Hit and run in Yorkshire

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/n...re/6538611.stm

"North Yorkshire Police said the man, who was about 50 years old, was hit by
a vehicle which failed to stop.
He was taken to hospital where he died."

I bet if/when they find him it'll be a slap on the wrists and points on his
licence. I'd like to be proved wrong.


--
peter

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"naked_draughtsman" wrote in message
...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/n...re/6538611.stm

"North Yorkshire Police said the man, who was about 50 years old, was hit
by a vehicle which failed to stop.
He was taken to hospital where he died."

I bet if/when they find him it'll be a slap on the wrists and points on
his licence. I'd like to be proved wrong.


To be fair, when a cyclist collided with my car and was knocked off, it was
essentially silent - if I had my radio on at any volume I wouldn`t have
heard it. The reason I knew I had been involved in the incident was because
I saw the cyclist trying to filter along my inside about 15 seconds after I
had started moving from a set of traffic lights. The near side of my car
was hard up against some cones, and in lane 2 there was a HGV, giving me no
further room to move either direction. The cyclist tried to filrt past me,
got caught between a cone and my car and fell off. When I moved my car out
the way of the junction and went back to check on him, he decided that it
was my fault (how he can blame me when he had no qualification to drive a
vehicle on the road, couldn`t give even the most basic of answers to
questions about what the highway code said about filtering and when he had
been stupid enough to try and squeeze down a ga that wasn`t there is beyond
me).

But the point is that if it where dark, and the cyclist wasn`t using
suitible lights, I could very easily have driven off without knowing that
anything had happened at all - if the cyclist then died then it could have
been a similar situation to the one in the story quoted. If the cyclist had
good lights then obviously it would be a lot harder to not see them,
depending on both their riding behaviour and the positioning of cars. This
is only valid in a situation similar to mine - if you are both moving down a
road, then provided the cyclist has good lights (and not the weird flashing
ones that make it almost impossible to judge their distance, or lights that
are far too dim) then there isn`t really any excuse.

--
Items on ebay:
http://search.ebay.co.uk/_W0QQsassZscousesifinQQhtZ-1

On Tue, 10 Apr 2007 09:19:20 +0100, "naked_draughtsman"
wrote:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/n...re/6538611.stm

"North Yorkshire Police said the man, who was about 50 years old, was hit by
a vehicle which failed to stop.
He was taken to hospital where he died."

The victim is, as yet, unidentified. His description is he

http://www.leedstoday.net/viewarticl...3&sectionid=39

Sadly, a pedestrian was killed on the same road a couple of days earlier. Drunk
driving suspected:

http://www.injurywatch.co.uk/news-an...llision-747620

On Tue, 10 Apr 2007 11:19:06 +0100, "Simon Finnigan"
wrote:

"naked_draughtsman" wrote in message
...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/n...re/6538611.stm

"North Yorkshire Police said the man, who was about 50 years old, was hit
by a vehicle which failed to stop.
He was taken to hospital where he died."

I bet if/when they find him it'll be a slap on the wrists and points on
his licence. I'd like to be proved wrong.


To be fair, when a cyclist collided with my car and was knocked off, it was
essentially silent - if I had my radio on at any volume I wouldn`t have
heard it. The reason I knew I had been involved in the incident was because
I saw the cyclist trying to filter along my inside about 15 seconds after I
had started moving from a set of traffic lights. The near side of my car
was hard up against some cones, and in lane 2 there was a HGV, giving me no
further room to move either direction. The cyclist tried to filrt past me,
got caught between a cone and my car and fell off. When I moved my car out
the way of the junction and went back to check on him, he decided that it
was my fault (how he can blame me when he had no qualification to drive a
vehicle on the road,

What qualification, exactly, does he need?

couldn`t give even the most basic of answers to
questions about what the highway code said about filtering and when he had
been stupid enough to try and squeeze down a ga that wasn`t there is beyond
me).

But the point is that if it where dark,

It wasn't dark -- the body was found at 7 PM, and sunset in Yorkshire these days
is well past that. All the ranting and speculation about lights is quite
irrelevant.

and the cyclist wasn`t using
suitible lights, I could very easily have driven off without knowing that
anything had happened at all - if the cyclist then died then it could have
been a similar situation to the one in the story quoted. If the cyclist had
good lights then obviously it would be a lot harder to not see them,
depending on both their riding behaviour and the positioning of cars. This
is only valid in a situation similar to mine - if you are both moving down a
road, then provided the cyclist has good lights (and not the weird flashing
ones that make it almost impossible to judge their distance, or lights that
are far too dim) then there isn`t really any excuse.

This knee-jerk reaction to blame the victim is, frankly, quite sickening,
especially given the increasingly hostile press that cycling is getting. Bikes
are legitimate traffic, not targets to be bulldozed off the road.

On Apr 10, 11:19 am, "Simon Finnigan"
wrote:


To be fair, when a cyclist collided with my car and was knocked off, it was
essentially silent - if I had my radio on at any volume I wouldn`t have
heard it.

There is a lot of difference between a cyclist falling off at walking
speed after catching a traffic cone and actually being hit by a
vehicle travelling at speed. Have you ever seen the sort of damage
resulting from a high speed impact (say anything over 20 Mph)? There
is NO WAY a motorist can 'collide' with a cyclist at anything above
walking pace and not know about it, especially when the impact was
serious enough to cause fatal injuries. In my experience of driving
even a piece of debris thrown up under ones wheels at speed can sound
apocalyptic.

he decided that it
was my fault (how he can blame me when he had no qualification to drive a
vehicle on the road, couldn`t give even the most basic of answers to
questions about what the highway code said about filtering and when he had
been stupid enough to try and squeeze down a ga that wasn`t there is beyond
me).


It strikes me that YOU are the one who never read the Highway Code, as
it says nothing specifically about filtering by cyclists! On the other
hand the official handbook of safe cycling 'Cyclecraft' does, and this
points out that 'filtering' is a legitimate manoeuvre, although not
one that should be done at speed. The 'Code does say "only overtake
on the left if the vehicle in front is signalling to turn right, and
there is room to do so'' but this is not 'filtering' as such and any
case the 'Code also says "If the queue on your right is moving more
slowly than you are, you may pass on the left".

Also a cyclists needs no 'qualification' to use the public road as
they have a legal right to do so. On the other hand, for motor vehicle
users driving on the public road is merely a privilege controlled
through licence, and this is because of the amount of danger motor
vehicles pose to others.

But the point is that if it where dark, and the cyclist wasn`t using
suitible lights, I could very easily have driven off without knowing that
anything had happened at all

The story does not say that the cyclist was riding without lights, or
even that it was dark at the time, merely that is was 'evening'.
(Think on, what time does it actually get dark now we are on summer
time). In any case what do you think the headlights on your vehicle
are for numbskull!

On 10 Apr 2007 05:02:19 -0700, "Howard" wrote:

In any case what do you think the headlights on your vehicle
are for numbskull!

Headlights only tend to illuminate things in front of them ;-)

On Apr 10, 1:13 pm, (Ziggy) wrote:
On 10 Apr 2007 05:02:19 -0700, "Howard" wrote:

In any case what do you think the headlights on your vehicle
are for numbskull!

Headlights only tend to illuminate things in front of them ;-)

True enough, but it is amazing how many drivers try to deny even this!

Marc Brett wrote:
This knee-jerk reaction to blame the victim is, frankly, quite sickening,
especially given the increasingly hostile press that cycling is getting. Bikes
are legitimate traffic, not targets to be bulldozed off the road.

It sounds like he was a victim of his own stupidity. You cannot go where
there is not enough room. Putting ones life at risk to save a few
seconds queuing is foolish in the extreme.

Howard wrote on 10/04/2007 14:03 +0100:
On Apr 10, 1:13 pm, (Ziggy) wrote:
On 10 Apr 2007 05:02:19 -0700, "Howard" wrote:

In any case what do you think the headlights on your vehicle
are for numbskull!
Headlights only tend to illuminate things in front of them ;-)

True enough, but it is amazing how many drivers try to deny even this!


But are presumably therefore admitting to driving to fast to stop within
the distance they can see in their headlights to be clear.

--
Tony

"The most savage controversies are those about matters as to which there
is no good evidence either way."
- Bertrand Russell

On Apr 10, 2:08 pm, Chris Hills wrote:
Marc Brett wrote:
This knee-jerk reaction to blame the victim is, frankly, quite sickening,
especially given the increasingly hostile press that cycling is getting. Bikes
are legitimate traffic, not targets to be bulldozed off the road.

It sounds like he was a victim of his own stupidity.

What the cyclist killed in that 'hit and run' in Yorkshire? (As this
is who Brett was referring to).

You cannot go where
there is not enough room. Putting ones life at risk to save a few
seconds queuing is foolish in the extreme.

If that is what really happened of course. Given the tone of the
posting I wouldn't be at all surprised if in reality the poster on
seeing the cyclist filtering up the inside, probably just before the
road narrowed off (hence the cones) decided to try to 'block' the
cyclist or at least to 'hold thier position' and as a consequece ended
up forcing the cyclist into the cones at the narrowing. If the poster
really was tight up against a continuous row of cones how on earth
would the cyclist even have been able to get up alongside in the first
place, and once they were there a good driver would have let them pass
before moving on.