Autumn's here (SMIDSY content)

We don’t live in the netherlands we dont have such high participation rates or drivers with the same cultural outlook or the laws and infrastructure they have either.

And constantly portraying cycling as a dangerous activity which needs safety gear certainly won’t help with that, will it?

Well, Al nearly got cleaned up 3 times in 10 minutes didn’t he?

No. If they could see them they’d just have a better view as they bounced off the windscreen.

I’ve managed to stop my car as a pedestrian stepped into the road. They weren’t wearing hi-viz, either.

Good for you, I’ve made a number of mistakes when driving and had a crash or two along the way happily no one’s been hurt and I’ve done my best to learn from these errors an ama better driver as a result. That’s not to say I won’t make errors in the future and I’m pretty sure, barring you being superhuman that you can’t guarantee the same. We don’t live in the netherlands we dont have such high participation rates or drivers with the same cultural outlook or the laws and infrastructure they have either.

The point is that PPE is not necessary to achieve low accident rates, as the Dutch & Danish models tell us. The best thing that can happen is more people riding bikes, and the best way for that to happen is for it to be seen as a normal way of getting from A to B.
And again – even ignoring the potential societal disbenefits, I’m still waiting for the evidence that hi-viz has a safety benefit.

I’ve asked for evidence that hi-viz improves cyclists’ safety several times in this thread. The silence is instructive…

Because no one can be arsed finding facts or figures – if you can’t see the obvious benefits of being as visible as possible on the road then there is very little we’ll do to convince you otherwise.

When cycling to work, I wear my work clothes. As I would if I was walking and driving.

Funnily the last thing I’d want to do is sit in sweaty clothes after riding into work – never mind subjecting colleagues to this… if I drive in I’ll turn the air con on as required.

And constantly portraying cycling as a dangerous activity which needs safety gear certainly won’t help with that, will it?

I wonder if danny has come up with any answers to my question yet?

Because no one can be arsed finding facts or figures – if you can’t see the obvious benefits of being as visible as possible on the road then there is very little we’ll do to convince you otherwise. I haven’t found any evidence to support the assertion, so I’ll just repeat it with a hint of ad-hom thrown in

Fixed

Funnily the last thing I’d want to do is sit in sweaty clothes after riding into work – never mind subjecting colleagues to this

woah woah woah, you can call people prat, numpty and halfwit (as you are keen to do jamesfts) but alluding that someone is “the smelly bloke in the office” is beyond the pale.

Harrumph!

I’ve managed to stop my car as a pedestrian stepped into the road. They weren’t wearing hi-viz, either.

So when other car drivers hit pedestrians it must be deliberate then?

The dutch and danish models do show us that they are safer places to cycle. Not wearing reflective/hiviz isn’t a factor in what makes them safer.

Because no one can be arsed finding facts or figures – if you can’t see the obvious benefits of being as visible as possible on the road then there is very little we’ll do to convince you otherwise.

“It stands to reason” etc. Seriously, is that the best you can do? If it was as obvious as you claim, then evidence would be a mouse click away.

Funnily the last thing I’d want to do is sit in sweaty clothes after riding into work – never mind subjecting colleagues to this… if I drive in I’ll turn the air con on as required.

If you get sweaty after a 2 mile commute, then I can only assume that you’re seriously unfit. You should ride your bike more.

So when other car drivers hit pedestrians it must be deliberate then?

You suggested it was impossible to stop if a pedestrian steps out into the road. You are wrong, because I’ve managed to do it.

The dutch and danish models do show us that they are safer places to cycle. Not wearing reflective/hiviz isn’t a factor in what makes them safer.

Precisely: not wearing PPE doesn’t make them unsafe.

on a more serious note if everybody knows drivers don’t watch where they are going WTF isn’t something being done about it? Check the amount of death by careless/dangerous driving cases the driver says they didn’t see the cyclist despite good conditions (or good lighting at night) and the driver “gets away with it”* and quite often drives home from court just to rub salt in.

Half arsed “please try not to kill too many peds/cyclists” campaigns and the widely adopted “they aren’t looking, so make them see you” really doesn’t cut it. If you want to reduce road deaths go after the ones doing the damage not getting everyone else to either stay off the roads or armour/hiviz up, it’s a shite state of affairs to be in.

*suspended/slap on wrist sentence

Has anyone linked to Dr Ian Walker’s study on hi viz and cycling?
http://www.bath.ac.uk/news/2013/11/26/overtaking-cyclists/

Dr Ian Walker from our Department of Psychology, who led the project and analysed the data, said: “Many people have theories to say that cyclists can make themselves safer if they wear this or that. Our study suggests that, no matter what you wear, it will do nothing to prevent a small minority of people from getting dangerously close when they overtake you.

“This means the solution to stopping cyclists being hurt by overtaking vehicles has to lie outside the cyclist. We can’t make cycling safer by telling cyclists what they should wear. Rather, we should be creating safer spaces for cycling – perhaps by building high-quality separate cycle paths, by encouraging gentler roads with less stop-start traffic, or by making drivers more aware of how it feels to cycle on our roads and the consequences of impatient overtaking.
It’s overtaking rather than the typical junction SMIDSY but it’s actual proper research rather than anecdotes.

I’m sure he did some ‘driver perception’ stuff too. It basically found that wearing hi viz* means that drivers who would have seen you if you were wearing dark clothes will still see you, just marginally earlier. But seeing a cyclist 10 seconds before you reach them isn’t really any different from seeing them 10.5 seconds before you reach them. But he also found that there is the small set of drivers who won’t see you regardless.

I’m always amazed when I’m driving on a fast road and spot a cyclist (even those in ‘invisible’ clothes) ahead by just how long I have until I catch up to them. The excuses trotted out when someone dies “I was distracted for a second by sneezing”/ “I was travelling at 50mph so had no time at all to react” just don’t make sense when you’re paying attention. I’ve regularly counted 30 seconds between spotting a cyclist and catching up to them. Imagine closing your eyes for 30 seconds while driving at 50mph…now think about the fact that loads of drivers are essentially doing just that every time you’re on the road…terrifying!

*assuming you’re not in all matte black on an unlit road in fog, i.e. a ‘plausible’ range of dull clothes in daylight or dull clothes and legal lights at night.

1. No I didn’t, if there’s sugffieicnt time and distance -but then if that were the case no on e would get run over (excpet where the driver is negligent) you’re suggesting people just arent bothering?

2. No diametric opposite. the wearing of PPE has no effect on their safety compared to all the other factors (I bet some danish/dutch people do wear PPE, if they7 are travelling on higher spped roads etc – We see lots of pictures of people in the towns and cities making short journeys in numbers along low speed, well established routes but for longer distance commutes etc I’d wager some do)

DONK – that’s what I’m getting at – the reality on our roads, particulalry for cycle commuting, is different so you’d be advised to mitigate risk in the absence of a proper enforcement/cultural response to poor driving.

on a more serious note if everybody knows drivers don’t watch where they are going WTF isn’t something being done about it? Check the amount of death by careless/dangerous driving cases the driver says they didn’t see the cyclist despite good conditions (or good lighting at night) and the driver “gets away with it”* and quite often drives home from court just to rub salt in.

I’m only guessing but I reckon it’s partly to do with the fact that juries in these cases will be made up predominately of drivers. As such they’ll always have a nagging thought that “that could be me” and tend to err on the side of the driver rather than the cyclist. There’s also the problem that if driving standards really are so low then this low becomes the norm and is the yard stick that bad driving is measured against. Suddenly it’s not bad any more, just normal 🙁

Ransos – member

Given reasonable visibility, I’ve never had any trouble spotting a cyclist on the road, regardless of what they’re wearing. I’m sure you’re aware of the Danish and Dutch accident statistics – and what they wear when cycling.

Countered your own argument there? The thread isn’t about good conditions, it’s about the low sun/twilight/misty/rain you get at commuing time at this time of year.

And it’s cold, possibly raining, I’m going to wear a jacket anyway, why not wear a yellow one?

1. No I didn’t, if there’s sugffieicnt time and distance -but then if that were the case no on e would get run over (excpet where the driver is negligent) you’re suggesting people just arent bothering?

You said:

No. If they could see them they’d just have a better view as they bounced off the windscreen.

That sound like you’re suggesting pedestrians can’t be avoided if they step into the road. Did you mean something else?

2. No diametric opposite. the wearing of PPE has no effect on their safety compared to all the other factors (I bet some danish/dutch people do wear PPE, if they7 are travelling on higher spped roads etc – We see lots of pictures of people in the towns and cities making short journeys in numbers along low speed, well established routes but for longer distance commutes etc I’d wager some do)

I’ve spent time in rural Jutland (including cycling), and hi-viz/ helmet-wearing is conspicuous by its absence. There are also fewer cycle paths than you might imagine.

Countered your own argument there? The thread isn’t about good conditions, it’s about the low sun/twilight/misty/rain you get at commuing time at this time of year.

And it’s cold, possibly raining, I’m going to wear a jacket anyway, why not wear a yellow one?

Funnily enough I use lights when it’s dark or very murky. As I would if I was driving. My car’s grey, btw.

You’ll have to explain how a hi-viz makes me more visible in low sun.

I’m always amazed when I’m driving on a fast road and spot a cyclist (even those in ‘invisible’ clothes) ahead by just how long I have until I catch up to them. The excuses trotted out when someone dies “I was distracted for a second by sneezing”/ “I was travelling at 50mph so had no time at all to react” just don’t make sense when you’re paying attention.

I remember in one case it was something like 8s the cyclist would have been visible for before the collision and the driver said they hadn’t seen them.

the wearing of PPE has no effect on their safety compared to all the other factors

Do.you think it is completely irrelevant to the normalisation of cycling?

the reality on our roads, particulalry for cycle commuting, is different so you’d be advised to mitigate risk in the absence of a proper enforcement/cultural response to poor driving.

So has anybody got any suggestions on how to effectively mitigate that risk?

I’m still waiting for the evidence that hi-viz has a safety benefit.

Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. The reason why the stats don’t exist is because they are almost impossible to collect. What is known is that hi-viz is more conspicuous, it fires more photons in the direction of the person doing the looking. What isn’t known is how much SMIDSY is down to people not looking at all, or whether people don’t look properly and therefore miss less conspicuous objects. In my own experience it seems to me that they simply don’t look, but I take the view that increasing my conspicuity can never be a bad thing, so I do it anyway. I don’t buy the argument that this makes cycling seem more dangerous: it is the attitudes and behaviour of UK car drivers who create the tone.

I wonder if danny has come up with any answers to my question yet?

Seriously mate, can you please put the question up again as I can’t find the will to trawl back through all the inane denying of the bleeding obvious.

Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. The reason why the stats don’t exist is because they are almost impossible to collect. What is known is that hi-viz is more conspicuous, it fires more photons in the direction of the person doing the looking. What isn’t known is how much SMIDSY is down to people not looking at all, or whether people don’t look properly and therefore miss less conspicuous objects. In my own experience it seems to me that they simply don’t look, but I take the view that increasing my conspicuity can never be a bad thing, so I do it anyway. I don’t buy the argument that this makes cycling seem more dangerous: it is the attitudes and behaviour of UK car drivers who create the tone.

That sums it all up very nicely. I assume this is just a pet issue for a couple of the other posters on this thread so they will just argue the toss whatever. What is the real issue, do you just not like how you look in day-glo yellow?

What Imnotverygood says sums it up.

I’ve a feeling I’m coming from a slightly different commute* to some. I’m lucky (unlucky?) if I’m passed by 10 cars, all A and B roads flanked by hedges and many sections with trees creating a tunnel over them.

Combining this with the low light levels this time of year I’ll be doing anything I can to get the drivers behind to spot me even a fraction of a second earlier.

Like the photo I posted with the two horse riders, I know which I’d rather be.

*18km so I’m hopefully allowed to be a little whiffy by the end.

Can you not think of any other possible reasons?

(interestingly that was the question BTW)

Can you not think of any other possible reasons?

Reasons for what? You really are going to have to spell this one out for me……………..

You’ll have to explain how a hi-viz makes me more visible in low sun.

Picture’s worth a thousand words, the suns backlighting them from the right.

My car’s grey, btw

Irrelavent, mines a kind of ‘british sky blue’, but car’s are 10x larger and even to the most dim witted car driver generaly where you expect them to be (in the flow of traffic). Whereas bikes tend to come from all directions at any speed. Fitering, overtaking, being overtaken, on the white lines, staying in the outside lane of roundabouts turning right, etc are all perfectly legal, but don’t nececeraly put you in the same position as a car and consequently drivers may not always be looking right in your direction, sto standing out like a sore thub and catching their eye is a good thing.

And another asside, plenty of results on google to say some car colours have more accidents than others, happily for this thread, black comes out top, first link i found put it at 10% more accidents in the day, 47% in twilight, negligable at night (headlights negating colours)!

Now if you wanted to make your car stand out whilst filtering past traffic, like we often do on bikes, what would you paint it…………….

or………..

There’s a theme emerging there.

I had a textbook SMIDSY the other day. Me heading downhill with right of way, minibus approaching crossroads ahead, trees screening me from sight.

Driver just assumed it was clear and pulled out in front of me, I braked and turned up same road as the van – just staying on bike. Fortunately I’d anticipated and feathered the brakes a bit beforehand.

After shouting at him for a minute or so and him being very apologetic, I calmed down enough to say something like “ok we all make mistakes but please try to take more care”. I hope he does.

Nothing I could have worn would have prevented that, but I still try to wear bright-ish clothes when I’m out in rush hour, when there’s low sun or if I’m gonna be riding on shady tree-lined narrow lanes.

What other people wear for cycling is up to them, thankfully.

A picture is worth a thousand words is often deceptive

Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. The reason why the stats don’t exist is because they are almost impossible to collect.

The only evidence I’m aware of is that drivers give you less room if you’re wearing hi viz.

Picture’s worth a thousand words, the suns backlighting them from the right.

Really? In which case, the picture is extremely misleading as it doesn’t look sunny at all.

Irrelavent, mines a kind of ‘british sky blue’, but car’s are 10x larger and even to the most dim witted car driver generaly where you expect them to be (in the flow of traffic).

And yet people keep driving into each other.

And another asside, plenty of results on google to say some car colours have more accidents than others, happily for this thread, black comes out top, first link i found put it at 10% more accidents in the day, 47% in twilight, negligable at night (headlights negating colours)!

So you’re saying that we should use lights at night? Any other pearls of wisdom?

Now if you wanted to make your car stand out whilst filtering past traffic, like we often do on bikes, what would you paint it…………….

Maybe it’s just me, but I find a siren and flashing blue lights are the first thing that attract my attention to a police car. In which case, why don’t we do that for bikes?

I have given up.

Although we’re going round in circles here…

This is a fairly frequent sight around this way at this time of year, and is IMO when wearing some hi vis is only going to improve things for everyone involved.

Feel free to replace the horse for a walker or cyclist. No one is doing anything wrong but the driver is going to make out the rider that fraction earlier.

Again, we’re talking lower light levels not bright sunlight but this time of the years its more likely those conditions than not.

The only evidence I’m aware of is that drivers give you less room if you’re wearing hi viz.

What evidence is that then?

so you’d be advised to mitigate risk in the absence of a proper enforcement/cultural response to poor driving.

except so far we’ve had no evidence to suggest it does make a difference and 1 study to say it makes **** all difference, so far evidence is not on your side (and the victim blamers also stand on your side, you’re already in deficit)

I’m only guessing but I reckon it’s partly to do with the fact that juries in these cases will be made up predominately of drivers.

true but even when by some miracle a god awful driver is found guilty the sentence is pretty derogatory.
Investigation*, charging** and sentencing*** all seem to stack very well in the drivers favour.

*ever tried getting (fortunately) injury free dangerous driving investigated? Helmet cam footage almost never used.
**obviously dangerous driving so often being downgraded to careless
***kill someone by any other means and see what sentencing would be. Bans running concurrently with jail time so you finish your jailtime and legally get back into a car (supposed to be fixed but hasn’t been yet and probably never will be)

So you’re saying that we should use lights at night? Any other pearls of wisdom?

Yes, you’re 47% mor elikely to be in an accidnet in a black car at dusk, other modes of transport in drab colours may suffer a similar increace.

Maybe it’s just me, but I find a siren and flashing blue lights are the first thing that attract my attention to a police car. In which case, why don’t we do that for bikes?

Are you just arguing for the sake of it, or do you really believe the high vis is there for some other reason than to make the vehicles highly visible. I mean the clues in the name. You’re argueing that high vis paint/clothes does nothing to make the object highly visible?

Really? In which case, the picture is extremely misleading as it doesn’t look sunny at all.

So it’s an example of how high vis is more visible in low light conditions with a low winter sun, it’s a very specific example, but it’s exactly the conditions most people are commuting in at this time of year. Are you going to argue that you cans ee the rider in blue better than the one in yellow?

What is the real issue, do you just not like how you look in day-glo yellow?

I’m sure there’s plenty of others but straight off: victim blaming, normalising hiviz as the default for cycling, portraying cycling as a dangerous activity leading to fewer people riding or considering taking it up.

that and the fact most riding gear is dark so often you have to go out of your way to get the day glow stuff

1 study to say it makes **** all difference

That evidence is only loosely related to the argument. It is about overtaking distance. Dr Walker is a lovely chap I’m sure, but his studies are about driver attitudes, not about conspicuity (if you believe his second study) or about helmet wearing/being a woman (in his first.) The problem with both his studies is that they contradict each other. They are also have several methodoligical problems but they are the only studies which seemto deal with these issues. This means they are easily taken up by people trying to push an agenda and are used to prove points they weren’t designed to prove.

…that and the fact most riding gear is dark so often you have to go out of your way to get the day glow stuff

Yeah… not that far though.

Plus, doesn’t everyone “enduro” these days? Surely you’ve got head to toe fluro kit to ride your mtb at the weekend? 😉

so just the victim blaming on the hiviz side and bugger all actual evidence of eficacy? compelling! someone get me a PPE catalogue.

oh wait, we still have the negatives.

Yeah… not that far though.

very quick rough count says 10/48 are hiviz/dayglo on page 1 of your link, go you!

I don’t actively avoid getting hivis stuff but the fact that none of my jackets (got 1 gilet) is hiviz suggests either the hiviz lovers always get there before me or darker stuff is more prevalent (I’ll guess – with no evidence as is becoming the norm for this thread – it’s the latter) anyway I’ve got more important things to base my clothing choice on.

oh wait, we still have the negatives.

Well, we have all those people for whom wearing Hi-Viz gives a sense of safety (supported by evidence or not) & who otherwise wouldn’t ride on the road in normal clothes. (Not supported by any evidence, but then again neither is your assertion that fear of the road engendered by Hi-viz puts people off). Victim blaming? If it wasn’t Hi-Viz there would be something else to blame cyclists for. There are plenty of cases where the cyclist has been lit up like a Christmas tree and still the car driver is exonerated for one reason or another.

The point was there are a good number of jackets (18 at a quick found) on page 1 of CRC available in bright/highly visible colours, delivered to your door with a couple of clicks. Congrats on missing that one.

So no, you don’t have to go out of your way to find it. In fact I’d hazard a guess it’s available at a number of online cycle stores and maybe even a few LBS too.

Since buying a road bike I’ve been struck by how much of the decent kit is dark coloured. We can argue all we like about how effective hi-viz is when a driver isn’t paying attention, but personally I like being seen.
Earlier this yr I was out on a ride through the Calder Valley and whilst stopped, saw a bunch of riders heading along the valley. Most were in black (overcast February morning) and I was struck by how quickly they blended into the background as I watched – and I was deliberately looking at them.

My road helmet is a Giro in their hi-viz yellow, I have a Sportful black/hi-viz yellow LS jersey, a Morvélo LS jersey that’s black with hi-viz yellow stripes up the back and across the chest and arms, I have a VERY yellow (& black) Morvélo jersey as well.
My bike is black and yellow with matching tyres so its a theme!

Best thing ive bought though is some hi-viz yellow shoe covers from Sportful. I saw a rider in deep shade under some trees and his moving hi-viz shoe covers really stood out even though the rest of his attire was black.

The point was there are a good number of jackets (18 at a quick found)… Congrats on missing that one.

It’s ok I managed to get a bright green sweaty boil in the bag packamac* for even less than that! However jackets I actually want to spend more than the duration of a short shower in that I own, are all darker. But I never said hiviz wasn’t available, did I? But hey nice to see you’ve dropped the name calling, you’ve just switched to implying stupidity instead, at this rate we may have you discussing this in a civil manner by the end of the thread.

*had forgotten about that when I posted earlier