Too close to the Edge for safety
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CLOSE to the Edge, the title of a television film made for the Department of Transport's campaign to reduce road accidents to children in the 1013 age group, has a wider relevance than its immediate context. Three elderly women, all not more than 5ft tall, were killed by heavy lorries in the one-way system at West Brompton, London, because they walked too close to the front of the vehicles and were not visible to the drivers.
This led to RoSPA's publication, Care on the Road, to make rudimentary tests of the blind spots on a Foden 38 and a Leyland Constructor.
A 5ft 3in driver in the Foden could not see the equivalent of a 4ft child 2ft 9in from the windscreen, the lower edge of which was 6ft 41n from the ground. In the Constructor a 5ft 71n driver could not see a 4ft child 3ft Sin away, with the windscreen 6ft 2in above the ground. In each case vision directly ahead was obscured by the top of the steering wheel and the raised instrument binnacle.