We have been assaulted in the media as of late with reminder advertisements that all motor vehicle drivers should look both ways and think bike at every junction. No doubt in a vain attempt to reduce the number of road incidents involving motorcycles and to reduce the need on the emergency services. This in itself i have no objection to, the premise is sound, look and ensure that you have a clear road ahead and in your intended direction before making a manouvre and do so safely taking into account other road users and pedestrians, simple driving experience gains this. However, they still want to remind us about motorcyclists, and there is only one reason for this, with the exception of some more advance trained riders the majority of motorcyclists are suicidal berks! and that is the nicest way to put it.
Now ofcourse this is a generalisation but the need is there to do this, anyone who goes out on a motorcycle is already taking their lives into their own hands and should not expect to survive any incident they may be involved in, the only thing between a rider and the incident is fresh air and whatever they are wearing which in most cases is scantly anything.
No the problem definately lies with the riders that are out in good weather, inexperienced show offs, clad in nothing more than jeans and a jacket. These riders are why the adverts exist in the first place, the majority of accidents it sounds like are from motorists in four wheeled vehicled making indicated turns and riders just appearing out from another direction and colliding with them. The blame however cannot be put with the vehicle driver but the rider, on many many occassions there have been incidents where a motorist starts a manouvre on a completely clear road to seconds later hitting a motorbike who has swerved to illegally overtake or undertake at speed, and in 90% of these incidents the rider comes off much much worse, as they only have minimal protection their injuries are severe, broken bones, internal bleeding, dismemberment and beheading to name but a few with body parts strewn for metres...
The main problem then is with the riders not the drivers, the riders (and this is from my own experience and the occupation i am in) are known to take risk and ignore road rules. As an example, on my drive in today alone - riders ignoring road markings that dont allow overtaking, speeding at least 10-15mph faster than the road limit, showboating swervinig in and out of moving vehicles cutting infront of trucks and cars at scary distances whilst on the move. Dressed in shorts trainers and the like. they are now called "organ donors on wheels" in our house and sometimes in the office.
Perhaps rather than targetting money to advertising drivers to look out for these riders who have no regard for others the money would be better spend on policing, traffic cameras, hotspot monitoring. In my humble view, the thousands that it has cost in production and air time for the reminders would be better spend on reviewing the motorcycle licensing test, implementing video monitoring at known hotspots (mobile units probably best so they can move as traffic builds in vulnerable locations), introducing better penalties for the riders and educating them. it is not good enough to out the onus on the humble driver, aking them feel guilty if a rider undertakes a suicide manouvre at the last minute in the hopes they miss you that you are made to suffer. Increase motorcycle insurance premiums to keep them off the road and increase their tax to pay for the cleanup when they inevitably do come off, the jet cleaners to clean the road of hazards and the undertakers to take them to their final resting place. The culture of younger people getting a motorcycle as cheap transport then riding like madmen must be kerbed before it should impact regular trained drivers...EOL
0 comments:
Post a Comment