Advocacy & Safety - David Cameron criticized for breaking traffic laws...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7308400.stm

Thanks

Following this on BBC is an interesting follow up article on attitudes of and towards cyclists.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7308895.stm

Time for you UK folks to follow and video some of the other members of the Houses of Parliament driving.

It seems laws are for everyone else.

Funny how when it's not convenient for someone, what they do is different from what they say.

BeHIT is busy promoting helmet use in the UK and in a leaflet produced by them there is an endorsement from Formula one racing driver David Coulthard under the section, "WHY you need a helmet..." that says,

"HAVE you ever seen me drive a Formula One racing car round a Grand Prix circuit without wearing a helmet? No, and you won't catch me riding my bike without wearing a helmet either."

The claim above was made in a leaflet copyrighted January 2003, but look what pics surfaced

http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk/w/images/3/37/Coulthard1.gif http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk/w/images/0/0a/Coulthard2.gif

Monte Carlo, May 2002 _____________________________ Barcelona, Feb 2004

Hypocrisy is nothing new but has always been frustrating for people who work for something and have it denied by hypocrites.

If he was simply waiting past the limit line for a red light to change, that is not the same as running a red light. I want to avoid being right-hooked while permitting motorists behind me to turn right on red -- sometimes the only way to achieve these objectives is to encroach into the crosswalk, in an unobtrusive manner which does not endanger or inconvenience any pedestrians who might be present.

There are exceptions, but I generally consider contraflow cycling on a one-way street to be extremely dangerous.

The curious thing about Cameron crossing the Pelican (bikes and pedestrians) crossing against the red light is that there is no law against it. We don't have anything resembling US jaywalking laws, so you can't be pulled up for doing so.

As for crossing a solid white line on red, this is illegal, but since you will find that umpteen drivers go over solid Advanced Stop Lines (ASLs)/ bike boxes to US riders, the clamour by the anti-bike brigade is somewhat hypocritical.

That said, he's been filmed ignoring a red light on a previous occasion, so his politician's antenna weren't working to well that day.

oh, give me a break.

when I finally get some time I will get some video of a stop sign near my home where I would guess that 75% of the drivers run it. When 48,000 Americans are killed by irresponsible bike riders I'll start worrying about bike riding scofflaws.

Let's start following members of Parliament, Congress, and the Senate as they walk around Washington and London and catch them jaywalking- that's putting our priorities in the right place.:rolleyes:

IMHO not worth getting your knickers in a twist.

I just did a youtube search- I was sure I wasn't the only one who thought this way and came up with this video, which may have been posted before, but it makes my same point.


Youtube link. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=182F3KnT9Z4)

when I finally get some time I will get some video of a stop sign near my home where I would guess that 75% of the drivers run it.


A couple years ago a small town near me that has some excellent roads for riding bicycles, tried to make bicycle registration mandatory in thier town in order to eliminate cyclists from thier roads... at least the ones that didn't live in the million dollar plus houses that make up most of this town. Their rationale was that cyclists ran stop signs (it's such a small town, there are only four) and were a danger.

They had a town meeting where they discussed doing this, and there was quite a bit of outrage against this patently stupid idea, even from a lot of residents. So to reinforce thier negative portrayal of cyclists, they put up a camera on one of the more travelled stop signs for a day, and planned on using the data at the next meeting to promote thier anti-cycling agenda.

The only problem was that the video showed that most cars did not stop... I forget the exact percentage, but it wasn't too far from your 75%. And almost all the bikes stopped... something like 25% of the bikes ran the stop sign.

At any rate, they couldn't use the video at the next meeting, and the idea was scrapped.

Az

As an American, I find three aspects of this story really amazing:
1. A powerful politician uses a bicycle for transportation.
2. He is not pegged as a wacko.
3. The author and editor of the story understand, and even take for granted, that the law considers cyclists to be drivers of vehicles and that they should act accordingly.