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Jon Senior · October 17th 04, 04:11 PM posted to uk.rec.cycling,uk.transport.london

Silas Denyer opined the following...
As an example, Rollerblades were, ISTR, banned in the Royal Parks
because a pedestrian was killed by being hit by a 'blader on a
"pavement". The pedestrian had no choice in the matter (as opposed to
the choice of not walking in the road with cars).

And where would you put the rollerblader? In the road?

Pedestrians should have the right to cross at crossings without fear
of being hit - by *anything*. The earlier "1ft vs 6ft" argument, for
instance, was spurious in this regard.

You are correct that a pedestrian should be able to cross the road at a
crossing without fear. To presume that this fear comes from a fear of
bikes shows a lack of understanding of reality. Given that you are far
more likely to be killed by a car than a bicycle, being more afraid of
the bikes is a little strange.

I have been hit (as a pedestrian) by a cyclist (breaking the law),
whose head (down, not looking, helmetted) struck me in the face. It
took me a good long time to recover from that. It was not trivial
(except when compared to death) and was caused entirely by the cyclist
"only doing what everyone does" (his words). That is my point - break
down the apparent scale of the offence and soon nobody knows what is
"wrong" or "unacceptable" or even "undesirable" any longer.

Indeed. Note the number of drivers who routinely exceed speed limits.

No, the analogy was simply non-analagous. Consider this one instead:

I beg to differ, but that comes down to your perception of threat from
cyclists (Which, it would appear, is tainted by personal experience as
apposed to objective observation).

You have to defend Smallium from attack by a mixed bag of opponents
from a single direction. Some have assault rifles, others have
sharpened fruit. You keep out the riflemen but let through the less
lethal (but not non-lethal) fruit carriers, and accept a number of
civilian casualties from fruit.

Soon the riflemen realise that disguising their weapons as fruit is a
good way to go, whilst your guards become used to letting some enemies
in. What do you think happens next?

If this is analogous to the original problem then presumably you are
aware of some way in which a car could be disguised as a bike while
retaining its inherent ability to cause damage.

OK, but:

(a) if every red light has a camera, and most motorists don't want to
be caught by them, and casualties continue to decrease, suddenly
cyclists look like a big problem.

1st problem. Not every red light has a camera. A very small proportion
of them are now equipped with cameras and since traffic lights appear to
breed faster than cameras I don't see this changing.
2nd problem. Given the ratios, the cameras would have to be close to
100% effective against the problem of car drivers jumping reds in order
to bring the KSI ratio down to a level where cyclists became a problem.
In that world, the cyclists would no longer see car drivers jumping red
lights and wouldn't assume it was OK.

(b) how long will people respect the rule of law if it is flouted by
everybody else, including the police (see my original post)?

The police _always_ flout the rule of law... it's a perk of the job!

Jon

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