[Closed] Mass suicide attempt by commuter cyclists.

Insane, glad i never have to cycle anywhere near the place!!

He's right though, they should have been in the same lane as the Lorry. If the lorry was there first they should have been behind it.

Wasn't a great move. I'm sure if he looks back at the footage he'll see why.

I love cycling in London. Have done it every week for 20yrs with almost zero incidents. Just need to not ride like a douche.

Would an advanced stop line have helped in this situation?
Either way, not a particularly intelligent move by either party.

Lots of comments defending the cyclist in the youtube comments section. I can't work out if that is due to tribalism and defend fellow cyclist at all costs or they truly believe that riding like that is ok. Can't decide which would be worse tbh.

Also, the only thing worse than waiting at lights is watching a video of someone else waiting at lights.

Left hand lane or not the driver could have left him a bit more room..

The cyclist was in the wrong in my opinion. I actually felt sorry for the lorry driver. He was clearly very shaken by the fact he almost killed somebody. Everybody does it is an excuse I would expect from a six year old. I hope they've both learnt a valuable lesson.

Left hand lane or not the driver could have left him a bit more room..

Did he even know he was there though? Pretty huge blind spot on an arctic and the cyclist was in the wrong lane.

How could the driver leave more room for people he cannot see?

It's a pretty arrogant person who sits in the well known blind spot of a lorry and expects the driver to know they are there!

Feel sorry for the driver here and I spend years cycling around London.

Left hand lane or not the driver could have left him a bit more room..

For the cyclist to risk his life on the fact that the driver of the lorry would leave space for a cyclist that he did not know was there by barging into the cars in the right hand lane he did know were there is a big ask.

For the cyclist to risk his life on the fact that the driver of the lorry would leave space for a cyclist that he did not know was there by barging into the cars in the right hand lane he did know were there is a big ask.

Left hand lane or not the driver could have left him a bit more room..

Every single cyclist that went straight on at that junction that was in the LH lane was in the wrong. The LH lane is clearly marked turn left only. Lane markings, road signs, traffic signals apply to all, end of story.

Lorry driver entirely in the right for me. The only comment is that perhaps he could have anticipated more cyclists after seeing the first few go through. But yeah, stupid move by at least 4 cyclists.

Foolish move by the cyclist but should HGV's with massive blind spots be allowed on busy crowded city roads?

Cyclist a dick but driver is in London, its the most cycling city in the UK, over a million cycle journeys a day.

Hgvs and poor cycling infrastructure (and bad cycling) make this kind of interface inevitable

Absolutely cyclists fault. Sitting and a left hand filter lane then going straight on and sitting right in a blind spot. Must be tired of living. I see stuff like this in London quite often and it makes me wince

Foolish move by the cyclist but should HGV's with massive blind spots be allowed on busy crowded city roads?

Now I do agree with this. I have never driven an HGV so my views are relatively useless but you would have thought cameras and head up displays could be used to help the driver have improved awareness without creating an information overload of different mirros and screen to have to monitor. Maybe dispense with mirrors completely and replace with monitors with a better angle to reduce the number of places the driver has to look. I know it's bad enough in my Ducato van.

Having said all that - it's still a pretty entitled move by the cyclists to use the wrong lane and expect other road users to make unorthodox moves (like slowing in the middle of a junction to make sure they have all under taken him or barged across into the traffic on his right to give them the lane) to accommodate their desire to cycle as an when they feel like. I have no desire to slow up cyclists on what should be a very appropriate transport method for a city but that spot seems on face value to be one where they need to yield from doing what they wish for purely geographical reasons and a desire to see tomorrow.

Watching it again I love the fact that our cameraman's first comment was 'I got the on film'. Like the police are going to side with a bunch of cyclists behaving like that. But maybe youtube shaming is the police these days.

Cyclists are guilty of a huge sense of entitlement and lack of road craft here. Poor truck driver probably got the fright of his life.
The idiot repeating "everyone does it" is clearly a complete dick. He's lucky the driver didn't lose his rag and chin him.
It's just embarrassing and is deliberate.
I can't be arsed watching these idiots again but did the cyclist even look once as he was about to exit the left only lane and force his puny frame in front of a 40t truck?

Watched the vid, deliberate, attempted murder. The truck driver knew there were lots of cyclists around and didn't take that into account. Selfish aggressive driving. You need a law that says you should always take care of the more vulnerable road user even if you have right of way.

Reformed Troll is not reformed then. Back under the bridge for you.

Funny. I've never seen brown lycra before.

It suprised me how quick the lorry pulled away. Must have been empty...

It's not about right of way Edukator. They were in the wrong lane. How long do you expect the driver to wait? The whole bunch of cyclists acted like utter cockwombles and that's coming from a cyclist.

How long do you expect the driver to wait?

Until it's safe to proceed.

Very frightening for both parties, I wonder IF the cyclist will look at this and think 'My goodness, I was unbelievably stupid there, I'll learn from that before I kill myself'

...probably not.

Until it's safe to proceed.

How's he supposed to know when that is exactly? As about ten people have already stated, huge blind spot, he doesn't know if there are fifty more cyclists to come. Attempted murder my arse. The cyclist took a stupid risk and then shat himself when it went wrong.

Trust me, I'm one of ther first people to condemn bad driving. In this case I feel sorry for the lorry driver.

First time I've ever said this ( probably ) but the cyclists are in the wrong.

Massive blind spots in that area, unless there are cameras retro fitted pointing that way, and the cyclists were in a left lane.

" it's London mate, everyone does that " I've only ever been London once so I've no idea if that's correct but, if it was a car or white van man who had tried jumping in front of the LGV from the left lane who would everyone be blaming when they were sideswiped ? Everyone would be defending the LGV.

Think the guy who was hit realised that as he screamed and shouted then cycled off without exchanging details.

Watched the vid, deliberate, attempted murder. The truck driver knew there were lots of cyclists around and didn't take that into account. Selfish aggressive driving. You need a law that says you should always take care of the more vulnerable road user even if you have right of way.

I think about the rules of the road at sea. The first responsibility for the vessel with right of way is to maintain course and speed so the other vessel has a consistent and predictable object to avoid. The HGV did this here IMO. However when a collision looks inevitable without manoeuvre it is still the responsibility of the vessel with right of way to alter course and or speed to avoid the collision.

It would seem reasonable to apply to the tarmac road too and only the most callus road user would not do this instinctively. In this case you are asking the lorry driver to manoeuvre to accommodate a potentially infinite number of unknown objects (I don't believe he knew he was there) coming down his blind side. Watch the female cyclist with better awareness slow down and go out of frame left when they appreciate they are too late to filter in. You are also asking the vessel with right of way to yield to the more vulnerable who are in no way carrying out the responsibilities of their side of the bargain. That seems harsh. Not as harsh as being squashed I grant you but riders riding with impunity with the onus of responsibility always placed on the driver would seem an impossible situation to maintain. I am aware it sort of exists on the continent and would be interested to know how it is enforced when the cyclists is clearly in the wrong.

That cyclist was lucky.. Could easily have been squished under the lorry. Doesn't seem a whole lot of self preservation going on there.. Right or wrong they should be riding so they don't put themselves in situations where they will easily get killed.

Usually I'm on the cyclist's side. Not this time.

he doesn't know if there are fifty more cyclists to come

So he assumes thare are more and doesn't close the gap. It's two lanes into one over that junction, there was plenty of space to the right of the truck, the drive just had to let cars pass then move into it.

What would those supporting the truck driver have done in the same situation? I'm absolutely certain I wouldn't have driven the way the truck drive did. The road narrows, he was the best placesd person to see that sat high and with all the time at the lights to work out what to do. He used that time to work out he could deliberately cut up cyclists rather than start slowly, indicate right, move out and give them room.

Wasn't a great move. I'm sure if he looks back at the footage he'll see why.

All those ****puffins were in a left hand turn lane.

They were in a likely blind spot

It was clear the HGV was going straight on, on a narrowing of the road.

Unless reading Peppa Pig is an intellectual challenge, the obvious course of action would have been to hang back.

I felt sorry for the HGV driver v a bunch of self regarding cockpellets.

he could deliberately cut up cyclists

That's quite aggressive language. I deem deliberately cut up as an action where the driver alters course to impede the cyclist. He did not do that in any way. He maintained his course in a way that was perfectly predictable to the cyclists if they had engaged their brains. Some did and either accelerated hard to get ahead or hung back. our hero did not, just hung around in the blind spot.

It suprised me how quick the lorry pulled away. Must have been empty.

I was thinking the same thing but on watching it again I think that the bike filming it slows down as they can see what's happening and at the same time the truck is moving away so it looks more like the truck is accelerating at the cyclists.

Definitely the cyclists in the wrong there though in my opinion but when I've cycled into London in the past it seems that stupid manouveres up the inside of trucks an busses is a fairly normal thing for done cyclists.

Edukator, it is most definitely not two lanes into one over the junction. The left lane is turning left. Only the right hand lane was going on and the bike was not in front of the lorry (hence needing overtaken) but beside it (hence pushing sideways into the lane).

First time I've ever said this ( probably ) but the cyclists are in the wrong.

Massive blind spots in that area, unless there are cameras retro fitted pointing that way, and the cyclists were in a left lane.

" it's London mate, everyone does that " I've only ever been London once so I've no idea if that's correct but, if it was a car or white van man who had tried jumping in front of the LGV from the left lane who would everyone be blaming when they were sideswiped ? Everyone would be defending the LGV.

It's not the first time I've said this.

The problem is that " it's London mate, [u]nearly [/u]everyone does that " is not far from the truth.

This seems more a herd/school/flock mentality...
The outcome of a bike hitting a truck, bus etc. is pretty obviously biased ... but I can only presume the mentality is like the prey animals... someone will die but not me...

I've sat at pub next to traffic lights and watched literally hundreds of cyclists jump a red light one after the other...and those actually stopping being a minority but I'd guess the majority of them are simply part of herd mentality. The first one does it and gets away with it... then a few more... but the majority would probably stop was it not for those ahead of them?

The onus on the truck driver to proceed safely - there was plenty of road width for him to leave a big gap on the inside, but in his haste the truck driver decided to cut the corner even though he would have been aware of bikes on the inside - if he didn't he shouldn't be driving in the city centre. Health and Safety at work legislation should be brought to bear on commercial vehicles and drivers - it's what has cut unacceptable deaths in the building industry. Yes the cyclist is an ar$e, but he doesn't deserve to die for his troubles.

All those ****puffins were in a left hand turn lane.

They were in a likely blind spot

It was clear the HGV was going straight on, on a narrowing of the road.

Unless reading Peppa Pig is an intellectual challenge, the obvious course of action would have been to hang back.

I felt sorry for the HGV driver v a bunch of self regarding cockpellets.

Agreed!

(Interesting also that ****puffin is allowed, but if you replace a with @ and puffin with peacock it isn't.....)

The Etape du Embankment is full of such ****puffins all day every day. Treating it like a race and not giving a shit about anyone else, be they truck, pedestrian or fellow cyclists. The culture is all wrong. It shouldn't be lycra clad aero-asshats, but people just riding along.

Edukator, it is most definitely not two lanes into one over the junction.

For factual accuracy - It most definitely is. 3 lanes - first lane left only, 2nd straight ahead, third right and straight on.

We see the same idiotic behaviour if we drive into Preston or Blackburn on an evening; kids dressed in black riding BSOs with no lights will cross or swerve in front of you almost daring you to hit them because they know you won't. It's time cyclists lost their feeling or moral superiority and began to consider themselves road users subject to the same rules as drivers.

- there was plenty of road width for him to leave a big gap on the inside,

Look at the clip at 1'04. Look at the road marking in the middle of the road on the far side of the junction. Yes, the HGV driver could have barged across and squeezed out the vehicles to his right and taken both lanes but he was aiming for the bit of the lane he was entitled to.

Blimey!

When I'm commuting or road riding if there is an artic in front of me I stay well back.

Never said this before be as others have said cyclists clearly at fault. Not only wrong Lane but their response as well.

If you stop the video a 0.26 you can clearly see the lane is left turn only. So wtf would you then shoot across into the other Lane with cars going straight on let alone a huge lorry!

I must be getting old as when I'm on my bike and lorries of that size zoom past it sends a shiver down my spine.

Plain and simple the cyclist was in the wrong...... 🙄

"Entitlement"

He wasn't entitled to that bit of the road, he wasn't entitled to move out either. The obvious answer was to drive behind the cyclist until it was safe to overtake.

As for the cyclist being invisible, I don't buy that, the cyclist was visible to the driver, visible enough for the drive to deliberately cut him up.

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I'm surprised about how anti-cyclist a cycling forum can be!

Obviously the cyclists are in the wrong. But the truck driver can see that they are around him and should adjust his driving to suit. He shouldn't have just kept plowing forward when he's surrounded by a flock of crazy cyclists.

Nice photo of a LHD truck.

I think the reformed bit should be removed from your title. The cyclists were in a left only lane. You seem to be the only one defending the cyclists behaviour. Does that not tell you something? I've lost family through bad driving, so tend to take a very dim view of it. This case, feel sorry for the driver

Turn the tables Edukator.

If it was a cyclist taking primary in the middle lane, and a car in the left hand turn lane cut him up, would that be acceptable, since the cyclist can clearly see the car on his left....?

. It's time cyclists lost their feeling or moral superiority and began to consider themselves road users subject to the same rules as drivers.

"cyclists"? Who are you talking about?

The obvious answer was to drive behind the cyclist until it was safe to overtake.

I agree. He could have simply reversed his HGV back along the road so that the cyclist that started behind him was in front of him.

I'm with edukator. The penalty for being a self-entitled idiot shouldn't be death. And I think the lorry driver deliberately closed the door on the cyclists because he was unhappy about their undertaking using the left turn lane.

At that junction there is an "area" for cyclists to stop in, in front of cars and trucks. The truck is stopped in that area so there is no where for the cyclists to go. Driver is at fault at the start as he stopped beyond the stop line for cars. At that very intersection a few years back they had coppers giving drivers fines for stopping in the cyclist area. I wouldn't be stopping next to a big truck like that - seen way to many near misses. Remember trucks are bigger than you and normally win! Either way he is a lucky man!

I'm surprised about how anti-cyclist a cycling forum can be!

Obviously the cyclists are in the wrong

😆

I'm surprised about how anti-cyclist a cycling forum can be!

Me too, and how car threads focus on performance, "making progress", thrashing along B roads, how many speding tickets people have picked up and how to protest, driving awareness courses... .

I haven't ridden in London for years but rode around Birmingham a few years back. I felt more targetted than in Paris and Paris is model for anti-social use of motor vehicles. The difference bing that in Paris drivers are inconsiderate and in Birmingham actually hostile.

Paris, the section around 3:30 is expecially depressing:

At that junction there is an "area" for cyclists to stop in, in front of cars and trucks. The truck is stopped in that area so there is no where for the cyclists to go. Driver is at fault at the start as he stopped beyond the stop line for cars. At that very intersection a few years back they had coppers giving drivers fines for stopping in the cyclist area. I wouldn't be stopping next to a big truck like that - seen way to many near misses. Remember trucks are bigger than you and normally win! Either way he is a lucky man!

Are you talking about an ASL? In which case there is not one at that junction. You could argue that there should be.

but in his haste the truck driver decided to cut the corner

I don't see any corner

Vehicles with 'blindspots' shouldnt be on the road

That said, having ridden around several European cities including London my concern in the UK is not of an accidental incident but someone purposely harming me.

The UK appears to have a larger proportion of ****s than most countries.

Cyclist is a complete bellend there. Plain and simple.

Vehicles with 'blindspots' shouldnt be on the road.

I don't know about you but my vision directly behind me when riding a bike is not tip top. It's certainly impeded what with me not having eyes in the back of my head and having to sit up and physically turn around. Does that count? Never driven a car without a blind spot either, though clearly not as large as the one on an HGV (or my bike).

You can turn your head though cant you and my car doesnt have a blind spot that makes it dangerous.

We repeatedly hear about trucks blindspots, that could easily be fixed but isnt.

Vehicles with 'blindspots' shouldnt be on the road.

You may well be right but everyone knows that right now they are on the road, everyone knows that HGV's have mahoosive blind spots and everyone knows that cyclists cutting up the left hand side regularly get squashed to death. So, whilst this is still the case, cyclists shouldn't play Russian roulette with 40 tonne head squashing machines*

*unless of course if they have a camera, we all know that in these cases different rules apply as you can get all angry and shout out number plates, and that stops you dying.

The cyclist should be up for a Darwin Award, that's some terrible riding 😯

He put himself at risk and the livehood/freedom of the lorry driver in jeopardy by being a dick.

I bet the video wouldn't have surfaced if the outcome had been more serious as it would have shown the cyclist to be in the wrong.

This is why its best to jump red lights, that way the driver can see you.

the red cyclist was in front of the truck coming across the junction.

cyclist made a bad judgement and came a cropper for it.

The Driver was clearly fed up with traffic and making bad judgements also.

If I was driving a lorry and I knew cyclists had just gone ahead of me I would be looking for the rest and leaving space by the kerb.

TFL need to be addressing this junction, No cycle wait area, no cycle lane. why ?

At that very intersection a few years back they had coppers giving drivers fines for stopping in the cyclist area.

Not sure which video you've watched, but the one linked from OP seems to clearly show that there is no ASL there. And I'm slightly sceptical about the other bit too - I think either the Guardian or the Times a couple of years ago tried to get information on prosecutions / enforcement of ASLs nationally and failed to find any evidence that anyone had been done for it, anywhere, ever. It would be great if there had been some enforcement though, so I genuinely hope you are right (although you can't be about this junction, since the ASL isn't there).

As to the question of should there be one there? IMHO perhaps, but with 2 caveats - one directly related to the above. ASLs are a good idea in theory if done properly but in my opinion and experience they don't actually work because:

1) Everyone knows they aren't enforced and a significant number of drivers ignore them and pull up to the second line as though the ASL doesn't exist. I've seen plenty of pictures on social media of police vehicles doing it.

2) The idea of them originally is that you couple the road paint with reprogrammed light sequencing that gives the cyclists a head start on the motorised traffic. But since we only get the paint the actual results are:
- cyclists very briefly accelerate faster, then the motorists catch up, usually right in the middle of the junction
- red light jumping is, imho, encouraged by this setup as riders try to compensate for the lack of a head start on the sequence by creating their own.

Unless these two issues are sorted out, I think ASLs are potentially more dangerous than not having them.

Edukator, it is most definitely not two lanes into one over the junction. The left lane is turning left.

Actually it is 3 lanes: 1 left, 2 straight on merging to 1.

Left hand lane is always empty, so that's where cyclists naturally filter to, but you have to know you're in the wrong lane and either get away quickly or hang back and let the traffic sort it self out.

At that junction there is an "area" for cyclists to stop in, in front of cars and trucks

No there isn't.

It is, hands down, the worst junction on my commute along the Embankment (and I have to go through Parliament square). It needs an advanced stop zone sooner rather than later.

IMO, cyclist made a mistake - thankfully one that didn't end up with him under the wheels.

It's very rare I'll say this, but the lorry driver did nothing wrong and those cyclists were insane. The driver saw lots of cyclists in the left turn lane, he rightly assumed they'd be turning left.

Arguments about visibility etc are all important, and there's a debate to be had about whether lorries like that should be on busy city streets, but that's not the lorry driver's fault.

In all the discussion about trucks' blindspots I think it's also important to note that the cyclist appears to have created themselves a massive, potentially lethal blindspot by not turning their head at any point and checking what is around them. Not sure what excuse there can be for that - I suppose "everyone does it" will have to do for that as well?

1) Everyone knows they aren't enforced and a significant number of drivers ignore them and pull up to the second line as though the ASL doesn't exist. I've seen plenty of pictures on social media of police vehicles doing it.

IME in London, they are fairly well observed.

Everyone does it......everyone does it.....

What a dickhead.

No idea what those cyclists were thinking; I bet they thought they'd be able to undertake the lorry off the lights, but because there were so many of them, it only worked for the ones at the front.

The person in the white t-shirt with yellow helmet did the sensible thing; realised she (I think it's a woman) was gonna run out of room, so hung back.....

Feel sorry for the lorry driver, in this instance.

sl2000 - Member
I'm with edukator. The penalty for being a self-entitled idiot shouldn't be death. And I think the lorry driver deliberately closed the door on the cyclists because he was unhappy about their undertaking using the left turn lane.

This.

Yes cyclists are being dicks. HGV driver on the other hand is being more of a dick, obviously trying to close the door on cyclists to his left, which already indicates he knew they were there, and so deliberately caused a collision.

Seriously another 10 yards steering in that direction and he would have been on the pavement. HGV driver (possibly cyclist too) should be in court.

Driver wasn't steering anywhere, his wheels were straight.

Cyclist on the other hand seemed to lean over to the right, but thats okay as he really did prove his point didn't he!

Everyone does it

Crikey! This from a grown up.

Cyclists in London.. nothing new. You see d*ck moves being pulled all the time.

franksinatra - Member
Driver wasn't steering anywhere, his wheels were straight.

Cyclist on the other hand seemed to lean over to the right, but thats okay as he really did prove his point didn't he!

Yeah, straight steering directly towards the pavement 🙄

Seriously another 10 years steering in that direction and he would have been on the kerb.

It's 2 lanes into 1, there was nowhere for the lorry driver to go and there is absolutely no movement to his left.
The cyclist should not have put himself in that position.
I can't see how a couple of people are defending the cyclist here. Do you have some special glasses to allow you to see things that aren't there?

Want to buy that driver a drink, poor guy.

For factual accuracy - It most definitely is. 3 lanes - first lane left only, 2nd straight ahead, third right and straight on.

Well fair enough I didn't see the right lane but that only makes it worse - the lorry would have had more reason to be concerned about vehicles merging from the right, not the left!

The only safe way to undertake there - and TBH it's probably what I would have tried to do - is to get well ahead of the lorry at the junction, i.e. sit well in front of it at the lights (which is of course illegal). With other cyclists already blocking the way there was no way for the later arrivals to do that, so they should have held back instead.

Yes cyclists are being dicks. HGV driver on the other hand is being more of a dick, obviously trying to close the door on cyclists to his left, which already indicates he knew they were there, and so deliberately caused a collision.

Irrespective of the argument one way or another with this I find it fascinating that adults with experience can see the same clip and view it in such different ways. Without malice or intent you see this as a deliberate act by the driver to endanger the cyclist - others (inc me) just don't see that so we are genuinely seeing what we are seeing. I don't think any of us come to this with so much of an agenda so be blinded. Who'd be convicted by a jury of your peers.