Day 3 of the Times Cities Fit for Cycling Campaign… a bit of a backlash

Oh dear.
Barking up the wrong tree yet again.

QUOTE:

Day 3 of The Times newspaper’s Cities Fit For Cycling Campaign sees
the paper publishing a 12-page ‘Guide To Safe Cycling' and
encountering something of a backlash from some cyclists in the
process. Parts of today's guide have not been universally well
received, and while there is undoubtedly huge support for the campaign
amongst cyclists, The Times is also finding out that they can also be
an independent and prickly bunch, who don’t like being lectured or
told what to do.

Among criticisms levelled at the paper on social networking sites such
as Twitter are its decision to include an article from James
Cracknell, now a strong supporter of helmet compulsion, who amongst
other things likens those who cycle without a helmet to football
hooligans, plus the newspaper’s own advice that cyclists should wear a
helmet as well as high visibility clothing.

Cracknell, the Olympic rower turned TV personality, almost lost his
life in 2009 after he was struck in the head by a truck’s wing mirror
while filming in the United States. He believes the fact he was
wearing a helmet saved his life.

However, with helmet compulsion being a subject guaranteed to incite
heated debate, Cracknell has come under criticism from some quarters
for the pro-helmet stance he has adopted in pieces written for The
Daily Telegraph.

As one blogger points out, Cracknell appear on Alpina’s UK website as
a “sponsored athlete" despite insisting, after mentioning his Alpina
Pheos helmet in The Telegraph that, “I don’t have a commercial
relationship with the manufacturer, by the way".

Cracknell's piece in today's Times is accompanied by a picture of him
holding the helmet, still stained with blood, that he was wearing when
he was struck by that lorry, although there is no mention of his
apparent sponsorship by the manufacturer.

Cracknell also likens those who choose to cycle without a helmet to
football hooligans.

“If you are cycling without a helmet, you are being selfish to your
family and friends,” he asserts. "It is like with football in the
Eighties, when a violent 1 per cent minority of football fans meant
the other 99 per cent were tarred as hooligans."

The Times itself suggests, in a two-page spread under the heading ’12
ways to cycle safely’ – there’s an interactive graphic here, under the
‘Graphic: 12 safety tips’ tab – wearing a helmet and high-visibility
clothing; it cites a statistic, unsourced, that “60 per cent of
cyclist fatalities are head injuries,” but fails to acknowledge
arguments against them often outlined by opponents of compulsion or
that in the case of cycling fatalities involving motor vehicles -
which make up the majority - the outcome is unlikely to have been
altered by the wearing of a helmet.

On a day when coverage in the main newspaper focused on the success of
the municipal authorities in Copenhagen of getting people cycling, the
focus on helmets and hi-viz strikes a dissonant note for many –
seeming to miss the point that when a city is fit for cycling there
should be no need for helmets or high viz cycling gear. In Copenhagen
and in other cities with high levels of cycling such as Amsterdam,
such equipment is noticeable more for its absence than anything else.
Cycling is an everyday activity, carried out in everyday clothes
something that was achieved by getting more people on bikes and
changing the attitudes of drivers in particular about interact with
other road users.

Among those interviewed for the newspaper’s supplement today are
Rebecca Romero and Chris Boardman, as well as several everyday
cyclists who have no ambitions of following that pair to Olympic
success, but simply want to get around on their bike, safely.

There is also an article penned by Jon Snow, the Channel 4 broadcaster
and CTC President, although he is writing in a personal capacity. A
couple of his comments do give food for thought.“The Times Cycling
Manifesto is good as far as it goes, but there is a serious dimension
missing: human rights,” he says.

“The dominant creature on the urban road is the single-occupancy car.
One person in a motorised 60 sq ft metal box.
And what are we cyclists — one person on a thin strip of tubing with
two wheels.

“One has the power, the presence and the rights; the other is deprived
of all three. Is that equality under the law?

“I would willingly pay a licence fee for my bike if it meant that
separated cycle ways were provided as my right,” continues Snow.

“My children were deprived of the right to cycle to school, even of
the right to cycle safely at university — it was, and is, quite simply
too dangerous.”

Even in a private capacity, that’s a startling point of view to be
expressed by someone who is the figurehead of one of Britain’s leading
organisations for cyclists.

Meanwhile, the urgency of the overriding goal of campaign by The Times
– to make Britain’s streets safer for cyclists – was underlined
yesterday by news of the deaths of two cyclists in incidents that took
place in very different parts of the country just minutes apart
yesterday afternoon.

A 77-year-old man died in the rural village of Whaplode Drove,
Lincolnshire, in a collision with a car driven by an 80-year-old male;
in London’s Bishopsgate, a male cyclist said by police to be aged in
his sixties died following a collision with a coach.

Broad support for the campaign continues to be strong, with more than
100,000 people now signed up to it. But reaction to the comments by
Cracknell and advice to wear a helmet and hi-viz gear do show that
while in some cases it’s appropriate to generalise those who choose to
ride bikes as ‘cyclists,’ it does need to be remembered that cyclists
are individuals too, with views as diverse as the machines they ride

http://road.cc/content/news/52181-da...6-bit-backlash

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Simon Mason