TD Ciaran Cannon hit by SUV, suffers serious injury

You are the first regular poster to say that in a 3 month old thread; they are refusing to discuss it openly.

Two very regular posters have just avoided the question like it wasn't asked or stated they won't.

An honest discussion could actually be beneficial to cyclists but instead as a forum its tribal with no room for nuance.

As a cyclist the only way you can reduce your risk is your own behaviour; route selection, road craft etc etc. You can't change (unless as a lobby group) how god/bad or indifferent other road users are.

Highway code rule 88 for motorbikes (snippet)

"Additionally, when filtering in slow-moving traffic, take care and keep your speed low."

From Carole Nash insurance consultants

"Often when you decide to filter through a line of slow moving traffic, it’s easy to not notice that one of the cars has left a gap, so that someone can suddenly pull out from a side road and turn right. Before you know it, someone has waved this other driver out and they likely can’t see you coming when they pull out. This is exactly the scenario that leads to the most accidents.

When you’re filtering you need to keep the difference in speed between you and the cars as low as you reasonably can."

I know filtering is different but it is useful from a safety perspective.

If someone ain't looking they aren't going to see you. Because its become THEIR habit not to look. Its not a problem of visibility. Its a problem of learned behavior. Bad habits. They turn without looking. Worse they do it at speed thinking it mitigates not looking. Well it doesn't.

So what can the cyclist do, since we are pushing prevention on the cyclist. Go at a snails pace. Go a different route, since its often poor layout that attracts poor driver behavior in the first place. Physically separated infrastructure, (yeah paint isn't it), wand, kerbs etc. Remove cars from the route. Driver education, education through enforcement (none in this case)

At the end of the day you have to deal what's there. Often in Ireland that means being on a less than idea road. Cycling on the left, alongside traffic, alongside entrances and junctions is just normal cycling. The majority of the time its not an issue.

Bad driving is habitual. If you see a car doing it, and you happen to be following, it won't a isolated insolated incident. They were do more bad driving as you follow. Which is why the rampant lack of enforcement, is a contributory factor.

What do you want here?

Because you have done exactly what cyclists are trying to avoid in this scenario, which is turn it into a big long discussion on why cyclists are the problem, deflecting the discussion from driver behaviour which caused the collision in the first place.

The only way a cyclist will avoid being hit in this scenario is come to a stop as they pass every car. That's not cycling that's walking.

Even then it's doubtful anyone walking would have avoided being hit by someone diving blind for a gap at speed. There wasn't time to react at the speed the car was moving.

A common tactic by media is to lump cyclists in with motorbikes statistics to make cycling look more dangerous. You know when someone trots out motorbikes in a cycling thread where the agenda is.

LOL

I mean All, not Most.

I have a friend who was in an accident similar to this one while riding his bike. The difference was he was the one turning across traffic when a gap was left for him. He swung across the road and got clobbered by another vehicle coming up the inside lane (a motorbike). He was relating the story to me and was contemplating all sorts of legal actions. I was sympathetic to his injuries and misfortune, but the reality was that he was entirely at fault in this case, like the driver of the SUV in the Cannon accident.

In terms of visibility, the SUV driver could see over the top of the car that stopped, if they had been bothered to look.

Coming from the other direction, I can't count the amount of times a car has done a right hook across my path when I have been the only vehicle approaching a junction going straight on. The right turn from Merrion Square to Holles Street, and the right turn from Mount Street Bridge on to Clanwilliam Place are two black spots where I have been constantly menaced by drivers who feel it okay to swing in front of me because I'm on a bike. I can't say for sure if it is because they couldn't see me (ie. didn't look), or they did see me and felt I was less important. I tended to take the lane, get out of the saddle, and glower at the driver edging towards a turn into my path. Didn't always help, so it really is up to the drivers to start driving better to keep other road users safe.

...but but isn't there someway we can blame the cyclist....

This type of opinion just emphasises how culturally far removed we are from a society where pedestrians and cyclists are given due respect by motorists. It's it the embodiment of car centric thinking. Drivers don't even need to bother checking if the way is clear of vulnerable road users. Sure why would it even occur to them. Until drivers are held accountable for the lack of basic observation we are going nowhere towards equitable sharing of roadspace.

Well you are doing your best to drag it down further.

it makes sense for every road user to protect themselves if they are unsure in any way. Recently I was out for a run and came to a pedestrian crossing , it was green for me but it didn’t appear that the cyclist coming towards me was minded to stop so I waited and sure enough they didn’t stop, didn’t even check the lights , blasted straight through, if I had to have kept running we both would have taken a nasty fall, I would have been the injured party and in the right but I don’t see that as much consolation.

So if you are driving you should top every time you pass a pedestrian because they could potentially just run across the road. That's what you're implying for a cyclist.

Because cycling normally down a road, passing cars, driveways, junctions, isn't normally a dangerous situation like you're implying.

If was comparable to not locking a bike, it would mean there was a near 95% chance every time you passed a car, or entrance, etc., you would get knocked down and killed. Which obviously doesn't happen.

Cops/DPP won't follow up on an incident like that.

You're almost guaranteed to get your bike stolen.

Join the dots.