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news
Cycling UK urges government to highlight 'Dutch Reach' technique to drivers
Cycling UK has urged the government to launch a road safety campaign promoting the so-called 'Dutch Reach' technique to vehicle occupants and thereby reduce the number of car dooring incidents in which cyclists are seriously injured or killed.
The charity says that according to figures it obtained from the Department for Transport (DfT), between 2011 and 2015 a total of 3,100 people were injured and eight killed in incidents in which "vehicle door opened or closed negligently" was cited as a factor.
In around two thirds of those cases, the victim was a cyclist, with 2,004 riders injured and five killed.
However, it believes that the statistics do not reveal the full extent of the problem, because they only reflect cases where the police are called.
The Dutch Reach takes its name from the technique, taught to learner drivers in the Netherlands, of opening a car door with the hand that is further away from it, which means the body naturally turns around and the vehicle occupant can see if anyone is approaching from behind.
Cycling UK chief executive Paul Tuohy called on the DfT to build a road safety campaign around the technique in a letter to transport minister, Jesse Norman.
He said: “Some people seem to see car dooring as a bit of a joke, but it’s not and can have serious consequences.
“Cycling UK wants to see greater awareness made about the dangers of opening your car door negligently, and people to be encouraged to look before they open.
“In the Netherlands they are known for practising a method, known sometimes as the 'Dutch Reach', which we think could be successfully encouraged in the UK. Cycling UK has written to the Department for Transport asking them to look into this, and highlight the dangers of “car-dooring” through a public awareness THINK style campaign.”
The charity, which has stepped up its campaigning on the specific issue of car dooring since the death last year of Leicester cyclist Sam Boulton, has also urged the government to introduce a specific offence of causing “death or serious injury through negligently opening a car door.”
Under current legislation, the maximum penalty for anyone convicted of "opening a vehicle’s door, or causing or permitting someone to do so, and thereby cause injury to or endanger any person" is a fine of up to £1,000.
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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20 comments
Its plain looking the comments on the BBC and newspaper sites that half the drivers think its not their problem.
I'm not sure it is a tv ad campaign Davel, it wont stop the immediate issue but putting it into the driving test would help, instant fails! Then you educate the next generation so that in 30 years time it is the norm...
I'm in two minds about this.
Obviously encouraging people to take care opening car doors is A Good Thing, and obviously when some government lickspittle makes noises about being scared of the media it betrays their priorities.
But these smaller campaigns, for me, distract from the elephant in the room, which is that far too much inattentive, intolerant and incompetent driving is accepted.
You're already not meant to open doors into passing traffic. This campaign, like the mobile phone one, will only chime with people who are careful drivers, making them think, and possibly become a tad more careful.
The type of driver who was likely to kill you via phone distraction, dooring or other selfishness or disregard a year ago, will still be likely to kill you today, whether or not they see an advert on mobile phone use or Dutch reach while they eat their cornflakes.
We've got a whole culture to change. Having this campaign seen as some sort of 'win', when it really isn't, risks undermining the enormity of that.
In the same way that nobody buys a car based on the NCAP ratings for pedestrian protection, the road safety lobby should be selling this message on the benefits of not having your door taken off by a passing truck.
I don't see what is wrong with counting to three whilst watching the relevant wing mirror before opening door.
Wing mirror isn't enough, you should ALWAYS do an over the shoulder check, I do this whenever overtaking or changing lanes in a motor. It's stopped me a few times from making an error in judgement. I always over shoulder check even when parking up in my own street or in the supermarket on the few times I drive to such. Make it a habitual thing for motorists.
What they could do is change dooring to be what it is, an assault. Without injury, a common assault (inducing fear in the mind even if not meant), with injury it's ABH, if one dies as a consequence then it's simply manslaughter. We should just change the law so motoring offences against the person are just that.
Might focus the minds of people. operating killing machines.
Hadn't thought of it that way before; you're right, it is assault. Of course assault is more important when carried out with a weapon unlikely to cause death or serious injury, a bicycle, than it is when carried out with a lethal weapon, like a motor vehicle. Or is that what we need to change?
Isn't properly checking before opening a door a MUST in the highway code?
Firstly, why are cycle lanes often put next to parked cars?
And secondly, when will we get more police and traffic wardens to stop people dropping people off where it's illegal?
Im not sure why CyclingUK has bothered to ask the government to do something useful, as they are hellbent on pandering to the Daily Fail, both the readers and the editors.
So give it a different name.
Life saver
Doorzone Check
Etc
Why is there any backlash against doing something so trivial, yet so important?
Because ministers are scared to put their name against something which will require effort to follow through, which could alienate some of their voters and which isn't likely to gain them any new ones. Some politicians are in the business of winning elections and getting elected, not of providing leadership and governance. Sad but often shown to be true.
I hope this campaign gets some traction, but judging by the BBC R4 reports this morning, two of ten seconds and one of 50s, killing cyclists is rather less of a problem than cyclists killing other people. Understandable, given the carnage caused by cyclists every year.
I wonder of the BBC will ever have a programme about cycling?
1) The government is probably right that the tabloids would pour scorn on this. Whether the government should be running scared of and pandering to the Mail is another matter.
2) Just ride a door's width away - yes, I agree and I do, but it's not always easy.
Where I live, there are parked cars both sides of the road. I know that almost every time I ride the street, someone in a car is going to drive impatiently right behind me.
I had a guy do a dangerous overtaking manoeuvre (because he was in a hurry), then stop to remonstrate with me (obviously not in that much of a hurry) - 'I gave you plenty of opportunity to pull over'.
I don't want to give in to bullies, but I also don't particularly want the conflict.
Just ride at least a door's width away from parked cars.
There's a lovely bit of my commute that runs marked cycle lanes alongside a line of parked cars. I don't tend to ride in this cycle lane and I don't care what anyone else thinks - I once knew a chap who had his shoulder ripped apart by a taxi passenger opening their door.
Riding wide along that section also puts me in primary position past the pedestrian islands, where the cycle track fizzles out because the road isn't wide enough.
Road hog. Don't even pay any road tax, ruined my harvest etc. etc.
He turned me into a newt!
I commute daily too and it's not always possible.
It's not always possible, sometimes there's less than two doors' and a bike's width between parked vehicles. I suppose the only options are to either accept the increased risk, or reduce the risk some other way (eg, by reducing speed).
From the same story on the BBC - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-41219977: "A government source, commenting on the proposal for teaching the Dutch reach, suggested ministers might be unwilling to prescribe a manoeuvre that would be ridiculed in parts of the media - but suggested that cycle safety groups might make more headway on this matter themselves."
Unbe-f**king-lievable.
"Card Dooming"............
Proof Read something ffs. 0/10.