truckyboy:
Following on from the recent post about safety features for trucks to protect cyclist, pedestrians and motorists, it was merely guess work as to what these might entail, so i am going to enlighten you by quoting what was in a newspaper i read recently, it wasMetronewspaper and dated Tuesday Sept 30th…so here goes:TFL recently commissioned Loughborough design school to research how changes to HGV cab designs can lead to real improvements in road safety. The project was joint funded by TFL and Transport & Environment, a campaign group arguing for smarter, greener transport in Europe.Poor driver vision and lorry blind spots are a major cause of fatal accidents involving HGV
s. Current cab design means the average cyclist is invisible to an HGV driver up to 1.9m from the base of the cab. Loughborough Design School has shown moreDirect Visionof other road users can be achieved through better design. This includes a slightly curved and elongated nose on the vehicle, a smaller dashboard, larger glazed areas in the passenger doors and corner of the cab and a slightly lower cab. These changes could potentially save hundreds of lives and reduce costs to the operator, as a more aerodynamically designed cab leads to better fuel economy. Leon Daniels, managing director of Surface Transport at TFL said ¬ Technology has moved in leaps and bounds since the 1980s, but HGV drivers are still in cabs that have seen very little improvement in direct vision for decades`. Thanks to our funding, a leading UK academic institution has demonstrated to Europe how the vehicle manufacturing industry can continue to oprogress. Improved and increased direct vision will benefit all. Safety will be improved, efficiencies will be made and lives will be saved.I think its an interference by a body ( that i have never heard of ) trying to be clever with their ideas that they know nothing about. They have probably never been inside a truck, and is more than likely has stood at the side of the road merely looking at different marques. The experts in this industry are of course the drivers themselves, and no organisation see fit to ask us what can be done about more safety. If you look back to the 80`s the Volvo F89 had a small window on the nearside/offside to get a better view of the lower part of the cab, as with the n/s upside down mirror, perhaps that could be brought back into the fold, also make it a serious offence for cyclists to head to the front of the queue as they do now, and another serious offence is for them to jump or totally disregard traffic signals, this can be achieved via a registration system and rear number plates to be fitted, therefore allowing cctv to report any illegal actions. What are your views and/or ideas on this.
Ahh,yes
There are Cabs in offer which are Low and more Windows but get not bought by Blue-Cheap Companies for some Reason.
VOLVO FM
DAF CF
for exemple.
Bigger Window take strenght from cab away why Cabs can’t be designed that way,except you will use Material from Aircraft Industry no Transport Company could afford anywhy.
and
Ha Ha 
What Aerodynamic in the City by 30 mph which goes now down to 20 mph in some parts of London.
Perhaps training Cyclists could be cheaper and were affordable,i would say.
