Traffic lights which give cyclists priority over other vehicles have been installed at a notorious roundabout after the deaths of two bicycle riders within weeks.
The first system of its kind in London that gives cyclists a few seconds’ head-start before other motorists get a green light is now live at Bow Roundabout, East London, where two cyclists died within three weeks at the end of last year.
Brian Dorling, 58, and Svitlana Tereschenko, 34, were both killed by left-turning lorries at Bow Roundabout, on October 24 and November 11 last year, at the point where the Cycle Superhighway lanes lead cyclists on to the roundabout beneath a flyover.
The new design also separates cyclists from the main traffic-flow with a raised kerb. While a red light is showing for the main traffic lane, cyclists see their own green light, allowing them to move 12m ahead to a second stop line. Cyclists are then given their own green light for four seconds, allowing them to clear the turning before the traffic behind them sees a green light and moves off.
The Times’s Cities Fit for Cycling campaign is calling for the 500 most dangerous junctions in the country to be identified and improved, installing measures such as phased traffic lights where appropriate.
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Nigel Hardy, head of Capital Development at Transport for London, said: “There were two fatalities at this junction and the Mayor asked TfL to see what improvements could be made at this junction, and others along the Cycle Superhighways.
“The junction has been completed in terms of traffic layout and the lights have been switched on. This is the first of its kind in the UK. We’ve been making a few tweaks to the phasing during the day, but it has worked well with the morning traffic today.”
A number of larger vehicles clipped the end of the dividing kerb as they passed, but engineers on site confirmed they would be shortening it imminently in response. The cyclists passing through the junction were able to navigate the roundabout safely, though some seemed unsure how the new arrangement worked and were hesitant to take up their advanced position.
Engineers on site said they would be monitoring how the junction works over its first week, before considering any changes, such as signage to make the instructions clearer.
Part of the extra £15m given to London in the Budget to address dangerous junctions for cyclists was used to meet the £200,000 cost of the Bow Roundabout redesign, which took six months from design to completion.
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Mr Hardy confirmed that the cyclist-specific lights could be trialled elsewhere in London, with the northern side of Blackfriars Bridge likely to be one of the next sites.
Jenny Jones, the Green Party candidate who came third in the London mayoral elections, had previously described the junction as a “scandal” and earlier this year wrote to police to ask them to consider corporate manslaughter charges against TfL over the deaths of Mr Dorling and Ms Tereschenko.
Mr Hardy said yesterday: “If drivers comply with the new layout and cyclists comply with the red lights, then we have eliminated the left-turn conflict at Bow Roundabout.”
The new traffic lights have been installed at the very spot where Brian Dorling was killed last October. Mr Dorling’s wife Debbie, told The Times: “The TfL guys did talk me through it and it does sound good. Anything to make it safer and to stop the conflict between motor traffic and bicycles and stop lorries turning left into cyclists has got to be good.”
Mr Hardy said that the new design incorporates the full extent of what can be installed “within current Department for Transport regulations”.
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Mr Hardy explained that no formal pedestrian crossings had been installed at the junction because introducing a green-man phase for pedestrians on each branch of the Bow Roundabout was shown to create “mile-long tailbacks” reaching back westwards towards Mile End.