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news
National Express stickersVideo: National Express ‘blind spot’ sticker spotted – but how useful is it?
Remember our story last month reporting how coach operator National Express wanted the public to vote on which of two designs of sticker warning cyclists of its vehicles’ blind spots it should adopt? A road.cc reader has spotted the final design on one of its coaches – and he’s not impressed.
The design chosen was the yellow triangle bordered in red that appears in the picture above with a drawing of a bicycle and the words, “Caution: Blind Spots” and, underneath, “Please take care.”
It was one of two designs put forward by National Express after consulting with a focus group of cyclists by National Express and staff from the sustainable transport charity Sustrans, which hosted the vote.
We were sent the above picture of a coach with the sticker by John Smith, who also uploaded a video of the vehicle to YouTube.
He said: “I saw my first 'National Express' sticker today. I can report that they are near enough useless. The only reason I saw it is because I was specifically looking out for it (I have been ever since hearing there was a new design).”
Outlining the reasons why he felt underwhelmed by the sight of the sticker, he said: “It's too small to read, it’s too low to be seen by a cyclist,” and “the back of National Express buses are already full of 'stuff'.”
What do you think? Now you’ve seen one, do the stickers make a contribution to the safety of cyclists, is this a well-intentioned gesture that has been poorly executed, or is this just yet another road transport company getting its excuses ready in advance so it can say a dead cyclist was warned?
Let us know in the comments below.
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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39 comments
Passed an artic pulling a trailer this evening on the A66. On the back was a sticker in the bottom left of the door worded Danger Zone and Do Not Pass. I think that this one is more offensive and more likely to be used to absolve the driver of any wrong doing than the National Express one. Tried to take a pic but camera shake wouldn't allow for it.
[[[[[ Well at least it's a politely worded little thing. And it's situated down low (along the sight-line of a dwarf on a bike). And well-outnumbered by seven or eight other stickers for us all to ogle....no, mikeprytherch, these stickers DO to some extent absolve drivers of responsibility for deleting cyclists, in some cases. And that's some cases too many.
I've always thought it strange how bus-drivers must, and do, have a near-side mirror view of their passengers---and cyclists---which works perfectly well. Is it rocket science?
It could be a heck of a lot worse (and many such stickers are). And at least its not on a small van.
Too small though.
Other countries seem to manage it. Paris only allows large vehicles to deliver at night (10pm to 7am). Plus France has a ban on any vehicles over 7.5 tonnes on ANY road at weekends and public holidays.
Despite this I haven't noticed the Parisians starving in the streets.
Or more bluntly, profits are more important than people.
HGVs only make up four or five percent of the traffic in London, but are involved in 43 percent of fatalities.
In 2011 there were 16 cycling fatalities in London.
In Paris there were ZERO.
Some relevant links:
http://www.britishcycling.org.uk/campaigning/article/20130619-campaignin...
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/men/active/recreational-cycling/10464893/Chri...
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/bike-blog/2010/nov/18/hgv-city-ba...
Inner city Paris doesn't have as many construction projects as London
Bricks have a pretty good shelf life - they can be delivered at night.
Premixed concrete doesn't.
And is there are reason that can't be delivered at off-peak times? Or transported in smaller loads? Or mixed on site?
I assume they never use concrete in Paris.
Do they just stick buildings together with ripe Camembert and a gallic shrug?
You know what, it wouldn't surprise me if one or two of them have done!
Cost, the same as why deliveries at night will cost more.
Make someone work nights and you'll have to pay them more typically (especially if they're on an existing contract).
Smaller transport loads push up the cost/tonne overall too.
These prices get pushed on to the consumer (commercial or otherwise).
It's not as black and white as just deciding lorries can only be making deliveries from 2200-0700, you'd be changing a lot of peoples lifestyles and ways of working. Stuff like that doesn't just happen over night, as well as pushing up costs overall.
I think theres a better option around somewhere than night deliveries only, but at some point someone has to pay for what ever happens, and you can be certian in terms of businesses that'll be the customer/consumers.
Yep, it'll cost more, but only because killing people is free.
But the good thing about a free market is that it would adapt to these changes. Competitive companies would soon find ways to lower costs again by rethinking/reorganising their deliveries, making better use of storage, and using alternative transport for inner city delivery.
One thing to think about: how many on-site fatalities does a construction firm think is acceptable when they are building something? How many staff deaths would be acceptable to fill the shelves at a supermarket?
None. Obviously.
So why then is it acceptable for a number of cyclists and pedestrians to be killed in those very same processes?
Seems a valid point. "Economic reality" should also include the full costs of things, including all the 'externalities' or its not being based on honest accounting.
In Paris they do not demolish the old buildings and build massive blocks in their place. There is thus less massive muck shift from demolition and less massive material import - the source of the trucks with the greatest propensity to kill & maim. Part of this is because of the weight restrictions on vehicles entering the city.
Large vehicles delivering retail goods generally do not enter the city centre - it simply is not viable for an operator to have £300,000 worth of tractor & trailer grinding around at well below the 80Kph it does on the motorway, eating up the driver's working time, and fuel. These trucks decant into smaller vehicles for distribution, and only the construction industry uses maximum weight trucks - the 4-axle 32T truck being the 'currency', because they can get cheap Class C drivers from agencies to fill the sporadic demand from construction. Class E drivers can get nice regular and clean work on trunk haul 44T trucks, at better rates, and the better drivers naturally go for the better jobs.
Well, I don't actually live in London nor do a large number of other cyclists. I would still have to deal with the HGVs where I live, unless you are proposing a blanket ban on HGVs across the entire country at peak times every day (not just 'public holidays').
Neither do I. The reason I mentioned London is that Bojo the Clown said a while back that he considering such a ban in London:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HofZd9vOchA
And as Chris Boardman says London is a focal point. If you can fix things there then you can roll it out countrywide:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MV-ImMSfNwc
All cities and large towns - yes, certainly. Blanket peak hour ban.
The primary danger is in densely populated areas so it makes sense to tackle them specifically.
I'm not sure we could dare go as far as France and ban HGVs on ANY road at weekends and holidays - but that would be a nice bonus.
Here here. Apparently despite my ranting about HGV's in West Yorkshire, dickhead drivers are only a problem in London. Mind you the level of peoples cycling ability sometimes leaves me cringing.
As a rough-and-ready solution to the problem of cyclists creeping up on the inside of large vehicles this sticking-plaster has some merit. But what are we going to do to address the equally significant problem of large vehicles creeping up on the outside of cyclists who were there first? Give cyclists similar signs to mount on their rear mudguards? Stop painting kerbside ASL-feeder lanes that encourage cyclists to leave space for a large vehicle on their right which may well be about to turn left across their path?
If a cyclist needs to rely on a sticker in this day of age to remind/warn them not to go up the inside of a heavy goods vehicle then god help them.
For what its worth, the sticker seems ok to me, hard to comment on the clarity and size of the font when viewing on a video.
The only problem is the sticker is too low. It should be on the top corner of the engine compartment or on the panel above. Size wise it doesn't look any smaller than the circular speed stickers that you see on long vehicles now days. Also it is not as commanding as the TfL ones telling the cyclist to stay back. These particular stickers advise caution and highlight where the danger is.
Only a fool would barrel down the inside of a long vehicle while it was slowly moving or stopped. Our current infrastructure does not help this with the creation of narrow inappropriate cycle lanes encouraging novice cyclists into the ASZ and into a place of danger in doing so. If you are going to pass slow moving traffic do so on the outside with caution if you wish to go ahead or turn right. If turning left sit in traffic.
There is no guarantee that motorists are going to check their near-side mirrors when driving whether they eradicate blind spots or not. And if there is a collision they are going to say they did check!
Needs to be much larger and higher up.
Designed by a committee full of morons.
It's funny how we just accept the presence of a vehicle where the driver apparently can't see a dozen people on bikes right next to him/her.
How is that a suitable thing to drive through a busy city?
image_450.jpg
Because the design follows function, ie moving a large amount of goods around as efficiently as possible. Would you prefer that one large lorry was replaced by fifty smaller vehicles? Where do you do your shopping? How do you think that all that food gets there?
As much as it would be nice to evisage an ideal world, economic reality will always take precedence.
How about this... take some responsibility as a cyclists and don't do stupid things like cycle up the inside of a bus or lorry unless you are 100% certain its isn't going to move or turn left, there are blind spots and whilst there is no doubt that some of the tragic accidents as the fault of the driver, some are also the fault of the cyclist, so look after yourself first, you really shouldn't need a sticker to tell you not to do some dumb manoeuvre.
And now I await the abuse from the god like members of this forum.
These stickers are for the benefit of bus/lorry companies, not cyclists.
But it's easy to see why novice cyclists are drawn up the left side of vehicles because that's where all the cycle lanes tell them to be. In fact till very recently it was illegal to enter an ASL box unless you used the feeder lane on the left. When it is safer to break the law than obey road markings then something is very wrong!
I'm confused: you're suggesting cyclists should all be infallible (like you?) and then complaining about "god like" forum members?
GrahamSt... this forum seems full of cyclists who believe that Drivers should be infallible, that is my point about the God Like forum members, I am not infallible and was not trying to suggest anything of the sort, my view goes against most of the posts in this forum in that I do blame cyclists as much as drivers, so I was waiting for a backlash for even suggesting that some of the fault lies with us the cyclist, after all it is a cyclist forum and not MaxPower.
How on earth you can say the stickers are for bus/lorry companies ? perhaps you mean its a get out for them for killing somebody, not even this country's laws are that fickle, its OK for me to run over that cyclist officer, I had a sticker on my bumper ! really !?!
I'm going to get a tiny triangle for the back of my saddle, so the coaches keep clear.
Calling others God-like, before they'd even read your post, let alone replied, it seems to me you weren't waiting at all, more just going ahead and lashing out yourself. I have a short attention span, completely switched off to any point being made under the weight of your prebuttal rebuttal, sorry.
I think most folk in here just want drivers to try a bit harder, or even just to try at all, to drive in a manner that reflects the risk of the kinetic energy they control.
Yeah....OK, I hear the comments, but we all still see people who are either foreign, don't drive, or are new/ naive cyclists riding up the inside of long vehicles that are about to turn that I wouldn't and never have.
Sticker isn't absolving blame, just a warning to take care, there isn't a reliable system yet to check the inside on long vehicles yet, when there is, it should be mandatory, until then, drivers will struggle to look in two directions at once.
I was following a guy in today on a London cycleroute (the one that goes West to East along the embankment). It looked like he knew what he was doing for the first 10 minutes, then chaos. He went up the inside of two slow-moving long lorries, both times at a section where the cycle lanes temporarily end when the road gets too narrow (Boris? Boris? Are you there Boris?) Both times he stopped a second before he was squeezed (er... and why did he do it after the first time?). He then proceeded to jumpo two red lights that had cross-traffic coming through them.
All the stickers in the world wouldn't help this guy ... and dedicated cycle lanes would probably mean he takes out other cyclists.
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