advertisement


Auriol Grey cycling manslaughter conviction overturned

stevec67 said:
No, he's saying that as a road user he has the same rights as any other road user. You however appear to imply that your journey is more important than his, because you had just been to see your daughter. It's not. If your journey is more important than anyone else, you get a blue light. If not, you don't.
Click to expand...
I wasn’t aware he was the cyclist the 30+ cars were following (sarcasm).

The actual cyclist involved I don’t doubt had every right to be there, as would any road user. Did I say he didn’t? I was commenting that the cyclist looked as though he could have been returning from work, given it was 5:30pm too it’s quite possible. This linked to a previous comment as to why he might have been tired / going especially slowly / seemed oblivious to the queue behind. My saying the cyclist good reason to be there was showing some empathy for the weary person and also feeling that he probably didn’t want to be there.

Quite why my original description of a specific occurrence became a hypothetical situation is very weird.
 
Salamander said:
Why are you not reading this thread before posting? Please look at my post No. 104. 🙄
Click to expand...
I was replying to an ill informed, reactionary post. The fact you later rowed back only highlighted the fact that you post without thinking.

When I open a thread it usually opens up from the last time I visited & I read in date order. Obviously there could be occasions where I misunderstand or miss a later retraction. Not sure that is the case here. My anti cycling bingo card is replete.
 
Woodface said:
I was replying to an ill informed, reactionary post. The fact you later rowed back only highlighted the fact that you post without thinking.
Click to expand...
All it shows is you are too lazy to read the thread properly, see something, post a reply without ever grasping what the post was about, if you had any common sense you would have understood my original post. Wouldn't it be nice if you posted at least one positive comment on this forum, It's not rocket science.
 
I’m not sure a 77 year old woman riding a step through shopper on the pavement at walking pace is exactly crime of the century. And the lady who had a go at her was hardly the most threatening of people. Seems like a sad incident in which two vulnerable people have both come off very badly, but plenty in the legal system have had a pay day.

That this sad incident has become a locus for the tedious gammony clamour for cyclists to have number plates and insurance doesn’t surprise me either.
 
clivem2 said:
I’m always very careful to overtake cyclists with space and care. I too cycle. It’s easy to understand the frustrations of car drivers in s9me cases. Yesterday we were driving back from our daughter’s house, there were more than 30 cars behind behind a single cyclist. The road is a wonderful country journey and some cyclists push it so don’t hold up cars too much but others are really slow, as was the case yesterday. No one did anything daft but there must have been a lot of frustration across many people. I don’t know how we can fix this, some roads are magnets for cyclists and of course they have rights to them.

Personally I feel vulnerable when on a bike so I tend to ride on a road to reach a cycle friendly route - usually a disused railway line.

Ultimately bikes and pedestrians or cars don’t mix well in some, but not all situations.
Click to expand...
You can fix it by being considerate, as you were. Car drivers should wait and be patient or use a main road instead. Cyclists and Equestrians should give way where is practical. Unfortunately, when cyclists are at their slowest, which is when climbing a hill, it’s not always practical to stop pedalling.

Roads are there for all road users and if you are behind a vulnerable road user, they have right of way and it is at their discretion to get out of your way. It is also worth noting that on many c roads there are few passing places suitable for cyclists and equestrians to give way to vehicles.
 
gez said:
So what you're saying is: cyclists shouldn't be as easily held to account as other road users because:

a) it's a bit of a pain to implement and
b) it would discourage something we want to encourage.


Sorry, to me at least, both of those are weak arguments. b) in particular implies that people are attracted to cycling partly at least because it's free from accountablity. Well if that's the case, I don't want such cyclists on our streets.

Taxing I don't see much value in, and given it's currently based on pollution, then it doesn't make much sense. Unless we decide that a cyclist is producing more CO2 than they would if they were walking (which is very probably true) and that that level of CO2 should be taxed in some way.

Insurance absolutely. Cyclists have the capablity to do harm on the road, as well as do damage to other vehicles. Why should any other road user not have recourse to financial redress from a cyclists harmful actions?

Very few things that are the right thing to do are simple and cost free to do. Of course it would be trivially easy to put a number plate on the back of a bicycle. Would it be unsightly? Very probably but a lot of motorcyclists and car drivers find number plates unsightly too, that's no argument for them not being licenced. It would also be trivially easy to mandate that cyclists wore special vests with the number plate on the back, so negating any argument against practicality of attaching them to the bike itself. (after all it's the person not the object thats meant to be held accountable).

It's very simple in my eyes. All road users need to be easliy identifiable and accoutable, because all road users are potentially able to behave in a way to cause injury and death to other road users (either directly or indirecly it makes no difference how). There needs to be a way to punish all road users and ban them from being on the road if required. I fail to see how anybody can argue against such a position and putting up barriers to do so is only putting peoples safety at risk. On top of that there is just the principle of fairness, that all road users should be treated equally with respect to rules of the road.
Click to expand...
 
I do love that this has become all about cars and cyclists when it’s actually about bikes and pedestrians. This case had nothing to do with cars and nor does the thread. Those using it as a means to attack each other really need to wobble their heads and take that agenda elsewhere.

I must say I read the judgement with some relief. For anyone partially-sighted the original decision, which wrongly excluded the impact of that, was genuinely scary. I’m not clear what her VI was but her reaction was exactly what mine is to anything which suddenly enters my visual field without prior warning. If you don’t have a full visual field; have reduced depth perception or have a lack of focus/are slow to focus then there is a world of difference between a non-electric car entering your visual field, for which you may have prior audio cues, and a bicycle where you almost certainly will not. Her reaction on video exactly mirrors mine to any small insect for example. It’s a surprised and defensive action which can look aggressive because of course something has just come at you out of nowhere.
 
From the New Highway Code Rules 2022:

“Always remember that the people you encounter may have impaired sight, hearing or mobility and that this may not be obvious.”

“Cyclists should give way to pedestrians on shared use cycle tracks and to horse riders on bridleways.”

“Cyclists, horse riders and drivers of horse drawn vehicles likewise have a responsibility to reduce danger to pedestrians.”

“Pedestrians may use any part of the road and use cycle tracks as well as the pavement, unless there are signs prohibiting pedestrians.”

anthonygold.co.uk

Cyclists and Pedestrians - New Highway Code Rules

The Highway Code has recently been updated to include new rules which introduce a new hierarchy of road users, meaning that cyclists and pedestrians now have greater protection when using the roads.
anthonygold.co.uk anthonygold.co.uk

Surely if you are cycling towards a batty, cantankerous, half-blind, disabled, gesticulating old woman on a narrow pavement you just brake and stop rather than alarming her further.
 
It wasn't a narrow pavement. There was ample room for both - Court Summary Paragraph 6

Secondly, she came out of nowhere at walking pace - Court Summary Paragraph 8

She was blameless.

The attacker was impaired. Mitigating circumstances, but that doesn't absolve her for what she did.
 
One of my points being that if you approach the case correctly you don’t start from assuming crap like “hostile gesticulation”. You hear evidence relevant to the facts to which the law needs to be applied. Her gesture was both not relevant and that of a visually-impaired woman and nothing more.
 
Salamander said:
All it shows is you are too lazy to read the thread properly, see something, post a reply without ever grasping what the post was about, if you had any common sense you would have understood my original post. Wouldn't it be nice if you posted at least one positive comment on this forum, It's not rocket science.
Click to expand...
Hilarious.

Buy a bike it might cheer you up. I’ve had a lovely ride today in the glorious sunshine, it was with some friends. We all wore Lycra, we stopped at a cafe, we had fun while exercising.

Be positive.
 
AndyU said:
From the New Highway Code Rules 2022:

“Always remember that the people you encounter may have impaired sight, hearing or mobility and that this may not be obvious.”

“Cyclists should give way to pedestrians on shared use cycle tracks and to horse riders on bridleways.”

“Cyclists, horse riders and drivers of horse drawn vehicles likewise have a responsibility to reduce danger to pedestrians.”

“Pedestrians may use any part of the road and use cycle tracks as well as the pavement, unless there are signs prohibiting pedestrians.”

anthonygold.co.uk

Cyclists and Pedestrians - New Highway Code Rules

The Highway Code has recently been updated to include new rules which introduce a new hierarchy of road users, meaning that cyclists and pedestrians now have greater protection when using the roads.
anthonygold.co.uk anthonygold.co.uk

Surely if you are cycling towards a batty, cantankerous, half-blind, disabled, gesticulating old woman on a narrow pavement you just brake and stop rather than alarming her further.
Click to expand...
The cyclist in question was doing 4.7mph.

The cyclist died. It’s a tragic case.
 
Great news for culture war bollocks, let’s pay less attention to the 400 odd pedestrians killed and 6000 odd seriously injured by cars each year, btw, remind me how many car drivers are prosecuted to the full effect of the current laws each year?,
 
Great news???? Possibly for those who are bereaved in this type of remarkably rare type of occurrence? Great news really for the type of idiot who hates cyclists and is probably the type of person who gives cyclists close, punishment passes on the road.

https://www.gov.uk/government/stati...es-in-great-britain-pedestrian-factsheet-2022

0.5% of pedestrian fatalities are of a result of a collision with a bike.
Probably similar to the number of cyclists who are killed by motorists not looking when they open their door and 'door' a cyclist killing them. The law is woefully lacking there. I suspect most motorists haven't heard of the Dutch Reach.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.


advertisement


Back
Top