-
It does sound like the other driver may have blasted through a red light, you might wish to go and check the phasing at some point.
Do you agree with this thought process?
I understand your thought process. ;-)
I aim to reduce my speed when approaching traffic light controlled junctions, so if the lights change I can safely stop. I strive to drive and cycle in the same fashion.
When delivering lorry driver CPC training it always amazes me how many drivers take the "all cyclists jump red lights" but completely fail to understand that amber is also a stop light. It is such a common misconception, but for me if I roll through an amber light then it generally means I have not been reading the road, approaching the junction at an appropriate pace and as such have failed to manage the road and elevated the level of risk for me and other road users.
You are reading a single comment by @dancing james and its replies.
Click here to read the full conversation.
dancing james
On amber lights, I'm not changing that part of my cycling. I am 100% sure I'll get in more accidents by being fully aligned with the highway code on it as I'll be stopping when people don't expect me to (even if they should expect me to). Do you agree with this thought process?
It doesn't help that I ride fixed a lot (not today though) and people get even more caught out by the lack of freewheeling when braking.
The big thing that was dangerous here was not me going through amber, it was whether the cycling of lights is variable. If not, the bin lorry blasted through on red a good 20 seconds after it would have gone red for him.
If they are variable, this seems to be asking for trouble. I should have seen that the green right turn arrow was not illuminated, but as I assumed it always was at the end of that phase, I got myself into a sticky situation.
I'm not sure which of these scenarios is what happened.