HGV blind spot safety systems require independent assessment says Lord Attlee

This idea predicates on all cyclists wearing beacons, and is old technology. If these beacons are to operate at a decent range they need to be active RFID with a small lithium (or similar) battery firing a pulse at intervals and lasting 3-6 years. an alternative is a 'sleeping' but amplifies a response to a signal it receives. A passive RFID is the chip in your bank card/Oyster card and range is 1 or 2 m at best in 'good conditions' as the respobnse has to be generated by a signal induced by the transmitted signal - rather a complex issue and quite crude given that electromagnetic and sound wave systems have for around 70 ears been able with increasing accuracy provide 'pictures' of objects which are not directly visible to the human eye.

One system which has looked at this pragmtically is CycleEye, already tested and in use - the system requires no tags at all and uses technology that has been in use with static cameras in car parks for nearly 2 decades.

CycleEye uses a combined radar & CCTV scan and fits to the side of the vehicle. The unit can identify cycles and other objects as distinctive patterns (cyclist = 2 wheels, thin at bottom with body blob at upper level) Radar means that it can work in fog.

But all this man-made technology has ultimately to be processed by the same 'computer' which has already been well tested with 2 key safety systems over around 2.3bn years. One of those systems is so directly connected to the 'processor' that 90% of the information being processed uses it and reaction times are fast, and require no verbal/aural alert.

It might be summed up by a simple phrase "Making Eye Contact avoids makind any other form of contact"

There seems to be a bit of confusion by several posters if I've understood the article correctly.

He's proposing an infrared system, but making the comparison with existing systems that use RFID.

20mph speed limits ( although I like the idea of them ) make drivers concentrate so much on the speedometer , they pay less attention to the road.

Doesn't make any sense, they currently have to stick to 30mph - that is no easier.

As for HGV drivers paying attention to the road vs sensors I don't go for that either, especially as the time these sensors tend to matter is when the vehicle is sitting still at a junction.

I think HGV cab and mirror design change are the way to go, other measures are just a stop-gap.

I can't see a solution to this situation, not matter which way it is tackled.
Add extra mirrors to vehicles, the driver needs to spend so much time concentrating on the mirrors they are unable to pay attention to the road.
Fit sensors on vehicles, the sensor alerts the driver, who then must react to the alert which removes attention from the road.
Blue flashing lights and sirens on emergency vehicles even cause accident because, as they approach, every driver then moves their attention to where the alarms and lights are coming from which removes attention from the road.
20mph speed limits ( although I like the idea of them ) make drivers concentrate so much on the speedometer , they pay less attention to the road.
There is no safe solution other than giving dedicated roads/lanes/pathways to motor vehicles, cyclists and pedestrians.

I picked up one of these tags for free from my local bike shop (they will retail at £19.99 when most lorries are fitted with the sensors). Because I could only have one free one and I've got four bikes, I fitted the tag to my helmet, as stated by Cycle Alert that I can do.

Now this all sounds very good, the lorry sensor detects a cyclist on the left, quick glance in the mirror and the driver averts a left hook KSI. We're all safe.

BUT I've noticed a problem, and I've only had mine for a week or two. The unit is motion sensitive. If it doesn't detect movement for two minutes it switches off to save the battery (CR2032). There is no on/off switch so you have to give it a shake to turn it on. Sometimes I had to shake my cycle helmet for 30 seconds to get it to respond, on other occasions it would switch on by me just moving my helmet from one side of the desk to the other.

Because my unit is on my helmet, my body seems to dampen out movement and I've found that the unit has often switched itself off by the time I get to work (1hr into the City of London). The light that shows that it's on is weak and in bright sunlight it's anyone's guess if it's actually on or not. I've no idea how long the battery will last, a month, six months, a year so it's likely that it could be not working and I wouldn't even know (after a few weeks am I really going to check for the green light on the unit?).

I may be on the inside of a lorry after he's pulled up alongside me and think, my tag will alert him to me being there, but if the battery is flat or it's switched off, or if the lorry isn't fitted with the sensors I could be another statistic.

A driver may hear a beep, see one cyclist and think that's okay, but not see the second, or the battery in the tag could be flat and he thinks no one is there I can turn.

Lorry drivers will rely solely on them and when they left hook and KSI a cyclist they'll say in their defence "He didn't have a tag fitted, how was I supposed to know that he was there".

Cyclists may also place their life in these tags and when the battery is flat, or it's switched off because it can't detect you moving, or the lorry sensors are working or there are none and we'll have more fatalities.

Is it just me or is the explanation confused? An infrared emitter emits and therefore would require some power. The detector would have to be in the lorry as it is detecting the cyclist. RFID is passive (and uses Radio Frequencies - not infrared) - basically the system used for anti-theft tags in stores, so that could work but then I see issues with false alarms (and drivers subsequently either ignoring or disabling the system) or construction muck causing malfunctions.

I suppose they could outfit all the Boris Bikes, and there would be some early-adopter safety advocate take-up - but where does that leave us? Two classes of cyclists with only those without tags still in danger?

And while no conspiracy theorist, you can see this as the thin edge of a wedge. The gov't gives out "free safety tags" which just happen to have unique IDs. Then they decide they need to be registered, then someone sues someone and subpoenas the data to see if someone was where they said they were...

This happened in the US when they brought in electronic toll payments. The gov'ts involved claimed not to use the data but third parties (in civil lawsuits) could - eventually everyone just gave in and now the gov't can track any user. Mind you, even if you pay in cash, they have CCTV of your reg and face at the toll booth (and only have to search the cash paying events...)

Resistance is futile

I find it laughable that someone involved 'professionally' in the road halage industry as could describe themself as 'passionate about road safe'. It's a industry with makes flouting safe rule part of doing business.

Sorting out the blind spot doesn't make any difference if HGV drivers just pull out into flowing traffic, blocking the road, forcing you to stop, and when you finally make eye contact, they just shrug at you. presumably meaning "my truck's bigger and heavier than you, therefore I win"
Culture change is what we need really...

There's no suggestion that the tag needs to be a unique identifier, so you can take off the tinfoil hats for the moment.

It's described as RFID for convenience, but it's not the actual RFID standard. As I understand it, the tag would be a passive device (as are RFID tags), so no battery needed, and it doesn't need to give any more identification than "I'm a bike!"

If it were installed on lorries with multiple antenna, they could triangulate to determine exactly where bikes are around the vehicle. It's certainly worthy of research. In the next decade we're going to be sharing the road with automated cars, even though it's intended for lorries today there's no reason why it couldn't trickle down in the future to all kinds of other vehicles.

For the unrelated reason of deterring bike theft, I actually would like RFID tags built into all new frames as a modern replacement for the serial number.

The RFID tag technology is an early generation system that has already been superceded. When developed it was recognised that it would be impractical, given that it would only identify bicycles fitted with a tag. I'm rather saddened that Lord Atlee is suggesting a technology should be installed, which its own developers realised was not fit for purpose and was for research work only. He's not up to date with the technology.

There is better and newer technology available for alerting drivers to the presence of cyclists and that does not rely on RFID tags.

RFID tags on bikes, it could be an option going forwards if the tags are fitted to all bikes, but this would need to be a EU wide mandatory standard for manufacturers of bikes.

But what you can't expect is the people who currently aren't aware of the dangers of HGVs at junctions to be fitting RFID tags.

Its good to see this issue discussed and ideas proposed.

However I think that relying on bicycles to have a transmitter fitted AND working (will require a power source) is not going to be the best and safest solution.

Why not use something like untrasound to detect obstacles near the HGV. That would have the benefit of detecting all obstacles, not just cyclists.

So! ALL cycles to be fitted with a tag but, NOT ALL LGV's to be fitted with detectors.

How long before 'mission creep' kicks in and we find that there is an annual charge and that we can be fined through them. I feel that this could be a very thin end of a very fat wedge.

Quote:

“These systems do have the difficulty that the cycles would have to be fitted with a tag, which could be a problem, but that has to be balanced against the technical advantages..."

I am not knowingly fitting an RFID tag to my bike or any others of my belongings. Who knows how that could be used.

Why should we (presumably) get charged to fit such tech, to overcome the fact that HGVs are unsafe in cities and a significant proportion of motorists just don't f-ing look?!?

(My bike helmet is made of tinfoil , btw)