Edmund King- "Two tribes"

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spindrift

New Member
Actually this time he's not quite as barking madly irresponsible as when he proposed enforced segregation of cyclists:



Cyclists flout law 'to stay safe'


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The government is spending £140m promoting cycling in England


Cyclists who break the law and ride anti-socially only do so because the Highway Code is set against them, a cyclists' organisation has claimed.
CTC says cyclists may flout some of the rules, such as turning left on a red light, as it helps them to stay safe.
It has called for the code to be re-written to protect cyclists.
Motoring organisation the AA said the behaviour of some cyclists meant in effect there were "two tribes" at war on the roads.
One proposal is to introduce an advanced green stage at a junction which allows cyclists to get away before motorists.
They could be allowed turn left on a red light.
Another proposal is to allow them to ignore instructions to stop at red on a pedestrian crossing, as they say being allowed to cross some red lights is safer.


Breaking rules


Chris Peck, of CTC, said: "Most cyclists obey the rules of the road, there is only a minority that cycle anti-socially, like breaking red lights and cycle on pavements but we have to realise why they are doing this.
"It's because the rules of the road are not set up for cyclists, the width of the roads, the layout of the roads, even cycle routes are not designed with the cyclists in mind, they are designed to keep cyclists off the road and mingle them with pedestrians."
Cycling is being promoted in English cities such as Bristol, with the government providing £140m of funding.
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We do see cyclists just not obeying the rules of the road, also we get motorists doing things that the shouldn't so maybe we need to clarify the rules for all
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Edmund King
AA


The rules are set to be changed at a local level, in London councils will soon get new powers to protect and prosecute cyclists.
Nick Lester, of London Councils, said: "We have got two powers, the first is to enable advance stop lines to be enforced to give cyclists the benefit at traffic signals.
"The second is better powers to control reckless footway cycling where cyclists can - and it's only a minority of cyclists - cause fear amongst pedestrians." Edmund King, of the AA, said at times it appeared there were two tribes at war on the roads. He said: "We do see cyclists just not obeying the rules of the road jumping red lights, one way streets, also we get motorists doing things that they shouldn't so maybe we need to clarify the rules for all."


http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7478823.stm

That's rather an odd story, the Britsol scheme is hacked on to a fairly anodyne statement from the CTC.

I'm not sure about the left turn at lights at all, Boris Johnson suggested the same thing but it would put cyclists where pedestrians don't expect to see them. Quite a positive tone to the piece thoughbut.
 

Wolf04

New Member
Location
Wallsend on Tyne
Err haven't we already got a thread on this?
http://www.cyclechat.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=14736
 

Haitch

Flim Flormally
Location
Netherlands
Edmund King is the head of the RAC yet he is quoted here as being the head of the AA. Did they get the man's name confused or his organisation's?
 

marinyork

Resting in suspended Animation
Location
Logopolis
Well I know there are two other threads on this elsewhere. I was actually quite annoyed with that piece this morning, having Mr King on and also the clip I saw seemed bang out of order, they featured a helmet cam pick of a van I think it was just turning out into a cyclist and the news item then complained about the van then hitting stationary traffic and the cyclist filtering past with a clear view. Absolutely couldn't see anything wrong with it at the time (there's a small possibility there may have been). It just screamed out to me that they had to invent "balance" in the reporting by saying well the cyclist did something wrong there. Just childish. I'm guessing when the day went on off the breakfast time and time constraints kicked in this clip may have been pulled and focused on the discussion that I only caught a bit of.
 
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