Well it seems since the  Fight Bad Driving has hit the media, people have been jumping to the wrong conclusions about the aim of the site. I suppose the name of the site doesn’t help (although the logo does portray all road users) but it was the only one available at the time!

The Sun wrote: “Cyclist snares careless drivers”
The Daily Mail wrote: “Cyclist wages one-man war against bad drivers by secretly filming them and posting clips online”
The Tameside Reporter wrote: “Cyclist snaps over driver behavior”

All completely out of context with what the site is about, and they fail to point that out.

Firstly, its not 1 cyclist. There are plenty of clips (more so these days) of other areas of the country – London, Birmingham and Ireland have all featured in the last week.

Secondly, I haven’t snapped, I am not waging a one man war, I am not secretly filming people, and I certainly don’t snare careless drivers. I don’t want to find out in three weeks time that someone has been crushed to death under a car at Denton Roundabout whilst crossing the road – knowing that I could have started questioning the council about the traffic light system there and actively trying to do something about it, rather than ignore what is definitely a problem at this roundabout.

Lastly, the side has been going for a good while and hasn’t just sprung up out of nowhere. The first clip was posted back in October of last year. Since then, the site has gone through a series of changes all for the better. It is slowly becoming a community and I invite everyone (drivers, cyclists and pedestrians) to submit footage to the site. If we all notice there is a serious blackspot we can do something about it – even just making people more aware is enough sometimes.

The above articles have also lead to some ridiculous comments and I’ve read a couple of forum posts about killing me like a dog and running me off the road and my wife accidentally stumbled across these. Really people. Really? All joking aside – thats not funny. Threats aren’t issued to the government when they run their drink drive campaign? There are lots of charities out there that advertise and campaign for safer road use too.

The video clips aren’t used for any form of malice – they are just here to make a point and draw out discussion. For instance – the big green boxes at the front of most road junctions these days (ASLs) are there for cyclists – allowing drivers the ability to see the cyclist in front and not have them in their blind spot – which is dangerous for both parties. Just because there isn’t a cyclist in front of you when you pull over the junction doesn’t mean their won’t be a cyclist there in 2 minutes.

So, the whole point of the site is to educate all road users and use the site as a tool to try and help make the roads safer. It seems we will meet with steep opposition from some road users along the way, and even local councils. Tameside Council told the press that they had never heard from Fight Bad Driving.

Whilst we all continue to use the roads with a wanton disregard for everyone else using them, we will continue to read stories about taxi drivers running over traffic wardens, truck drivers dying trying to help a stranded motorist who shouldn’t have been out on the road, Japanese students driving 4 miles with a dead body through the windscreen, people fainting at the wheel to get away with murder or closer to home, a collision between a cyclist and car on Ashton Old Road.

Lets just hope, that for all the hate out there, none of these stories, or similar stories EVER happen to any one of you.

This site has got the backing and support of some excellent people – cyclists, drivers, driclists (cyclists who drive) and motorbike riders. I’ve had some lovely discussions with newspapers and radio shows too – all positive stuff. I’ve even, if the comments are to be believed, had a person who was involved in one of the clips post onto the website – which is fantastic. He nearly hit the side of me whilst pulling out of a side road. It wasn’t his fault, it wasn’t my fault, nor was it the vans fault that was parked obscuring the drivers view – its the councils fault for the way they’ve laid out the parking bays along Manchester Road. But he had the courtesy at the time to get out of his vehicle and make sure I was OK and has even popped on here to support the site!

Compare this to a very impatient lady on Manchester Road last week who, for some reason, thought that, despite me travelling down a hill at 28mph, she could try and overtake me with an oncoming vehicle AND a van not 25 / 30ft in front of me. She then proceeded to drive erratically and dangerously behind me, leaving me unable to slow down. Couple that with the snow to the left of the road, the parked cars, the van in front (as mentioned) and a car coming out of a junction on the right – I thought I was going to die. Once she’d squeezed past me (I was still travelling fast and she overtook me with around a 6 inch gap) she then had the “courage” to slam on her brakes, wind down her window and tell me that I was taking up a car and a halfs space on the road, but before I had the opportunity to speak up for myself, she shot off.

I reviewed the footage when I got home, as, of course, if people point out that I may have been doing something wrong, I’d like to know and alter my ways for next time I am on the road. It turns out that this was not the case, I was riding sensibly, safely and nowhere near a car and a half’s width in the road (I think, had that been the case, I should have been cycling into oncoming traffic) and of course I have the video footage to show that.

And then we have this lovely story:

A motorist stopped at the side of me today in Ashton (14-01-10) and commented about the driver in front, who, with no regard for myself, decided it would be fun to try and turn into me on a 90 degree bend. This motorist said that he couldn’t believe what he’d just seen and bet the guy has never ridden a bike on the roads. A driclist? Probably. If not, a damn good motorist with his head screwed on.

Most drivers out there would support the cause, but those people, happy to discuss it with family, will rarely discuss it with anyone else out there.

I will continue with the site, uploading clips of potential dangerous junctions / roundabouts that I come across on a day to day basis, such as Denton Roundabout and Princess Street / Portland Street junction – with the sole aim of trying to get traffic calming measures for these areas, and I encourage anyone else out there to submit video’s to the site.

I’d like to take this opportunity to thank 99.99% of the road users out there that make my journey too and from work an enjoyable journey, and appreciate any patience that you have shown me, even though I’m just “A Road Tax Dodging, Pavement Riding, Red Light Jumping Lycra Lout”.

To the 0.01% of road users that don’t care  – please think before you act. We all have common goals in life.

If you have managed to read this garbled mess, then I leave you with a story:

“Sometime towards the end of last year, I was cycling up Manchester Road in Denton and I noticed a heavy amount of traffic. Being a cyclist that day I was able to slowly make my way forward. People where tooting their horns behind, obviously in a rush to get home.

What these people didn’t realise is that not much further up the road, a taxi driver had, what was being discussed at the time, as a heart attack at the wheel.

Lucky for everyone around, the driver had been coming out of a side road and hadn’t been doing any great speed.

I couldn’t find anything else out about this incident, and I did look, and on a blog whereby I post about my commuting and weight loss and how its helped me get healthy, this is the only entry I made for that evening:

Nothing much to say. My heart and best wishes go out to the taxi driver and his family, and hope that he fully recovers from the heart attack he had at the wheel on Manchester Road in Denton tonight.

Its at times like this, you realise your own morality.

Peace Out.

If you know of this person, that I would like to know the outcome if at all possible. It saddened me. It made me realise that at any time, any place, anywhere something could happen. It also changed the direction of this website for the better.”