Presumed liability for cyclists

[cdtaylornats]

Mark Beaumont is asking for the Scottish Parliament to change road laws so that in a collision between cars and cyclists then car drivers are assumed to be liable.

I think that would be okay as long as cyclists on roads are licenced and insured and in a collision between cyclists and pedestrians then the cyclist is assumed to be liable.

If you do want to cycle in traffic at a speed to suit yourself and against the main flow, then fine.

I've never seen anyone do this

I suppose what you are saying is cycle at your own risk but don't be surprised if you get killed is own fault for doing it in the first place.

That's a similar argument to saying that women should avoid wearing short skirts or getting drunk and should be careful where they walk so that they can reduce the risk of getting raped

I'm sure you don't agree with that - so why should cyclists, who are lawfully on the highway and have done nothing wrong, have to give it up because of the big bad cars .

Why does it manage to work in other countries - and why has presumed liability help reduce the accident rates? Is it attitudes that is the problem? The presumption that cars always have right of way and don't think about other users on the road? Not saying that those on thread are inconsiderate - but there are other drivers who are.

It used to be accepted that people drank and drive. Fortunately attitudes have changed.

And that's before you even start on the environmental or health aspects of cycling.

I could cycle home from work in 17 minutes (max). If I were in the car, it could take anything between 15 minutes and an hour. Therefore when ds was at the childminder or after school club, then cycling was a no-brainer. It was the only way I could guarantee to be back by 5.45. It had the added benefit, as I had a demanding full time job, of ensuring that I got my daily (well, three times a week as there were days when I had to drive to other sites or fly to London in which case dh picked ds up) exercise without having to go to a gym It also meant one less car contributing to the traffic jam on the Kingston Bridge

They don't have to give it up, just be aware that by putting a frail human body on a small, relatively unstable set of wheels in amongst much bigger and faster vehicles ( not big and bad, just bigger and faster - and harder!,) they are increasing the risk of being hurt or damaged. I suppose, it's a life choice like anything else but it is a choice.
For example my daughter rides horses. Even wearing suitabke head and body protection ,she is choosing to accept the element of risk that goes with this hobby. However, for many of the reasons outlined by cyclists above, she will never ride on roads in traffic because, in her opinion, the risk of injury becomes too great to make it worth it. There's nothing to stop her doing it, and demanding the same rights as cyclists do, but she chooses not to endanger herself by being in a slower moving and unpredictable mode of transport in faster moving traffic.

Can I ask, seriously and given all the stories by cyclists as to the injuries they have suffered and the high risk of death, why the heck do cyclists persist in putting themselves in this position?

Because the benefits outweigh the risks, which are statistically not that high at all. Even health-wise - your life expectancy actually goes up if you start cycling regularly, because the health risks of being sedentary outweigh the risks of cycling.

Also for me, it's a great way of getting exercise into my regular day without having to make extra time for it. I can cycle to work and back, cycle to off-site meetings, and it takes less time than the bus would do. I cycled 19 miles yesterday, most of it fairly fast and up and down lots of hills - I couldn't get that level of exercise by just pootling round the park a few times.

Also, I don't drive, and I have a lot more freedom of movement with a bike than on foot/bus/train.

Fair enough 53rd

I would say I am a considerate driver - (certainly more than the ignorant shites that let a poor elderly woman run out of slip road yesterday just so they could get a few meters further up the road), I try to take account of other road and pavement users, I go carefully when driving past groups of children on the pavement in case one of them steps onto the road, I allow as much space as possible when passing cyclists, I try to imagine that those cyclists and pedestrians are my children and how would I expect them to be treated.

All that doesn't eliminate the fact that my daily journey takes me on a 60 limit A road with bends and curves and hills with Lorries and trucks and animal transporters etc etc using it too. I have nightmares about coming round a bend and being faced with cyclists ambling 2 abreast in front of me with a lorry coming the opposite way. I can't travel the road at 20 mph to eliminate any risk and I have good brakes and drive at appropriate speed for the road conditions.

It isn't always the case that drivers are mean and evil and want to try and shunt bikes of the road. I would imagine that the vast majority of accidents are genuine accidents caused simply by two categories of people with vastly different strengths and speeds sharing the same small piece of tarmac.

Cyclists aren't allowed on motorways but in some cases that is a safer place than other roads since at least there are two carriageways and a hard shoulder available to avoid trouble. Different story in more built up areas though with on and off slips etc.

wankers I think you expressed what I was trying to say, but with more eloquence.
Different strengths and speeds on the same area of tarmac is spot on, so to go back to the question posed by the OP , why should the larger vehicles automatically be assumed the guilty party?

Wankers, drivers like you, who worry about hitting cyclists are not the problem.

Anyone who rides a bike knows the drivers this law would affect and has probably been hit at least once by one of them. On my bike, I've been deliberately swerved into multiple times. DELIBERATELY. Then of course there are the legions of the irritated, lazy or rushing - just bad drivers. Buses, taxi drivers, white van drivers - yep, all the cliches - they're in a rush, they're cross about something, they've had a bad day at work I don't know! But I've been hit seven times and each of those times not because I was taking a risk, or doing something wrong, but just because a driver passed me too close, or drove past too fast in a sudden rush, or who didn't look when they turned out of a side road.

I'm lit up light a Christmas tree in winter

The potholes worry me too. I'm so busy looking and signalling and braking and accelerating that I have almost come off my bike hitting a pothole in the road.

Maybe, demented we should remove the cars and lorries from our roads rather than the cyclists? Less pollution, fewer deaths ...

Of course, that's silly. No matter what your mode of transport, we all have a right to use them. We all contribute to the building and maintenance of roads but infuriatingly at the moment, roads are built for cars not pedestrians or horses or cyclists.

Presumed liability can't exist on its own. Improved infrastructure is critical.