WEBVTT Kind: captions Language: en 1 00:00:03.990 --> 00:00:07.810 This is Ipley Cross, in the middle of the New Forest, in south-west England. 2 00:00:07.810 --> 00:00:11.400 I couldn't find any official statistics for the most dangerous crossroads in Britain, 3 00:00:11.400 --> 00:00:13.690 but this is certainly a contender. 4 00:00:13.690 --> 00:00:16.680 Because even though it's quiet and rural here, there's not much traffic, 5 00:00:16.680 --> 00:00:20.060 there's an average of two incidents a year here. 6 00:00:20.060 --> 00:00:23.860 Two cyclists have died in the last ten years in near-identical crashes: 7 00:00:23.860 --> 00:00:26.580 both times, a driver failed to stop 8 00:00:26.580 --> 00:00:30.279 and hit a cyclist who had right-of-way on the main road. 9 00:00:30.279 --> 00:00:32.330 But the visibility is excellent here. 10 00:00:32.330 --> 00:00:35.360 It's well-signed. Actually, really, really well signed, 11 00:00:35.360 --> 00:00:38.980 now I'm here it's obvious there's a lot of road markings for such a rural junction. 12 00:00:38.980 --> 00:00:41.840 But people keep getting hurt here. 13 00:00:41.840 --> 00:00:43.540 So why is it so bad? 14 00:00:43.540 --> 00:00:46.500 For the research here, I'm indebted to someone called Bez. 15 00:00:46.500 --> 00:00:48.880 That's the only name I could find, I couldn't track them down, 16 00:00:48.880 --> 00:00:50.600 they didn't reply to messages, 17 00:00:50.600 --> 00:00:55.850 but Bez wrote the definitive article on why this place is such a disaster. 18 00:00:55.850 --> 00:00:59.190 Let's say there's a driver approaching on the side road at around 40mph. 19 00:00:59.190 --> 00:01:01.640 They're not slowing down, because they're reckless, 20 00:01:01.640 --> 00:01:03.740 and they can see the main road is clear. 21 00:01:03.740 --> 00:01:04.700 Here's their view. 22 00:01:06.040 --> 00:01:10.220 The cyclist, until the very last second, was exactly in the blind spot 23 00:01:10.220 --> 00:01:12.630 caused by the driver's door pillar. 24 00:01:12.630 --> 00:01:15.640 The driver didn't slow down for the stop sign, which would have shown them the cyclist. 25 00:01:15.640 --> 00:01:18.591 They didn't move their head, which would have shown them the cyclist. 26 00:01:18.591 --> 00:01:21.460 The speed involved doesn't have to be some magic bad number. 27 00:01:21.460 --> 00:01:23.520 Because of the angle of these roads, 28 00:01:23.520 --> 00:01:27.960 for every possible speed that a reckless driver might be travelling at, 29 00:01:27.960 --> 00:01:31.240 there is a reasonable speed for a cyclist on the main road 30 00:01:31.240 --> 00:01:34.960 that'll keep them right in that blind spot all the way. 31 00:01:34.960 --> 00:01:37.249 But why won't the cyclist see the car? 32 00:01:37.249 --> 00:01:41.640 They have right of way, yes, but surely they'd notice that the car's not slowing down. 33 00:01:41.640 --> 00:01:44.820 Well, if these two roads were crossing at right angles to each other, 34 00:01:44.820 --> 00:01:46.240 yes, they would see them. 35 00:01:46.240 --> 00:01:48.940 Don't get me wrong, the driver would still be reckless, 36 00:01:48.940 --> 00:01:52.859 but at least the cyclist would notice and be able to take evasive action. 37 00:01:52.859 --> 00:01:55.460 But these roads aren't at right angles. 38 00:01:55.460 --> 00:02:02.170 There's one other subtle thing here: in this situation, the car is approaching from behind the cyclist. 39 00:02:02.170 --> 00:02:04.569 The cyclist won't see it until it's too late. 40 00:02:04.569 --> 00:02:08.580 And even if they do, when both car and bicycle slam on their brakes, 41 00:02:08.580 --> 00:02:10.940 simple simulations don't work any more . 42 00:02:10.940 --> 00:02:15.100 Because it's not up to trigonometry at that point, it's up to human reactions 43 00:02:15.100 --> 00:02:17.580 and how both of them try to avoid the collision. 44 00:02:17.580 --> 00:02:20.810 This junction is at the worst possible angle. 45 00:02:20.810 --> 00:02:23.400 And it happened by accident: you can see on old maps 46 00:02:23.400 --> 00:02:27.520 that this was just the angle at which two paths happened to intersect, 47 00:02:27.520 --> 00:02:30.980 and those were the paths that happened to become roads over time. 48 00:02:30.990 --> 00:02:35.260 This wouldn't be built nowadays: but at some point in the early 20th century, 49 00:02:35.260 --> 00:02:38.220 before it was possible to travel by road at these sorts of speeds, 50 00:02:38.220 --> 00:02:41.170 this was a reasonable junction. 51 00:02:41.170 --> 00:02:43.360 The local council has made some changes. Not only the paint: 52 00:02:43.360 --> 00:02:48.680 but you can see on Google Street View that the signs here used to be 'give way', not 'stop'. 53 00:02:48.680 --> 00:02:50.180 Stop signs are really rare in Britain, 54 00:02:50.180 --> 00:02:53.540 they're only meant to be used in exceptional circumstances like this, 55 00:02:53.540 --> 00:02:56.020 and almost everyone just rolls through them anyway. 56 00:02:56.020 --> 00:03:01.120 And they're clearly not working, because people keep getting hurt. 57 00:03:01.120 --> 00:03:02.940 So why hasn't it been redesigned? 58 00:03:02.940 --> 00:03:05.100 Speed bumps or a chicane on the approach would solve the problem, 59 00:03:05.100 --> 00:03:08.660 but it's not legal to have those unless you also have street lighting, 60 00:03:08.660 --> 00:03:12.930 which would mean laying miles of new electrical cable at enormous expense. 61 00:03:12.930 --> 00:03:14.540 That's assuming you could get around all the regulations 62 00:03:14.540 --> 00:03:17.020 that define this area as a conservation area, 63 00:03:17.020 --> 00:03:20.280 and the objections from the locals about putting bright lighting 64 00:03:20.280 --> 00:03:23.260 in a place famed for its dark skies. 65 00:03:23.260 --> 00:03:25.730 Same problem with a traffic light. 66 00:03:25.730 --> 00:03:29.940 The best solution is to stagger the crossing, to curve the two side roads 67 00:03:29.940 --> 00:03:35.300 so they meet the main road at right angles, force the drivers to slow down. 68 00:03:35.300 --> 00:03:37.300 But again: conservation area, conservative locals, 69 00:03:37.300 --> 00:03:41.510 and a budget estimated at around £100,000. 70 00:03:41.510 --> 00:03:43.300 The cheapest and easiest way to solve it, of course, 71 00:03:43.300 --> 00:03:46.760 would be for drivers to stop at the stop sign. 72 00:03:46.760 --> 00:03:51.940 But road safety, and anyone's safety, shouldn't require faith in human nature. 73 00:03:53.060 --> 00:03:54.820 Thank you to Bez, whoever you are! 74 00:03:54.820 --> 00:03:56.800 The research for this video started with that article, so 75 00:03:56.800 --> 00:03:59.160 I've put a link in the description, please do go and read it.