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Witness appeal after cyclist killed in HGV collision in Nottingham

Female rider not yet named

Police in Nottingham have issued a witness appeal after a female cyclist died following a collision with an HGV in the city centre yesterday morning.

Police were called to Lower Parliament Street, Nottingham — a four-lane one-way street which appears to have no provision for cycling — at its junction with Pennyfoot Street and Fisher Gate, at around 8.30am yesterday, Thursday July 3.

The rider, who has not been named, was taken to the city’s Queen’s Medical Centre with critical injures but was subsequently pronounced dead.

Eyewitness Judith Birkett, 78, told the Nottingham Post: "I was behind the Greene King lorry. It was like it happened in slow motion and it sort of hung in the air.

"I was so shocked and I think I actually screamed. It was horrible. Somebody dashed across the road to help the cyclist."

Birkett, who runs the Castle pub on Lower Parliament Street, was in her car on the way to Colwick Park when she saw the collision.

 

"It's a terrible junction because people aren't always aware that there's traffic coming round the corner from Parliament Street," she said.

"I've been here 17 years and have seen some horrendous misses."

The male driver of the Greene King HGV was treated at the scene for minor injuries. The company said it was working with the police to investigae the collision and offered its condolences to the victim's family.

Nottinghamshire police request that anyone who saw the incident or has any information contact police on 101 or call Crimestoppers on  0800 555 111, citing Incident Number 000138-03072014.

In January, Nottingham council announced it planned a to spend £600,000 improving two other dangerous junctions to make them safer for cyclists. 

After seven cyclists died on the area's roads in 2012, Nottingham councillors and MPs lobbied Parliament to force cyclists to wear helmets and to ban BMX bikes from being used on the roads.

John has been writing about bikes and cycling for over 30 years since discovering that people were mug enough to pay him for it rather than expecting him to do an honest day's work.

He was heavily involved in the mountain bike boom of the late 1980s as a racer, team manager and race promoter, and that led to writing for Mountain Biking UK magazine shortly after its inception. He got the gig by phoning up the editor and telling him the magazine was rubbish and he could do better. Rather than telling him to get lost, MBUK editor Tym Manley called John’s bluff and the rest is history.

Since then he has worked on MTB Pro magazine and was editor of Maximum Mountain Bike and Australian Mountain Bike magazines, before switching to the web in 2000 to work for CyclingNews.com. Along with road.cc founder Tony Farrelly, John was on the launch team for BikeRadar.com and subsequently became editor in chief of Future Publishing’s group of cycling magazines and websites, including Cycling Plus, MBUK, What Mountain Bike and Procycling.

John has also written for Cyclist magazine, edited the BikeMagic website and was founding editor of TotalWomensCycling.com before handing over to someone far more representative of the site's main audience.

He joined road.cc in 2013. He lives in Cambridge where the lack of hills is more than made up for by the headwinds.

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9 comments

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cookdn | 9 years ago
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That area is terrible and is worsened by two bus depots that use two lanes of the four lane one-way system as a queuing area for their buses at certain times of the day.

I was so shocked the first time I passed through here on my bike just after 1830 on a weekday, I spoke to the two men marshaling buses into the Trent Barton depot. They were completely oblivious to the dangerous road conditions that they were creating.

Nottinghamshire - not the most bike friendly county in the country.  17

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Jon Malcolm | 9 years ago
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Nottingham City Centre is a vile trap of one way systems, sudden lane changes, HGVs, sudden 3/4 lane junctions and really fast traffic. I simply stopped cycling through it and now plan my commutes through the suburbs.

I challenge anyone to ride London Road to Trent Bridge and not be bullied and cut to pieces by the traffic for example.

Regarding the deaths in 2012 - I regularly ride on the road where two of those deaths occurred (kids as I can recall) and I've yet to see anyone obey the new 50 speed limit which was the sole response to those deaths.

Nottinghamshire in general and Nottingham in particular is not served well for safe cycling despite all the press releases the council chuck out saying the opposite.

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IanW1968 | 9 years ago
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We just need the politicians, police, cps and judiciary to give fuck.

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Metaphor | 9 years ago
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So they don't bother to engineer safer roads, just force cyclists to put a helmet on. Utter negligence from Nottingham council.

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banzicyclist2 | 9 years ago
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I agree corporate manslaughter charge would certainly rause the stakes. Might even get some action that's meaningful.

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BikeBud | 9 years ago
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I've ridden through that junction many times - it carries a lot of traffic, there is a lot of lane changing, and the traffic can be quite fast. My thoughts go out to the cyclists family.

Where Nottingham does provide routes for cyclists it can be extremely poor, sometimes presenting a greater danger than riding along a busy road.

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Airzound | 9 years ago
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"After seven cyclists died on the area's roads in 2012, Nottingham councillors and MPs lobbied Parliament to force cyclists to wear helmets and to ban BMX bikes from being used on the roads".

WTF!

Terrible. RIP the dead woman cyclist above.

Avatar
jacknorell replied to Airzound | 9 years ago
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Airzound wrote:

"After seven cyclists died on the area's roads in 2012, Nottingham councillors and MPs lobbied Parliament to force cyclists to wear helmets and to ban BMX bikes from being used on the roads".

WTF!

Terrible. RIP the dead woman cyclist above.

It's a shame that there's absolutely no appetite for trying the councils that behave like Nottingham under corporate manslaughter. Would be hard to make it stick, but the prosecution alone would sharpen some minds around road safety.

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cshep87 | 9 years ago
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My thoughts go out to the family.

I ride this road as part of my daily commute. It's busy and not a nice junction.

Had the day off work yesterday but drove past mid morning whilst the road was still closed. Felt numb when found out someone had died.

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