Push to lower speed limit after crash
Written 29 September 2009
Following another car-versus-cyclist incident this past weekend cycling advocacy groups are calling for lowering the speed limit on Tamaki Drive or, as suggested in the Herald on Sunday, closing the road! �I'm sorry but, yawn!...
These types of campaigns, along with the 1.5 m to survive campaign, are all reactions to what is an attitudinal problem of the average Kiwi driver. Simple fact of the matter is that 80% of Kiwi drivers consider cyclists to be a "pest" who should not be on the road, one abreast, two abreast, polite or unpolite wearing "high vis" cycle vests or not.
The type of bunches that are discussed in the article and on Breakfast News this morning are usually large enough to necessitate drivers to slow down below 50km/h to enable motorists to get past. �It is not speed that causes the majority of incidents but attitude - the driver involved in the weekend simply failed to stop. �Incidents at roundabouts and intersections, along with car doors and incidents where motorists underestimate the speed of cyclists cause the majority of accidents. These types of accidents are not a result of speed so much as negligence from the motorist toward the cyclist. �The motorist does not consider the cyclist as a fellow road user but more of a target for road rage and abuse.
This type of attitude can be seen by these comments in the Herald, interestingly from a driver who wishes to remain anonymous:
Cyclists' behaviour in large groups frustrated drivers, he said, particularly closer to the city, where there were two traffic lanes in each direction. � "They take up enough room that you have to change lanes. It nullifies the left lane."
So, if we consider the above comment, his complaint is that he has to change lanes? This attitude and the lack of consideration of the cyclist as a road user with the same rights as the motorist is where the cyclist-versus-motorist debate will constantly fall over. �A mutual respect policy is the only way to deal with these issues. �That mutual respect has to come from cyclists as well though. �For every bad motorist there is a bad cyclist and there has to be a consensus from the cycling community that jumping through intersections on a red light with a bunch of 40 trailing behind you is not mutually respectful, nor is nearly knocking an old lady over when failing to slow down for a pedestrian crossing.
Legislating for change will do little other than create further laws on the statute books. �Until there is an attitudinal shift from drivers considering cyclists as merely "lycra louts" nothing will change, laws or not.
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