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Sian Hughes and her bike after her crash (@Simon Cooper)Three riders crash in five minutes on Brighton's latest bike lane
A newly opened cycle lane in Brighton has been called a "death trap" by one of three cyclists who crashed on it in a five minute period yesterday morning.
According to Ben Leo in The Argus, the three riders said their crashes were caused by a a disguised kerb in the new Vogue Gyratory cycle lane in Lewes Road, Brighton.
The first rider to come a cropper was Rick McEwen who fell at around 8am.
He said: “There’s a little kerb which you can’t see and I went right into it. I flipped over my handlebars and on to my side.
“I was getting myself together after the crash when I saw Simon come round the corner and do exactly the same thing.
“He had a really nasty injury to his elbow and was quite shocked. A few minutes later a woman came round the corner and also came off.
“There should be something identifying the kerb. It doesn’t need to be there. It’s a death trap. I wonder how many others have crashed?”
The next rider to fall, Simon Cooper was taken to hospital with a deep cut in his elbow that needed stitches.
He said: “The cycle lane is raised above the road and the kerb is impossible to see.
“I was left shocked and needed stitches to a deep wound in my elbow.
“I went to hospital and had to take the day off.”
Cooper tweeted an image of the next casualty and appealed on Twitter for Brighton Green MP Caroline Lucas to pressure the council to fix the lane:
3 cyclists floored in 10mins on #brighton's new cycle lane, Lewes Rd. Pls do something @CarolineLucas pic.twitter.com/sgnDz7CUhA
— Simon (@el_moncho) December 18, 2014
"Really sorry to hear of accidents - will urgently raise with Council to get it made safer," Lucas replied.
Sian Evans was the morning's third casualty. She was taken to hospital with grazing on her chin, hands, knee and shoulder.
She said: “It’s the first time I’ve fallen off a bike in ten years.
“You can’t see the kerb at all, it’s half-raised and not the full height.
“My bike is fine and I’m ultimately fine. That part of the turn in the road is terrifying as it is, but that new kerb is just insane.”
Brighton's Green Party-controlled council came in for harsh criticism on news story comments, but Hughes defended the new bike lane.
"Hallo everyone retweeting me about the cycle lane," she tweeted. "For the record I vote green and think the Lewes Road improvements are a huge success."
She added: "I love the Lewes Road improvements, cycle every day & they really help, just this bit is scary!"
Brighton and Hove City Council said: “We have been made aware of the cycle lane incidents and are investigating them to make sure the temporary safety measures that are in place there are appropriate.
“We cannot comment in detail about the incidents themselves until we have seen the police reports.”
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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20 comments
Yet again, reading this sort of thing just makes me want to move to the UK. In even the most progressive cities in the US, addressing this sort of a shortcoming with cycle infrastructure — if any had even been built in the first place — would take years!
You have to watch the video. That kerb looks lethal!
I hope all the cyclists brought down and injured by it sue Brighton and Hove Council.
tiny kerb is pointless won't stop vehicles going into cycle lane, will stop cyclists getting into the safe zone.
But to disguise it with that white stripe? crazy. Better to have full size kerb between road and cycle land and small kerb between cycle lane and pavement.
Disagree. As I mentioned, Brighton already has one of these lanes. I've used it, and it did feel markedly different from a painted lane.
Bear in mind that a full size kerb doesn't do anything to stop cars driving over it if they are determined to do so. It's psychological: it marks the cycle lane out a separate thing, rather than part of the road. The colouring makes it more obvious. It's also wider than most painted lanes, so the separation from motor vehicles in greater.
That said, I would prefer proper segregation myself. But the hybrid lane is more flexible, and is a big improvement over painted lanes, IMO. It is a standard design I other parts of the world.
Looks like the council will have a pretty significant number of personal injury claims to defend shortly...
The video in The Argus shows the problem better http://www.theargus.co.uk/news/11677816.After_three_crashes_in_five_minu...
It does indeed. Not 45 degree kerbs, and seems to appear suddenly.
I don't like the look of the paint surface myself: looks slippery.
But Brighton already has a hybrid cycle lane, on Old Shoreham Road.
What is different about this design that is confusing people?
Who is Hughes? Referenced once here and not at all in the original article.
Well I see comments above (weren't there when I wrote, appeared when I reloaded the page - honest) have an explanation, however there is a Tracey Hughes on B&HC, don't know why she would be commenting as she seems to be something to do with education.
Aaaah, now I see the offending kerb. I was staring at the picture for ages before I spotted it.
Question: what's behind the person taking the pic? It seems that one would have to cross a solid line to join the lane in such a way to come undone on the kerb and that would suggest to me that this is not a natural place to join or leave the lane (these would be marked with a broken line I think).
If you look beyond where the accidents happened, the lane jinks out into the road specially so that it can be in the door zone of the parking lane that starts there. In NL or New York it would be the other way round so the parked cars protect the cycle lane from traffic. This puts the lane into jeopardy from both sides, as well as exposing cyclists to danger from cars leaving or joining the parking lane.
the Cambridge semi-segregated lanes are going to have a specially made kerb that will avoid this.
It's people's jobs to design and install these things and the consequences of doing it wrong are grave. In any establishment, other than a council, you would likely loose your job if you made a cock up with such dire results as this.
So is the kerb where you come onto it from the left over that white line?
Has the victim of the third crash changed her name as a result of the accident? She was Sian Evans when she crashed, but by the time she leapt to the defence of the council she seems to have become Sian Hughes - must have been a pretty bad spill!
Ah, that must be it. I had to go back through the story to try to find out who "Hughes" was!
agree with zermattjohn
if 3 cars had crashed on a new road surface unveiled by the council there would be uproar.
"I love the Lewes Road improvements, cycle every day & they really help, just this bit is scary!"
If this was a lane for motor traffic, the kerb was slighty higher such that it caused 3 motorcycles or even cars to crash, would their riders/drivers say that? Why do we accept that cycle infrastructure will inherently be a bit sh!t? If you choose to drive, your infrastructure will have been designed well and safety audited to check so. If you choose to leave the car at home are you saying you accept crap design? Why this blind-spot when it comes to cycle infrastructure?
Looks like it is on the way in to Brighton from Colddean Lane? That's a shame as that Cycle Lane is one of the few I use despite the proximity of bus stops. It's pretty wide, free of debris and other sh1te, and you don't feel like public enemy #1 if you're motoring along at more than 10 mph.
Typical of the Council to buck pass. The Gyratory has been a massive headache since they started tinkering with it. I prefer to cycle into and around Brighton, but now avoid the gyratory like the plague.
The Council has been run awfully since the Greens assumed power. The debacle with the A259, the Gyratory and the silly 20mph limits have shown them to be muddled in their thinking.