rain miles count double

I’ve been doing a lot of cycle commuting lately, managing the 18 mile round trip to work and back more or less three times a week in spite of the Northern Ireland weather. I’m not motivated by any green or fuel saving agenda, I just enjoy it and find cycling a great way to relax and get some thinking time.

In the media and the cycling forums you can read many horror stories of cyclists being run over, maimed and even killed by other road traffic. However, in Belfast I’ve so far found drivers to be by in large very courteous and tolerant of cycle traffic. I’d even venture to say unusually so.

But by far the most common hazard I’ve run in to (if you’ll excuse the phrase) is the humble pedestrian. I don’t want to tar all foot travellers with the same brush as most are well behaved and manage to not endanger themselves. Furthermore, I don’t wish to imply that I’m completely innocent of doing stupid things as a pedestrian from time to time, because I have. But a crazy few behave as if they’re immortal (or at least vehicle-proof) and blithely wander across roads no matter what colour the traffic or pedestrian crossing lights are. Worse, for these people, cycle traffic barely even registers in their world view.

This week, I experienced two shining examples of this seemingly suicidal behaviour and they have prompted this post.

The first incident involved two young ladies with earphones in, who decided to cross a red pedestrian crossing on Chichester Street – a four lane main road in central Belfast. To these two I say: bikes are traffic too and you’re damn lucky I’m not a car or bus and was able to quickly and nimbly brake and swerve to avoid you. My only regret is that your ear attachments may have prevented you from hearing the important safety message that I attempted to convey via the medium of shouting. Certainly, they seemed enough to prevent even the sight and sound of a hefty mountain bike and hefty(ish) rider in hi-vis gear, feet away and sliding sideways towards you at 20mph eliciting so much as a glance in my direction. I suspect it would have taken me to actually explode to get you to notice me.

Or perhaps you did notice but chose to ignore me. Let me tell you this: getting hit by a bicycle travelling at 20mph will hurt. A lot. Imagine standing at the end of an Olympic 100m track and stepping out in front of the winning athlete as he hurtles across the line. Then imaging that the runner you “catch” is wearing a spiky metal suit. That is how much it would hurt. Road cycles can reach speeds double that and so would hurt four times as much. Pedestrians have been killed in such collisions.

Looking away will not cause me to disappear, turn permeable or otherwise change the laws of physics and allow me to brake harder or swerve faster to avoid you. You were lucky this time. If I was a car, you would be statistics.

As an aside, I’ve decided to call this class of oblivious pedestrian “iPeds” from now on:

iPed; i-ped; noun; person travelling on foot, rendered unaware of danger by use of earphones or other portable equipment. See also: Podestrian.

The second suicide-ped incident ocurred on the evening journey home, just as I’d finished the five mile hill climb into Glengormley along the A6 Antrim Road and was taking the right hand fork at the traffic light controlled Y junction on to the A8 Ballyclare Road. A woman, hiding under her umbrella, wanders across from the left to a pedestrian island between the two forks. My lights are green, her pedestrian crossing lights are red, but she doesn’t even break her stride and continues out on to the road in front of me while looking the other way. I have to slam on the brakes and just barely get stopped in time.

I managed to blurt “HEY!”, to which she responded with this absolute classic line:

“F**k you, you shouldn’t have been going so fast!”

For one thing, I was doing at most 10-12mph at that point, i.e.: not fast. Would she expect motorised traffic to be travelling at that speed? Her comment also shows the complete lack of personal responsibility that’s all to common these days; clearly she felt it was my fault for cycling where she was walking – how dare I!

This incident got me thinking about liability insurance. The woman would probably have tried to “claim” against me if I’d actually hit her and, even though I’d done nothing wrong, the legal expenses incurred in fighting the case would likely be significant. I’ve since become a member of Everyday Cycling, a branch of British Cycling (the governing body for cycling in the UK). Annual membership is relatively cheap and comes with £10M public liability insurance and access to legal help and so protects me from the numpties that inhabit our streets. I shouldn’t need protecting, but then pedestrians should watch where they’re walking and not cross on red either.

I’ll close with some advice.

Pedestrians: take care!

Cyclists: get some insurance against pedestrians who don’t.