Advertisement
If you have a new account but are having problems posting or verifying your account, please email us on hello@boards.ie for help. Thanks :)
Hello all! Please ensure that you are posting a new thread or question in the appropriate forum. The Feedback forum is overwhelmed with questions that are having to be moved elsewhere. If you need help to verify your account contact hello@boards.ie

Hi vis discussion thread (read post #1)

Options
1909192939496»

Comments

  • Registered Users Posts: 28,939 ✭✭✭✭AndrewJRenko


    So good lights means that you don't need hiviz, good to clarify that.



  • Moderators, Sports Moderators Posts: 24,771 Mod ✭✭✭✭CramCycle


    I have the same on my bike, hence why I don't put a jacket that is out of line with dipped beams. Much like your car, if you don't see my lights, you won't see my jacket.



  • Registered Users Posts: 10,216 ✭✭✭✭Hurrache


    So what you're saying that lights are sufficient and you don't actually need highvis?



  • Registered Users Posts: 1,399 ✭✭✭SharkMX


    Who would ever have thought that making yourself as visible as possible while walking or cycling would make your journey that bit safer.

    Some incredibly stupid people in this thread to be honest. Darwin awards incoming for a few of them i imagine. I will bow out of the thread and leave it to the dopes.



  • Registered Users Posts: 10,216 ✭✭✭✭Hurrache


    Because highvis has become a stick for victim blaming with very little evidence as to its effectiveness.



  • Advertisement
  • Registered Users Posts: 28,939 ✭✭✭✭AndrewJRenko


    Do you not want to make yourself safer while driving and while parked up?



  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Arts Moderators, Sports Moderators Posts: 49,391 CMod ✭✭✭✭magicbastarder


    i think you'll find that on the forum here, the general article of faith is that lights are sacrosanct; lights are proactive and clothing is passive. you need light to fall on clothing at night for it to work, whereas lights don't need that. and as Cram mentioned. hi vis jackets aren't incredibly useful in urban areas as dipped lights won't angle high enough to catch them.

    also, there's a lot more nuance than you appear to appreciate. many of the people on this thread do thousands, or even tens of thousands, of km cycling a year on the road; it might be a bit silly to dismiss that understanding out of hand. and it's not just about the basic (apparently ambiguous effect) of visibility/conspicuity/lumens - it's about the cultural effects of the predominance of hi-vis in the discourse from people who don't know about cycling, thinking that helmets and hi vis are the be all and end all of cycling safety.



  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Arts Moderators, Sports Moderators Posts: 49,391 CMod ✭✭✭✭magicbastarder


    i've mentioned here before that i was once 'nearly' knocked off my bike by a motorist (i spotted well in time that he was pulling out in front of me without even glancing towards me), and was able to brake just short of his window, which caught him off guard. he did offer a cursory apology, but quickly followed it up with an arch 'when i cycle i wear a helmet and hi-vis'.

    that's how ingrained the topic is with the general public; he clearly hadn't had time to appreciate the irony of shifting the blame back onto me when hi-vis wouldn't have made a damn bit of difference. but he was trying to place me at fault for his error, because of the clothes i was wearing; and that's what really irritates cyclists; they get blamed for other peoples' mistakes because of something which appears to be of ambiguous benefit anyway.



  • Moderators, Sports Moderators Posts: 24,771 Mod ✭✭✭✭CramCycle


    MOD VOICE: I know you have left but attack the post, not the poster in future



  • Registered Users Posts: 8,242 ✭✭✭07Lapierre


    Same here.. I've good light s on my Bike and my car. My bike is black. Last night i cycled home and i was wearing black shoe covers, black bib tights and a black jacket. One motorist did flash their headlights at me as they approached, so i tilted my 1500 lumen front light down towards the road a bit more.



  • Advertisement
  • Moderators, Politics Moderators Posts: 39,559 Mod ✭✭✭✭Seth Brundle


    One motorist did flash their headlights at me as they approached

    As they surely didn't see you without hi-viz, I doubt it was you that they were flashing their lights at!



  • Registered Users Posts: 8,242 ✭✭✭07Lapierre


    No.. they were blinded by the brightness on my Light! oh wait you were joking right?

    Post edited by 07Lapierre on


  • Registered Users Posts: 24,742 ✭✭✭✭zell12


    RPU inspector says on national radio. A road suitable for walking - did he really say that?

    "Motorcyclists, get that high-visibility gear on you to improve the chances of a driver seeing you when you’re on your motorbike.

    Pedestrians, when you’re out walking is the road suitable for where you’re out walking and are you wearing hi-vis?

    Cyclists, the same, helmets and high-visibility gear and think about where you choose to cycle your bicycle," Inspector Sutton said.



  • Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators, Regional South East Moderators Posts: 28,483 Mod ✭✭✭✭Cabaal



    Outside of motorways every road is suitable for walking and cycling, what makes them unsuitable is people driving too fast.

    I run on mainly rural roads, they aren't very busy but the times they do become dangerous you have people doing 80km+ on single track road with grass in the centre! (even around blind bends)

    They also pass me at excessive speed and maybe 1 foot clearence. I drive one section of the route almost daily and I always pass any walkers doing less then 30km and plenty of space (I'll drive into the grass verge)

    I suppose its easier for Gardai to victim blame then actually do their job.



  • Moderators, Sports Moderators Posts: 24,771 Mod ✭✭✭✭CramCycle


    My daughter used to work for an insurance company that gave better premiums if you had a self reporting GPS box fitted. Really simple, not expensive, could be retroactively fitted to all cars. Driving without one incurs a heavy fine and seizure of the vehicle. Simples. She would have people ringing in claiming they weren't speeding, or that they were wrong about the limit in a certain area but it always ended up that the customer was wrong. It gave leeway for poor GPS but in regards accident investigations, automative penalty points, identifying dangerous drivers who aren't driving to conditions. it seems like an open goal.

    Is the issue that it is too easy? It could also be linked to the garda app with a sensor, so if its not active or installed as they approach, it is an immediate seizure and fine.



  • Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators, Regional South East Moderators Posts: 28,483 Mod ✭✭✭✭Cabaal


    Not sure about seizing cars, but certainly could hike premiems

    400e fully comp with GPS, 800e without.

    If device is deactivated then insurance should be voided so Gardai can do them for no insurance, insurance company should be able to tell that remotely.

    Anytime I've done my insurance I've never once had a GPS unit as a suggested option to reduce my yearly costs, was it targetted at younger drivers only by any chance?



  • Moderators, Sports Moderators Posts: 24,771 Mod ✭✭✭✭CramCycle


    Not sure, possibly, it was with 123.ie. Your premium was hiked automatically if you broke certain conditions, and if you paid in a lump sum, you had to leave a deposit. Like you suggested, repeated breaches voided your insurance IIRC (I could be wrong). I do think it should be run by Revenue and Gardai rather than private companies though and simply make it mandatory. Part of your next NCT is that it has to be installed and register as functioning. Heavy fines can be put on the long finger, siezing a car has an immediate and unavoidable affect (although that could be for severe breaches eg, greater than 50% of the speed limit), the fine being an auxillary punishment to stop cheap disposal cars becoming the norm. It would certainly help with accident investigations as well.



  • Moderators, Politics Moderators Posts: 39,559 Mod ✭✭✭✭Seth Brundle


    Thames Valley Police offered these words of wisdom to the public…

    Understandably, people are not amused by the victim-blaming by the police here and the replies make that clear, e.g.



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,030 ✭✭✭nomdeboardie


    I remember being in fear of my life as a car whizzed past on the road running past the Lough Brays, then being miffed that my companion walking in front of me wasn't angry too 😅



  • Registered Users Posts: 24,742 ✭✭✭✭zell12


    “And to tell me that the Road Safety Authority doesn’t have a road safety engineer on staff. I am gobsmacked,” Marc Ó Cathasaigh said. He also questioned what the cost benefit analysis of a RSA campaign to distribute 394,350 hi-vis materials to school children, and whether this money should be better spend on targeting drivers and preventing road deaths, rather than focusing on the victims.

    Ciaran Cannon raised the prospect of changing remit of the organisation, questioning why it was never critical of the number of cars on the road. 😉


    394,350 hi-vis yokes - the whole country illuminated visible from space



  • Advertisement
  • Registered Users Posts: 8,242 ✭✭✭07Lapierre


    only visible from space if the spacemen/martians are looking!



  • Registered Users Posts: 586 ✭✭✭ARX


    Gobsmacked? He's easily surprised.



  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Arts Moderators, Sports Moderators Posts: 49,391 CMod ✭✭✭✭magicbastarder


    why would the RSA employ a road engineer? they don't engineer roads.



  • Registered Users Posts: 4,955 ✭✭✭what_traffic


    True - that's why the Road Safety remit needs to be removed from them.

    Road Safety should be placed back again under the Dept of Transport(they won't want it of course) where they do have Engineers and Policy makers who do issue guidance on Engineering Design manuals but they need to expand on this.



  • Registered Users Posts: 9,387 ✭✭✭Macy0161


    As I said on thread - half the problems we have with infrastructure are caused by Road Engineers in councils, who think roads means for cars. A new active travel role (reluctant to use tzar) would be more use, whether that's in the RSA or elsewhere.



  • Moderators, Sports Moderators Posts: 24,771 Mod ✭✭✭✭CramCycle


    The RSA are under the remit of the DoT, so that is the case but the RSA act as if they are entirely standalone. I don't know the specifics of the legislation but they really should not be as stand alone as they aim to be.



  • Registered Users Posts: 4,955 ✭✭✭what_traffic


    Aim or are? Agree the should NOT be standalone as they are but -they are 100% self revenue generating org now ; in real terms what this means is that they can pretty much focus on the easy stuff that they want to do. If they needed a begging bowl - they would not have been in a position to fob off the Public Account Committee earlier this year. Dept of Transport / Minister like's this arrangement as well especially when things start going bad.



Advertisement