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news
Cyclist in traffic (copyright Simon MacMichael)“The day cyclists took over the roads”: The Times, Darren Grimes and TikTok react as new Highway Code revisions come into force this weekend
Revisions to the Highway Code aimed at protecting vulnerable road users came into force this weekend – and some news outlets have marked the occasion by calling for the changes to be scrapped and declaring a ‘battle of the Highway Code’ on Britain’s roads.
The updated Highway Code includes not only the laws that road users are required to follow but also contains advice aimed at improving safety. A new hierarchy of road users has been introduced, where the most dangerous road users carry the greatest responsibility for the safety of the most vulnerable, with pedestrians at the top of this hierarchy followed by cyclists.
Other updates include advice for cyclists in certain situations (such as riding in the middle of their lane to increase visibility on quiet roads, in slower-moving traffic, and when approaching junctions), giving priority to pedestrians at junctions, and encouraging the adoption of the ‘Dutch Reach’ method of opening car doors.
> Highway Code changes: ‘What about cyclists, or do the rules not apply to them?’
Despite the new Highway Code’s focus on the safety of all road users, some media outlets and commentators predicted “carnage” under the new rules.
This stance has not softened since the changes were introduced on Saturday. In two articles titled “The day cyclists took over the roads” and “Battle of the Highway Code”, the Mail Online claimed that since the new rules were brought in, cyclists have been “deliberately hogging the centre of the road, causing pile-ups of traffic behind them”.
The Mail again misleadingly referred to cyclists “taking to the middle of the road and riding two-abreast” with drivers “powerless to stop them under the new Highway Code”. This claim has been rebuffed by groups such as Cycling UK, who emphasise that bike riders are asked to ride in the centre of their lane in certain situations, not the middle of the road.
> Press misrepresents Highway Code changes – just days before they come into force
The site also prominently shared a tweet which claimed that a group of cyclists “refused to let cars past for eight miles looking back and laughing”.
As we reported on Friday, the Times responded to the incoming revisions by calling for cyclists to be licensed and insured, almost 10 years to the day since the newspaper launched an award-winning campaign to make Britain’s roads safer for people on bikes. The paper also appealed for a new offence of death by dangerous cycling to be introduced, under the headline "Killer cyclists may be classed like motorists".
Beyond the written press, the changes were featured on a particularly embarrassing segment on GB News yesterday, hosted by conservative political commentator Darren Grimes.
Grimes said that the new hierarchy featured “pedestrians and cyclists at the very top” before adding “I don’t need to tell you where motorists end up” (the presenter, hosting his first show on the channel, neglected to mention that van and lorry drivers bear more responsibility for car drivers and motorcyclists under the updated guidance).
He also criticised what he said was the overt emphasis on dangerous drivers under the new rules, claiming that in London “you’re lucky if you get away with your life with cyclists storming down the road so fast”, despite cyclists being involved in four of the 346 incidents which resulted in the death of a pedestrian in 2020.
> Grant Shapps calls for new ‘death by dangerous cycling’ law
Grimes was joined on the programme by Fair Fuel UK’s Howard Cox, a prominent opponent of the new Highway Code, who described the changes as “a cyclist’s charter” and said that the updates permitted bike riders “to cycle in any way they wish, no matter how dangerous, without fear of prosecution.”
Cox continued: “They have been given the right to pass all the blame to other road users. They are innocent no matter what they do, and this can’t be right. I believe this Highway Code will actually lead to more injuries and more deaths.”
Despite Cox’s criticism of the changes, he called for the updates to “be sent to every household in this country”.
“This Highway Code assumes all drivers are homicidal maniacs, and that is completely and utterly unjust,” he said.
While Cox adamantly defended the “law-abided majority” of motorists, one TikTok user was criticised over the weekend for claiming that the new rules meant that she was inevitably “going to hurt people”.
Chantelle Bradd, a model from Bristol, posted a video on the social media platform in which she argued that the new Highway Code was part of the government’s attempt “to de-populate us”.
Give up your licence. pic.twitter.com/mBV9pkCWWu
— put it in the bin (@photogog) January 30, 2022
In the video (which contains copious amounts of swearing), she said: “I’m a new driver, so I don’t know how I’m even going to deal with driving through the centre of Bristol, because bikes now can be on either side of you, and you have to give way to them.
“They don’t have to use the cycle lanes, which our councils have spent maybe millions of pounds on. They can opt to be in the centre of the road instead, they can ride two-abreast in the middle of the road, so they’re definitely going to be making you late for work in the morning. Why have you done this?
“People are going to get hurt,” she continued. “I am going to hurt people. I’m going to be responsible for hitting Maisie with her little helmet going to school. I’m going to t**t her off her bike in the morning because of this. Why?”
Yesterday, Cycling UK called for a long-term public awareness campaign from the government to help produce a “mindset shift” on British roads and to counteract misleading reports in the media. The charity says it will take years to fully enforce the revisions and change “entrenched driving behaviour”.
“The latest changes to the Highway Code are a hugely important start towards a mindset shift that will make the roads safer for everyone – not just for people who choose to cycle or walk,” Cycling UK’s head of campaigns Duncan Dollimore said.
“The changes in our driving behaviour, however, will only happen if the government commits to communicating them with simple, accurate, and memorable messaging in the long term.
“We’ve seen the public’s attitude shift on seat belt use and drink driving. This shows entrenched driving behaviour can change. The new Highway Code requires a similar shift, and it can happen again but not overnight.
“To make our roads safer for everyone, the government must be looking in terms of years not months to communicate and eventually enforce these changes.”
After obtaining a PhD, lecturing, and hosting a history podcast at Queen’s University Belfast, Ryan joined road.cc in December 2021 and since then has kept the site’s readers and listeners informed and enthralled (well at least occasionally) on news, the live blog, and the road.cc Podcast. After boarding a wrong bus at the world championships and ruining a good pair of jeans at the cyclocross, he now serves as road.cc’s senior news writer. Before his foray into cycling journalism, he wallowed in the equally pitiless world of academia, where he wrote a book about Victorian politics and droned on about cycling and bikes to classes of bored students (while taking every chance he could get to talk about cycling in print or on the radio). He can be found riding his bike very slowly around the narrow, scenic country lanes of Co. Down.
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104 comments
Not sure about this bit though...
That is to keep your take-out warm. As you will, according to some sources, be trapped behind a cyclist riding in the middle of the road for at least 8 miles.
Picked this article up by a self confessed petrol head as well. https://www.warwickshireworld.com/news/people/the-rugby-advertisers-view...
Also from the auto express article. Was taught to drive out of a parking space many years ago. Can never figure out why people insist attempting a reverse with minimal sight lines. Also having driven the length of England spent time on musing why petrol stations no longer have a bucket of water and sponge to wash windows, lights and number plates as mine were filthy after 300 odd miles.
Thanks - that's a well written article.
The inability of people to reverse into spaces (including their own driveways!) infuriates me.
They know what other motorists are like when they perceive themselves to be held up for a few seconds, and the ones they'd annoy whilst reversing into their driveway would know where they live!
But the ones held up whilst they reverse out have no clue where they live?
Reversing in gives you the opportunity to wait for a gap in the traffic - often with better sight lines - and generally involves a single manoeuvre.
On the other hand, reversing out often involves poor sightlines, requires two manoeuvres, is more dangerous and is contrary to the Highway Code
Motoring journalist giving safe driving tips.. hardly surprising.
It's very rare that a motoring jurno will advise drivers to exercise caution when interacting with vulnerable road users.
If you think that tiktok video, from Chantelle Bradd, is shocking, then one of her earlier posts will simply scare you...
https://www.tiktok.com/@chantellebradd/video/7053729413762010374?is_copy...
I disagree, belugabob. Most people consider themselves above-average drivers and refuse to admit that they could make a mistake.
Good point...
Spot on
One survey found that 98% of American drivers thought they were above average.
I don't have a figure for the UK - it may be better (or worse!)
I believe a mere 85% of UK drivers think they are better than average...not sure where I read that though.
Assuming you are thinking of the mean average, that is entirely possible, if most people drive at standard x, and a few at x-y. Or, think about a small firm with 9 engineers paid 50k each, and one admin bod paid 10k. 90% are paid above the average.
But you'd have a point if we consider the median instead.
Mean, Mode, Median - Whatever measure of centrality you take most drivers think they are in the top half
And if you are using the word "half" in the vernacular sense of "bigger half", they'd be right, since only the median splits the population in two equal halves.
The power of the original statement, "most drivers think they're better than average", relies on the double-take people do when it strikes them that the statement must be impossible, from which it is a short step to concluding that most drivers overestimate their driving. The double-take rests on the popular misconception that exactly half must be above and exactly half must be below the average.
Taking a simple but appropriate measure of driving quality, how much room I'm given when overtaken on my bike, I'd say the vast majority of drivers are above average, since they give me no cause for concern whatsoever. The average is dragged down by the few idiots who close pass. That leaves the few idiots well below the average, with the great majority marginally above the average.
That's an interesting perspective though, isn't it, and one I frequently fall into myself, in thinking that somebody obeying road law is de facto about average? Have we become so used to being subjected to bad driving that what should be average or standard appears to us as above average?
Actually I'd argue that the sense of 'average' most people are using when they answer this is none of those, but the further sense (perfectly acceptable if you're a real person, rather than a mathematician) of 'neither above or below an acceptable standard'. On that basis, I'd suggest that the reality is that most drivers are below average.
Does that make UK drivers above average at judging whether they're better than average?
On average, yes
Sounds about right.
the same article I got my info from said 65% of Swedish drivers thought they were above average
At least Chantelle recognises some of the everyday situations re pedestrians and cyclists that she is going to have to contend with. She also acknowledges her own lack of experience and an awareness of her own deficiences with spatial awareness. I expect we would all be better road users if we did likewise.
Part of me wants to watch, just in case my blood pressure is dangerously low right now...
Edit:
"I just think I should not ever be allowed to pass my f-ing test hah-ha-ha!"
Edit (2):
Just started to watch the one from the Liveblog. The weird echoing <BANG> you all heard was probably a vein in my forehead popping...
Edit (3):
She thinks it's hilarious that she admits she's a rubbish driver, that she can't be expected to be aware of what's going on around her, and that she'll probably end up killing someone. High. Lair. Ee-ous.
of course not all motorists are homicidal maniacs. Most are simply not paying attention; many are frustrated/angry; many more are simply extremely thick and many are sensible people going about their daily business, unconcerned by the global environmental crisis.
But, as cyclists, we have to assume that they are all homicidal maniacs, because we only need to encounter one.
Good (sensible) piece in i Weekend.
Isn't this as expected from a brainless 'model' called Chantelle?
Probably.
Let's hope her employer (presuming she can actually hold down a job) takes a dim view.
But why is it that even newly qualified drivers have already been suckered into believing that they have some god-given right to rule the road?
FFS!
because for years they have been on the other side, yielding to the drivers that ruled the roads, and now they want their turn.
More likely that throughout childhood they have been ferried short distances in their parent's cars and never had a bicycle beyond the one they got at the age of 3 with stabilisers that did a few trips to the local playground before being car booted. The thought of walking let alone cycling are considered horrendous, demeaning options for losers.
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