Petition to ban lorries from London's streets during rush hour receives 2,500 signatures in first 10 hours

In an ideal world the idea of banning HGVs at rush hour and separating cyclists away from other vehicles every where is great but in reality it'll never happen.

I've been disliked for saying this but I'll always say it, cyclists need to be more careful and less blasé when it comes to cycling.

As Jim Morrison sang,

"Riders on the storm.
There's a killer on the road.
His brain is squirming' like a toad.
Take a long holiday ………"

OldRidgeback: I have been looking at HV /cyclist statistics since the early 90s. Take Rosamund Irwin's article today http://www.standard.co.uk/lifestyle/london-life/why-are-hgv-lorries-so-d... which shows that about half the HGVs involved with cycling fatalities from January 2008 until today were in the construction industry.

As I pointed out above, differently designed industry vehicles, or retro-fits on existing ones, are one of the key aims of both us in the RDRF and LCC. LCC have been working with CLoCS to produce new designs over the last 2 years and point this out in their press release today. they, like RDRF, are also into enforcement, training, highway design as key elements - the ban in the morning rush hour is just one element which the press and politicians have zeroed in on.

So I have already made the points you are making.

Re-the a.m. rush hour ban: I have argued that it could be useful if adequately safe vehicles and drivers were exempted - it would give a kick start to the necessary compulsion. BTW, non-construction HGVs often avoid the rush hour so they wouldn't be affected anyway.

Me again: OldRidgeback's point about LCC missing the point is, er, missing the point.

If you go to the three point list of LCC objectives, the morning rush hour ban is only one of them. LCC has done a lot of work on alternative lorry design, and is well versed in the particular issues around the problems of construction vehicles.

I have been working through Road Danger Reduction Forum with the LCC on this for ages and it's largely due to them, RoadPeace and See me Save Me that we have managed to get TfL to do anything on this issue.

Another crucial point: if the safety regime is to be changed, there are concerns about how Transport for London's Fleet Operators Recognition Scheme has been not pushing as hard as it should have been on HGV safety : http://rdrf.org.uk/2015/07/20/what-transport-for-london-is-still-getting...

In our view there are a number of specific measures which should be implemented, mainly:
1. Redesign of HGVs re- "blind spots" (by retro-fitting transparent doors and infra-red sensors on existing vehicles and having new low cab direct vision vehicles and reducing the space between the vehicle body and tarmac (by retro-fitting side ad front guards and again newly designed HGVs with bodies closer to the ground/tarmac).

2. Enforcement: for rogue operators, "normal" rule and law breaking by HGV rivers like close overtaking and having a proper health and safety regime governing freight on the roads.

3. A morning rush hour ban could be a useful adjunct, but is of relatively little importance - perhaps HGVs with right design features and adherence to safety regime could be exempted.

4. Training of drivers - a minor but significant potential contribution. And training of cyclists - although even well-trained cyclists make mistake and don't deserve to die for them.

5. And of course, engineering the highway to reduce the potential for collision in the first place - although this isn't going to cover all junctions and will take loads of time to implement.

All this is explained in our summary here : http://rdrf.org.uk/2015/07/21/what-transport-for-london-needs-to-do-for-...

By the way, a pedestrian was killed under the wheels of an HGV just near me today - it isn't just cyclists at risk.

Distribution companies do not want their vehicles stuck in traffic. Most would want to operate efficiently in light traffic conditions. The problem is they are banned at night from many London boroughs because of noise nuisance legislation. Paris bans HGV's in the rush hour to save lives and London bans HGV's at night to reduce noise pollution. Two cities with very different priorities.

There aren't safe and unsafe vehicles, these are just machines. there are brainless and balless drivers hidden behind a steering wheel, and there is an equal amount of them behind a handle bar...
To talk about DEATH count of more than 5 a year in a civilized world as the UK, shows no civilized world at all, in the contrary it shows the dark ages of the uk where human life was insignificant are back. what I suggest? very high penalties in confirmed deliberate actions (25 to life) even if there is no death and high penalties in deliberate negligence (yes there is deliberate negligence). but don't be fooled, never will a day come where cycling will be completely away from cars, because everything in this world is fit and constructed for cars, planes, boats and generally everything that runs on PETROL. if bicycles were run on petrol, there will be highways built for them and not for cars...

I know this ain't gonna be popular, but, ban cycling during rush hour. It pains me to say that, but some of the idiotic riding I've witnessed during rush hour, is worthy of it.

Another good reason:-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C1aSvoIpVss

The major issue is that health and safety legislation doesn't apply on the roads so that companies don't have to apply the care they take with their staff and contractors at their work sites to the population at large. This results in the ridiculous situation where a lorry is legal on the roads but once it arrives on a building site it is "illegal" because it doesn't have a mirror (for example) that eliminates a blind spot.

If HSE legislation applied to operations on the road then organisations would have to apply the HSE hierarchy (any HSE professionals out there feel free to correct me) Eliminate (stop doing the dangerous operation) Segregate (Barriers ) Training (It's a dumb idea, please don't do it) Personal Protection (please wear a helmet). You start at the top "eliminate" and work your way down with Personal Protection judged to be the minimum and least satisfactory level.
If companies had to show that they'd completed this kind of analysis then you'd find a lot less trucks on the road, using appropriate roads with better trained and equipped drivers as HSE prosecutions can go all the way to the top.
As for bleating about cost I wouldn't worry too much about that, most industries when forced to can sort that out pretty effectively themselves with enough pressure.

The LCC is totally missing the point. Sorry, but it has to be said. The problem is not one of all HGVs, it involves specific categories of HGVs, namely tipper trucks and skip delivery lorries.

A rush hour ban on HGVs will target those many trucks that are not causing a problem. And this will drive up construction costs and making building (and homes) even more expensive, at a time when London is expanding fast.

There are ways to improve safety for construction HGVs such as tippers, skip trucks and concrete mixer trucks. The LCC would be far better to target those safety measures than calling for an outright ban.

The Evening Standard has an excellent article on truck safety. If the people at the LCC would only read this, they'd perhaps appreciate the problem and how best to address it:
http://www.standard.co.uk/lifestyle/london-life/why-are-hgv-lorries-so-d...

As for traffic figures, London's congestion levels and traffic volumes are lower than in the noughties at the turn of the millennium.

40% of cycling fatalities involving lorries occur in the morning rush hour.

And 60% don't, that's not really much of an increase during rush hour.

Policing HGVs heavily and mandating mirrors that eliminate blind spots should be the priority.

The lorry blind spot to the left of the driver's cab is implicated in 80% of cycling fatalities

This really says it all, that blind-spot needs to be eliminated.

This is London, all day is rush hour now, seriously, I'm not exaggerating.

I'd love to see a comparison between 1980 traffic flow levels at 5pm and 2015 traffic flow level at 9pm, I'd bet 2015 is more busy.

Anyone have access to that data?

Instead of restricting movements of HGVs at peak times ... given that the issue is more one of visibility from the drivers perspective, why not just require that all HGVs that are driving at peak times in city centres to have a passenger (co-driver). This co-driver would have their own set of mirrors fitted on the left of the vehicle, thus allowing them to easily check the left-hand-side blind spots that the driver can't see from their side. With regards other solutions being proposed this is probably one of the cheaper solutions.

use the river a bit more? barges can carry even more than lorries, much easier to design them to be lower polluting, electric vans pick up at points close to the city centre. You wouldn't need to massively increase the traffic on the river, because one boat can carry a lot of containers.