Cyclists stay back! stickers

…and (my favourite) on the front of a van.

Ha ha. Does that say Keep Clear? On the front, ha ha ha. KEEP CLEAR, I HAVE A STICKER

They want all the stickers in the photos removed?

Alot of them say "Beware this vehicle may be turning left" or "When this vehicle is turning left, do not pass on the inside" which is perfectly good advice. they do not communicate "fear, anger or hatred" as Skydancer suggests, unless you wish to read that into them. To demand these are removed is stupid, and undermines the whole campaign.

The problem as it have been pointed to you many time, is that it excuses bad driving.

Independent Beer Wrangler is an excellent job title.

it excuses bad driving.

That's an annoying idea, but it doesn't make me think the stickers I mentioned should be removed. Is there proof the stickers actively cause bad driving?

@winnifred1849

The stickers give people an excuse for their bad driving.

i don't see what the problem is with a polite notice.
Cyclists in the asl, driver left hooks, gets out and says "I've got stickers!"

youtube.com/watch?v=zRtsDEPw­HDo

It's more nuanced than that. I personally think it's fine to warn riders of undertaking large goods vehicles--there is the usual principled (and very important) argument that road danger ought to be reduced at source, as explained in Colin and Bob's excellent article, but it's a sensible warning and can save lives. The warning certainly shouldn't have to occur at the point of the large vehicle, rather should be embedded in a general societal understanding that that is just something you don't do, but we are far away from that and if this simple message is spread, it can save lives.

However, these stickers have migrated to all kinds of vehicles, and they have little point on smaller vehicles beyond trying to shift responsibility onto riders. Left-turning collisions involving those only very rarely cause the kind of life-changing injuries inflicted by contact with a large goods vehicle, and the proliferation of the stickers to these vehicles is most definitely not in the spirit of road danger reduction. With (the relatively few) lorry drivers, you can rely on most of them to understand the responsibility they have and not to assume that the stickers absolve them of all blame, but if you have them on all vehicles, they'll be used as 'get out of jail' cards for all sorts of crashes, however minor. And this can, in due course, lead to increased road danger, as people's perception of the standard of driving expected of them changes for the worse.

So, yes, they should be removed from all of those smaller vehicles, and the messaging needs to be sorted out for the larger vehicles.

Lest anyone thinks these stickers are new, they're not, of course. Just today I saw a massive scrap metal lorry (very similar to the one involved in Stephanie Turner's death at Seven Sisters Road/Amhurst Park) which had two ancient-looking and torn 'cyclists, do not pass this vehicle on the inside' stickers on its rear. It's just one more of those endlessly recurring topics in cycle campaigning in which the same problems arise again and again.

^ / thread

#rep very well put

if you have them on all vehicles, they'll be used as 'get out of jail' cards for all sorts of crashes

Anyone passing a lorry deploying this sign would automatically assume blame for any resulting collision.

http://www.trucknetuk.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=123168&sid=e760577b7fb97f2f863dfe124519399b&start=60

The whole reason those signs and the laws surrounding them exist is to keep cars from pulling around buses and murdering school children...a little ironic suggesting to use them to protect truck drivers from indemnity in the case of an accident

^^ interesting link. And the bit before what you quoted isn't quite as bad as that. The goal of what he's proposing is to keep cyclists out of the way of a turning truckx, not to stop cyclists from passing trucks. Basically another indicator.

The only thing I can suggest, and it is ridiculous that such a thing is warranted, are stop signs that swing out from the left rear corner of lorries when the left indicator is applied.

I'm not actually sure it's a bad idea.

In fact, on school buses like the one pictured, they also have arms which force the children to walk further away from the bus so they can't get into the driver's blind spot.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3d/Children_about_to_board_the_school_bus_(Thibodaux,_Louisiana).jpg

It's more akin to something like that, rather than the stop-sign.

(the legal aspect, which you quoted, is problematic though).

can you imagine what happens when you get an overtake+indicate?!

In that case, if the cyclist survives he can legally shoot the driver's entire family. I'll make some stickers.

Oof. Good point.

Presumably the intent would be to only have the sign on the near side, not on the outside so shouldn't affect overtaking.

That said, as always this depends on the driver being engaged enough to use it. The number of lazy drivers you seen in an average day who don't bother to indicate suggest that it would be worse than useless as all it would do is instill a false sense of saftey

All these posts will be lost like tears in the rain ...

it's a sensible warning and can save lives. The warning certainly shouldn't have to occur at the point of the large vehicle, rather should be embedded in a general societal understanding that that is just something you don't do, but we are far away from that and if this simple message is spread, it can save lives.

Exactly this. And stickers on all types of vehicles could help with this. I personally find it more likely than this scenario:

if you have them on all vehicles, they'll be used as 'get out of jail' cards for all sorts of crashes, however minor. And this can, in due course, lead to increased road danger, as people's perception of the standard of driving expected of them changes for the worse.

Which is supported by anecdotal evidence only, though if there has been proper research into this theory I'd be interested to hear it.
The many drivers who pull out on me without looking (no euph) or rear- end me at traffic lights (no euph) are unlikely to use a sticker as an excuse.

Seems these stickers have reached Belfast...there was some "cyclist" somethingsomething sticker on the back of a car. Not that I could read it cos the font was that small it was probably listing the whole of Jeremy Clarkson's rants on it.

There are some lorries with "cyclists please don't go on the inside of this vehicle" stickers which is fair enough to me. In mainland Europe a "stop" sign to the left and "blue with white arrow" sign are quite common on lorries.

The bump on this thread reminded me I need some new Cyclists Stay Awesome stickers for my truck. The road.cc ones bleach out in the sun a lot quicker than the victim-blaming varieties..

Are "Cyclists Stay Awesome" the preferred sticker if one has to be there?

They are on my rig....
There's no real need for any sticker at all but I prefer a wave and a smile to making people feel guilty for riding their bike!
Might do 'beware of passing this side' on the left and 'stay awesome' on the right this time.
Forumengers have been known to skitch my truck up hills before. Like to think of myself as an accomadating van cunt....

If you're going to be an accommodating van driver, you should leave the vans doors open when driving with a ramp leading up, with refreshments and a masseur inside.

The Birchfield people may have a point. Have you walked along the Regent's canal recently. Not pleasant thanks to those Racy Sts. That's not really a "space for cycling"

The absurdity of shared space...

Why oh why do these stickers not mention anything about not undertaking/filtering/passing at junctions?

What means the inside?[/foreigner]