Tony Raven wrote:
FrengaX wrote:
PERIL OF HEADPHONES EXPOSED AFTER GIRL CYCLIST DIES IN CRASH
http://www.dailyexpress.co.uk/posts/...-dies-in-crash



This is much more complicated than you are portraying it.

There isn't a cycle lane on Northam Road at that point but there is an
unmarked shared pavement route there. I would guess she was cycling
westbound to the Fire Station in St Marys.

If those assumptions are correct then the accident is a text book one
as illustrated he
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cy...sion_risks.jpg)
and it links to why cycle paths are more dangerous in another thread.
Danish research has classed the problem as insoluble in that even if
the cycle path has priority the problem remains The headphones were
most likely completely incidental to what happened.

Its a busy road so its unlikely the sound of the lorry would have
stood out even if she had not been wearing headphones. The cycle
pavement is on the left of a left turning lane that the lorry would
have been using and ends there so you need to rejoin the straight on
traffic by crossing the left turning lane. The difficulty for a
cyclist is you need to check traffic through 270 degrees when you are
on the cycle facility and that is what she would appear to have
failed to do. Headphones or not do not make up for lack of looking
and she paid a high price for it.
The lorry driver did what is classically known in the literature as
"looked but failed to see" - cyclists in those positions are
invariably invisible to drivers even when they are looking. Whether
he made the other classic error of not fully passing her before
making his turn I don't know but he should have been aware she was
there from having passed her earlier.

The guilty parties if any are the traffic planners. If she had been
riding on the road she would not have been going straight on on a
cycle path to the left of a left turning lane. Its not the only
place where I've seen such stupidity I'm afraid to say.

Tony

she should have stopped and looked when she reached the junction, she did
not, she cycled straight on.
since she had been stopped and told to remove the headphones on previous
occasions it is reasonable to assume that she was a typical cyclist: "road
laws do not apply to me"
in those glamour shots she is quite good looking, what a waste.