Sensationalising is what the media do. Relatively minor incidents can be blown out of proportion, a small upward trend in crime can lead to hysteria about how we're not safe to go out on our streets. Sensible advice from the government gets labelled as the 'nanny state' dictating how we should live. This is common amongst tabloids - it's how they sell papers. Now online content is a source of revenue, similar tactics are used to generate visitors to a site. 'Opinion' pages are full of outlandish views we probably shouldn't believe, but we get sucked in anyway. Cyclists are a favourite target - they are already contentious - many cyclists are ready and willing to vehemently defend both their own actions - and any of their 2 wheeled brethren - from attack. The tactic is often to state how cyclists break the law - don't stop at red lights, cycle the wrong way, on pavements & how they all have a reckless disregard for the safety of themselves and others. Such articles find a publisher on almost a weekly basis. What I didn't expect though, was for the BBC to get involved in poking the hornet's nest.
It's clear from the title that 'The War on Britain's Roads' isn't going to be a rational look at what needs to be done to improve the safety and harmony of all road users. I did expect at least for this to feature in the concluding minutes. It does not, short of a taxi drivers wry comments that the best thing for all of us is if no one drives and no one cycles.
A lot of the footage is from helmet cameras - such footage is increasingly found on YouTube, of drivers who pass too closely to cyclists, who get out and get aggressive. The programme treats this as though it means cyclists are getting militant, or that they feel the need to have camera's as protection & the abundance of them is indicative of an increase in poor driver behaviour. Nonsense, it's indicative of an increase in cyclists & a decrease in the cost of such technology.
We see a video from CycleGaz where a taxi driver cuts in too close & Gaz slaps it to make the driver aware, leading to the driver getting out and angrily confronting him. Rather than focusing on whether the original manoeuvre was safe, what a safe distance to leave is or what cyclists and motorists can do to avoid such close calls, the programme chose to show the confrontation and analysis of this. Such incidents are rare - whereas the close misses happen all the time.
The programme continues in essence, as we have seen - looking at confrontation, from cyclists getting punched in the head, to police having to intervene in a grievance. There is a large amount of discussion around a cyclist who was unfortunately killed, and her mother's campaign for greater safety on the roads, especially concrete mixer lorries and other HGVs. This part is rare though - the programme's aim doesn't appear to have been to resolve anything, but to provoke a reaction from both the cyclists and the motorists featured.
Towards the end, this is exemplified by the showing of what I am led to believe was a commercially funded race of cycle couriers across London. Of course everyone condemned their risky behaviour, but what did showing this achieve - it's not typical, just as boy racers having drag races along dual carriageways are not typical of drivers. It's easy to show the obviously bad and get universal condemnation of it - what the show didn't do was explain what behaviours were seen by drivers as acceptable, yet felt dangerous to cyclists, or the behaviours cyclists engage in which they may not be aware unnecessarily antagonise drivers.
In sensationalising the issue & picking extreme examples, the BBC may have been successful in portraying a 'war' on the roads, but it was unsuccessful in showing the truth: The vast majority of interactions between drivers and cyclists occur without note - giving way to each other, overtaking safely, obeying the law. I would say that 90% of the cycle journeys I take pass without incident, and only 1-2% feature dangerous or reckless behaviour towards me rather than simple misunderstanding. It's what we can do to fix that which falls in the gap which concerns me - the drivers who don't know they are overtaking dangerously close, the cyclists who act as though they don't need to obey the law. If we can change the cultural norms that disregard safety on the roads, that is where the most lives will be saved. If cycling can be adequately protected, if drivers don't feel the need to overtake cyclists at any half-opportunity, if cycle infrastructure can be created that meets the needs of cyclists, we will get somewhere, not focusing on individual, isolated acts of aggression. 'The War on Britain's Roads' has been greatly exaggerated - it's mostly just blustering and hot air.
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