It appears all the boxes are ticked – woman, tipper truck, turning left at junction.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-33223823

How many more before somebody is prepared to stand up and say that these vehicles are clearly unsuitable for use on our roads?

From the link above it is unclear who’s fault it was, sad news either way.

They serve a purpose, the best advice for cyclists is don’t go anywhere near the things.

They serve a purpose, the best advice for cyclists is don’t go anywhere near the things.

So stay off the road in case one overtakes when it shouldn’t?

Sad, maybe something will come of this, or maybe it’ll be just another dead cyclist.

A tipper, what a surprise.

Jog on Dez that is not what I said, you want to wade in fill your boots.

Depressing comments as usual in the ES story about it I read. All cyclists’ fault for being silly enough to cycle in London apparently.

Froma previous news story:
She is the sixth cyclist to die on London’s roads this year. All have involved HGVs.

Is it really more than one a month? Incredible.

Sorry Pigface, all I’m saying is it is just as likely to be a case of the lorry overtaking.

Which is completely irrelevant to the suitability of such vehicles on those roads. One of the common factors I highlighted suggests that some of the cyclists may be making a mistake some of the time, but not one which deserves a death sentence.

As does a chainsaw or a shotgun – also things which I’d suggest are unsuitable for use in central London.

You can’t compare the average cyclist with the average London cyclist, rushing to work and ignoring so many potential disasters. I’m just amazed its not one a day!

It’s so horribly predictable. Boris is massively encouraging cycling participation whilst at the same time knowing full well this particular risk (tipper trucks) is the cause of almost all the deaths (IIRC 9 out of the 12 deaths each year), and doing nothing about it.

Personally I steer well clear of a tipper truck when I see one – the data speaks for itself in terms of the risk and anecdotally they’re not always driven with skill and care… I would like to see a massive push towards Bikeability – whilst the main problem is these things being driven badly on crowded roads, you can do a lot to avoid them – e.g. pulling over and waiting 60 secs till they’re gone is easily done but for newbie riders I don’t think the risk is evident and some training would go a very long way to reducing the numbers of deaths.

We really should be making a huge racket that so many people are dying under tipper trucks but no change is being made to reduce the risk.

You can’t compare the average cyclist with the average London cyclist, rushing to work and ignoring so many potential disasters. I’m just amazed its not one a day!

This is really important to remember, cycling is really nothing like as deadly as you may think. We lose around 12 people a year and 120 nationwide, but – in City AM this morning there was an article about pedestrianising Oxford St with this quote: “Clean Air in London estimates that over 1,300 Londoners have died prematurely this year due to air pollution” I’ve seen a figure of this being 30,000 nationwide and another 30k from obesity-related diseases…

I know this isn’t quite like for like comparison but there’s plenty of stupid/avoidable ways to die in the UK, of which cycling makes a very tiny contribution…

Is there a hierarchy of truck drivers? I mean, is a long-distance HGV driver likely to be brighter and a more careful driver than a tipper truck driver, who probably doesn’t need to think too hard about the daily back and forth collect, shuttle, dump, repeat? I know this sounds patronising but in my 20s I used to drive 3 ton delivery trucks and I know that time pressure and fatigue made me careless and slapdash and I probably would have taken more pride and care in the job if I had been doing long-haul stuff.

In parts of the Yorkshire Dales quarry tipper trucks drive frighteningly fast, presumably out of familiarity with the route and because they probably actually handle quite well with their numerous wheels and stiff suspension.

There is a joke that goes; What do you call a fly in the cab of a tipper truck? The most intelligent life form in the cab.

Another cyclist “serious injured” at Bank this morning too. 😐

Edit: Now confirmed dead at the scene.

Sad news. I can’t quite believe that it being a woman again is just coincidence. If we could work out why the combination of tipper lorry/ female cyclist is so lethal we might be able to mitigate the risk.

that junction is a nightmare, the road markings are poor, theres no good cycle routes nearby and a lot of construction going on

terrible news for her family

We know why it’s so lethal or at least we have some pretty solid theories

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/green-living-blog/2010/may/13/cycling-lorries-women-road-deaths

Mitigation has already been suggested – enclosed wheels, better visibility, better road markings/designs and better education for people who choose to cycle.

You can’t compare the average cyclist with the average London cyclist, rushing to work and ignoring so many potential disasters. I’m just amazed its not one a day!

agreed

personally I’d ignore that particular junction at all costs except the weekend when its almost traffic free

If we could work out why the combination of tipper lorry/ female cyclist is so lethal

One explanation that has been suggested in the past is that women are less likely to RLJ and thus more likely to end up sitting alongside a lorry at the lights.

When will London catch up with Paris? London is killing folk off left right and centre. Paris has a HGV ban and doesnt have anything like the number of cyclist deaths that there are in London.

Paris is a joy to cycle round, London isn’t.

How many more before somebody is prepared to stand up and say that these vehicles are clearly unsuitable for use on our roads?

Perhaps it’s that cyclist are unsuitable for the roads?

You can’t compare the average cyclist with the average London cyclist, rushing to work and ignoring so many potential disasters. I’m just amazed its not one a day!

agreed

personally I’d ignore that particular junction at all costs except the weekend when its almost traffic free

Cyclists are perfectly suitable for the roads. They were built for us in the first place. What isn’t suitable is large vehicles that can’t see vulnerable road users.

Perhaps it’s that cyclist are unsuitable for the roads?

perhaps. Got the stats for KSI incidents caused by cyclists vs car drivers vs hgv drivers? I’m sure they’ll backup your suggestion.

When will London catch up with Paris? London is killing folk off left right and centre. Paris has a HGV ban and doesnt have anything like the number of cyclist deaths that there are in London.

The big difference is that Paris is built on a network of underground quarries, from where the stone was quarried for all the beautiful Haussmann buildings. The instability of the ground means that Paris only has one big skyscraper and new building is almost impossible while cave-ins are not uncommon. This is the reason why in the 70s it was decided to build La Défense, as an out-of-town business district with tall modern office blocks to house the emerging post-war companies. Hence there is very little construction going on at any time in Paris and banning HGVs probably didn’t cause much hardship.

By contrast London is receiving massive investment and there is building and refurbishment going on all over the city.

Footnote: apparently those Parisian Haussmann buildings are terrible places to live, with no soundproofing and ancient plumbing and electrics. Floods are common and difficult to rectify if coming from an empty apartment above and refurbishment is massively expensive because of the need to preserve the fabric and the difficulty of access. Typically the apartments will be owned by a big Parisian family who, thanks to the complexity of French inheritance laws, will not sell but will keep the place empty, increasing the potential for leaks and structural problems.

Could they not remove the building waste using the extensive train network, or at night, or not during rush hour? There will be a solution out there that reduces the risk for all involved. It would probably cost more than using tipper trucks though. Perhaps if they used more tipper trucks and stopped paying the drivers by the load that might work?

Safer lorry scheme:

http://road.cc/content/news/142312-london-ban-hgvs-without-cyclist-safety-equipment-safer-lorry-scheme-comes-force

Due September

They were built for us in the first place

London’s roads were built for cyclists? Hmmm.

Ffs. Every time i see this I wonder if its going to be my sister. She’s 26ish. Loves commuting across London on her bike, and is pretty road savvy but you never know.

Bank really is a nightmare junction….

6 major roads converge and there are two other little side roads…. various sets of lights (meters apart on two roads, and in the “middle” of the juction for some routes) with Ped Xings all over.

I walk past daily on the way to/from work…. I’d give it 10/10 on the concentration scale if on my bike.

Sad for all involved

Perhaps it’s that cyclist are unsuitable for the roads?

In one case the “cyclist” was actually walking in front or the lorry pushing their bike and it just drove over the top of them.

You’d have to ban pedestrians from crossing the road too.

… and do we need to post the picture of the HGV shunting a car sideways along the motorway at 50mph??

Technology can remove blind spots of lorries, but the haulage lobby group has campaigned against it.

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/bike-blog/2013/apr/16/roads-not-built-for-cars-book

London’s roads were built for cyclists? Hmmm.

The street I live in was built in 1860. How old is the motor car?

We could put all the technology in the world on board

You would still see people cycling up the inside of them at traffic lights

[video]https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=leW8Mx1GciE[/video]

[video]https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_DHQQtp6bh0[/video]

Sometimes you can’t legislate for sheer stupidity.

Good post globalti, interesting Paris facts.

roads were not built for cars as I’m sure you already knew Ned you cheeky wee scamp.

You would still see people cycling up the inside of them at traffic lights

what if there is a cycle lane there*? How many car drivers wouldn’t go down the left hand lane if a car was waiting in traffic just incase they turned left without looking or indicating? I had a bus driver do this to me the other day, I declined to go up the cycle lane, good job, the useless ****er wasn’t indicating for the left turn he subsequently made across the cycle lane.

Telling cyclists (and then doing a bit of victim blaming) not to go up the left hand side of vehicles is a lot easier than getting professional drivers to drive professionally.

<edit>*my comment was made before you added the video illustrating your point, yes that sort of stuff makes me wince.

So I’m going to tread very carefully here because I don’t know the details of the accident or who, if anyone, was at fault, and because however this was caused it is a tragic accident and someone who must have been very close and very special to their loved ones has died.

However, with that in mind, here is my tuppenny’s worth:

Speaking as someone who lives and cycles very regularly, ie every trip I make, in London, I feel like I can honestly say that I’m not surprised that, has horrific as the death toll is, it’s not even higher. My reasons for saying are that:

A) there are a lot of cyclists in London, cycling on roads that are already very busy.
B) the number of cyclists who I see taking crazy risks as well as having absolutely no intention at all of following any of the basic rules (red lights, one way systems, cycling on pavements etc) are, well, certainly the majority if not pretty much all of them.

God knows I appreciate how vulnerable cyclists are, I know because I feel it every time I go out!! But I have absolutely had enough of people blaming the motorised traffic for every incident and death that occurs on the roads. When I think about the thousands of interactions I have with both cars and other cyclists every week, and compare how many stupid things that each type of road user has done as a percentage then I suspect (and I am obviously guessing here) that the cars would be less than 1%, and the cyclists would somewhere well over 60%.
I apologise for the rant but, honestly, I’ve had enough if this moany, whiny hipocrisy. If you want the motorists to drive well, then feel free to start showing them how it’s done. Ugh!!!