cliffton 27:
its guy something and most of the time he ends up just shouting down the other person and makes us all look like knuckle draggers
You only need to look at half the posts on this forum to reach the same conclusion…
Due to the nature of my job I wasn’t able to give my full concentration to the slot or even hear the whole thing all the way through.
I did catch the fact that a disproportionate amount of the deaths in London involved female cyclists on the nearside of the truck.
I did catch that several key points raised by the pro cyclists were shot down with facts from pretty much everyone else without the pro cyclist agenda.
It’s a debate that can only raise more questions without answering any.
The first question I would ask is : why would an average ‘expert’ truck driver care whether or not they were banned from London?
The second would be : is there an alternative yet undisclosed agenda riding on the back of an emotive subject like cyclists V’s trucks?
Hands up anyone who remembers another recent ‘hot’ topic, gays being allowed to marry in church. Keep your hands raised if you had a slight inkling that it had nothing whatsoever to do with gays getting married in church but was more to do with an outright attack on Christianity itself.
I feel there is an alternative agenda being touted as a debate between cyclists & lorries at work here, I feel that agenda has more to do with the normalisation of the bicycle as a means of transportation for the masses than it does the deaths of a few silly wimmin who can’t assess the risk factor involved with being in close proximity of a 20, 30, or 40 ton truck.
Ched:
cliffton 27:
i didnt hear all of it but i did catch the driver who rang up trying to explain how trucks turn etc he sounded very reasonable and didnt make us sound like morons unlike that clown of a driver they normally have onI know exactly who you mean. He’s been on Vine loads of times and does the industry no favours whatsoever. I heard the whole program and it was pretty fair to be honest.
One idea … compulsory day lights or high viz clothing/markings for cyclists. Lots of motorbikes use headlights during the day and you can spot them a mile off.
Not much point anymore, everything has lights on all the time now, the thing without lights on gets noticed now due to people calling them a knob head 
Maybe a different colour light for cyclists? But some modern lights seem to change colour as they go over bumps etc?
There are several things that could be done to improve the situation for all road users, but I wouldn’t hold my breath on any of them.
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Cut down on the clutter of signs on city streets; in fact everywhere. Every superfluous one is both a distraction from the road, and camouflage for errant cyclists and pedestrians.
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Make jaywalking an offence. We (quite rightly) get fined if we jump red lights; the same should apply to other road users and that includes pedestrians.
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Where there is a safe and viable cycle lane parallel to (and seperate from) a normal road, force cyclists to use it, on pain of a £30 fixed penalty.
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Working lights to be compulsory on bicycles. There is no excuse for not having them, they cost peanuts these days and with LED technology the batteries last ages.
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Compulsory road training for cyclists. Anyone who’s done a motorcycle test in the last 20 years will know all about the “life-saver”, the glance over the shoulder which is drummed into you in training and quickly becomes habit. Yet how many of us have observed cyclists changing lanes, making right and left turns and negotiating roundabouts etc without even a backward glance.
Problem is that the police are reluctant to prosecute cyclists and pedestrians, partly I guess because of the cycling lobby and partly because since they don’t have registration plates it makes it more difficult for them to nail the offenders. Add to that the natural inclination of the public to automatically assume that anything like this must be the fault of the lorry or its driver, and we’re soon on a hiding to nothing.
Couple of points : Why when we have an " industry " spokesman in this case the FTA guy do we always end up with someone who cant string two words together? blah blah same old platitudes instead of someone who grabs the subject and the interviewer by the balls and tells it like it is. It took Vine for christs sake to point out the difference between Paris and London, the FTA man should have jumped on the statistic for what they were bol…! No fatalities in Paris you might as well compare London to New York ( Americans drive every were ) or how about Alaska, Dubai, or the middle of the Sahara Desert, but no he mumbled on about well 4fifths of b all now if the statistics had been about Amsterdam (where bikes outnumber people ) and only one fatality had occurred then he could still have stuck it too them but no blah blah we will deliver any time you want ,we will fit more mirrors , cameras , every waggon will have two safety attendants with red flags that will walk along side, we will absorb any costs that occur. If it hadn’t been for the feed back from the guys at the sharp end you and me, 6 months from now a " trial period " will start and before you know it will be law and were next? Birmingham , Bristol Exeter , as was once said Lions led by Sheep these people ( RHA inc ) are suppose to represent the interests and views of the industry arnt drivers part of that? The FTA and RHA ought to get their act together and do some proper talking and lobbying.
Now what he should have said: All cycles should be registered and insured the money from this should go paying for all the extra costs and safety extras you want and if you want to impose day time bans and so on best you buy a Transit and we will meet you up at areas outside the 25 best fetch a few 25ltr drums with you an all for your Chelsea tractors instead Wimper wimper wimper.
I might be missing something here but why are drivers moaning about maybe not being allowed to take trucks into London if that’s what they want let them get on with it.
^^^+1
Vine being a journalist, is probably being paid by the Boris Johnson cycling lobby to whip up a storm of protest against wagons in the city.
Just reach for the search button and switch the daft ■■■■ off.
You don’t really need a HGV for London as I just witnessed a white van man load five pallets of Coca Cola into LWB VW Crafter 3.5 ton van.
That’s not a one off either they do it every day.
Stupot:
You don’t really need a HGV for London as I just witnessed a white van man load five pallets of Coca Cola into LWB VW Crafter 3.5 ton van.
That’s not a one off either they do it every day.
Stupot, it doesn’t matter what you say I’ll always agree with you like an eager puppy!
Please don’t tell me you’re really a hairy arsed trucker and not the lovely in your avatar! I think I love you. 
bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-22350776
Hope these come in so I can get through town even faster on my bike.
chester:
'Dutch-style' cycle roundabouts for London tested - BBC NewsHope these come in so I can get through town even faster on my bike.
I already see a problem with that junction.
A british right ■■■■■■ artic stops on the roundabout exactly where that peugeot has stopped, he is now blind to any other speeding cyclists that may come and have right of way?
Tell me im wrong 
Would I be wrong in thinking that any trucker worthy of the title would be looking around throughout the roundabout manoeuvre prior to leaving it? I do it now so it will make little difference to me.
100 million quid and cyclists who this is being done for are paying nothing:-(
How do you work that out? And please don’t say cyclists dont pay “road tax”.
merc0447:
A british right ■■■■■■ artic stops on the roundabout exactly where that peugeot has stopped, he is now blind to any other speeding cyclists that may come and have right of way?Tell me im wrong
No, your right. You’d certainly likely miss a burke on one of these coming around : tandem-bicycle-central.com/images/trike.jpg
Many cyclists will of course come flying round these roundabouts at speed, thinking only about the fact they have right of way and with no regard to their vulnerability and risk of a car/truck driver making a mistake.
kjw21:
It’s called Darwinism. Survival of the fittest/most intelligent.I somehow manage to survive each 24 hours by not doing stupid life threatening things such as walking in lane 3 of the m6, head butting a moving train, smoking a ■■■ in a gas works and also not cycling up the inside of trucks.
If I did any of the above I’d deserve what’s coming and be helping the human race by removing myself fr the gene pool.
Nice 1
Slackbladder:
How do you work that out? And please don’t say cyclists dont pay “road tax”.
So every cyclist is a car driver that pays vehicle tax then … see I’m a dumb ■■■ a didn’t know that!!! …
What will happen though is plenty of cameras will be installed on these roundabouts to tax drivers further whilst cyclist’s can carry on breaking the laws regardless
Your original post suggests that the roundabouts will be paid for by everyone but cyclists! They will be paid for out of the general tax fund as usual, we all pay into that regardless of wether you cycle or not. As it happens only about 87% of cyclists also own cars.
I’ve always been an advocate of natural selection, I’ve said it many times on these forums, if a cyclist wants to take on a truck by speeding up well, good luck. However, if you watch the vid posted the only one to get it wrong was the car driver, not unusual.
Then you’ll have other berks going round the wrong way. Here in Oz, you’re lucky to see 'em on the correct side of the road.