17, 000 sign up to Times ‘safe cycling’ campaign

More than 17, 000 people have now signed up to the
Times campaign calling for safer cycling a few days after a man
in his 60s was killed by a coach while cycling through London.

The news came as The Times received official backing from the All-Party
Parliamentary Cycling Group, which pledged to push forward the demands made
in our Cities fit for cycling manifesto and will table an Early Day Motion
supporting the campaign in the House of Commons on Monday morning.

Ian Austin, joint chairman of the group, said: “I think the campaign is
absolutely brilliant. The parliamentary group backs the campaign and is keen
to meet people from The Times to discuss how we can get the issues on
the manifesto in front of the right people.”

Lord Sugar, the rower James Cracknell and the singer Florence Welch, all keen
cyclists, have joined the pantheon of famous backers, many of whom appear in
the Bike Britain supplement in The Times newspaper today. Welch said: “Me
and my whole family cycle and my father was knocked off his bike last year.
It was so traumatic for all of us, so understandably I am a huge supporter
of the campaign for safer cycling.”

They added their names alongside the Olympic champion cyclists Sir Chris Hoy,
Bradley Wiggins, Rebecca Romero, Victoria Pendleton and Chris Boardman, the
world champion cyclist Mark Cavendish, the TV presenters Gabby Logan and Jon
Snow, the actress Olivia Williams, and all major candidates for the London
mayoral elections.

The Times also received backing yesterday from the London Ambulance
Service, which sent cars and an ambulance to the scene of yesterday’s
accident.

The death becomes the tenth cycling fatality in Britain this year, and took
place just after 1pm on a busy junction on Bishopsgate in the City of
London. The cyclist, whose next of kin have been informed, was pronounced
dead at the scene. He had been involved in a collision with a Terravision
airport coach.

One witness described the “appalling” sight of a police cordon around a red
bike “broken in two pieces”.

Another witness said that they saw the man being dragged beneath the wheels of
the coach at the junction with Wormwood Street, and members of staff at a
nearby Boots store laid flowers at the scene as the debris was removed.

The driver of the coach, a 61-year-old man from Essex, was arrested on
suspicion of causing death by

To read the whole story, visit here: http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/public/cyclesafety/article3309631.ece

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