Once Again: Kill Your Speed!

Wed 19 Nov 2008, 16:28

In an attempt to take some of the heat out of this, and to convince some of the posters in this thread that bad drivers do operate in the Charlbury area, allow me to relate the following experience:

July 2008. I'm cycling east on the B4437 towards Charlbury down the long hill from the Shipton turnoff. I'm doing just under 30 mph. I see a car ahead of me approach the crossroads at the foot of the hill from the Leafield direction. I'm aware it may pull out in front of me so I ease off slightly (down to about 25 mph). The car stops at the white line. "Good," I think, "it's going to allow me to pass." When I am about 30-40 yards away, the car suddenly pulls out directly across my path. I slam the brakes on. The back wheel locks up and I swerve drastically. Somehow I maintain control and stay upright. I notice that the back end of the car is approaching me very rapidly and that I am likely to crash into it. Luckily, I just avoid it. Having survived what could have been a very nasty collision, I look round at the motorist. She (and I'm sorry but it was a she) drives off without even a backward glance. What do I think happened? One of three things perhaps:

1. The motorist never saw me at all, probably because she didn't bother to look. I should point out here that it was about 2 pm on a dry, clear, sunny summer's afternoon and that I was wearing a bright red cycle jersey.

2. The motorist saw me but assumed that as I was a cyclist I was probably a grey-haired old lady doing no more than about 8 mph.

3. She saw me, realized that I was probably travelling quite quickly but decided to pull out across me just for the hell of it.

OK, I wasn't injured (apart from a short-lasting whiplash injury to my neck) and the bike wasn't damaged but it shook me up and I didn't use that road in consequence for several months afterwards. The driver was almost totally at fault in my opinion but didn't stop to apologise or to check that I was OK. To anyone who thinks that it is dangerous to cycle down a hill at speeds in excess of 25 mph I would point out that (a) I am an extremely experienced cyclist; (b) I have descended the same hill many times before without incident; (c) I was scannning the road ahead as one is supposed to, saw the car and took what I thought to be appropriate action; (d) the car appeared to have stopped at the junction to allow me to pass; and (e) I was way inside the legal speed limit for that particular road.

At the risk of being boring, because I've said this before: there are bad cyclists, bad motorists and bad pedestrians. They all have the potential to be dangerous and life-threatening. (The worst cycle-related accident I have ever had was when, as a pedestrian, I was hit by a cycle courier in London who was cycling on the wrong side of the road. Again, almost totally his fault.) Pedestrians in the Charlbury area frequently walk on the left-hand side of the road, rather than facing the oncoming traffic, and thus endanger themselves and jeopardise others. Many pedestrians also walk out into the road without looking because if they can't hear any approaching traffic then the road must be clear musn't it? Wrong! A well-maintained road bike is virtually silent. Please look before you step off the kerb - don't rely on just one of your senses! Everyone makes mistakes, everyone can improve their road craft. I have learned not to cycle quite as fast on the B4437 as I used to, which is probably not such a bad thing. Witch-hunts don't help - commonsense and consideration for others do.

Finally, unless anyone has video footage of Charlotte's accident how can they possibly comment on it? We weren't there, so we don't know exactly what happened. Nuff said.