Thursday 7 July 2011

Pavement Cycling not 'blameworthy'?

Just come across an interesting case concerning pavement cycling last
year in the High Court in which the judge made some interesting comments: [my emphasis]

http://www.bailii. org/ew/cases/ EWHC/QB/2010/ B11.html

"43. In my judgment, this piece of road was dangerous for all but the most experienced, traffic fast, confident and dominant of cyclists i.e. the 'serious' cyclist as Mr Ibbotson puts it, as opposed to the ordinary prudent cyclist using a cycle to go to work encumbered with his cyclerucksack.

44. In my judgment, although it is illegal for cyclists to use the pavement (unless it is specifically sanctioned by a local authority for shared use), when weighing up the danger to himself (cp danger to
pedestrians) it was a reasonable decision by the Claimant to ride on the pavements in this area rather than the road in the context of the duty of care owed to himself to take reasonable care for his own safety
whilst cycling. In my judgment, although illegal and potentially negligent in any action vis a vis a pedestrian, it was not "blameworthy" in terms of negligence in contributory negligence."

It would be interesting to know whether this has any implications for pavement cycling beyond deciding damagesas it seems to echo then Home Office Minister Paul Boateng's famous statement when pavement cycling FPNs were introduced that “The introduction of the fixed penalty is not aimed at responsible cyclists who sometimes feel obliged to use the pavement out of fear of traffic and who show consideration to other pavement users when doing so."

Friday 1 July 2011

East Coast Abolish £5 minimum spend on ticket website

My main objection to this limit is that it was applied after you had typed in all your credit card details, shoe size, mother's maiden name. A little programming tweak would have brought the warning up at a much earlier point in the process and saved irritation. East Coast's predecessor ignored me when I flagged this bug up, but fares guru Barry Doe has used his contact and achievd the better result of removal of the £5 minimum. I last fell for this bug buying a £4.20 ticket. I would have happily paid £5 to avoid the hassle, and finished up paying £5.20 to a competitor who charges £1 per transaction.

Thanks Barry, thanks East Coast (at last).