At night maybe 40% of cyclists in Oxford won’t use lights. Very occasionally, the police will have a spot check on Magdalen Bridge and fine cyclists £30 for not wearing lights. However, if you buy a pair of lights and present the receipt at a police station, you can get your £30 back – Pretty lenient really.
The police say they don’t do checks for lights more often because they can’t afford it. It sounds a bizzare thing to say, because if you fined cyclists £40 and didn’t give it back the next day, I’m sure the operation would be very profitable. If they did it every week, they may raise less because cyclists might actually start to use lights. But, isn’t that the whole point? The thing is cyclists, especially young cyclists don’t really feel there is anything wrong with not using lights, which is why the rule is flouted so often. Yet, it is a law worth enforcing.
It would raise revenue for all the New cycle infrastructure (OK, I mean raise revenue for refuse collection or whatever)
Would improve safety
Would improve the image of cyclists and give motorists one less thing to moan about.
Cyclists generally get a tough time – inconsiderate motorists, bad planning, useless cycle paths e.t.c. At the same time, cyclists create external benefits in the form of less pollution, lower congestion e.t.c. From an economic point of view there is a convincing case that people who cycle to work should be subsidised to reward the social benefit of cycling.
Yet, despite this, I would be quite happy if there were more occasions of the police fining cyclists without lights. I don’t think it would reduce cycle use that much. But, if people are too tight to pay £10 for lights then they deserve to be fined.
Then the question would be should we have greater fining of cyclists for riding on pavements / going through red lights / dangerous cycling.
Maybe, increased use of fines for dangerous cycling would help improve standards of cycling. I would support it, if it was reasonable and targeted at real infractions and not just for breaking the letter of the law. At the same time, if we have more fines for bad cycling, shouldn’t we have much greater fines for dangerous driving? It is not cyclists who cause 3,000 road deaths a year, it is generally bad / lazy / inconsiderate driving. Unfortunately, everyday dangerous driving goes unpunished – I sometimes wonder if drivers really appreciate the danger that they create.
Fortunately or unfortunately I am an economist and economists love taxes and subsidies. The idea is to make the free market more efficient. Unregulated, there will be market failure – people riding through red lights, not using lights at night e.t.c We don’t want an overbearing police presence targetting cyclists(who are not the real problem). But, at the same time, cyclists are sometimes allowed to do the wrong thing. Councils should do more to enforce basic road safety for both cyclists and all road users.
Do we need to take a stick to cyclists? Many Dutch cyclists travel in complete “safety” with no or faulty lights.
A lack of lights can increase risk, but does not necessarily make cycling dangerous. Most Dutch bikes come with lights built in – the Dutch police frequently fine cyclists on old bikes where the lights have broken after many years of use.
Removable, battery powered lights are forgotten – especially when trips start out in daylight. How many cars would be driven with no lights if drivers had to remember to put car headlights into their pockets each morning, when the driver may (or may not) be returning home after dark?
I read that the cycle shops in Oxford are complaining that people are buying lights to beat the fines and then returning them for a refund… So, why do the UK/Oxford bike shops not do what the Dutch shops do and fit a dynamo and lights as “standard”?
If the bikes are part of the bike they cannot be forgotten, and dynamo lights are not subject to batteries running out – though there can still be issues in the extreme cold and wet.
Utility Cycling is a system. Whist we rightly complain about the poor provision of cycle lanes and other facilities, few mention the fact that most bikes sold in the UK are simply not suitable for utility cycling.
The bicycle industry is as much at fault for low cycling rates as our councils.
@ Westfield wanderers.
True- plus some police seem to offer a ‘stern warning and let them off’ principle in a few cases which is not good. As long as there’s a real penalty then that’s ok. Attending courses in your own time (espectially if you have to pay the course fees) may well be more effective than 3 points and a £60 fine- £60 being not too much more than a tank of fuel these days and well within the ‘just another cost of motoring’ budget for a lot of people.
@ Dan.
I don’t agree. Poeple who drive inconsiderately tend not to ride at all- that’s part of the reason they drive so badly wrt cyclists- they don’t understand what it’s like.
It’s not just the formal ‘rules of the road’ I meant- things like road positioning just get ignored. People I know from work who (like me) are trained in defensive driving techniques and should know better ride far too close to the kerb, fail to anticipate etc, just what they’re trained not to do in a car.
When is a vehicle not a vehicle – when it has 2 wheels and no engine? No.
When is a law not a law – when I choose ? No
When is breaking a law not the real issue? – when I can get away with it ? No
Get on the road, on yer bike, behave appropriately and follow the rules for vehicles on roads (Highway Code ring a bell?). Anything you don’t understand? No.
Breakdowns in society start at very basic level. Disregard the Rules – pay! Be warned.
End
“It amazes me how many cyclists (who very often have driving licences) completely ignore the rules of the road which they use when they’re in a car as soon as they get onto a bike.”
Actually, I’m pretty convinced that it’s the same people who drive inconsiderately and dangerously who also cycle inconsiderately and unsafely.
Cambridgeshire police have a similar but extensive spot check scheme that they run at about this time every year, at key locations in town (mostly to catch students). In contrast to Thames Valley’s plea of poverty, they say it’s a big priority for them because the public asks them to. But the public (or at least the portion of the public who ride bikes) also ask them to enforce against motor vehicles parking in and driving along MCLs, but they never seem to quite manage that one.
mike, you said “Providing rebates on fines for cycling without lights is ridiculous and not at all in line with fines for other road users “.
Not strictly correct. There’s a well established practice among some police forces to waive speeding fines providing the driver consents to, and attends, an advanced driver training course run by the police. My local force runs regular training days for motorcyclists whom they’ve caught.
I’ve been on several! Not because I got caught, but because I was, at the time, involved in a motorcycle training scheme (this was before CBT training was introduced) and us instructors were invited to attend.
The courses were so much fun, especially the on-road observed rides (those motorcycle cops are amazingly skilful and enthusiastic) that I and my wife volunteered to attend for several years and we became great friends with some of the motorcycle traffic cops. The important thing is that we learned a lot and I sure we became better road users as a result.
Providing rebates on fines for cycling without lights is ridiculous and not at all in line with fines for other road users- in fact it gives moaning motorists another stick to beat us with.
Policing the laws which cause most hassle with other people- riding through red lights, riding with no lights and riding on pavements gives practical training on how to be a good road user as well as improving safety for all concerned. Ignore drivers, they are a seperate issue until cyclists get their act together- it amazes me how many cyclists (who very often have driving licences) completely ignore the rules of the road which they use when they’re in a car as soon as they get onto a bike.