Showing posts with label road safety. Show all posts
Showing posts with label road safety. Show all posts

Monday, 29 October 2012

Commuting after dark

On Sunday morning, the clocks went back; which means many fewer concious hours in daylight for the next few months.  My next evening commute in daylight will be be Feb/March time & from the back end of November, I'll have six weeks of commuting in the morning in darkness.
When working office hours, the first commute in the dark comes as a shock since it'd been light until six on Friday & today it was getting  dark as I was leaving work.  & the first nigh-time commute of the season is always a little anxiety provoking; especially with a new bike.  I also had the opportunity to try the lights in anger for the first time, as well as to see whether traffic reacted differently.
The opening 2km were a huge traffic jam that took me nearly 20 minutes to clear (I really don't want to filter just now).  Whilst that was annoying, it was a good opportunity to test how well I was being seen.  The answer was, as ever in the VM, far too well.  As the road opened out, I held primary at 40 ish km/h & traffic held back & passed wide when it did go past.  So I was either far more visible than I normally am on the road, or it was magic...  Despite the comments of someone who is clearly a risk to bollards, children and prams (NSFW language used in link, be warned!), I'm going to guess that it was the former.  I have never had road room like I did today.  OK, it helps that I'm holding a bit more speed, but even so.  Tonight, on a bit of dual carriageway, a driver slowed and flashed me out having noticed the roadworks in my lane.  Said driver can only have had me in his eyeline for less than 2 seconds &, as he passed, I saw that it was a black cab driver: not your stereotypical cycle-concious driver.  (Chapeau, sir, if you are reading this, that was a courteous & aware piece of driving).  & a bus driver picked me in his side mirror from 50+m away (I was slowing to let him out of the bus stop (partly out of politeness & partly in fear that he hadn't seen me), but he didn't pick that I was slowing.  I had to actually stop for a couple of seconds before he moved.  I'm guessing he saw me, despite being in a huge vehicle with limited visibility, poor lighting for night vision & a huge number of distractions).
Night commuting by velomobile is OK, then.  It takes a chunk more concentration and I am really glad I got mirrors on both sides, but I didn't feel worried at all once I got going.  Once again, it outperforms my other machines by a good margin as a commuter.
So if you hear someone tell you that VMs or recumbents are difficult to see (or that the riders "would be better off going to Dignitas"), point them in this direction & point out that thousands of Glasgow drivers can see me incredibly clearly, even in the dark.  If you, as a driver, can't see recumbents, maybe it's time to stop driving since you appear to be in 99.9th percentile of incompetence...