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Motorway Sign.jpgSat-nav leads cyclist onto M25... driver takes him off it
A cyclist who was filmed cycling along the M25 was first shepherded along by a concerned motorist and then offered a lift. The driver learned that the cyclist had been guided onto the motorway by his sat-nav.
The Daily Mail reports that on May 31, at around 2.30pm, Andy Cracknell spotted a man riding on the M25 near Brooklands in Surrey.
Cracknell said he couldn’t believe his eyes and called the police.
“To protect him and others, I needed to put something between him and the massive steel boxes hurtling down the motorway, whilst making the police aware.
“It was carnage just waiting to happen. At least if I was behind him it would draw attention to the situation from other drivers with the hope they slowed down.”
He sson decided it would be better if he just stopped and offered the cyclist a lift.
“We put the bike in the boot, he got in and off we went. We were talking in the car and I just remember being in shock.
“When I first went over to him he pulled his headphones out. I think he was listening to music, he didn’t know I'd been behind him.
“I was dumbfounded. I just remember I kept saying to him ‘did you not realise how dangerous it was what you did?’
“He was really upset once the reality had dawned on him. He was a really nice guy, early twenties, just didn’t seem to have a clue initially about what he’d done.”
The man told Cracknell that he had been to buy a new bike and was using the satnav on his phone to get home. It had taken him an unfamiliar route, “and before he knew it he was heading down a slip road onto the motorway.”
Earlier this year, we reported on a cyclist who’d ridden for three days to attend a court hearing for riding on the M5 because he said it was against his spiritual beliefs to travel in petrol or diesel vehicles.
Balin Hobbs admitted using a pedal cycle on the motorway and a second charge of resisting arrest, but said he was only doing so to avoid having to repeat the ride to attend a trial.
Alex has written for more cricket publications than the rest of the road.cc team combined. Despite the apparent evidence of this picture, he doesn't especially like cake.
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16 comments
I have heard knowledgeable offficials in the USA comment that “freeways” aka “limited access highways” are much safer on a per-mile-cycled basis than regular roads that have one lane going each way and typically narrow shoulders.
Everytime these stories come up, I am amazed at the magical thinking.
A cyclist cycling in a dedicated lane (the hard shoulder) on a motorway, 2 to 3 metres from the passing traffic somehow is in terrible danger. And the solution to that is to have them cycle on other roads where they have to cycle *sharing* the *same* lane as motor vehicles, passing at least as closely, and often *much* closer.
I've cycled the A1 out from Belfast. It's effectively motorway standard for the initial bit, and that bit is fairly pleasant to cycle on - hard shoulder all to myself. It then turns to standard, shoulderless dual-carriageway, where it becomes *frightening* to cycle on.
Give me the motorway-standard shoulder, over sharing lanes with 70+mph cars, any time.
I've used a GPS many a time. On both bike and car.
I'm still able to read road signs and recognise a motorway when I see one. Seriously, even if after all the obvious signs (pardon the pun) you still make that mistake, whats wrong with stopping in the hardshoulder and walking back up the slip road?
I'd feel far safer in the hard shoulder of a motorway than I do in one of the lanes on a dual-carriagway where the speed limit is the same and I'm in the same lane as the traffic.
It's funny how stuff like this is deemed as "suicidal" etc when the reality is that some dedicated cycling lanes are more dangerous than this
This is Darwinism in action.
To quote from a Larry Niven book " Think of it as Evolution in Action"
He might have already popped a load of kids out; regardless, The Kindness Of Strangers has allowed him to live (and breed) another day.
Demonstrates how intraspecies altruism has messed up your traditional natural selection model, or, as Darwin said, "homo sapiens sapiens Fucks Shit Up".
Paul J is right - the alarm expressed at cyclists who occasionally wander onto motorways contrasts sharply with the indifferent shrug exhibited nationally about cyclists using roads on which they do actually die.
I'm as guilty as the next man of "following the line" and not really knowing where I am but joining a motorway is a pretty special case.
Having said that I'm not totally convinced that a motorway (with a hard shoulder) is really that much more dangerous than any other road.
I'm sure breakdown organisations (who have a special way of parking on hard shoulders for protetion) and the emergency services may disagree!
Is that really spacial awareness or peripheral vision / scanning ahead.
Either way, now we know how dangerous Sat Navs are surely they should be banned and removed from all cars...
I am a bit suspicious that they might be encouraging rat-running and increasing the level of fast through-traffic on what should be residential side-streets. (I might be wrong, having never used one, but without that sort of assistance motorists would surely be more likely to stick to well-known, well-signposted, major roads?)
Nope.
Sat navs tend to take you along A and B roads. The only exception is if there is a traffic jam then they will take you down side-streets.
It is local knowledge that means drivers will use side-streets and ignore their sat navs for a while until it reroutes.
Doh! I've said it before and I'll say it again, the use of GPS devices messes up people's spatial awareness.
The use of a bicycle seems to effect the temporal awareness of news sites --- this occurred in May FFS, hardly breaking news.
He was wearing headphones and listening to music...
Nope it is an inability to read, understand and follow road signs.
They have added into the driving test a section where drivers have to navigate from A to B using road signs.