While I understand the motivation, I don’t see this making any difference.
Mum Ria Brisland is campaigning for a motorbike awareness course to be included in the driving theory test.
The theory test is an attempt to get novice drivers to look at the highway code. The reality is that they forget much of it once they have a licence. Awareness and anticipation is key to survival on the roads. Educating other road users makes sense only if they are receptive to it and my experience of novice drivers is that many of them simply want the licence at minimum cost. So, as a motorcyclist, I take responsibility for my own survival. My own awareness and anticipation is heightened and I take nothing for granted.
Ms Brisland’s campaign might be better targeted at motorcyclists with a slightly different message – assume that every road user out there is out to kill you and ride accordingly.
And that includes vehicles with automation technology.
Then it seems like Autopilot’s Autosteer stayed locked on the left line even though it became the right line of the ramp. The system most likely got confused because the line was more clearly marked than the actual left line of the lane.
Great. Presumably the Uber one got confused as well. There are plenty of worn lane markings on the road infrastructure. If an autonomous system can’t cope with that, then it’s not fit for purpose and has no place on the public highway.
It’s a tragic event that serves as a reminder that Autopilot is still not perfect and that drivers need to pay attention at all time and be ready to take over.
Not much point in it being there, then.
assume that every road user out there is out to kill you and ride accordingly.
That is almost verbatim what my (car) driving instructor, a Bundeswehr instructor,taught me on the very first lesson. Although I think the phrase, in German, ‘homicidal maniacs with a death wish’ also featured.
I would suggest all Learner Car Drivers should have to pass the motor cycle CBT test before they are allowed behind the wheel of a car. It instills a solid appreciation of the issues facing bike riders and indeed other road users. I remember how it improved my attitude to road usage in general many years ago and to this day I benefit from the lessons learnt there.
Secondly autonomous vehicles have no place on the road. The tech is not up to the complexity in the real world and won’t be for a long time. For the foreseeable future it should only be deployed in closed systems.
The problem with this is that it would exclude people who are perfectly capable of driving a car competently but unable to manage a motorcycle. The late Mrs L, for example. She was a good driver, but the bike was too physically demanding for her.
Autonomous vehicles, yes, quite. We still have road infrastructure that cannot cope with the horseless carriage…
it would exclude people who are perfectly capable of driving a car competently
It would also exclude those like myself who have such a ‘phobia’ of bikes that even sitting on one when stationary and the engine off is terrifying. I have however decided that that is a sorry state of affairs for a 50 year old ugly bastard and when my youngest next gets a big bike (he likes things with more CC than my car) I shall get him to take me out for a ride…hopefully his next bike will have an Ezz-Kleen pvc seat. Mind you I’ll probably do meself a mischief just straddling the bloody thing.
I’ve often thought that everyone should have to spend a little time riding a motorcycle before being allowed to go on the roads in a car. Nothing over the top. Just a couple of months on a little moped or similar after which one would be allowed to move up to a car, but then only on test tracks/ skid pan type of places. I’ve always thought that allowing people straight onto the road in a two ton killing machine is utterly mad and where I live, on a big circular type of estate the driving instructors bring all their first time students here and most of them cannot control the vehicle in anyway that could be considered okish. Should get all that stuff out of the way off road somewhere…I should mention that I spent 3 years as a biker before realising my life would be very short if I continued but it instilled the awareness in me that has never gone.
The problem is access to such land. We have to do the high speed module one exercises on road because we do not have access to off road facilities. Land is expensive and schools cannot afford it.
As it is something I would consider a danger to the public I think such places could be found and supplied by the state for the use of schools for a nominal fee maybe just to cover costs. my dad took me up to the local heath to learn how to control a car before he would allow me on to the road with everyone else. My first driving instructor remarked on how well I handled the actual driving part during the first lesson so it is something that does work….or did in my case…
Solution is in your post: “[MC]..schools cannot afford it.”
Team up with private/public schools* who have large playgrounds.
* schools and any firm with large empty at some times areas.
Hotel & Pub car park & land 1500-1700 is where I learnt to ride/drive from age 13.
Well, yes, for CBT and the low speed module 1 exercises. The high speed exercises need a decent run up as they are conducted at 50kph. The average playground isn’t big enough.
The basis of a good idea is in there somewhere I think. The playground idea isn’t bad, (makes a bit of extra dosh for schools which can’t be a bad thing) but how about industrial estates that are not open at weekends? That happens to be where I took my son to learn…I’m just trying to think of ways of people learning without being a nuisance/danger to the rest of us and I’m not talking about the slightly advanced learners here. Strictly the people that have never been in the driving seat and tend to stall at turnings and bounce off down the road kangarooing all over the place.
I use trading estates at the weekend. The week days are a problem.
@Tony Halford
+1
As I said, I learnt off-road.
Bike: self-taught as no family/friends had ever ridden one. Fell off many times trying to change gear from 1 to 2.
Car: self-taught – father handed me keys to Landy and said “don’t crash”.*
Made
drivingpass test lessons & test easy as control already mastered.Agree with those who said car learners should not be on-road until control skills aquired.
* eventually I did – rolled it.
@LR
“High speed exercises are conducted at 50kph”
High speed? 50kph = 30mph. On any MC other than a <=50cc that is easily achievable in a secondary school playground, office car park etc.
I can achive 30mph on my bicycle on level ground in 200-300 feet.
Be positive and open minded.
It’s an expression used to describe these exercises, nothing more. Clearly you haven’t looked at nor tried to train module 1. I have and the playground we use is insufficient for a suitable run up. We are talking metres not feet here.
The exercises are set so that the students can carry them out at a consistent speed and not still be accelerating. For that you need in excess of 50 meters and another 50 or so for the cone layout. So the absolute minimum is going to be 100 metres. And we are talking novice riders here who haven’t long completed a CBT.
Oh, and just to add, 50kph is 32mph. At 30mph, they are going too slow.
FTFY – speed doesn’t kill
No and Yes. When CBT first came in I set up cones in car-park at minimum spacing and passed first attempt on GPz550H1, when became stricter did same on GPz900RA2; then again on ZZR1100C1 etc. For tight manoeuvrers using suspension bounce & motoX weight on foot-pegs helps.
Which is ~300 feet, not large. Find a larger playground.
Yep, another EU regulation stupidly adopted verbatim by UK instead of amending to 30mph. iirc there are others relating to higher speeds.
There is nothing stupid about it, so it doesn’t need fixing, thanks. Mod 1 is divided into two parts: low speed and high speed. I have every intention of continuing to use those definitions because the expression describes the two parts accurately and succinctly.
As I don’t own the schools I work for I do not have the luxury of just getting another venue. And to imply that this is somehow easy is simply wrong. One of my clients is currently trying to secure a venue for weekday training. Not only does it have to be suitable: i.e. good surface and big enough, the land owner need to be prepared to allow its use when we need it.
Yes agreed about EU legislation being implemented verbatim, but I’m stuck with it.
Do you think that the ATB owners haven’t considered any of these issues?
I never said it did.
https://www.longrider.co.uk/blog/2014/11/28/speed-kills-2/
https://www.longrider.co.uk/blog/2014/05/28/speed-kills/
https://www.longrider.co.uk/blog/2011/04/01/getting-the-answer-you-dont-want-to-hear/
There’s more if you do the search.
Thanks for links.
BRAKE is my most detested anti-motoring fake charity
Agree. On CBT
Yes, I’ve read LR’s and other excuses why not.
They are “not me” I’m xxxx whines. Tough, do it or no car licence.
Did I want to be restricted to 50cc at 16? No. So I didn’t ride on road.
Did I want to be restricted to 250cc at 17? No. However, good enough to accept until test passed.
Whiners: your choice to do or not do.
No, sorry but I cannot agree. Motorcycle experience certainly enhances a driver’s abilities just as truck experience enhances those of a novice rider, but it is not essential. This is not a whine but the professional experience of someone who has spent time teaching both types of vehicles.
I think I’ve said before that I have driven, professionally almost every kind of vehicle at one time or another and I’m in agreement with you on this.
While I agree motorcyclists need to take additional precautions (http://think.direct.gov.uk/motorcycle-partners.html)to ensure their own safety due to the appalling standard of driving on UK roads, anything that helps improve driving standards should be considered. However it is not simply about motorcycle awareness, it is about driver awareness generally and thinking ahead. It is quite clear that many drivers today do not think ahead and have absolutely no awareness of what is going on around them. These attributes need to be measured in a test and a lack of demonstration of these attributes should be sufficient cause to fail a test. A vehicle is a potentially lethal weapon and needs to be driven accordingly.
That’s what the hazard awareness part of the test is supposed to achieve. Although in my experience it leaves much to be desired.
Generally agree (and I ride my push bike with very much the view that everyone is out to kill me – see posts passim on this very topic!), but I fear that any such improvement will be at the margins:
– need to train everyone on the road, not just new drivers
– for a not insignificant (and growing?) group of drivers, a valid licence, insurance and roadworthy vehicle are delightful anachronisms. Denying a licence to these individuals will not stop them driving.
– I rather suspect that the group of drivers you really need to reach is strongly correlated with that group of drivers for whom a valid licence, insurance and roadworthy vehicle are delightful anachronisms
When my Youngest took his car test I thought I would try out the then newish fangled Hazard Perception test exercises on the CD Rom. Biggest problem i found with them was that it refused to recognise anything but, what I would categorise, ‘as a DIRECT and PRESENT LETHAL DANGER’ as a ‘hazard’. Within the first few seconds I had pressed the ‘hazard’ button maybe 5 times. Cars parked badly are a hazard, sun shining in your eyes is a hazard, small children toddling down the pavement not on leads are a hazard etcetc
An experienced driver will struggle with this test precisely for that reason. It’s a very simplistic test – a blunt instrument at best.
Or a test for ‘blunt instruments’, anyone who needs telling that a car braking suddenly in front of you is a hazard, can’t be the sharpest tool in the drawer.
I believe those are “potential hazards”. Then there are “developing hazards”. When the developing hazard reaches the really dodgy stage, that’s when you click.
I failed my theory test the first time round because I was too click happy for the system’s liking. Then on practise tests I failed several times not clicking because I was trying to (badly) anticipate when it wanted me to click rather than when I thought I should be clicking. It’s ridiculous.
Yes Youngest Dwarf did explain it that way too. However this older, wiser dwarf retorted: “there are NO ‘potential’ hazards. A ‘hazard’ is what comes directly before ‘oh shit we’re all gonna die!’ “
A vehicle is a potentially lethal weapon
Only if it is a Bavarian Murder Weapon 😛
Not the motorcycles though 🙂
Tell me about it; German Father-in-Law still bangs on about his wonderful BMW bike he had after the war and took all over the Alps. I think he said it had a ‘koenigswelle’ not a chain, which apparently was (is) the dogs gonads?
These days BMW do make bikes with chain drive. It isn’t natural.
As someone who cycles more miles in the year than she drives (by at least 5:1), my general rule of thumb is that anyone in a metal box is out to kill me. Fortunately none have yet done so despite some very close calls. Left hooks and dangerously close passes tend to be methods favoured.
What got me was:
1) Aged 19, so was he on a 125 or had he graduated to the 35kw engine output size? He was on his way to a bike meet, so I’d be inclined toward him being on something larger and more powerful than a 125.
2) Mother’s doing the heavy lifting on this. Portsmouth. Home of something navy. No talk of a father, so for whatever reason she seems to have raised him on her own.
So to the original article and that shows it was a wet evening and the accident happened on a residential street in April 2015 about 6 pm. Two cars involved.
http://www.dailyecho.co.uk/news/12914564.UPDATE__Tributes_paid_to_teenager_killed_in_motorcycle_crash/
What I see is an overweight kid with a pair of man boobs. Also transpires he worked for McDonald’s. So he lives with mum and is earning, so adding to my theory he was on a bigger bike.
Had he done anything to improve his upper body muscles? If not, then his weight combined with the bike’s weight may have been a factor. That and the fact he was with a mate going to this bike meeting.
What got me about the article was the mother’s quote:
“He was a friend as well as a son. He had a very good sense of humour. He was just an all-round amazing person.
“He was always thinking about me and would always turn up at the shop with flowers for no reason, other than to put a smile on my face.”
Putting a smile on mum’s face is all too rare. I only did it when I was after something… most of the time.
Now the interesting bit. Seems Mum also rides motorbikes, so could it be there’s an element of guilt going on here? Maybe.
What’s obvious is Mum has lost someone very, very special. Great compassion for her.
My own view is everything is a threat when you’re riding a motorcycle, scooter or bicycle. And it’s way worse during the rush hour and when it’s wet.
It seems the lad was a good sort. the comments on the article I linked to all confirm that. His mother may never get motorcycle awareness added to the test requirements, but she has raised our profile and for that alone I am very grateful.
What has upper muscle strength hot to do with bike crashes?
Well if you can’t figure it out with your towering intellect…
There’s no point dressing it up or mincing around the subject, upper body strength has no relation to.motorcycle accident rates. If you disagree, put your handbag down and prove it!
Once again you ignore what was actually said in order to construct your strawman. I have grown weary of your sanctimonious trolling. Not once have you engaged in a discussion in good faith, preferring to use logical fallacies and snarky ad homs in an attempt to make yourself appear clever and superior. You are neither. Do everyone a favour and go away.