The scope for segregated cycling infrastructure on the Dutch model on this road is obvious. But the ideologues of the Cyclists' Touring Club only want to perpetuate lethal cycling conditions like this, pinning their hopes instead on ameliorating the conditions of vehicular cycling. This is a policy which can only lead to yet more carnage.
Or as Mikael puts it:
The theory about Vehicular Cycling has been around for more than three decades. The reason that vehicular cycling can not be considered any more than a theory is quite simple.
There is nowhere in the world where this theory has become practice and caused great numbers of citizens to take to the roads on a daily basis.
The hegemony of vehicular cycling in Britain simply results in events like this:
A man has been taken to hospital this morning (July 1) after a collision between a bicycle and a car at an A24 accident blackspot. The collision happened at about 5.30am on the A24 London Road, Stoneleigh, involving a red Renault Megane and a pedal cyclist.
Police cordoned off London Road between Briarwood Road and Sparrow Farm Road shortly after the accident. The cyclist, a man in his 30s, has sustained head and chest injuries and was taken to St George’s Hospital, Tooting.
A mother, who was passing by with a baby pram, said: “There is a car there, but we can’t see what happened. I’m not surprised there has been another accident - they always happen around here. I came along just to check it wasn’t anyone I knew.”
Last year, in November, an 88-year-old woman was left fighting for her life after being hit by a car at the junction of London Road and Sparrow Farm Road, on the border of Sutton and Epsom.
In September 2008, another cyclist, an elderly woman, was killed on the same stretch of road after being hit by a grey Audi A4.
