the side of the road you are leaning out in front of the next person to try and catch a glimpse and have nothing in between you and the riders.

My points hold. You can try again if you want but i dont think I can be bothered to reply any more.

It's not a deflection, it's one of many other considerations which you have chosen to ignore in your wish to sum up and pass judgement on the matter in one brief, ill-informed forum post.

kingstonian

Tom Dean wrote:

Your first point seems to assume JvS would want to pay x amount now, but no more, without accepting any responsibility.

On the second point I don't know how you can say 'I would sue the organisers' without knowing all the safety measures that were and were supposed to be in place, and the specifics of how the crash happened. At the end of the day, this person was standing in the middle of the road when there was a bike race. The organisers did not put her there.

I stand by my first point, I am sure lawyers would advise he makes no payment as it could be construed as an admittance of guilt.

I see the point you are making re the second point, clearly I do not have all the facts and none of us on this forum do. But if the family were looking to sue someone, if I were them the first target would be the organisers and not the rider. If you runa bike race you have a responsibility to ensure traffic islands are clearly indicated and made safe to riders and I suspect spectators, and they will also have insurance which could potentially pay out.

I have extreme sympathy for the poor lady, no on expects to go to watch a bike race and end up critically injured. I don't believe from the admittedly little we know that she was unduly negligent, just extremely unfortunate.

type:epyt

There is a crossing point in the island 1 or 2 metres back from where she was stood ... It would be interesting to know what type of crossing points are on either side of the road to see if someone in normal circumstances should be standing there or is it a through crossing point where traffic is ordinarily stopped for those crossing. If it is not a normal 'stopping' point then choosing to stand there is not a clever decision when the road is going to be flooded with a mass of vehicles and 200+ cyclists. If it is a normal stopping point to cross the road safely then it should have likely been better signed (maybe by Eddy himself )/marshalled.