no blasted lights.

[theclaud]

Did he/she look foreign then?

Kinda shifty.

 

[Sheffield_Tiger]

Does anyone experiencing the self-switching-off-in-the-rain effect of Smart 1/2 Watts for the first time not deserve the teeniest bit of sympathy if they get squished after setting off with a good bright light and fresh batteries?

 

[Dan B]

If people want to ride around in the dark and get splattered by big trucks or cars, who am I to complain? This is not inhumane. They know the risks and have known the risks for years but cannot be bothered to do anything about it. If they are run over because they ride around on intrinsically unstable bicycles with no safety features or crumple zones, whos(sic) fault is it?

Trouble is, once you start saying "it's your own fault because you didn't take all reasonable steps to workaround other peoples failures", where do you draw the line? If everyone sets out to be brighter than average, better encased than average, more circumspect than average, in a few years time the "average" will have shifted and people will be blaming cyclists for getting run over because they only had hi-viz, 1W rear light, and dual CREE XML-6superwhiz lights on the front, but didn't have the additional backpack light, helmet light, fluoro shoes, 3m scotchguard spokes, millimetre wave radio transmitters and radar corner reflectors that the "safe" cyclists will all be sporting.

It's an arms race

 

[steveindenmark]

Theclaud. I live in the wilds of Denmark. At 5am when I go to work it is pitch black out there. It is so dark I use a head torch to get to the car, when I drive. There are so many deer between home and work that I take it very steadily. I drive 18km to work and all but the last 1km is in total darkness and down country lanes.

Last week I almost run a woman over walking a dog. She was all in black with a black dog, walking away from me on my side of the road. This could quite easily have been a cyclist with no lights.

In your opinion, when do you think the pedestrian or cyclist has a responsability for their own safety or am I expected to drive everywhere at 10km an hour in the dark, just because some stupid, idle cyclist or pedestrian wont make themselves visible.

I am also a cyclist. But really cant understand this idea you appear to have that everything is the responsability of the motorist and not the cyclist.

Dan,

I really dont think that is an argument. Good effective lighting is cheap and easy to find, you dont even have to get out of your chair to buy it. All I am saying it is our own responsibility to fit it to our bikes and use it. Just as important is that if you have children, you teach them about lighting up and make sure they do it. How many deaths are we going to read about this year where the bike did not have lights? Some of them are avoidable. It is not a degree of how bright you are and never will be. But it is not just the car drivers responsibility to see us. It is also our responsibility to be seen.

Adrian, sorry but it appears to me that they were saying just that. Unless I read it wrong.

"No fault? The poor dears. If only simple means of avoiding such misery were available to them - such as slowing down, anticipating the presence of others and/or simply looking where they are going before rolling lethal heavy machinery into or over flesh and bone, eh?"

Steve

 

[Linford]

No, we are employing a zero tolerance policy here. Similarly I had only myself to blame the other day, when some twat rode into the back of me at a set of lights breaking the wire to my rear light, something I didn't spot at the time.

Did you chase him for recompense, and if not, would you expect recompense for the damage he did to your light ?

 

[ShipHill]

I'll try one last time - No one has said cyclists don't need to use lights, or shouldn't use them. Something Steve and Adrian have in common seems to be a generous tendency to give away lights to unlit people. The part that is contentious is the 'only have yourself to blame' part, which is so wrong and inhumane it always amazes me that cyclists, on a cycling forum, resort to it.

Pragmatically they are obviously better off if they have lights but they shouldn't have to have them. Unfortunately that argument was given up in 1920 something, so we are left with the pragmatic.

I think it's stuff like the bit I bolded that some folks have an issue with. I must admit that I'm not sure what the thrust of this is.

Apologies for being a thickie.

 

[DrLex]

[QUOTE 2757273, member: 45"]People, we're all on the same side here. Yes, cyclists should be responsible to light themselves up at night and yes car drivers should remain fully alert at all times. That's all there is to it really.[/quote]
How can this argument get to ten pages or more if you insist on bringing logic & sense back in to it?

 

[Dan B]

I really dont think that is an argument. Good effective lighting is cheap and easy to find, you dont even have to get out of your chair to buy it.

But the lighting which is currently considered effective is only effective because it stands out against the current visual background. When everyone and his dog has dual 1W red LEDs on their backside, the road users who stand out will be the ones with 3W and a fibre flare and a full suit of 3m Scotchlite and a pair of flashing amber viking horns coming out of their helmet, and the poor sod who gets run over because he "only" has the legally required lights will be blamed for being the author of his own misfortune.

Pedestrians used to be advised in the HC to wear light colours at night. Now they're told to wear hi-viz, because merely wearing a white t-shirt doesn't make them stand out against the background any more when everyone else is brighter.

 

[HLaB]

8 pages and still nobody has explained what blasted lights are; one you find in a quarry ?

 

[Origamist]

Theclaud. I live in the wilds of Denmark. At 5am when I go to work it is pitch black out there. It is so dark I use a head torch to get to the car, when I drive. There are so many deer between home and work that I take it very steadily. I drive 18km to work and all but the last 1km is in total darkness and down country lanes.

Last week I almost run a woman over walking a dog. She was all in black with a black dog, walking away from me on my side of the road. This could quite easily have been a cyclist with no lights.

Steve

Or a deer! Those beasts should have lights attached to their hindquarters, hoof reflectors and Hope snout lights. I say this as drivers can often get splattered when colliding with large animals. I do have sympathy for the deer who might have to live with the fact they have killed someone through no fault of their own...

I say what I think and don't talk round the houses to avoid upsetting delicate souls.

 

[ShipHill]

I farkin give up.

 

[ShipHill]

I was just trying to grasp the whole "lights at night" argument and I'm failing to follow the reasoning behind certain statements. Internet threads rarely follow the same lines than if we were all in the same room having tea and biccies.

 

[J.Primus]

I was just trying to grasp the whole "lights at night" argument and I'm failing to follow the reasoning behind certain statements. Internet threads rarely follow the same lines than if we were all in the same room having tea and biccies.

Essentially everyone agrees you should have lights on at night, except for those who dont, but they didn't say you shouldn't need them, except where they did, and if they did you read it wrong or something.
Hope that helps

 

[ShipHill]

I usually read stuff wrong.

 

[Linford]

[QUOTE 2758278, member: 1314"]I've been riding with no front light on, not for the sake of it, but because I remembered an argument that was posited by a slightly overweight, ex-truck driving, accountant who is a very good cyclist ( ) some while back who said that it made it not safer as such, but that on street lit roads you had to be that much more aware of what was happening in front, rather than relying on drivers etc seeing you. I can recommend the merit in that argument, though I would recommend that there are reflective bits on the front of the clothing, but not on the bike itself because that's sacrosanct.[/quote]

You don't recall the story of how a rider locally lost his life ?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/gloucestershire/4134206.stm