Road Safety

I was working at a client’s on the Team Valley today, and over lunchtime, I put together a post that I immediately decided to embargo for just over a fortnight. My reasons may become clearer later. So on the way home, I was wondering what to write about, and surprisingly enough a couple of drivers...
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I’ve been called all sorts of things in my time, many of them not particularly flattering, though many quite justified. But I have thick skin - something that probably comes from being an engineer. Unless insults are printed out on tractor-feed paper & backed up by a lot of calculations, I just don’t understand...
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I still had to do my daily run on Wednesday, even though Algernond and I had just been skiing across the whole of the Three Valleys. Somewhere around 30 miles or so on our skis, and somewhat less in various lifts along the way. So I did an ‘easy’ road run - up towards Méribel...
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I’d already been out to walk Huge Dalmatian just after dusk, and even then there was a heavy frost faorming. Two hours later when I went of my run, it was seriously cold - I mean real freeze-your-face-off-cold. I was tempted to head straight back indoors, and clip some LEDs to my clothing, so...
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A lot of cyclists get obsessed with high-visibility. Day-glo jackets, Scotchlite tape, more blinking LEDs than you can shake a stick at, and even changing the paint jobs on their bikes with stick-on patches. But there are two other things that you can use to make yourself more visible - especially to drivers of car’s...
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Some of you may remember the video I made last year about The World’s Shortest Cycle Lane. This was in Gateshead, next to their shiny new college, and a mere ten metres long. At the time, several commenters, and Gateshead Council’s extremely friendly and approachable* Team Leader for Traffic Projects and Rights of Way said...
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This via Tom Vanderbilt’s blog and the BBC today - crafty Nigerians are dodging new laws to force them and their passengers to wear helmets. But far from civil disobedience, they’ve got a cunning plan: Make their own helmets from hollowed-out pumpkins. No, really. The country’s unregulated moto-taxi service has particular problems as helmets are expensive,...
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So I used to think that I was maybe a little paranoid about the way people drive around bikes. Or more specifically, about how people drive around my bike, when I’m riding it. But after today, I’ve realised that it isn’t paranoia - they really are all out to get me. Today I had FIVE assassination...
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This via Tom Vanderbilt’s ‘How We Drive’ blog (think of it as the blog of the book): Coming soon - a mobile phone blocking key for your car. It’s paired to your phone, and when the key’s in the ignition, it blocks all incoming and outgoing calls & SMS text messages. Anyone calling you get’s...
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. . . because, then it’s really quite safe to do so. And I’m sure that you can hold your phone in a hand that’s resting on top of the steering wheel, so that you can keep an eye on the road ahead AND on the text message you’re composing or reading. Or at least...
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