The bike was going too fast...A valid reason/excuse?

Yeah.... i think i agree with abssorb really. you can over complicate things sometimes spin.

WARNING!
For those of you who get upset when Spin 'n' me argue about things we agree on, look away now.

Or get used to it



Which is exactly what I said:

ie if you're further away, but travelling faster - so you'd arrive at the same time as a slower, closer, vehicle, then Crunch.

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Argue with me: http://the-ride-info.blogspot.com/

This?

The Habit of the Three Invisibles

From a long out of print, 1976, American book called 'Living With Your First Motorcycle' by Henry Gregor Felsen


Riding in traffic, you need the habit of being invisible in three different ways.

Most cycle accidents involving another vehicle, involve a car. Most of the time—about 70 to 80 percent of the time—the accident is the fault of the motorist. The usual excuse is "I didn't see the motorcycle."

Most of the time that's the truth, even if the driver of the car was staring right at the cycle.

Most of the time the accidents that are the fault of the motorist are the fault of the cyclist. It doesn't seem to make sense to say that, but it's true.
Most drivers on the road today are over thirty years of age. Most have never ridden a motorcycle or received any instruction or information about how to share the road with a cycle.

It is up to the cyclist to remember that and not to expect the auto driver to understand his problems.

Unfortunately, hundreds of thousands of cyclists are too young to drive cars, so they don't know the problems of the auto driver. And they do things that invite accidents, like not knowing that a car has many blind spots when it comes to a little machine like a cycle, and if you ride in a blind spot, you're inviting an accident that is technically the auto driver's fault, but really the cyclist's fault for getting in a dangerous position.

So to be safe, you develop the habit of the three invisibilities.

Think of this:
In order really to see you, the motorist must be able to see you three ways.

1. He must see you physically.
2. He must see you mechanically.
3. He must see you emotionally.

1. You assume when you ride that he cannot or does not see you in those three ways, even if he is looking right into your baby blue eyes. And you think for both.

In order to be the most visible physically, you wear bright colors, turn your headlight on, day or night, avoid riding in his blind spots, and give him every chance to see you.

In this country our driving eyes are still trained to look for big cars and trucks. We are learning to adjust our eyes to look for small cars, but motorcycles still sneak up on us, get lost behind a window post, seem farther away than they are, and, being small, seem to be travelling slower than they are.

So we make mistakes and hit cycles.

Have the habit of thinking physically invisible.

2. Motorists who do not ride cycles and who see it physically do not see it mechanically.

They do not know that a cycle has greater traction problems in bad weather, and it has to slow down for street conditions that a car can ignore. Expecting the cycle to start, stop, and behave like a car, they don't know how to give it a chance and pile into it.

So, you assume that no motorist understands your road and bike problems and expect the worst. If you expect it, you won't get it.

Remember your mechanical invisibility.

3. Seeing you emotionally.

If the car driver thinks of all cyclists as Hell's Angels and hoods, noisy nuisances who flout law and order, get in his way, and are looking for trouble, you're in trouble, even if you're wearing your pin for perfect attendance at Sunday School.

The motorist who does sees not you, but his idea of what all cyclists are like, is dangerous. He won't give you a break even if he sees you physically and mechanically, and in a shoot-out his big car has your light bike outgunned.

Assume that the motorist is hostile toward cyclists until proved otherwise, and hold your habit of feeling that you are emotionally invisible.
Perhaps I should add a fourth category, that of seeing you legally.

Your cycle is entitled to a full lane of traffic. You ride left of center, where the traction is usually best, and so cars won't treat you like a skinny bicycle and try to squeeze you into the curb. The motorist doesn't know your rights. He wants to get by, and you seem to be blocking him. He thinks you are an arrogant road hog and might give you a bad time in return.
I am happy to say that my own state of Iowa—and we're one of the big cycle states in the country—is doing something about that. When you get your materials to study for a license to drive a car, it includes how to understand and share the road with cycles.

Too bad that more cyclists don't seem to know. If you treat your cycle like a toy and squeeze between cars, don't expect them to yield a full lane to you when you need it. Know your rights, ride according to them, and watch out. Being in the right is fine, but it doesn't stop the bleeding.

Remember the habit of the three—or four—invisibles, and you won't get into situations where the motorist is to blame and you are in the hospital.

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Argue with me: http://the-ride-info.blogspot.com/

You think it's over-complicating things to explain why drivers don't see motorcycles at junctions?

You'd rather sit on the floor and say "You must have seen me" whilst the driver says "sorry mate, I didn't see you" ??

In any case, WB asked for reasons someone might not see a bike travelling quickly, I simply flagged up some that research in to junction collisions has flagged up as issues riders should be aware of. It's your choice whether you choose to take any notice of it.

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The dull copyright bit - feel free to nick it for personal use. If you want to reprint it for your club, I'd like a mention as author. Otherwise hands-off. Full terms
"Force has no place where there is need of skill" Herodotus 450BC

My point is that if you come over a brow with a bend and bridge restricting the view to 70 yards AND you are in a town environment with side turnings then you shouldn't be doing silly speeds. And if you are, and you T bone someone pulling out, then it is YOUR fault. Car or bike, makes no difference.

Light works both ways, if you cannot see more than 70 yards ahead then the guy waiting to pull out 71 yards away can't see you.

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Cousin Jack
A pipe and slippers man to the core.

Totally agree.

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Argue with me: http://the-ride-info.blogspot.com/

I thought WB was asking about when a rider was making legal progress.

Because if we assume the rider was riding legally then either:

1) The person saw the rider and chose to pull out anyway either due to poor judgement or malicious intent.

2) They didn't see the rider and could be deemed to be driving without due care and attention.

There are valid points on the thread about why people may have looked but failed to see.

Following on from your point about using experience and that a car X big is Y far away and will therefore take Z seconds to be there possibly helps explain this too for people with less experience of bikes. They may misjudge the distance to the bike by relying on the comparison with a car too heavily and not scaling the bike correctly.

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Move along - nothing to see here

Ah, OK. I hadn't realised that was what was meant. In which case, agree with both of you. Although there could be a retrospective 'point 1' in that research has indicated that most people make up their minds at junctions after a 0.5 second 'look'.

A time 'limit' like that may mean the best they can do is see a bike, but not accurately judge its speed. then bearing in mind the 'looming' issues, it may 'appear' to be travelling faster, as in the vid.

That's not defending the driver, BTW, just offering an explanation. It also offers a clue or two for riders about how they might alter their approach to junctions . . .

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Argue with me: http://the-ride-info.blogspot.com/

Not what WB said at all, if you re-read the original post. However, you can still be "legal" and far too fast approaching a junction.

As has been said by me and others, many MANY times, it makes not a jot of difference to the inscription on your tombstone whether you're within the law or not, it's the way you deal with the hazard that's the important bit.

Ditto - it's still down to the RIDER to avoid the accident whatever the cause.

How many drivers have experience of riding?

Remember, people see what they expect to see. They understand the performance parameters of what they drive - ever seen a bike pull across in front of an unladen artic which then locks up the trailer wheels when the driver has to stamp on the brakes? I have, plenty of times.

Don't expect other people to do what you want them to or to understand what you're doing on a bike and behave appropriately - take your own precautions.

That's the simple, bottom line, in a nutshell answer to the topic.

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The dull copyright bit - feel free to nick it for personal use. If you want to reprint it for your club, I'd like a mention as author. Otherwise hands-off. Full terms
"Force has no place where there is need of skill" Herodotus 450BC

Ditto...

Driving standards arguably SHOULD be better... but they aren't... so we have to live in the real world and get on with it.

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The dull copyright bit - feel free to nick it for personal use. If you want to reprint it for your club, I'd like a mention as author. Otherwise hands-off. Full terms
"Force has no place where there is need of skill" Herodotus 450BC

Its not a valid reason but its how most drivers look back on it and its probably how their solicitors advise them to play it, particularly as the driver has committed a right of way violation. What might be legally and/or morally right isn't always the case; moreover its what can be proven or disproven. Courts are generally anti bike and its harder for the rider than the driver (recent cases in the South West prove a bit of bias; rider jailed for 6 months for speeding with a pillion, drivers term reduced to 6 months after killing a rider and pillion (daughter)).

Its nearly always to do with obs; most drivers have committed to pull out and looking both ways as they do it, rather than before. As Spin and others pointed out; they're looking for cars and car size gaps so their eyes may have clocked you but the brain has ignored the info.

On a another angle I would rather a driver carry on his manouevre and give me less of a target to hit than stop completely blocking both lanes and presenting a target that would be hard to miss

Unfortunately, as you realise a collision is looming, the instinct to hit the brakes as you start to pull away is overwhelmingly strong and completely at odds with the momentum which keeps the car moving forward for a couple of metres.

Ironic that motorcyclists are now obliged to perform collision avoidance techniques when nothing similar is taught to the car drivers who create the SMIDSY in the first place.

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The dull copyright bit - feel free to nick it for personal use. If you want to reprint it for your club, I'd like a mention as author. Otherwise hands-off. Full terms
"Force has no place where there is need of skill" Herodotus 450BC

Amen.

There is a 3rd.

3) Rider was riding at the legal limit, but too fast for the local conditions. Driver pulled out because rider was not visible. ( AFAIK not being able to see through hills or round corners is not driving without due care.)

See my post above, knobber was driving at about 90, but 70 (legal limit) is still way too fast for going over that brow.

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Cousin Jack
A pipe and slippers man to the core.

I have sometimes had the exactly same thoughts as WB in his original post. It is such an obvious counter-argument to X saying that Y was going too fast and should not have hit X and surely this must have come up in court at sometime? (Horse, you have all the references for these questions so why not just tell us the outcome in the case when it happened? )

Isn't it a case of the driver being technically at fault regardless, but the rider still has some responsibility for not planning (well enough) ahead? Even if that is not the case, then are not courts nowadays tending to go down the route of allocating some responsibility by reducing the payment for damages?