Very safe.
A couple of incidents today, what you would call close encounters of the very near miss kind got me thinking about other close calls I have had over the years. It was the fact that in the space of a few hours I had to brake hard to avoid first a cyclist and later a teenager on a skateboard that got me thinking about other near misses. And I realised how few such incidents I had had in the the last ten years and about 10 000 trips through this pedestrianised street. I could now count them on the fingers of one hand and still have a couple of fingers left over and that wasn't even bothering with the thumb.
The first of two today had happened as I was going up Fleet St, I approached a small section set aside for the parking of bikes. A young man had just got on his bike and he , without bothering to look round, set of. I braked firmly and a collision was avoided. By chance there was an other number 12 waiting outside the former post office for me to pass. The driver was one of those brave hardy souls who cycles to work and he held his thumb and forefinger about half an inch apart to indicate how close I and the cyclist had been, As I went past him I expressed the hope that he didn't ride his bike in a similar fashion, "Sometimes" was his answer. Right. Cyclists.
Later the skateboarder came hurtling down the slope at the Strand end just as I entered, again a sharp application of the brake reduced the speed of the bus down from 5 mph to zero in the space of a couple of feet and the youth on the board and the bus missed by inches. Which was lucky for him because running into even a stationary bus at 20 mph on a skateboard tends to ruin your evening.
Which is why we ALWAYS drive slowly in Fleet Street.
Two close encounters in one day and they say things happen in threes. Well not today. I was on my way to Newton and then back to the depot to finish. No more trips along Fleet St for me today. Probably just as well.
3 comments:
How safe is Fleet Walk? Very, as long as you don't waltz in front of a bus.
It's why they put big signs at either end, stating buses use the street.
I BET if you hit the cyclist, you would get it in the neck.
You bus and the land train drivers do a damn good job negotiating the area. It should never have been, or remain, engineered in this manner. You and your colleagues could factually tell the Highways Dept. here in Torbay how many really near misses occur each day with unwary pedestrians (numerous!)- let alone the dangers cyclists and skateboarders additional cause. But Highways here are so incompetent it won't make the slightest bit of difference.
Sorry Mr 'always writing on virtually every subject' Henderson but pedestrians do not read or necessarily understand road signs at either end! In addition many are holidaymakers, the very young or the elderly. They just don't expect buses and themselves to be mixed, separated by comparitively few black posts that tell them nothing (and cannot even be seen when it is busy with pedestrians) but are supposed to be the traffic separation' barrier.
The reason, and only reason Fleet Street is so safe is because we drive very slowly along it.
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