Poll: who is at fault here

Who was at fault?

  • Bike

    Votes: 102 36.2%

  • Woman

    Votes: 106 37.6%

  • Equally at fault, I've deduced that while sitting with a digestive biscuit and a steaming hot bovril

    Votes: 74 26.2%
  • Total voters
    282
Mercenary Keyboard Warrior said:
No thats all wrong

Its never been right for ANYONE to step into a road without looking.
Its why you were hopefully taught as a kid to apply the green cross code.
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I never said it had been right to just walk into the road. Do you drive? Do you crash into anyone that does something they shouldn't do or do you compensate for it. When someone on the motorway pulls into the tiny space in front of you do you stay 3ft from their bumper or pull back. When someone pulls out in front of you when you are overtaking do you just plough into them or do you slow down?

People do things you aren't expecting so you have to do your best to drive in a way that minimises the chances of you getting into an accident. If I am coming around a blind corner and the road is thin I reduce my speed so I could stop. Thats quite literally all this is. Taking sensible precautions.

Its not even slightly unreasonable to go very slowly when filtering through static traffic in this situation.
 
I would say both at fault but more toward the elderly lady. This is due to stationary traffic is still not a safe place to cross and this could have been avoided just from that. I would say the biker was travelling 20mph however while filtering should have been 10mph personally and the knock would have been much less painful. Either way both could have been in a worse situation such as driver opening car door, or lady getting run over by sudden moving traffic if a driver was not paying attention and quickly put foot on pedal without a thought of the lady. Multiple outcomes but thankfully nothing more than a bruise all be it a nasty one. lesson learnt by both parties.
 
Bug One said:
It's always the driver/rider with the more dangerous 'weapon' who bears the greater responsibility to avoid an accident.
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No it hasn't. That is complete rubbish. The person stepping onto the road should still watch for oncoming traffic. That video should she have tried to claim would have been thrown out by the insurance. I know because I have been in the same situation on my motorcycle when a lady decided to wonder between stationary traffic and I was filtering. It also isn't true because of the highway code changes that she is no longer liable for her actions because the first part for the pedestrian is still stop, look, listen because she would have stopped at the edge of the cars and then been avoided. This would have given two things. Chance for the biker to see and react accordingly, her not to get hit by following her part of the highway code. It doesn't give the pedestrian the right to just walk out into the street.
Colonel_Klinck said:
Filtering through traffic is one of the great advantages of being on a bike and is legal but I think its been set by the courts at around 15mph. So technically the bike is at fault if faster than 15mph, hard to judge his speed there. But she shouldn't be running though the traffic like that and not looking. He should have seen her far earlier as he can see over the cars, poor riding on his part not stopping sooner of even beeping his horn. So for me its the guy on the bike at fault.
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Not true at all. There is technically no speed limit for filering. However beliw is the 20:20 rule that is generally considered good observational riding and what police are generally suggested to consider. Which means if the traffic is stationary as shown in clip then 20mph would technically be following that guidance.

The 20:20 rule – filtering safely​

There is a school of thought that says filtering is safe as long as the traffic you are overtaking is travelling at no more than 20mph and you are overtaking them at no more than an additional 20mph.

This rule will cap filtering speeds at 40mph and it is thought that the police will not intervene with anyone filtering at that speed. Again, however, it is worth stressing that this is a school of thought rather than a hard and fast rule.

If a police officer determines that you are filtering unsafely, carelessly or too quickly, you could still be stopped, even if you haven’t broached the 40mph limit.
 
Zatoichi.uK said:
The expectation of not being hit by something is exactly what got her hit.

I'm all for 20mph limits and constantly stress about school run traffic speeds but even at 20mph the biker didn't stand a chance. She was completely oblivious to potential dangers and it could have cost her her life.
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And he was oblivious to the fact he shouldn't have been doing the speed limit in that location. As I said. Both in the wrong but hes the one who is going to hurt someone so the bulk of the blame goes to him. Its the same reason is far more serious when cars commit dangerous acts on the road than when cyclists or pedestrians do the same.
 
It's your responsibility as a motorist car/bike/truck to ensure the safety of more vulnerable road users.

Pedestrian > Horse Rider > Cyclist > Motorcycle > Car > Truck

Is I believe the correct order for who has priority over who, and the reverse is the order of which responsibility for an accident takes place.
 
Zatoichi.uK said:
Well sure if everyone went 2mph everywhere then there would be close to zero accidents. It's not practical to go so slowly that any random person jumping out into the road is always safe however.

Like I said, even if he was going 15mph she still would have been bopped. She is a moron.
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I never suggested everyone should drive at 2mph though. Just that the bike rider should have been going slower. I’m not a bike rider but have a number of friends who are, brother in law told me before that he literally crawls along through stationary traffic when filtering just in case some dozy headcase wanders out or opens a car door.
 
MadMossy said:
It's your responsibility as a motorist car/bike/truck to ensure the safety of more vulnerable road users.

Pedestrian > Horse Rider > Cyclist > Motorcycle > Car > Truck

Is I believe the correct order for who has priority over who, and the reverse is the order of which responsibility for an accident takes place.
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Just as it's your responsibility as a pedestrian to not negligently throw yourself into oncoming traffic without looking. Woman at fault and hopefully, having escaped serious consequence, she'll never do that again. You can be as aware of potential and actual hazards as you like, but if someone runs out into your vehicle inside your stopping distance, there's nothing you can do.
 
Thekwango said:
I never suggested everyone should drive at 2mph though. Just that the bike rider should have been going slower. I’m not a bike rider but have a number of friends who are, brother in law told me before that he literally crawls along through stationary traffic when filtering just in case some dozy headcase wanders out or opens a car door.
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I'll grant he should have been driving more defensively but even at 15mph he would still have been screwed. 10mph more and she could have been toast and all because she didn't bother to look.

Anyway going circular now so will peace out of this thread.
 
Zatoichi.uK said:
Legally it's fine. Even if he was doing the 20mph he claims which he may well have been she still ran into a road without looking. It's totally on her.

Bikers should ride defensively and it's possible his speed was slightly too high, I have no way of checking but you cannot account for people randomly running into a road. He had no time to react at all, even if he was going slower.
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It's a tricky one I don't believe it would be quite as clear cut as "the biker had priority". Whilst he was perfectly legally filtering, 20mph could have been the speed limit of that road, which if traveling in-between stationary traffic might be seen as a bit careless. It's not like filtering at 20mph on a motorway for example. Had he been filtering at say 10mph then they both may have seen each other before a collision occurred.

Either way, I guess we'll never know who's legally wrong unless she needs to claim injuries through the insurance.
 
I don't know. Bit of both really.

Lady should have been looking for filtering bikes, and the bike should not have been filtering in stationary traffic at 20mph.

If the lady looked more and the bike was going more like ~10mph the accident probably wouldn't have happened.
 
fez said:
I never said it had been right to just walk into the road. Do you drive? Do you crash into anyone that does something they shouldn't do or do you compensate for it. When someone on the motorway pulls into the tiny space in front of you do you stay 3ft from their bumper or pull back. When someone pulls out in front of you when you are overtaking do you just plough into them or do you slow down?

People do things you aren't expecting so you have to do your best to drive in a way that minimises the chances of you getting into an accident. If I am coming around a blind corner and the road is thin I reduce my speed so I could stop. Thats quite literally all this is. Taking sensible precautions.

Its not even slightly unreasonable to go very slowly when filtering through static traffic in this situation.
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yes I drive. And no I wouldn't undertake any of those actions, but they are somewhat different.
If a car pulled out in front of me without looking it would be the cars fault if we collided. Car, horse, bird, child whatever I would avoid the collision if I could.

The motorcyclist was using the road legally and the woman wasn't (well maybe not technically illegally but she failed to follow the prescribed pedestrian code for joining a road)
If she had just stepped out in front of a car whilst they were travelling at 30 it would be the same drivers fault in your example, you cant say its a bikers fault when using the road legally but it wouldnt be the cars fault.

So if you are forced to drive down a narrow road with cars parked each side how fast do you go. 1mph?, thats still fast enough to hit a little kid on a small bike / scooter type thing as you wouldn't see them.

I went on an advanced training course many years ago, where you were taught to not drive around any corner faster than you could stop within visible distance.


MadMossy said:
It's your responsibility as a motorist car/bike/truck to ensure the safety of more vulnerable road users.

Pedestrian > Horse Rider > Cyclist > Motorcycle > Car > Truck

Is I believe the correct order for who has priority over who, and the reverse is the order of which responsibility for an accident takes place.
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Indeed but its not a hard rule.
As in unlike NL where its automatically assumed the driver is at fault.

Eg if a pedestrian has STARTED crossing a road they get priority over a vehicle turning into that road.
If a pedestrian is waiting they should be given priority.

This woman didn't wait, she entered the road without even looking.
 
I'm going to put my neck on the line and say that they're both to blame. The pedestrian for not looking before crossing and the motorcyclist for filtering going too fast.

If I was forced to blame anybody, it'd be the motorcyclist. The traffic seems to be stationary, so the lady reasonably didn't expect any traffic to be coming towards her. If the motorcyclist had been going slower, they would have perhaps seen the lady crossing and had time to stop sooner.
 
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