SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
[...] It is clear that a significant minority of British drivers put their time and their 'needs' above the safety of other road users and pedestrians. In a few decades, the driverless car will be perfected and the driven car must be made obsolete, preferably by law.
Until then the Government and the insurance industry should take radical steps to help residents of rural and urban communities reclaim their neighbourhoods from the lorries, the lunatics - and those Great British Motorists who like toddlers think they can do what they like, and explode with rage and indignation when questioned about it.
Black boxes compulsory in every vehicle, with improved technology that detects speed limit breaking and careless or aggressive driving.
Insurance companies encouraged to hike premiums immediately and punitively as bad driving is revealed.
Insurance companies obliged to hand over to DVLA and / or police all data that reveals traffic offences and dangerous driving.
Legal framework to allow prosecution and driving bans relating to offences revealed by black boxes.
Legal changes to encourage use of dashcam / helmet-cam / CCTV evidence to prosecute motorists.
Comprehensive review of 30mph speed limits, with local consultations on which should be lowered to 20mph.
Limit revs to 3,000rpm on all vehicles - as condition of passing MOT - to cut noise and dangerous acceleration.
Funding for technology that will limit all vehicles automatically to the local speed limit (and in the case of national speed limits, a safe speed for the road conditions); and will prevent heavy goods vehicles from using inappropriate rural and urban roads.
Source: This is Money
(Score: 1) by Francis on Monday August 22 2016, @02:06PM
Basically, you want to be predictable in the street, look as far forward at possible risks as practical and be as defensive as practical for other people's nutty behavior. It's obviously not going to completely prevent the possibility of being in a collision, but it does cut the risk significantly.
Any 2 wheeled vehicle is going to be harder to gauge than a car will. 2 wheeled vehicles have at most one headlight, which makes it hard to gauge. Bikes are probably easier to gauge for distance than motorcycles are because they're all roughly the same size. There's a pretty huge variance in sizes among motorcycles.
Situations like that are why you want to be looking 12 seconds ahead of you at pretty much any time and you want to be especially paranoid of people that appear to be looking to turn across your path of travel. Especially on a bike, the default is to slam on the brakes as hard as you can without going over the handle bars.
Unfortunately, since there is no test to ride a bicycle, I don't think most cyclists actually know how to apply their brakes properly. Which is a potentially fatal error if you're going 20 or 30 mph.
(Score: 2) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Monday August 22 2016, @03:31PM
Because I was planning to opt out of a drivers' license for a while, I took an adult cycling course instead.
CAN-BIKE 2 [canbikecanada.ca]
I decided to get my license after learning that a motor vehicle is essentially required for any job doing on-site servicing. (1 hour on highway is like 5 hours by bicycle.)
For left-turning cars, braking can sometimes be avoided by steering towards them. They either see you and stop, or you go behind them as they pass.
(Score: 1) by Francis on Monday August 22 2016, @08:21PM
That's cool, I wish we had something like that here. Unfortunately, without insurance and licensing requirements, the only folks that would sign up for those classes are the ones that weren't a problem in the first place. Which would still be a net gain, considering that a lot of cyclists are unaware of the fact that they can kill pedestrians if they hit them, I think a class would be a great step in the right direction.
One of the things I make a point of doing is being predictably unpredictable. If folks see that I"m using the entire lane at various points along the way, they're more likely to see me and less likely to think that they can encroach into my lane. It also means that they see more of the side of my bike than they would otherwise see.
One of my favorite tricks is to deliberately move towards the side of the road I can't see coming up to a blind intersection and then purposefully cross across the lane to the other side. It's not something that the drivers expect to see, but it makes me look a lot bigger as they see more of my side.
(Score: 2) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Monday August 22 2016, @09:05PM
The most common reason for taking the class is cycling for work. Be it courier or police work.
The class I took is aimed at mature cyclist who learned a few of the lessons the hard way already. You can learn in a month what trial-and-error will teach you in 20-30 years.
Though I don't think I would have figured out counter-steering myself.