I have no confirmed reports, but Twitter users (and London Fixed-gear & Single Speed forums) are reporting two incidents involving cyclists on Brixton Road.
One incident occurred at approximately 7:20am at the top of Brixton Road/Camberwell New Road (near Oval tube station) and involved a male cyclist, a bus and a petrol tanker. The road was closed for the rest of the morning, but the incident is not reported to have been fatal.
Another accident occured this morning further south on Brixton Road, involving a female cyclist, which is again not reported to have been fatal. Stockwell News mentioned an incident allegedly concerning a cyclist and a lorry (which may be the southern incident). I hope the cyclists did not sustain major injuries.
In addition, another Twitterer/Tweeter/Twitter user (what is the correct noun?) reported an incident involving a motor bike on Clapham Road outside Greggs and Pearl Pharmacy at about 11am this morning. That's down in Stockwell, so I can only refer you to Stockwell News for further information.
I'm particularly concerned about the number of road accidents in and around SE11 at the moment, and further concerned that many of the incidents seem to involve cyclists. (Please don't use my blog to moan about bad cycling. There are bad cyclists and bad drivers and both are to blame). I'd call on TFL to consider segrating the cyclists from the rest of the vehicular traffic, but I know that major arguments exist between cyclists as to whether this is the safest option.
I haven't (and cannot) report all local accidents since many are not serious and do not make the news, but people frequently search Lurking about SE11 for mention of incidents so I can see that they are frequent. I'm fairly certain that there was a road accident on Bowling Green Street yesterday, and I know that there was a road accident on Kennington Road last week, involving a police vehicle. I know that Lambeth Council are investigating the possibility of 20mph zones, but I do not imagine that these would include the major roads (Kennington Park Road/Clapham Road or Kennington Road or Brixton Road or Camberwell New Road) and these seem to be becoming accident hot spots. Does anybody have any further data on accidents or information about the wellbeing of the cyclists mentioned above?
"There are bad cyclists and bad drivers and both are to blame." Indeed. Regardless of the street, intersection, or city, these events are inevitable and one (or both) of the parties should assume responsibility of the accidents. Another thing to point here might be the location itself (poor traffic, lack of signs, etc.) In any case, we can all hope that the welfare of the cyclists, together with the pedestrians, gets more attention.
ReplyDeleteI believe everyone who uses the road should learn to be responsible. When this happens, I wouldn't be surprised if the number of road accidents would dramatically go down.
ReplyDelete