CyclingSheffield has highlighted the hazard posed by town’s tram tracks to cyclists, after a brand new map with crowdsourced knowledge revealed 806 separate incidents the place cyclists have been injured alongside the tracks, and has criticised the council of failing to implement security enhancements regardless of acknowledging potential dangers.
Simply in the previous couple of weeks, three cyclists have been injured — one breaking their arm, and one other two struggling dental accidents, having their tooth knocked out.
Marketing campaign group CycleSheffield requested their followers to log particulars of any tram-related crashes on the map, specifying whether or not the incident triggered damaged bones, a critical damage, or no critical damage.
CycleSheffield mentioned that the tram tracks have been “the largest reason for accidents and accidents to individuals on bikes in Sheffield.”
> Cyclists name for motion on Sheffield tram monitor
Dexter Johnstone from the group mentioned: “The overwhelming majority of crashes happen the place individuals biking are pressured to cross the tracks at angles lower than 90 levels. This primarily occurs at tram platforms and the place the tracks bend on or off the street, and will be seen on the map the place there are particular clusters of crashes.
“The council ought to have applied highways enhancements in these areas years in the past, utilising issues like tram cease bypasses and different minor highways alterations to permit individuals to cross the rails at a bigger angle.”
He added: “In the long term, the council must be designing and constructing a cycle community which is separate from the tram community.”
Sheffield Metropolis Council had permitted a Tram Cycle Security Motion Plan co-created with CycleSheffield in 2017. It proposed quite a lot of interventions, together with a complete program of design options on the 20 worst incident websites.
Nevertheless, since then just one a part of the plan has been carried out – putting in warning indicators for cyclists across the 20 worst websites.
> Sheffield bike owner accuses Supertram of ignoring potholes close to tram tracks
The council’s personal report from six years in the past reads: “The warning indicators won’t in themselves resolve the issues created by the [tram] infrastructure.
“If progress is to be made in drastically decreasing accident numbers different measures will likely be needed. These will must be designed and applied over the approaching years, beginning with the 20 worst websites.”
However none of those design adjustments to enhance crossing factors or to change the tracks themselves (which, in response to the plan, have been speculated to be full by 2019) have but been applied.
Based on Now Then, the council funding for the challenge got here to an finish, that means extra complete work to enhance bike security round tram tracks is now on maintain indefinitely.
Councillor Ben Miskell, chair of the Transport Committee, mentioned: “The security of all street customers, together with essentially the most susceptible customers similar to pedestrians and cyclists, is extraordinarily vital to us and that’s the reason we’re introducing some important adjustments to our roads and the way we use them via our Connecting Sheffield scheme.”
“Whereas progress on warning indicators has halted I want to guarantee cyclists that via Connecting Sheffield we’re designing out collision hotspots and constructing in safer biking routes.”
> Campaigners name for segregated cycle lanes on proposed Edinburgh tramway extension
Liz Glover, a bike owner from Sheffield mentioned that she got here off tram tracks twice — each occasions in rain and amidst site visitors, including that she “was fortunate to not be hit by vehicles behind me”.
“I have been cycle commuting for over ten years and these are the one accidents that I’ve had,” she mentioned.
One other bike owner Chris Rust mentioned: “You possibly can trip over tram tracks safely but it surely takes an incredible quantity of care and focus which is simply unreasonable to anticipate. Particularly if you end up additionally having to fret about site visitors, together with drivers who could also be impatient and don’t know why you might be using so fastidiously.”
Accidents suffered by cyclists on account of poorly designed tram infrastructure is just not distinctive to Sheffield. Final 12 months, we reported that the Metropolis of Edinburgh Council paid out £1.2 million in compensation to cyclists injured on the tram line, with 422 incidents occuring because the trams have been put in greater than a decade in the past, most of them on Princes Road and Haymarket.
A freedom of knowledge request revealed that 196 profitable claims have been made in opposition to Edinburgh Metropolis Council since 2012 by cyclists who suffered accidents or whose bikes have been broken after slipping on town’s tram tracks or getting their wheels caught.
In 2017, a 23-year-old medical pupil, was killed when the wheel of her bike turned trapped in a tram monitor and she or he was struck by a tour bus driver.
A neighborhood councillor had mentioned: “It’s outrageous that the council is aware of the tram line is harmful for individuals on bikes, however it’s paying out damage claims as an alternative of creating it secure.
“Until the council actually prioritises street security, and invests in making secure areas for biking, lots of extra individuals will likely be harm.”> MP says it’s “a matter of time” earlier than a bike owner is killed on stretch of Nottingham tramway
Cyclists in Nottingham had additionally gotten injured after falling on the tram strains. One bike owner who was crossing the street in 2016 required stitches after her glasses broke and received embedded in her head, prompting tram bosses to make adjustments to assist cyclists.
In Sheffield itself, the group CycleSheffield had arrange the web site Tram Crash for reporting on such incidents, with 228 of them reported in simply two years by 2016.
Dexter Johnson from CycleSheffield had mentioned: “Biking alongside a tram monitor is a harrowing expertise which places individuals off biking in Sheffield. The floor is more and more poor with quite a few potholes and little room for manoeuvre. Approaching tram platforms is a dangerous enterprise, particularly with autos passing too shut and too quick for consolation.
“The tram community is 20 years outdated and there’s no good motive why enhancements to cut back cycle accidents haven’t been constructed by now.”