Plea to drive with caution near bikes

Road signs warning motorists to keep 1.5m away from cyclists should be put on every main road in Hawke's Bay, a local cycling club has said.

Ramblers Cycling Club chairman Gavin Bush told Hawke's Bay Today he hoped more measures would be put in place to prevent accidents happening in Hawke's Bay in the future.

"Signs saying motorists should keep 1.5m away from motorists are very effective. I'd like to see them on every main road in Hawke's Bay," he said.

"It's a good message - the more signs we have, the better."

Mr Bush was commenting after a former club member David Joyce, who was involved in a horrific accident near Taupo a fortnight ago, said at the weekend that drivers needed to moderate their behaviour before more cyclists were killed.

Another Rambler Don Kennedy has been a member of the Hastings District Councils' cycleway strategy group since its inception in 2001.

The $6 million iWay project is being rolled out by the council, encouraging Hastings residents to cycle. Almost $4 million came from the New Zealand Transport Agency and more than $2 million from the council for cycle lanes, roading upgrades, community safety programmes and other initiatives.

Mr Kennedy said he pushed for the 1.5m signs - they helped change the attitudes of motorists who passed cyclists at the same time as oncoming traffic.

"The motorists won't brake - 9 times out of 10 they will go for the gap," he said.

Mr Kennedy was a submitter to the Hastings District Council's long term plan hearing last week, as was Dr Amy Symonds who showed a video of herself crossing the Chesterhope bridge over the Ngaruroro river on a bicycle. Major safety issues were evident.

Mr Kennedy's submission was for the council's need to continue with cycle safety initiatives when central government funding ceased in two years.

But the onus was not just on councils and motorists for safety, he said.

"Cyclists have to accept they should ride single file where appropriate, keep to the left of the road and wear high-visibility gear - just basic common sense."

Mr Bush said yesterday that he had been "horrified" to hear of Mr Joyce's crash. Mr Joyce and his wife Sirpa Lajunen, who now live in Taupo, were knocked off their bikes in a crash a fortnight ago and were airlifted to Waikato Hospital.

Mr Joyce told Herald on Sunday "badly behaved" drivers were putting lives at risk.

"I've had beer bottles thrown at me, young guys in their car breezing very close, people who beep the horn at you for no reason," he said.

Road cycling was one of the fastest growing forms of recreation in New Zealand but was dangerous because of the attitude of drivers, he said.

He suffered a cracked vertebra and shoulder blade, a dislocated rib and a large cut down his backside. His wife Sirpa is still in Waikato Hospital, having sat up for the first time on Friday. She has damage to five vertebrae and was bruised - "the blackest colour you could imagine" - down one side of her body.

"Drivers need to learn empathy, because it's always us that's going to get hurt. In Denmark, if you hit a cyclist and you're in the wrong, you go to jail. I'd like to see that happen here."

Joyce said the top-of-the-line helmets he and Lajunen were wearing were the difference between life and death.

"I remember lying on my back and trying to sit up, but I couldn't. Sirpa was screaming 'My back, my back'. I turned and looked at her and she was lying about 3m away, with the wheel around her head like a halo."

Until three years ago, the couple owned Revolution Bikes in Havelock North. Their son Sean Joyce, 21, was a professional cyclist in Europe.

Police have charged a 17-year-old man on two counts of careless driving causing injury and a 51-year-old man with counselling another driver to drive while their licence was revoked.

It is alleged the two vehicles were travelling in convoy in the same direction as the cyclists, after the son had bought a vehicle. The father pulled wide to avoid the cyclists but his son, driving a 4WD, allegedly hit them.