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Live blog: Removable windscreen for urban bikes; banned driver charged after Essex cyclist was killed in New Year's Eve crash, Chris Froome to ride Tour de Yorkshire + more

Meanwhile, we've been reading up on some impressive stats from the Netherlands that outline just how beneficial cycling is to the economy...
Thu, Jan 03, 2019 18:21
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Live blog: Removable windscreen for urban bikes; banned driver charged after Essex cyclist was killed in New Year's Eve crash, Chris Froome to ride Tour de Yorkshire + moreVeltop (via YouTube)
03 January 2019, 17:14
Lorry blind spot detail
Lorry driver who shared footage of filtering cyclists says he'd like to see them invited on 'ride-alongs' to learn about blind spots

“I couldn’t see the cyclists until they were in front of me. They should have waited.”

More here.

03 January 2019, 16:19
British Cycling Logo
British Cycling handed £5.6 million funding boost by Sport England

British Cycling today receive another £5,690,000 funding boost from Sport England in 2019, taking the total received to £17.3 million since 2017. Sport England also announced a £15 million funding injection to be channelled directly in to local community cycling facilities as part of the staging of the 2019 UCI Road World Championships in Yorkshire. 

 

Martin Merryweather, British Cycling’s Strategy Director, said:

“This funding award is fantastic news, and gives us additional momentum and impetus as we look forward to 2019, building on British Cycling’s reputation for successfully combining elite success and increased participation.

“Our HSBC UK Breeze programme has been the hugely successful cornerstone of our women’s strategy, which is on course to encourage one million more women to cycle by 2020. It is our intention to continue to develop and evolve programmes which effectively inspire people from all walks of life to take up cycling, through industry-leading research, insight and dedication.

“This, in addition to the legacy funding for the UCI Road World Championships – which will also be aligned to many of our programmes - is a fantastic boost for recreational cycling as we look forward to 2019, and we’re extremely grateful to Sport England for giving us the opportunity to continue this vital work.”

03 January 2019, 16:08
"Cycling to work? But what about when it's raining?"

Then you need the Veltop Urban in your life! You get a waterproof basket and the 'windscreen' is removable in seconds according to Veltop. We're intrigued, and will be trying to track one down soon...   

03 January 2019, 14:41
Road Safety Authority Ireland Sharing The Road With Cyclists Still
Ireland abandons plan for close pass law and sets to work on ‘dangerous overtaking of cyclists’ offence instead

Attorney General felt passing distance would too easily be challenged in court.

More here.

03 January 2019, 14:39
Pro Conti team hasn't heard of Naomi Klein
03 January 2019, 13:33
Essex police logo
Story update: cyclist killed in Thurrock hit-and-run named by police and banned driver has been charged

The cyclist killed in a hit-and-run in Thurrock, Essex on New Year's Eve has been identified by police as 43-year-old Alexandru Matei, reports Essex Live. The driver responsible, 31-year-old Ravinger Matharu, has been charged with causing death while disqualified from driving, causing death while uninsured, causing death by aggravated vehicle taking, failing to stop at the scene of an accident and failing to report an accident. He has been remanded in custody to appear at Basildon Magistrates' Court today.  

     

03 January 2019, 13:04
The Dutch are spot on again

This time, in realising the benefits that cycling brings to the economy, that has been handily converted into £s by the chairman of Cycle Bath Adam Reynolds. What would the figures look like for the UK, we wonder?  

03 January 2019, 10:59
Callum Skinner predictably unhappy with Russian anti-doping situation

Speaking at the time, Callum Skinner said that the World Anti-Doping Agency’s (Wada) decision to lift the suspension of Russia’s anti-doping agency "just stinks basically”.

He’s backed the comments from the Wada Athlete Committee after Russia missed the deadline to hand over doping data from its Moscow lab.

03 January 2019, 11:19
Turning blue shorts brown...

Australian pro Miles Scotson got a bit of a scare thanks to a mid-corner white line in the Bay Crits series. Thankfully for us and unluckily for Miles, fellow pro Alex Dowsett had a GoPro handy to catch a very good save!

 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

What does blue mixed with brown give you? Ask @miles_scotson

A post shared by Alex Dowsett (@alexdowsett) on

03 January 2019, 11:14
New bike day for team Deceuninck-QuickStep

New name, and a fleet of shiny new Specialized Tarmacs for Deceuninck-QuickStep riders in 2019.  

 

03 January 2019, 11:42
Path_through_Llanerchi_Wood_-_geograph.org_.uk_-_608568
Elan Valley Trust working with Back on Track to design new adventurous trails in Llanerchi Woods

If you're partial to off-road riding and aren't far from this picturesque part of Mid-Wales, then there's good news in the form of potential new and exciting trails at Llanerchi Woods, reports County Times. The Elan Valley Trust says the new trails would "bridge the gap" between easy and difficult mountain bike trails in the Elan Valley.

Jennifer Newman, of Elan Valley Trust, said: "The development of a new woodland biking trail will complement and enhance the current mountain biking available at Elan.

"The construction of the new blue and red trails will provide the much desired for circular routes."

03 January 2019, 10:52
Cyclone-24-start
Entries open for the Cyclone24 at Geraint Thomas National Velodrome

The event takes place on the Newport velodrome now named after the Tour de France champ on October 20-21st, which will see 24 teams of six ride in relay over 24 hours from noon to noon. 

if you fancy it then the Early Bird Team Entry is £900 for a team of six, available until 31st December 2018. Standard Team Entry is £999 for a team of six - unless you've competed before you also need to attend a taster session to prove your worth on the track first - head here to find out more.  

03 January 2019, 09:18
Chris Froome at pre-Tour de France 2017 press conference (picture credit Team Sky).jpg
Froome to race Tour de Yorkshire with World Championships in mind

Chris Froome is hoping to ride the UCI Road World Championships in Yorkshire in September. With that in mind, he aims to ride the Tour de Yorkshire in May.

Froome said: “Yorkshire hosted the start of the Tour de France a few years ago and the atmosphere was just incredible. The Tour de Yorkshire has been growing year on year and I’d love to get out there this year.”

As we reported earlier in the week, both Froome and Geraint Thomas are targeting the Tour de France this year. Thomas said that his Worlds ambitions centred on the time trial.

“Looking at the course for Worlds in Yorkshire, I think the Men’s Elite Individual Time Trial will be my best chance of getting a title. It’ll be a good goal to have for the end of the year. I certainly want to be there because the support in Yorkshire is unbelievable. I think it’s going to be a massive World Championships and I want to be a part of it.”

Alex Bowden

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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5 comments

Avatar
OldRidgeback | 5 years ago
0 likes

Those removable screens for cycling in the rain are really popular in China and have been available for years there.

Avatar
kil0ran | 5 years ago
1 like

The problem with enforcing bans with technical means is that it needs to be continuous authentication. So that means biometrics, and the only systems that really make sense for that are iris recognition or heart rhythm. They're expensive, and probably not good enough to be 100% successful at preventing banned drivers from driving, plus there is a substantial risk of false positives for the non-banned population. And there are privacy aspects because the continuous authentication would require reference to a central database and potentially end up tracking everyone's journeys. 

I don't think facial recognition is sufficiently good to be able to use the ANPR technology to prevent use of the road network.

That leaves legal enforcement. I think a ban backed with a mandatory prison sentence (or 24hr curfew) is probably the best option. If you're caught driving whilst banned (admittedly unlikely) you go to prison for a year. Do it again and its five years. And life bans should be mandatory for persistent offenders.

None of this will happen until we get the right sort of victim, or a truly exceptional death toll. Even then it probably won't - the bus driver with persistent health issues in Scotland springs to mind.

Avatar
ConcordeCX replied to kil0ran | 5 years ago
1 like

kil0ran wrote:

The problem with enforcing bans with technical means is that it needs to be continuous authentication. So that means biometrics, and the only systems that really make sense for that are iris recognition or heart rhythm. [...]

it could be done fairly easily with fingerprint readers on smart keys.

Avatar
Organon | 5 years ago
1 like

'Froome lands on British soil in Knighthood bid.'

Avatar
burtthebike | 5 years ago
7 likes

Yet another banned driver involved in a death.  We have to have a better system for preventing these people from driving and detecting them when they do, as they clearly obey no laws nor respect the life and limb of other people. 

It can't be beyond the wit of scientists and technicians to develop a cheap, universal system for ensuring that a driver is legal.

I'm sure the government review of road law will address this issue, but the backlog of issues is now ominously long.  Still, I'm sure it'll happen any day now.

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