WTF cyclists in the snow

[lifeandtheuniverse]

Cycling in the snow and ice, with no lights on and no reflective gear.

AIBU to think they should be arrested as a danger on the road.

Just had one fall off as lost back wheel on the snow,, car behind him managed to swerve round lost his back end and corrected. Me second car behind, I slam on brakes as he slides towards my front wheels - feet under my bumper. Car behind me ends up touching my bumper!

Then the moron has the balls to swear, berate me and demand my details.

Do agree they should have to make themselves visible though.

@rollingonariver if a car driver can't see you because you are poorly lit, then that's not just the motorist's issue.

Sorry @rollingonariver x post!

YANBU OP

Sometimes I think they have a deathwish

As to cyclists not hurting anyone - please talk to the family of the woman killed by a cyclist last year - bikes are a lethal weapon, as are cars.

Sure, but bikes cause 0.6% of pedestrian fatalities in road collisions, motor vehicles cause the other 99.4%. In 2016, 43 pedestrians in Britain were killed by a motor vehicle mounting a pavement or verge. None was killed by a bike on a pavement or verge. You can read the statistics here if you want some knowledge before going on about lethal weapons.

I’m a bit baffled ginger, I’ve said drivers should worry about their bit of road safety, that’s all. No beef. You seem a bit over-invested.

How is trying to make sure I don't knock a cyclist off their bike 'overinvested'?

illustrious - I do agree the minority on both sides make it bad for the majority.

My car had lights on 30m behind effwit and had snow tyres.Windscreen, roof and rear window clear -comes from being brought up in a nordic country - that does not stop when a few flakes of snow hit the ground! I was prepared

He had standard road tyres ( I am a keen cyclist - mountain bike mainly - my ancient Diamondback is still going strong), no lights, no reflective gear.

One of us did prepare and one of us did not.

Reserve the same right for cyclists considering you could kill them.

OK, as long as cyclists sit in the queue with the cars, wait at the lights with the cars and don't weave in & out as they see fit causing chaos.

Responsibility goes both ways & my dashcams will cover my arse at the inquest.

cakeflake - bikes are as lethal as cars, jsut less of them on the road.

Difference is you can sue the car driver for your injuries, a pedestrian can not sue a cyclist because they do not have insurance. If you are on the road, be insured, everyone can cause catastrophic injuries - some can get some recompense, others get nothing.

Does not make either right or wrong.

@gingergenius

The OP doesn't state if it was before or after dark.

However, I often see arguments from people complaining about how cyclists don't wear hi vis / aren't using lights / etc. even when it's perfect daylight and perfect visibility.

Should this car have been wearing hi vis and have had its lights on? www.facebook.com/paul.delta.9/videos/10213020096471828/

rolling - I do not think my car journey is more important than cyclists, but with asthmatic child, whose trigger is often extreme cold( hence why we relocated many years ago to Exs place of birth!) putting them on the back of my cycle really was not an option!

Illustrious - I think they call it filtering and it is allegedly legal - we are supposed to look, clock them on the inside and then not realise as you pull out thinking you are fine to find they have filtered on the drivers side and scoot passed you, hand off your car, narrowly miss your front wheel and swear at you!!!

1730 ish

bikes are as lethal as cars, jsut less of them on the road

No, they're really not.

Cycling in the snow is probably more dangerous than driving but not possible to legislate about, you have to rely on people using common sense. However I do think cyclists should be made by law to wear helmets and reflective gear as well as passing a proficiency test. Just as I and my kids do. And having lights is a legal requirement. Car drivers sometimes do stupid things but so do cyclists and I have little sympathy for a cyclist who has an accident as a result of their own actions.

@AvocadosBeforeMortgages I was taught, many yes s ago when doing my motorcycle training that just because the law states you don't need your lights on until after dark, doesn't mean you shouldn't.

As a motorist I put my lights on during daylight hours if I feel visibility is impaired. I don't think it's unreasonable to think cyclists should do the same, bearing in mind their relative size?

Of course cyclists have as much right to be on the road as cars, but sometimes people think their right to be there somehow trumps natural laws - like ice and snow is slippy, bike tires are skinny, cyclists are squishy humans - it's not rocket science

You can have the right to be there and you can also kill yourself in the process- the two things aren't mutually exclusive

And obviously that clip was an unusual situation, @AvocadosBeforeMortgages. Which I'm sure you're aware of. It was most likely caused by a poor manoeuvre choice by the driver of the small car, at a guess.

DingDongDenny
Beautifully put

bikes can kill and maim and so can cars.

Have seen many people hit by cars - a mess

Have also seen many pedestrians hit by bicycles -different types of injuries but no less life changing.

OK but you said "bikes are as lethal as cars". That is not true and not even close to being true.

Cycling in the snow is probably more dangerous than driving but not possible to legislate about, you have to rely on people using common sense. However I do think cyclists should be made by law to wear helmets and reflective gear as well as passing a proficiency test. Just as I and my kids do. And having lights is a legal requirement. Car drivers sometimes do stupid things but so do cyclists and I have little sympathy for a cyclist who has an accident as a result of their own actions.

You appear to be playing fallacy bingo
Compulsory helmets: cyclingfallacies.com/en/29/people-should-wear-helmets-when-cycling (countries with compulsory helmet laws show no reduction in the number of head injuries, but do show a reduction in the number of people cycling, so you have an overall negative health impact because people exercise less)
Reflective gear: cyclingfallacies.com/en/19/people-should-wear-hi-viz-when-cycling (can make you less visible in certain circumstances; certainly in the snow in daylight I would prefer to wear high-contrast black than low contrast bright yellow)
Proficiency tests: cyclingfallacies.com/en/33/cycling-should-require-a-licence-and-registration (see driving tests: people have to take those and still do some spectacularly stupid/dangerous things after taking their driving proficiency test)

Yes, lights are a legal requirement, we can agree there. While I have little sympathy for people whose actions are dangerous to the point of irresponsibility, our road network is designed so that you can make a tiny error and end up paying with your life; this would not be an acceptable situation in any other sphere (factory workers, aviation, construction etc.)

And obviously that clip was an unusual situation, @AvocadosBeforeMortgages. Which I'm sure you're aware of. It was most likely caused by a poor manoeuvre choice by the driver of the small car, at a guess.

The clip doesn't show the impact itself or what led up to it, so I wouldn't like to speculate.

What it does, however, show is that the lorry driver completely failed to notice a small car being pushed along by his lorry. If a lorry driver fails to notice a tonne of metal & human in such situations, it rather suggests that the problems on our roads are much bigger than anything high vis clothing could possibly solve.

How do cyclists have as much right as car drivers when they don't pay road tax or insurance? A cyclist rode in front of me and landed on my stationary bonnet at a roundabout and stuck his finger up at me!!

Just to clarify OP, you were going no more than 9 miles per hour up the hill (because of that nasty cyclist on YOUR road!!), but when he was apparently sliding towards you, you had no option to avoid him as you would have bumped into a tree?

At well under 9 miles per hour (9mph being his and tour top speed per your claim, then factor in the deceleration thanks to braking with your claimed winter tyres, and the effect of gravity from the hill sufficiently steep to pull him towards you) the tree would have only dinged your bumper at worst. You would seriously rather propel a tonne of metal towards another human being than bump into a tree at walking pace?

You are the one who should be locked up.

Bicycles don’t damage roads, they don’t pollute the air, they don’t burn fossil fuels, they don’t require large amounts of rare metals for their batteries, they provide exercise for the user and they reduce the numbers of cars on the roads.

They are also less dangerous than cars: it is possible for them to cause injuries or even kill someone: but the latter is highly unlikely and a serious injury is also unlikely even if you’re hit by a bike. They are manifestly better for our towns and cities than cars.

yes people should have bright lights and so on, but once you drive expecting cyclists instead of viewing them as a problem or a surprise their level of lit-up-ness is less important.