Chris Froome back on the bike day after being rammed by driver

Pub bike wrote:

If this had happened in the UK, the Police would be asking for whether anyone had any dashcam or other footage to verify that he was riding on the pavement so that he could be properly fined.

Nah, that would involve them having to actually pull their finger out...

fretters wrote:

I'm not citing the BBC as any kind of authority on cycling before I get shot down in flames!!!

however I found it interesting the European Commission study  they quote which shows the Netherlands (which is cited as a kind of cycling nirvana that campaigners are wanting to replicate here) as having 25% of road deaths as cyclists (or people who ride bikes if you wish) whereas uk is 6%. That is a massive difference

is it really that bad or am I missing something? 

Run some made up numbers to try and better explain that stat.  (vast oversimplification alert!)

Lets assume 1 % of all cycling miles end in a road death in the UK, which has 1 billion miles ridden per year.   It will have fewer road deaths than the Netherlands which has 50 billion miles ridden per year even if the deaths per mile is 0.5 %.

In short, if something is safer but done more often it may result in a higher absolute number of accidents.

fretters wrote:

I'm not citing the BBC as any kind of authority on cycling before I get shot down in flames!!!

however I found it interesting the European Commission study  they quote which shows the Netherlands (which is cited as a kind of cycling nirvana that campaigners are wanting to replicate here) as having 25% of road deaths as cyclists (or people who ride bikes if you wish) whereas uk is 6%. That is a massive difference

...

am I missing something? 

Yes: modal share.

Back of a fag packet alert:

UK 2% vs NL 27%, so proportionally NL has 13-14 times more cycling and 4 times proportion of cycling deaths.

NL not looking too bad now, is it?

fretters wrote:

I'm not citing the BBC as any kind of authority on cycling before I get shot down in flames!!!

however I found it interesting the European Commission study  they quote which shows the Netherlands (which is cited as a kind of cycling nirvana that campaigners are wanting to replicate here) as having 25% of road deaths as cyclists (or people who ride bikes if you wish) whereas uk is 6%. That is a massive difference

is it really that bad or am I missing something? 

I linked that document a few weeks ago on here.

Not only have the EU done this to try and point the finger at the Dutch and the Danes in terms of helmets and the EUs push for them to 'solve' the road safety problem, the WHO have done the same thing.

utterly disgraceful misrepresentation that borders on just simply lying to suit their agendas, it makes me want to puke frankly.

instead of wanting to actually curtail those that kill and maim they keep jabbing at those actually presenting very very little harm to others and the huge overall benefits high rates of cycling has.

The Dutch as it happens have a very high rate of over 70s and 80s riding bicycles and they have single person incidents which increases the rates quite a bit (but still isn't that bad compared to other countries of all ages in any case)

That these oldies would likely die years before if not riding bikes regularly and be more of a burden on society is utterly lost to these groups of idiotic decision makers. in any case they could die from simple falls from walking (more likely as we know) but it's so much easier for these fuckwits to point the finger at the Dutch and say, yeah, your cycling KSIs are shit, put helmets on when as stated above, so much more is missed out of the equation and deliberately so

racyrich wrote:

BBC still in denial about the problem. 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-39856219

Being chased onto the pavement is not a reflection on how safe or otherwise cycling on the road is.

I don't recall an article about how safe walking on the pavement of Thames bridges is after that incident.

I am still waiting for them to ban the obvious ISIS weapon of choice:  automobiles.  Paedos and head-hackers couldn't operate without them (like iphones).... it's obvious they shoudl be banned.