All these fatalities

[BentMikey]

Only obnoxious because I called out your nonsense? Hopefully you'll have learnt from your mistake and won't ever claim again that drivers subsidise cyclists, when in fact it's the other way around - everyone subsidises drivers.

 

[mattybain]

Crikey Peanut, you can really sprout some utter boll0cks.

Wow that's incredibly rude and unlike you. What bits did you think was boll0cks?

He seems to be making a valid point and you and others are shooting him down.

It's clear from reading about all these deaths that in *some* cases training would have helped the situation. Especially the left hook by lorries where the cyclist seems to have scooted down the side of a HGV.

From cyclists and non-cyclists I have spoken it seems they are just not aware of the danger of HGV's.

So IMO some saying that additional training would help is clearly not boll0cks and not offensive.

I had some rudimentary training when I was 9, I feel like I am a careful cyclist now because of reading forums like this. If I hadn't I wouldn't know about primary and certainly wouldn't be aware about the dangers of HGV's.

Now there are many more people who haven't had any training at all.

 

[BentMikey]

It's extremely offensive because in 4 out of 5 collisions with cyclists, it's the driver's fault. Sure, training helps all of us, but it's not legally required, and probably would have made no difference anyway in the fatalities. Peanut's approach is pure and simple victim blaming, and that's contemptible.

In any event, I was referring mostly to the stupidity of the claim that drivers subsidise cyclists, when it's the other way around.

 

[mattybain]

Only obnoxious because I called out your nonsense? Hopefully you'll have learnt from your mistake and won't ever claim again that drivers subsidise cyclists, when in fact it's the other way around - everyone subsidises drivers.

Really is that true? do you have a cite or link that proves that?

I think that overall drivers pay more than the total cost of roads, so surely that statement is correct?

It's hard to get accurate figures but total fuel duty in 2008 is around £25.7bn http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld200708/ldhansrd/text/80709w0001.htm

Total road building costs and maintenance costs for 2005/6 are £8.8bn http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200708/cmhansrd/cm080501/text/80501w0006.htm

There seems to be a difference between true costs i.e. the amount actually spent and the "environmental cost" which is a made up amount including all sorts of spurious costs.

So you appear to be wrong, yes drivers do subidise cyclists. Unless you have some evidence to the contrary?

 

[mattybain]

It's extremely offensive because in 4 out of 5 collisions with cyclists, it's the driver's fault. Sure, training helps all of us, but it's not legally required, and probably would have made no difference anyway in the fatalities. Peanut's approach is pure and simple victim blaming, and that's contemptible.

In any event, I was referring mostly to the stupidity of the claim that drivers subsidise cyclists, when it's the other way around.

4 out of 5? where do you get that number from?

To say he is contemptible for suggesting that training might save *some* lives is crazy?

Unless I have missed some heavily edited or removed posts I just don't get this anger?

 

[peanut]

matty please don't waste your time discussing this with bentmikey he is simply trolling. He posts any rubbish, rudeness or nonsense he can to elicit a response then he'll embroil you in a useless and unproductive argument because these weird people get a kick out of upsetting others .?

They should imo be thrown off the site for being disruptive but this site seems to be more tolerant than most

Just put him on your 'ignore' list and you'll not need to read any of his rubbish again

 

[BentMikey]

Really is that true? do you have a cite or link that proves that?

I think that overall drivers pay more than the total cost of roads, so surely that statement is correct?

It's hard to get accurate figures but total fuel duty in 2008 is around £25.7bn http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld200708/ldhansrd/text/80709w0001.htm

Total road building costs and maintenance costs for 2005/6 are £8.8bn http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200708/cmhansrd/cm080501/text/80501w0006.htm

There seems to be a difference between true costs i.e. the amount actually spent and the "environmental cost" which is a made up amount including all sorts of spurious costs.

So you appear to be wrong, yes drivers do subidise cyclists. Unless you have some evidence to the contrary?

I believe that it's not so simple, and people whom I respect have shown the contrary, conclusively enough that there's no point in going back into the debate. Try googling on uk.rec.cycling, ISTR there were some very good posts on the topic.

 

[rh100]

Really is that true? do you have a cite or link that proves that?

I think that overall drivers pay more than the total cost of roads, so surely that statement is correct?

It's hard to get accurate figures but total fuel duty in 2008 is around £25.7bn http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld200708/ldhansrd/text/80709w0001.htm

Total road building costs and maintenance costs for 2005/6 are £8.8bn http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200708/cmhansrd/cm080501/text/80501w0006.htm

There seems to be a difference between true costs i.e. the amount actually spent and the "environmental cost" which is a made up amount including all sorts of spurious costs.

So you appear to be wrong, yes drivers do subidise cyclists. Unless you have some evidence to the contrary?

In the same way I, as a general tax payer, subsidize everything else. My tax, however paid, directly and through stealth, is used to pay for whatever the government decides to spend it on. Tax collected in one name - eg fuel tax isn't set aside just for building and fixing roads, maybe some council tax is, maybe a LOT of that investment goes on motorways and traffic police when I cant (quite rightly) take my bike on there. I'd quite happily ride to work on a dirt track, except all the dirt tracks got built over when cars needed the infrastructure to support them. What I'm trying to say is that roads are there to support the motor vehicles, not bikes, but bikes have nowhere else to use so have to use the roads. I find it offensive to say that drivers support me using a bike - I pay tax on everything I buy or pay for - which is used to fund everything else that a driver uses. I still drive by the way, so this isn't a go at motorists - just that point of view.

 

[Origamist]

Peanut are you the same "Peanut" who was banned from the CTC forum for abuse? I think we should be told?!

 

[palinurus]

Many people get through a liftetime of (bad) driving, because they never suffer any consequences from it. If we all received better/advanced training, we might not suffer any consequences, but we'd be made much more aware of what they might be.

Yup. It's not a few drivers taking really big risks, it's a large number taking an even larger number of regular small risks, only very few have any consequences.

 

[humptygocart]

Some people may be shocked, appalled, outraged and disgusted by bent mikey but I'm afraid he is correct.

Cyclists have the lowest "at fault" rating of any road user. They have, after all, a natural disincentive toward collisions with anything because they flipping hurt.

Drivers, too, are subsidised by the rest of the population. That this fact is little known demonstrates the sway held by the motoring lobby who complain about the over-taxed motorist when in fact the average urban motor vehicle is subsidised to the tune of around £2000 a year.


There is nothing "spurious" about the ten children killed or seriously injured on our roads every day, nor the cost of policing, or the cost to the NHS, or the pollution costs, noise pollution, damage to the infrastructure, rises in asthma and lung disease, global warming, disposal of vehicles etc etc etc.


Proposals to licence or have compulsory insurance on bicycles are unworkable and would cost far more to administer than any potential benefit.

 

[mattybain]

I believe that it's not so simple, and people whom I respect have shown the contrary, conclusively enough that there's no point in going back into the debate. Try googling on uk.rec.cycling, ISTR there were some very good posts on the topic.

What you are disagreeing with Hansard? that it is pretty solid evidence in my mind.

How could it possibly be wrong, when you look at hard numbers money coming into the treasury from drivers is vastly more than is spent on the roads.

Okay so there may be some additional costs of policing but the revenue figure I quoted is just fuel duty, this doesn't include road tax, congestion charging, revenue from speed cameras etc

The numbers are so vastly different that I am not going to waste my time trawling through old threads.

Also the £8.8bn includes £4.4bn of road construction, which can be argued is a benefit from the country economically so there is an argument for taking this number out of the occasion.

Just cut to the chase and show me a link (like I have) which definitely shows that cyclists subsidies motorists or take back your comments and aplogise for this post "Hopefully you'll have learnt from your mistake and won't ever claim again that drivers subsidise cyclists, when in fact it's the other way around - everyone subsidises drivers. "

If it's not clear cut to you whey would you post something like that?

And what about the 4 out 5, do you have anything to back that up?

 

[rh100]

Some people may be shocked, appalled, outraged and disgusted by bent mikey but I'm afraid he is correct.

Cyclists have the lowest "at fault" rating of any road user. They have, after all, a natural disincentive toward collisions with anything because they flipping hurt.

Drivers, too, are subsidised by the rest of the population. That this fact is little known demonstrates the sway held by the motoring lobby who complain about the over-taxed motorist when in fact the average urban motor vehicle is subsidised to the tune of around £2000 a year.


There is nothing "spurious" about the ten children killed or seriously injured on our roads every day, nor the cost of policing, or the cost to the NHS, or the pollution costs, noise pollution, damage to the infrastructure, rises in asthma and lung disease, global warming, disposal of vehicles etc etc etc.


Proposals to licence or have compulsory insurance on bicycles are unworkable and would cost far more to administer than any potential benefit.

Some good points

(by the way - welcome to the forum)

 

[MartinC]

There seems to be a difference between true costs i.e. the amount actually spent and the "environmental cost" which is a made up amount including all sorts of spurious costs.

"Environmental" cost include things like the £1.5 million average (at 1980's figures IIRC) total cost to the country of each fatal accident. If you're going to selectively eliminate figures from the equation that you don't like because they're "made up" then anyone can prove anything.

 

[ttcycle]

I think the issue that I'm picking up is that the deaths caused by HGV (a few of us are working on raising awareness by a campaign- check out the pages) are preventable by simple training. Training in my view can help all road users become more aware of hazards and poor driving/cycling- it is not however, simply an answer for some of the HGV deaths. It has not always been a case of people undertaking, what I think BM and others are annoyed about it the perpetuation of the attitude of 'blaming' the cyclist- there are so many factors involved in these situations - I had an email from a relative of a woman killed by a HGV - she DID NOT UNDERTAKE and was a confident cyclist. If you read media reports on this issue - it's often biased as to 'oh the cyclist was to blame' etc etc in subtle use of language-sometimes so subtle it may not even be purposeful.

Training raises awareness but just simply saying cyclists all have a blanket skills shortage does not in my opinion address the issues around the HGV/cyclist interations.