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Nearly half of the cyclists killed or seriously injured in London last year collided with a truck. Colin Barnett visits a firm taking steps to prevent accidents by alerting its drivers to cyclists.
One of the greatest nightmares facing truck drivers, especially those operating on crowded city streets, is getting an undertaking cyclist tangled in their wheels when turning left — and the cyclists tend not to enjoy the experience either.Apparently.46% of cyclists killed or seriously injured in London last year were in collision with a truck.
Of course, in theory, drivers about to turn left should be monitoring their nearside mirrors. In reality. however, it only takes a moment when the driver's attention is occupied by other hazards on the road for a cyclist to silently nip up the inside.
Vulnerability
Now, though. one major fleet operator is spending hard cash on efforts to greatly reduce the number of such incidents.With more than 900 mixers, predominantly long-wheelbase eight-wheelers. on the road and with many of those operating in redeveloping city centres, RMC Readymix is as vulnerable as any organisation to this situation.
It has equipped a new Seddon Atkinson 8x4 mixer with a number of features to make it more cyclist-friendly. Some will be fitted to all new and existing trucks, while others are the subjects of an operational trial.The new truck is awaiting deployment to an owner-driver in e New Year. at one of RMC's depots serving e London area,so it will have plenty of oportunities for real-life testing.
Although it has a policy of removing anufacturers' grille badges.R.MC's favoured hassis at present is the Seddon Atkinson, with ummins 340 and 16-speed Zr transmission, iding on Hendrickson rubber suspension at he rear. On four axles. the Seddon's payload dvantage allows a full 8m3 load in the Hyrnix rum.
From the rear of the vehide, the first thing in approaching cyclist sees is a large reflecive yellow warning sign at eye level on the ear nearside corner, warning riders that the truck's nearside is a danger zone during left turns, and not to enter it Probably unseen by the cyclist is the centrally-mounted reversing camera, the Brigade system that is fitted to all of RMC Readyrnix's fleet.
Moving forward,most of the new equipment is fitted to the space between the axles, An extra level of side under-run protection bar reaches to around six inches from ground level obviously, this would be impractical for certain site operations, so it can be raised by a quick and easy cantilever system, the process literally taking only a second or two to complete. Above this, completely filling the gap between front and rear mudguards, is a large yellow sign board reading -CAUTION! KEEP CLEAR" in six-inch high black letters.
Behind the side-guard, there is an electronic voice synthesizer,which loudly broadcasts the message "Caution truck turning left" whenever the left-hand indicator is operated.The prototype vehicle has a simple on-off over-ride switch for this function to allow silent operation of hazard lights for extended periods, although future versions will have a self-resetting switch Also attached to the side notice is a pair of small black devices, the motion sensors. These detect the presence of an object such as a cyclist moving into their field of view, and sound a loud warning buzzer in the cab to attract the driver's attention.
The final piece of the specification is a convex mirror mounted above the front left corner of the cab,giving a distorted but adequate view of anything right alongside or in front of the cab. This is in addition to the three existing mirrors; normal, wide-angle and ke view, already fitted, and is similar to those ri+ compulsory in the Netherlands.
Conflict prevention
Of the above list, the blind spot mirror and warning notices are joining the reversing camera as part of the standard spec. while tt others are being evaluated. Both sides still need to take care, but the whole shebang de pretty well everything possible to prevent conflict between the truck and two-wheele( road users. •