Responsibility

It's a weird time to be a cyclist in London.

As you are no doubt aware there have been a number of tragic deaths on the streets and the responses are all over the media. Key spokesman has been the Mayor who has been criticised for some of his comments. He has definitely been focussing on the smaller issues, like suggesting that he ban headphones for cyclists. A lot has been made of his comments that appear to blame cyclists and suggest that there is responsibility on their parts to not end up dead.

The thing is, to an extent, I agree with him. You can't ride as if a blue strip on the road makes you perfectly safe to ride without care, and you should do things that you judge to be sensible. Setting aside the law, which we have discussed before, that could include not riding in headphones that cut off one of the senses you're relying on, picking a route that matches your experience and ability, and even wearing the kind of protection you deem useful. From my point of view I don't listen to music, and I do wear a helmet, because I've chosen to, and it has become a part of my getting on a bike.

However, none of this justifies what seems to be a huge waste of Police time as they seem to be committing a considerable force to stand at traffic lights and lecture people who aren't in helmets. Until or unless there is a law about helmets, I'm honestly not sure what this will achieve. Clearly people are aware of the risks and have made a decision based on their judgement. In fact the guy who I saw stopped started to point out that there is no real conclusive evidence to suggest that they make you safer, before he was moved to the kerb and the lights changed. It's at this point that you wonder if the police realise that perhaps even if they managed to get every cyclist in a helmet it's unlikely to save your life as you are crushed to death by a lorry.

In related news the driver who tweeted about hitting a cyclist in her car had her day in court. It was no real surprise that she wasn't that harshly punished, and the publicity has got her a TV deal. For a bit of light relief it turned out her Twitter account had been released and has now been restarted by someone else using it to comment on and highlight the case. Check it out here.

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