Van driver intimidates female cyclist... doesn't realise she's plain-clothes cop; Would this cyclist be fined for using the pavement?; Colbrelli needs "miracle" to race again; What does it take to ride 1000km in 24 hours?; COBBLES + more on the live blog

hirsute wrote:

Says here crippled biker has died.
https://mobile.twitter.com/Doug_Paulley/status/1507475149687336961
Slightly different name on twitter but the same person as he confirmed this on here recently.
He was great knowing the legislation and advising people. Loved reading his comments.

So sorry to hear that.

He enriched any discussion he was part of.

This is the last thread he posted in

https://road.cc/content/news/longleat-security-tell-cyclist-no-bikes-all...

Very sad indeed. His last posts show his typical mixture of great in-depth knowledge of the law and robust good humour. RIP.

Alternately put the phone in the boot AND turn it off / airplane mode so you don't distract yourself on calls / dictating text messages whilst driving. Yes the government state it is legal, but check the science on distractions uing phones and hands free can be just as bad.

Making calls and dictating text messages still means you're distracted and a risk to yourself / other road users.

Unless you're in a genuine life or death type career (international spy, world statesman) whatever it is can wait until you've pulled over.

All the research shows the distraction from phone use at the wheel is mental and not physical. The TRL has done a lot of research on the topic. Basically, you're kidding yourself if you think these hands free tools are actually any safer than using the phone. Again, research says they aren't.

Research also says that a driver having a conversation with someone in the vehicle is different to having a conversation on the phone, hands free or not. When a driver talking to a vehicle occupant has to think about something happening on the road, they'll prioritise the driving function and pause speaking. But with a phone, the opposite is true. 

Seriously, ditch these hands free kits. It's only a matter of time before they're banned anyway.

Just because they're legal, it doesn't mean they're safe. They aren't. Read the research and then bin your ApplePlay.

Just saw a transporter lorry driver thundering down my road with phone to ear. Sadly was carrying half a bed at the time otherwise would have tried to get vid ..

It's too bad that the clip shows the cyclists going through on red, because of course that gives a green light to all the irrelevant comments missing the point of the clip, successfully sabotaging the the comments section.

Sriracha wrote:

It's too bad that the clip shows the cyclists going through on red, because of course that gives a green light to all the irrelevant comments missing the point of the clip, successfully sabotaging the the comments section.

See, I'd have gone for a humorous 'well the car driver was right, they did go through a red'. Given it was on (at least) the third phase by the top, it kinda misses the point.

Generally no time for RLJ, but where it's impossible, fuck it.

Yes, it is interesting to see that, by going plain clothes, the officer got to experience how cyclists are treated by motorists - and yet failed to follow through to experience how they are treated by the police. Odd logic.

Why not submit the report incognito to get the full experience?

Unless someone has experience they can post of the Sheffield North West Neighbourhood Team treating their close pass video submissions with indifference, then its irrelevant, not all police forces,teams or individuals are the same.

Why wait - most organisations mystery shop themselves. This situation seemed like an ideal opportunity.

The point is you can't use your or even my experience of our local police force reactions to close pass submissions and judge them by how this was treated, because they just aren't the same people.

I mean other than the fact that I can point to literally dozens of times I've personally prosecuted people for exactly this when it has happened to other local cyclists what evidence is there?

I appreciate the cynicism, but you might want to think about if you can find a more pro cycling outfit than the one I run.

First team to do a close pass operation involving a group of cyclists worldwide

first team to try and keep up with a patalympian cycling commissioner and use her to publicise close passes

Going out across the police force to train officers across force about how to cycle, the benefits of cycling operationally and what it feels like to be a vulnerable road user

personally intervening when people experience close passes that have been mishandled 

worked to introduce Nextbase portal

attending active travel meetings on behalf of the force to improve road safety measures  

provided training on how to deal with cycling footage 

working with local universities to do research on close passes and driver behaviour 

But yeah, we don't really care about cyclists do we ?  /glib mode off  

Also I didn't need to mystery shop our portal because I did that last week. And I have to say, they were pretty good. Or much better than we used to be for damn sure. 
 

Thanks for responding. It is great to have your input, and clearly your team is doing a good job.

Hopefully, if you have seen some of the other stories on road.cc especially (but not only) nmotd, you understand why people might be cynical having seen the response of other forces to similar or worse incidents.

Please could you do everything in your power to make the police response to these incidents more uniform? Wjts would like you to start with Lancashire police I would guess. I know they are the wrong side of the Pennines though...

Hi as a Sheffield resident please can I say thank you for your thoughtful posts, and indeed for engaging on a cycling forum. 
 

Generally I think the standard of driving with respect to cyclists is fairly high in Sheffield at peak commuting times, although the infrastructure is appalling. Please continue to engage with cycling groups and do all you can to improve active travel generally. 
 

P.S. if you can have a word about formally opening Snake Pass that would be fab...

Sounds like you've really been doing a terrific job - so a genuine thanks for your efforts.

Having said that, your efforts do seem to be an outlier - road.cc reports almost every day on the police inaction / obfuscation and in some cases outright lies in relation to their apparent reluctance to police the roads.

I can imagine this is very frustrating to other officers  / forces that are doing the "right" thing but the fact remains it's more often than not the typical experience.

In my case having received a crazy stupid close pass (at speed) from a Police van, I landed up feeling I was about to be arrested when I **very** politely asked the driver to be considerate when I caught up with him a bit later on my journey. I've also reported a number of drivers for phone use (including one having a full on argument by FaceTime video) but in every case the police (Met Police) confirmed they took no action despite me making good quality video available.

YEStotheEU.

Did you see that photo of Johnson looking a bit lost at the NATO meeting t'other day?  Showing how important the UK is in the world now...   

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What a wally you are!

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Children ignoring our PM, so that 'proves' that UK has lost importance.

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Yes, sure, right - I see your impeccable logic.

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Flintshire Boy wrote:

What a wally you are!

Children ignoring our PM, so that 'proves' that UK has lost importance.

Yes, sure, right - I see your impeccable logic.

Didn't say it proved it.  Just thought it kind of demonstrated how well thought of we are.  We're no longer being called "Plague Island", so I guess that's something, but Johnson (and you, it appears) needs to remember that we are no longer in the Premier League of Nations and we need to act (and expect to be treated) accordingly.