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Despite criticism London's 'Think! Cyclist' campaign extends to 5 other cities

Flawed advice on passing and advanced stop lines retained

THINK! Cyclist, a campaign designed to highlight to cyclists and motorists ways to share the road safely that has been running in London since September 2012, is to be rolled out to five other cities in England.

Outdoor advertising will be put in place in Birmingham, Bristol, Cambridge, Leeds and Manchester to highlight to drivers and people on bikes alike potential hazards when sharing space.

Developed by Transport for London (TfL) and the Department for Transport (DfT), the initiative aims to reinforce a culture of mutual respect among road users with the aim of improving safety.

When the campaign was launched last year in London, no cycling body endorsed it, and CTC was critical of some of the campaign’s advice.

CTC campaigns and policy director Roger Geffen says the organisation’s stance hasn’t changed.

He told road.cc: “CTC welcomes the posters and has no problem with the imagery, but has long-standing concerns about some of THINK!’s associated ‘tips’, especially its advice to drivers to give cyclists at least half a car’s width.

“This is far less than the overtaking distance recommended in the Highway Code: “…as much room as you  would when overtaking a car" – i.e. far more than half a car's width in most cases.

“CTC also believes that THINK!’s recommendation that cyclists should wear a helmet implies that it is irresponsible not to wear one, advice that could be prejudicial to cyclists in legal cases.

“CTC points out that helmets are not designed to protect riders in the sort of collisions that are likely to happen in fast or heavy traffic and that it is far more important to provide sound advice to road users on how to avoid collisions in the first place.”

While we admit we haven’t exactly been keeping an eye out, the only place in London where we’ve spotted the posters is on bus shelters. The pic at the top, and this one are from shelters on a quiet suburban shopping street close to road.cc’s east London office. Has anyone out there seen them on, say, buses?

The advice

The campaign contains advice aimed at both drivers and cyclists. The advice to drivers includes:

  • Look out for cyclists, especially when turning - make eye contact if possible so they know you’ve seen them
  • Use your indicators - signal your intentions so that cyclists can react
  • Give cyclists space – at least half a car’s width. If there isn’t sufficient space to pass, hold back. Remember that cyclists may need to manoeuvre suddenly if the road is poor, it’s windy or if a car door is opened
  • Always check for cyclists when you open your car door
  • Avoid driving over advanced stop lines – these allow cyclists to get to the front and increase their visibility
  • Follow the Highway Code including ‘stop’ and ‘give way’ signs and traffic lights.

When the campaign was launched, CTC also criticised the phrasing of the advice over advanced stop lines, which is weaker than the instructions in the Highway Code. The Highway Code says: “Motorists, including motorcyclists, MUST stop at the first white line reached if the lights are amber or red and should avoid blocking the way or encroaching on the marked area at other times.”

Cyclists, meanwhile, are advised:

  • Ride positively, decisively and well clear of the kerb – look and signal to show drivers what you plan to do and make eye contact where possible so you know drivers have seen you
  • Avoid riding up the inside of large vehicles, like lorries or buses, where you might not be seen
  • Always use lights after dark or when visibility is poor
  • Wearing light coloured or reflective clothing during the day and reflective clothing and/or accessories in the dark increases your visibility
  • Follow the Highway Code including observing ‘stop’ and ‘give way’ signs and traffic lights
  • THINK! recommends wearing a correctly fitted cycle helmet, which is securely fastened and conforms to current regulations.

British Cycling, which has been lobbying for a campaign to promote understanding between cyclists and other road users for two years, has welcomed the initiative.

Martin Key, its campaigns manager, commented: “British Cycling has long championed the need for a driver and cyclist awareness campaign.

“It is vital when talking about safety on the roads that we don’t get a ‘them and us’ mentality emerging between drivers and cyclists.

"We are all road users and I hope that this campaign can help foster mutual respect between everyone who uses the roads to make journeys safer, more pleasant experiences.

“We hope it will not be long before this this media campaign is launched nationwide.”

We contacted British Cycling to ask what had persuaded them to change their stance and back this year's THINK! Campaign but as yet have had no reply - we will update this article with their response when we get it.

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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36 comments

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WolfieSmith | 10 years ago
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Bad logic Congo. I would imagine not wearing a helmet on a building site could result in more serious injury than wearing one and hospitals see less head injuries from building sites because helmets are mandatory.

Of course they're mandatory for insurance reasons and I personally would never make wearing bike helmets compulsory. It doesn't mean they don't offer partial protection.

As I've said before on this site. Hit yourself on the head with a hammer whilst wearing a bike helmet and then hit yourself again with without. Remember to make sure you film it so we can see it on YouTube. When you're ready?  45

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Colin Peyresourde | 10 years ago
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What does the HC say about cars overtaking other cars?

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jarredscycling | 10 years ago
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I don't get why they would half bake the advice. It seems quite reasonable to try and educate all road users including cyclists; but why not working with cycling groups to make sure you are accurate with one's advice?

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burtthebike | 10 years ago
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So, mostly good, but sheer unadulterated genius to put them in bus shelters, where the only people to see them will be bus passengers. What are they going to do, give the driver advice as he follows the bus route?

This would have been a much better use of the advertising vans recently stopped by the govt, which were telling illegal immigrants to go home. And they could have demonstrated their cycle awareness to other road users at the same time.

 39

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toothache90 | 10 years ago
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you can see how one sided the advice is.

Advice to cyclists "Follow the Highway Code including observing ‘stop’ and ‘give way’ signs and traffic lights"

Yet they don't give that same assertive tone to ASL and giving the same width as a car when passing.

I'm all for this campaign but TfL/DfT must not be biased to vehicles, cyclists are considered a 'carriage' that has the same road rights as any other.

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a.jumper | 10 years ago
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Another close- but- no- cigar waste of taxpaying cyclists' money!  2

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Bhachgen | 10 years ago
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Overall this looks like a decent campaign. Certainly the messages it is trying to put across are infinitely better than the Nice Way Code.

Heading into Manchester a couple of times over the next couple of weeks so will be looking out for these.

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Rouboy | 10 years ago
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Perhaps the posters should have pictures like the rule 163 highway code as detailed above printed on them.. There is absolutely no question where everyone should be having seen that.

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lolol | 10 years ago
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Goes along with my experience with a corpulent driver today, who overtook and turned left across me, when I caught up with her, and after she had almost immediately shouted that I didn't pay road tax, she informed me that she hadn't cut me up, she had gone around me. I was lost for words, printable words.

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paulfg42 | 10 years ago
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Who, when driving, leaves a car's width between them and the car they are overtaking?

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FluffyKittenofT... replied to paulfg42 | 10 years ago
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paulfg42 wrote:

Who, when driving, leaves a car's width between them and the car they are overtaking?

But that's not what the highway code says, is it?

"Leave as much space as you would a car" doesn't make clear whether or not that includes the space the hypothetical car would itself be taking up.

i.e. does it mean leave the same distance between the overtaker's left side and the lefthand side of the vehicle being overtaken? Or leave the same distance between the overtaker's left side and the _righthand_ side of the vehicle being overtaken? As many have observed, the picture implies the former.

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banzicyclist2 | 10 years ago
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Leave a cars width......  24 it really would be funny if it wasn't so sad. A lot of motorists leaving just enough space not damage their wing mirrors if the cyclist wobbles or falls off. Half a cars width is far more than I usually get!

As far as the rest of it goes, I think the thinking behind it is very sound, the wording is just a case of interpretation. It's good the authorities are making an effort.

As far as helmets are concerned, my wife's an A&E nurse; over the years she's seen the aftermath on not wearing one compared to wearing one. I'm convinced and never go out without mine.

Overall I'd rather have these campaigns than not, anything promoting a better attitude between cyclists and motorists is surely a good thing!  7

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Simon E replied to banzicyclist2 | 10 years ago
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I too would expect any meaningful campaign to seek advice from CTC and BC beforehand.

But do any drivers actually read and digest this sort of information? Humans have ignored well-meaning advice and public service campaigns for as long as human have been around.

banzicyclist2 wrote:

A lot of motorists leaving just enough space not damage their wing mirrors if the cyclist wobbles or falls off. Half a cars width is far more than I usually get!

That seems to be most people's experience. I feel it has improved a little for me in the last couple of years, though I don't know why. Half a car is OK on urban roads but it's just one part of considerate driving, something many drivers are unable or unwilling to do.

Many cyclists won't ride central (AKA take the lane) anywhere. My wife has only recently adopted secondary position after much persuasion from me. Not surprisingly, it has reduced the number of close overtakes.

Riding up the inside of lorries and buses is a big no-no, but authorities paint stupid little 18" wide cycle lanes there.

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congokid replied to banzicyclist2 | 10 years ago
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banzicyclist2 wrote:

As far as helmets are concerned, my wife's an A&E nurse; over the years she's seen the aftermath on not wearing one compared to wearing one. I'm convinced and never go out without mine.

A popular fallacy - the 'appeal to authority' - that we hear a lot from those who'd like to see the introduction of mandatory helmet laws.

As a point of interest, how often does your wife see head injuries that don't arise from cycling? Would it be more or less than cyclists with head injuries? And in those circumstances, what does she recommend to the victims?

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sm | 10 years ago
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Why do we think we can solve all our problems in the UK with posters? Immigrants, bad driving, terrible cycling, you name it, we've a poster for it! Lip service.

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Mr Agreeable | 10 years ago
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I saw one of these adverts in central Bristol today, which suggests that they may have a bit more budget behind the campaign than previous efforts. However the initial CTC reports suggested otherwise, and £80k really isn't going to do a lot to raise awareness, even without some of the slightly dodgy advice: http://www.ctc.org.uk/government-think-cycling-campaign-misses-bigger-pi...

I also have to wonder, even if they're giving out sound advice, how much effect these types of campaigns have. For example there are plenty of people who are aware of the advice to "take the lane" where a road narrows, but don't want to do it because they're worried about antagonising the people driving behind them.

Changing conditions on the ground seems a lot more sensible than blowing a bit of leftover budget on an underfunded advertising campaign; this seems like another example of lip service to cycling that the government can point to when criticised, but which isn't going to make a blind bit of difference overall.

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Leodis | 10 years ago
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I feel so much more safer now in Leeds...  39

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jova54 | 10 years ago
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What's all this 'Half a car is OK' crap?
What sort of car, Fiat 500 or Humvee?
HC says leave as much room as you would for a car; and that is generally interpreted as a car's width. It was when I took my test over 30 years ago and also when my daughter took hers 4 years ago. The rule hasn't changed, just some drivers' interpretation of it.
If you take up prime position on the road and they can't get round you safely then they shouldn't be trying to pass.
Remember, you have as much right to be on the road as they have.

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Paul99 | 10 years ago
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Just to add something that no one else has seen - these things are plastered over the back of a lot of buses. I commute every day in London (all the way up the old kent road, which is horrible) and as far as I'm concerned, any highlighting of the issues is a good thing. There will always be those who don't agree with the advice, whoever has been consulted, so some visibility and at least putting it in people's minds is better than none at all.

As for the highway code - Edgeley and Fluffy are spot on. The text is fine if seen with the picture, but without the pic, it's open to interpretation. As someone who has also had their hand clipped by overtakers (mopeds, motorcycles and cars), and seeing other drivers overtake cars, buses and lorries etc, I can assure you that most people's interpretation of "as much space as you would a car" is about 6 inches...at least on London's congested roads.

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Tony Farrelly | 10 years ago
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We're all over the place we are Tom  16

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Tom Amos | 10 years ago
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Roadcc has an east London office? I thought you guys worked out of Bath?

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congokid | 10 years ago
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Where, apart from bus shelters, are the messages aimed at drivers going to appear? Television adverts? The backs of buses?

The campaign's website doesn't offer us any clues.
http://think.direct.gov.uk/cycling.html

It seems a very hit and miss approach to rolling out a campaign that supposedly aims to make roads safer for vulnerable road users (if that indeed is its aim - to me the campaign looks wishy washy in the extreme, to the extent of being completely ineffectual).

Apparently the campaign has already been running in London since September 2012. But is there any data to suggest how effective it has been? I noted that when the original campaign was launched, there were quite a few 'going in the right direction' comments. Does anyone think now that any progress has been made? To me, it looks like we're exactly where we were a year ago.

If the campaign aims to change attitudes between motorists and people on bikes, I'd say nothing has changed. From what I've seen over the past year, ask motorists to 'think cyclist' and the prevailing 'thought' appears to be 'they're in my way' followed by 'they don't even pay road tax'.

I'd actually want to see something a lot more effective and also know more about how it's being publicised before I start 'welcoming' it as the CTC does.

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koko56 | 10 years ago
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CTC is being awkward here - all of the advice above is sound including half a cars width for overtaking and if you think cars should be giving you the whole lane in all situations then it's just not needed 99% of the time. Helmets, as usual personal choice and is the only questionable point

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oozaveared replied to koko56 | 10 years ago
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koko56 wrote:

CTC is being awkward here - all of the advice above is sound including half a cars width for overtaking and if you think cars should be giving you the whole lane in all situations then it's just not needed 99% of the time. Helmets, as usual personal choice and is the only questionable point

CTC has been developing expertise in road safety as it refers to cyclists for decades. They advise the DfT run campaigns, develop statistics and advice. They have a legal department that specialises in cycle safety legislation. They are the genuine bona fide experts on the HC and UK cycle safety.

Their advice is free. It's a charity. So why not call and get it right from the horses mouth. hell why not get them to write it for you for free.

So then when they don't consult and get the best advice I think its fair that the CTC don't just rubber stamp it.

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koko56 replied to oozaveared | 10 years ago
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oozaveared - Good point, just comes across as kind of whiny. Fair enough if the advice was not good, but it's mostly spot on.

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rogdog replied to koko56 | 10 years ago
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Sig - I Totally agree, I'm happy with a foot or two from cars and a bit more from lorries and buses, much more is unrealistic. I have had my hand clipped a few times and that's clearly too close. But half a car - good advise I'd say, a car that's stuck behind you for half a mile is as dangerous as one passing too closely!

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Tony Farrelly replied to rogdog | 10 years ago
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rogdog wrote:

a car that's stuck behind you for half a mile is as dangerous as one passing too closely!

Surely that depends who's driving it?

if it's an impatient idiot then probably it is, if it's a considerate road user who understands their responsibilities to other, and particularly to vulnerable road users then there shouldn't be any risk at all.

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Colin Peyresourde replied to Tony Farrelly | 10 years ago
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tony_farrelly wrote:
rogdog wrote:

a car that's stuck behind you for half a mile is as dangerous as one passing too closely!

Surely that depends who's driving it?

if it's an impatient idiot then probably it is, if it's a considerate road user who understands their responsibilities to other, and particularly to vulnerable road users then there shouldn't be any risk at all.

Sort of agree and disagree. It's fine as long as the car overtakes as soon as possible, because one of the cars backing up behind that car is bound to have an arsehole in it.

I always try to wave a driver on ASAP. I don't mind them passing within a couple of foot. Always best to look out for road furniture/holes ASAP so that you can position yourself early and not swerve about too much.

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giff77 replied to Tony Farrelly | 10 years ago
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tony_farrelly wrote:
rogdog wrote:

a car that's stuck behind you for half a mile is as dangerous as one passing too closely!

Surely that depends who's driving it?

if it's an impatient idiot then probably it is, if it's a considerate road user who understands their responsibilities to other, and particularly to vulnerable road users then there shouldn't be any risk at all.

I would second that. I've been tailgated by motorists determined to intimidate me out of the way. On the flip side I had a tipper truck follow me for half a mile along an unlit road the other morning. He kept well back and made no attempt to pass me until I turned off at the T when he went the other way. He could quite easily have passed me as others have done before but didn't.

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Edgeley | 10 years ago
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The Highway Code advice on passing a cyclist is ambiguous at best. I'd like more than "half a car's width" on the posters too, but at least it doesn't say that you only have to leave as much room as you would leave a car, which is what the HC appears to say, and which could mean only the width of a white line.

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