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Life paint

volvolifepaint.com

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Retro reflectives and their impact on accident rates is still pretty contentious within the bicycle community, and personally, I think it gives people a false and very dangerous sense of security and visibility.

As a daily bicycle commuter and motorcyclist, the only rule I follow is that I am invisible when on two wheels. So I ride in a way that makes me safe, and that usually means doing things that most people would probably find dangerous.

In over 15 years of daily commuting (yes, all through the winter, too) I've been hit a half dozen times. The majority of those accidents were intentionally caused by the car driver, only a couple were truly faultless. None of them were the result of the driver not seeing me, they were all the result of the driver behaving badly.

A reflective jacket or spray isn't going to do ANYTHING if the driver decides that they own the lane and they're okay mowing you down to get it. That to me is the big flaw with any conspicuity safety measure, it relies on drivers actually being aware of the road around them and honoring your use of it. At least around here in DC, those two things are seldom present.

Most riders are foolishly naive about their safety. Traffic laws aren't going to keep your head from bouncing off a hood, and a reflective vest isn't going to make the driver put down their cell phone and pay attention to the road.

As an experienced bike commuter, I wonder how you feel about an issue that bugs me. When I was young I was taught to ride against the flow of auto traffic so that I could see cars coming. When I taught my kids I told them the same thing, but that has been countered by every other authority they have come into contact with, all of which instruct them to follow the same rules as cars, including riding on the same side of the road. I do all my riding on a trail, but my personal feeling is that if I were riding on a road I would not ride with car traffic. However I know people who have been ticketed/warned about riding against. If you really follow a rule that you're invisible when riding, then it would be hard to justify riding with auto traffic, rather than against, wouldn't it?

The rule of thumb that I've heard is to walk against traffic if there are no sidewalks or dedicated space, but always to ride your bicycle with traffic if there are no bike lanes. You might be practically invisible to motor vehicles, but as you've noticed, traffic regulations often consider bicycles the equivalent of cars for all intents and purposes. Until the tide changes for cyclists and dedicated infrastructure improves, I think people are stuck with the cards they've been dealt for traffic regulations.

One reason to ride with traffic is that you give the driver more time to react to you. If a driver is going 40 mph and you ride 15 mph, if you're going the same way the speed delta is 25 mph. Going the other way makes the speed delta more than double (or 55mph).

This is true, and a reasonable point, although it still puts the outcome nearly completely in the driver's hands, which is the part I have a hard time getting past. Given the number of people I see talking on their phones or otherwise distracted and weaving a couple of feet here and there, it wouldn't really take much to end up a hood ornament.

Riding with traffic doesn't put the outcome in the drivers hands, your still responsible for paying attention to cars behind you and not, for example, pulling out in front of them. Even if it was completely in the drivers hands, I'd would rather they have more time to deal with it. And if nothing else, I'd rather become a hood ornament at 25 mph than at 55 mph

If you ride on the wrong side so you can jump out of the way in front of a car to survive, some drivers will expect you to do exactly that. This is a game much more dangerous than vehicular cycling.

Edit: also, don't expect other cyclists to endanger themselves by swerving into overtaking cars for an against the flow rider. They might even consciously chose a good head-butt with the other rider over ending under a car. In other words: you should be _really_ ready to jump.

It might seem counter-intuitive, but you are much safer riding with traffic than against it. Drivers are conditioned to look in the direction of traffic and they aren't going to expect someone coming the other way. This ends up causing a lot of accidents at intersections and parking lot entrances.

In my area, [these accidents](http://bicyclesafe.com/#wrongway) are way to common. I almost hit a biker like this the other day because they were riding against traffic past my apartment entrance.

[Here is a stack exchange question with some more stats on the topic](http://bicycles.stackexchange.com/questions/9033/why-is-it-s...)

The way it was explained to me was that drivers have a harder time estimating the speed of fast-moving objects that are differently sized than an automobile, such as bicycles and trains.

Meanwhile, bicycles that go with traffic will (relatively) approach the driver at a much slower speed, giving the driver more response time.

The problem with against-the-flow is that it's unexpected to cars that are making a right turn.

The other day, I was coming out of an alley, turning right on to a one way street. I'm turning right, so I expect all road traffic to be coming from my left. That's the direction I'm focused on in making my right turn.

Now, I always check to the right, but I never really expect to see anything. When I did actually see a cyclist zinging up from my right, it kind of gave me an adrenaline jolt. He was never in any danger, my car was fully stopped and never moved: but it was so unexpected to see him there, that i kind of went "oh god, I almost ran him over".

Point is: if safety is your concern, then probably the safest thing you can do is to follow the same laws cars do. Be where a driver expects to see another car.

If anything, riding against traffic in the lane of traffic freaks out drivers and their reactions to it aren't always good (there are bunch of contra flow dedicated bike lanes in DC, so I'm not talking about those). I find the drivers are actually worse at gauging distance on drivers side of the car and will drive past you dangerously close. It may also be illegal outside of dedicated lanes (not to say that I don't regularly ride one-ways the wrong way, but that takes a different level of awareness).

The other issue with it is that it severely reduces your options. When riding with traffic, you can take the entire lane if necessary, something I have to do several times on my commute because the traffic flow around me is dangerous if I don't. Riding against traffic means you're stuck riding the gutter, somewhere I actively avoid on city streets if only to save my tires.

I don't ride with headphones, and shoulder check constantly to maintain awareness of what is behind me. My hearing has saved my ass several times (nothing quite gets your adrenaline going like hearing the roar of cabbie flooring his Crown Vic behind you in an attempt run your ass over).

Bicycling, like motorcycling, requires constant vigilance and awareness, it's naive to believe otherwise. It's tough to do and lapses happen all the time, but on a bicycle you don't have 5,000 lbs of metal and electronic nannies, just your wits and senses. And a U-Lock if it comes to it ;)

When I as a child, I was struck by a car while riding my bicycle. I was riding against traffic, and the car that struck me as making a right-hand turn from a side street. They were looking left at oncoming traffic, and not to the right, where I happened to be at that moment.

It's ingrained in drivers to pay attention to the source of traffic in such cases, a sort of optimization tree for their merging decision. If you're traveling against traffic, you're an outlier not considered in others' equations, and you're at risk of injury.

"Ride like you are invisible" is a philosophy, not legal advice. As you say, it is illegal in every jurisdiction in the US that I know of to bike against traffic (baring contra-flow bike lanes, which are quite a different thing). I have been hit once in 20 years of riding cautiously (but speedily) with the flow of traffic, and that was an inattentive driver, not anything about my style of riding (I was stopped at stop sign, ironically enough).

In most places I'm familiar with, when you are riding on the road, you're a vehicle. That means riding with traffic. (How do you ride against traffic if you're "taking the lane"?)

>In over 15 years of daily commuting (yes, all through the winter, too) I've been hit a half dozen times.

I don't know anything about your situation, but with respect, this seems extremely high to me.

>the only rule I follow is that I am invisible when on two wheels.

The strategy that I take to counter this is to actively make myself visible. Not only with lights but also with my actions.

If there is a tight squeeze coming up, I will take the centre of the lane and proactively block vehicles from passing dangerously if necessary. (The same if there are parked cars that may open their doors)

http://www.ctc.org.uk/blog/julie-rand/why-wont-cyclists-take... has more advice on taking a visible position.

5 yrs of driving been hit 2x (knocked off my bike) both times because the driver didnt see me beside his car. 2 other times hit by doors opening into the bike lane (nyc at nighttime). At night, i always have front and rear blinking lights. Although lifepaint seems awesome, none of my accidents would have been prevented either

I occasionally cycle in London.

There are two schools of thought to making cycling safer:

1) Make cyclists brighter and more armoured.

2) dedicated infrastructure.

Option 2 is much more costly and harder politically, but is the only school of thought worth taking seriously. Look at places such as as Amsterdam and Copenhagen where cycling is common and safe (1). Do they rely on helmets and glowing things? No they don't. Lots of ordinary people cycle in regular clothes on dedicated separated cycle lanes.

Yes, you'll be safer if you stand out by being brighter than everyone else. But new and interesting ways to ramp up the brightness wars are a frivolous distraction from what cyclists in London need. You should not need to "look like cross between Darth Vader and a Christmas Tree" (2) in order to ride a bike.

At lot of the current infrastructure is terrible:

Advanced stop line? You mean that white mark on the road with a minicab over it.

Cycle "superhighway?" You mean that blue stripe underneath the buses and trucks.

1) http://www.theguardian.com/cities/2014/oct/16/copenhagen-cyc...

2) http://lcc.org.uk/articles/cycling-what-not-to-wear-1

Still, for people or organizations who have no measurable ability to affect infrastructure, but have the ability to make protective or high-visibility gear, doesn't it make sense to do so?

How well does that high-vis gear sell in Copenhagen?

Even if it does make financial sense for these organizations to sell their glow-sticks in London, it doesn't mean that it is in the interests of the rest of us to agree with the idea that it's the answer? It isn't the answer.

> How well does that high-vis gear sell in Copenhagen?

I don't know, but it's not relevant.

> it doesn't mean that it is in the interests of the rest of us to agree with the idea that it's the answer.

Of course not. Like any product, each of us can decide whether it is worth more to us than the money required to acquire it.

> but it's not relevant.

The point is, if a city does cycling well, extremes of hi-vis gear become irrelevant. The endless focus on hi-vis gear is a distraction from getting to that state.

The good examples of Copenhagen and Amsterdam are relevant to that.

When the mayor or some other official suggest that cyclist need "more shiney" and to "keep your wits about you" (1) it is a way of fobbing off with cheap placebos.

I don't entirely blame a company for promoting their product, but calling it a "solution" is wrong, and seeing this "solution" roundly rejected here is encouraging.

1) http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/boriss-comments-...

They even have a hard time selling reasonable bike lights, because people feel safe enough with tiny little occasionally blinking magnet/coil contraptions that are giving the absolute creeps to any cyclist that has grown up breaking German StVZO all the time. (StVZO: technical regulations for anything on the road, the bicycle part is like JavaScript: lots of cruft, but a few really good parts)

There is one other school of thought:

3) Stop motorists running people over

Strict liability and improvements to the construction of and training of drivers for lorries are ideas that stem from this school.

For all other kinds of potentially lethal machines, the law and public opinion are in consensus that it is the operator's responsibility not to kill people with them. Motor vehicles somehow became an exception to that.

#3 sounds good to me, but even better if it's in conjunction to #2, not instead of it.

A gun manufacturer handing out protective vests to school kids.

Instead of this stunt, maybe they should focus on building cars and particularly trucks that are not unsafe by default. All this talk of blind angle obscures the basic fact that this is first and foremost an engineering problem, and most importantly, you can not turn the defects of your vehicle into the responsibility of other road users.

If your vehicle isn't safe, it can not be driven. The solution is certainly not to tell everyone else to just watch out because you can't see shit left and right and man is this thing large and heavy.

I believe Volvo's are some of the nicest cars you can collide with as a pedestrian/cyclist. Yes, a car is an insane concept, but I'm not sure you're barking up the right tree here.

Oh really?

http://www.euractiv.com/sections/transport/eu-truck-safety-a...

Volvo, for instance, began rolling out new designs in 2012, so it could be at a disadvantage if competitors introduce more up-to-date models in the near future.

Wait guys, we just brought out these shitty unsafe trucks recently, we can't be making safe ones already! We'll take 10 years, thank you very much.

Seriously, fuck them. They delay improved safety designs for trucks (with extremely mild changes, nonetheless) and then tell people to spray themselves with reflective plastic.

In retrospect, the gun analogy was way too tame. Gun manufacturers don't want kids killed, but Volvo is pushing for more of them to be run over.

Volvo Car Corporation and Volvo Trucks are owned by different companies

You say this as if the particular organizational structure of a company has any bearing on the matter at hand. I think that's a ridiculous notion.

If you're happy with your Volvo, feel free to replace that make with any other you don't like. All the same, really.

Look, they're not the same thing. Volvo is a Swedish corporation that makes heavy vehicles and their engines, e.g. buses, trucks, construction equipment and ship engines.

Volvo Car Corporation is a subsidiary of Zhejiang Geely Holding Group. They used to be owned by Ford or something.

It's totally their fault that it's confusing, though, I'll give you that, but you're still wrong.

> Volvo's are some of the nicest cars you can collide with as a pedestrian/cyclist

What does this mean?

That many volvos have the safety of pedestrians and cyclists in mind in the design. Most of it of course to avoid colliding in the first place (such as cyclist and pedestrian detection systems), but the design has elements that protects pedestrians in a collision too, such as soft elements in the front of the car, a special hood and external airbag for pedestrians, and so on. http://www.popsci.com/cars/article/2013-02/volvos-new-airbag...

Ok thanks, I had no idea.

The solution is certainly not to tell everyone else to just watch out because you can't see shit left and right and man is this thing large and heavy.

The compromise is technology to make things as safe as possible.

To be honest, as long as we (citizens) accept to have vehicles driven by humans inside our cities, this has little to do with Volvo.

Agreed. This feels like a sticking plaster when Volvo could do so much more to help safety. Like with the design of their vehicles.

These Volvo SUVs (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volvo_XC90) are very popular where I live and they are huge, with poor driver visibility. I was almost reversed into by one only a few days ago. I was waiting for a gap in the traffic to pull out of a side road with another cyclist. The SUV turned in to the side road, discovered that this road was not passable for motor vehicles and attempted to reverse into us. Luckily I noticed what was occurring and intervened. I have no idea how they failed to see us when pulling in and in their mirrors.

As far as SUV's go, you probably picked the absolutely safest one made on the planet for cyclists. It's the only car I know that has a cyclist detection system with auto breaking as standard equipment.

It will never be as safe for pedestrians and cyclists as a small vehicle, but let's not blame manufacturers for making cars of different sizes. I think it's the job of legislators to tax the hell out of gas and large vehicles, then let the consumer decide. The job of the manufacturer is to make the product people want, and make it as safe as possible. I can't see where Volvo could do any better with the XC90 really. Do you?

> Instead of this stunt, maybe they should focus on building cars and particularly trucks that are not unsafe by default.

I'd say that in the last 10 years, the largest growth in car accessories in premium brands have been safety gadgets. Volvo is probably class leading in providing these things as standard on new models, rather than optional accessories. http://www.volvocars.com/us/about/our-innovations/intellisaf...

I'm continually dismayed by the lack of visibility in modern vehicles. It seems like every new model year increases size and weight while decreasing visibility. Take a look at cars from the 90s, and notice how much of their upper body is glass versus pillars or whatever. I drove a 1995 VW Golf for a number of years -- that thing was like driving around in a glass bubble compared to cars made today.

Surely, safety concerns/regulations are partly to blame for bulkier pillars and body parts, but I get the feeling that manufacturers just aren't investing engineering dollars in better visibility.

Aerodynamics (and thus fuel efficiency) could be another factor - even with the Volvos, compare the boxier 240/740/850 vs the later, more rounded models; the sloping curves are more aerodynamic but definitely make it harder to see exactly where the edges of the car are and what's around it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:%2780-%2782_Volvo_240DL_S...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:2012_Volvo_S60_--_NHTSA_1...

Fuel efficiency is another interesting stat that seems to not have improved much since the mid 90s. Tighter emissions standards are probably the reason, but it's funny to see new cars advertising "35mpg!" when 1995 VWs could pull that off easily.

I don't think you're right there at all. Taking your specific example, a '95 Golf got about 24mpg (combined cycle). Today, the 2 liter gasoline engine gets ~36 combined. That's despite the '95 golf having a curb weight of around 2,500lbs, and the 2015 being over 3,000lbs.

Don't forget that since the '90s, European and USA crash safety legislation has caused very large increases in vehicle mass. Airbags, collapsing structures, side impact beams, rollover protection all are required now.

And finally (though you didn't mention this), the crappy visibility of today's cars is directly as a result of increases in crash safety standards: poor visibility is a function of thick A, B, and C pillars; they are thicker today because cars have to stand up to more.

Edit to add: This video shows a 50+ year old Chevy Bel Air in a head on, offset collision with a modern Chevrolet grey box. No analysis, and I'm not putting it here to add weight to any point, but it does show that we have made some progress. http://oppositelock.kinja.com/classic-car-vs-modern-car-safe...

I think visibility decreasing mostly stem from new bulky airbag system, especially that driver's side blind zone in front of the car.

Making airbag system smaller seems hard. I wonder if having cameras and screens for all the blind spots would work.

> "Cycle safety is the cyclist's responsibility"

Woah there. Hold up right there.

The safety of ALL road users is on the backs of ALL road users.

It's not uncommon in London to see reporting of one of the one-a-month on average deaths of a cyclist to see such comments as "the cyclist was wearing a helmet".

Yet the helmet didn't save the cyclist, because the cyclist was crushed by a fully loaded construction HGV tipper truck.

This idea that cyclist safety is 100% their responsibility is part of the root cause of the problem.

Cyclists are one of the most (if not the most) vulnerable demographics of road users there is, and it should be the responsibility of other road users to help protect them.

Failing that, it should be the responsibility of those who provide roads to ensure that the infrastructure itself protects them (segregated cycleways).

But creating an idea in which "Cycle safety is the cyclist's responsibility" is plain disgusting when every damn month another cyclist is in a morgue, regardless of whether or not the cyclist wore high visibility clothing, had lights, wore a helmet, etc, etc.

And there is my issue with Volvo's "Life paint"... it shifts the blame for the continued stream of fatalities onto the cyclist.

Do you want to know where the real problem is? Try this, of the 8 fatalities on London roads this year, 7 were caused by HGV construction vehicles even though such vehicles take up less than 5% of all London vehicular traffic.

Here's one from Monday... this week! http://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/cyclist-26-killed-in-b...

Being covered in reflective spray paint will do nothing against a system that pays HGV drivers by the job count and doesn't enforce the many existing rules about vehicle safety, driver training... and in the recent case where a driver was convicted, the company that hired him didn't even check that he had a valid licence.

Perhaps if Volvo really wanted to make a big difference to the safety of cyclists, they'd get heavily behind the proposed designs for safer HGVs for cities: http://lcc.org.uk/articles/lcc-challenges-construction-indus...

Cyclists are one of the most (if not the most) vulnerable demographics of road users there is, and it should be the responsibility of other road users to help protect them.

I fall squarely in the camp that says they are just not suitable vehicles to share the road with other occupants. Frankly they make motorbikes look safe. Of course no government is willing to give up the money or the space to dedicated infrastructure.

So as you say, once a month or more a cyclist dies when a lorry turns left. I've watched a cyclist literally crawl from underneath a bus that knocked her off - and it's a contributory factor to my never cycling in London.

I don't know where you are from, but your assumption about all the world's governments is wrong.

> I fall squarely in the camp that says they are just not suitable vehicles to share the road with other occupants

Here's the converse:

* Bicycles the cause of essentially 0% of road deaths.

* Motorized vehicles are the cause of essentially 100% of road deaths.

It's not the bikes that are unsafe.

The bikes are extremely unsafe in the environment that they are being used in. That the risk is only to themselves is neither here nor there.

The choices in my mind are pretty much to either remove cyclists into dedicated highways or remove motorized vehicles. I just don't think one of those is even slightly viable.

It's close to the summer holidays, come and spend some time bicycling in the Netherlands, it is a great, safe, and relaxing experience. (Assuming you know how to cycle properly, that is; I've seen foreigners and tourists do very dangerous things on their bikes, such as swaying, riding on the right, looking back when signaled to move out the way, braking instead of overtaking when someone wants to pass, riding too slow, difficulty estimating other traffic and as a form of conflict behavior stopping halfway crossing a road, riding on ill-fitting bikes, and over-all they behave quite insecurely.)

Riding on the right? You have right-handed traffic.

Thanks for correcting me. Yes, they often tend not to keep right, but, I presume, cycle a "safe" distance from the right hand side of the road. Of course, in doing so, they hinder both cars and cyclists who want to pass.

re - saftey is "on the backs of ALL road users"

Indeed but I feel slight guilt as a bus using techie that one of us has not made an inexpensive camera and vision recognition system to fit to HGVs and set off a buzzer / the brakes when they are about to go over a cyclist. Something like that seems the most likely way to stop the death a month in London. Or maybe a skirt around the vehicle so they are more like busses saftey wise?

Construction vehicle design is very poor — the driver is high above the road, and can't see things near the cab.

The London Cycling Campaign proposed a new design [1], which has a cab similar to buses and bin lorries, with a much improved view for the driver.

[1] http://lcc.org.uk/articles/lcc-challenges-construction-indus...

They essentially designed the Econic [1] series by Mercedes. Those have been available for quite some time, before the 2013 date of the article and video.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes-Benz_Econic

The elephant in the room that nobody wants to talk about - because they get attacked for it- is that many of the cyclist deaths involving HGVs were the fault of the cyclist, e.g. http://road.cc/content/news/106227-coroner-dr-katharine-gile...

Obviously accidents taken in aggregate are not 100% the fault of any single side. I would challenge your "many" statement, especially when you link to an article about one accident. Do you have other citations or sources that indicate this?

But yes, everyone needs to be careful. However, the important distinction is that a careless cyclist is a danger primarily to themselves, while a careless motor vehicle operator is a danger to others on the road more than to themselves.

Yeah, I must admit that pretty much all cyclists and pedestrians alike have no idea about what's happening in their surrounding. But as a cyclist who's always aware (which is natural once you neared death enough times) I must say that oftentime there is absolutely no care about cyclist (or even pedestrians really) and you really have to freestyle it in the streets.

What do you do, cycle on a road where cars drive insanely fast and pay absolutely no attention to you, cycle on the busy sidewalk where you slalom between elders and kids that have absolutely no idea you're coming behind them, or cycle on the tramway tracks? The safest option for you and others is the most illegal one, and the most dangerous option is the one you're enforced to use.

Right... sure...

Eilidh Cairns death, the driver had incorrectly adjusted mirrors, failed an eye test, overtook the cyclist in a road not wide enough to do so [1]

Prominent artist death, the junction is badly designed and was on a blacklist but funds not allocated, the junction forced HGV drivers to watch the wrong side of their vehicle, leaving them blind to cyclists... in this case the truck drove over the cyclist without even seeing her [2]

Another junction in which 2 (two) cyclists died in a month due to the confusing design and narrow spaces [3]

Cyclist killed after driver is on the phone [4]

HGV Driver jailed for killing a cyclist after previously being banned from driving 5 times [5]

This was the first page of hits for "HGV cyclist death" that I found.

And there's an elephant somewhere? It's far more likely to be junction design, unenforced laws on driver behaviour, and a very very low standard applied by HGV contractors for their drivers.

[1] http://www.roadjustice.org.uk/case-study/driver-lorry-which-...

[2] http://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/woman-cyclist-dies-aft...

[3] http://road.cc/content/news/133336-second-serious-cyclist-cr...

[4] http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-32999770

[5] http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3082792/Lawless-self...

Edit: I fell for the new troll account. I apologise to HN, but I bit before I realised it was a troll account and the overwhelming evidence is the opposite of what was claimed.

"It's true that some accidents are caused by cyclist's own poor judgement and more must be done to educate cyclists about the risks of pulling up into the blind spots of large vehicles. We are planning a campaign to raise awareness of these risks, and we are working closely with TFL to erect warning signs at accident blackspots to discourage cyclists from putting themselves at risk," said no cycling safety campaigner EVER.

Just because I don't agree with the line that all cyclists are angels and drivers should jump out of their way doesn't make me a troll and I set up a throw-away account because I don't much fancy getting targeted by an online lynch-mob.

We should not have such different kinds of vehicles sharing the same road in the first place. The solution is not gimmicks but more dedicated bike paths.

Incidentally, one of the speakers in the video is from Malmö, Sweden. I lived there for a year, and it is by far one of the best biking cities that I know. And not because they hand out reflective sprays.

I disagree, mostly based on reality.

When I go out in a car I take my life and my families' lives in my hands. I live in Philadelphia in the U.S.. When I go driving, I constantly dodge other cars making a left hand turn from the right hand lane, city buses that consider red lights "suggestions," cars that slam on their brakes for a parking spot, cars driven by lost tourists paying attention to anything but the road in front of them...

The best thing my father ever taught me when I was learning to drive is "you don't drive for just yourself, you have to drive for everyone on the road, because they can't be trusted to do it themselves."

Philadelphia is notoriously hostile to bikers. It seems to me most people don't know that, at least here, bikes have to obey the same laws as cars - ride on the road (not the sidewalk), stop for red lights, etc. Even bikers seem confused about road laws (or flagrantly ignore them).

I'm all for bike lanes, new driver education, and whatever makes everyone safer. But self-driving cars aren't an indictment of our laziness, but rather our inability to drive safely all of the time. Making noise about how biker safety is everyone's responsibility is ideal, but the reality is a far different story. So if Volvo's contribution here to personal responsibility for safety helps a few people live longer, then bravo. It's available now, ubiquitous self-driving cars are not.

That's the reality of the situation. Stay safe.

it shifts the blame for the continued stream of fatalities onto the cyclist

If Lifepaint wouldn't have helped stop an accident then suggesting you should have been using it is ridiculous - but conversely, if it (or an equivalent product) would have stopped an accident, and you chose not to use it, then you are culpable to some extent. If I drive my car down the road at night with my lights switched off then it's my fault if someone hits me. Why wouldn't that be true for cyclists?

> if it (or an equivalent product) would have stopped an accident, and you chose not to use it, then you are culpable to some extent

Speed limiters on cars would prevent a large number of deaths in which pedestrians are killed.

Are all drivers culpable for pedestrian deaths because they do not have speed limiters even though such things exist and you chose not to use it?

If we stop considering them "accidents" perhaps we can move beyond the "Oops, you're dead" culture and start thinking that these are all avoidable incidents.

Cyclist death hasn't been attributable to visibility... but to a wide variety of causes ranging from poorly designed junctions, a class of vehicles not suitable to rush hour city use, some individual drivers, some individual cyclists. I know of no incident, not even a single one, in which the coroner ruled that cyclist visibility (or lack of) was a cause of the incident.

I was watching the news this lunch about the terrorist attacks in France and Tunisia... but the number dead is nothing, a rounding error, compared to the number killed on the road every day. This is way more terrifying and should appal everyone. A very large deal of it is avoidable, blaming other parties, getting defensive... it's not constructive. There are no easy answers, as a collective, as a society we need to take responsibility for road safety, re-design junctions, re-evaluate the vehicles we want on the roads, re-evaluate how our standards for training for all road users. Spray paint doesn't cut it.

Are all drivers culpable for pedestrian deaths because they do not have speed limiters even though such things exist and you chose not to use it?

Yes. In the case of cars the speed limiter is the legal speed limit for the road you're driving on, and if you choose not to use it then you are criminally culpable even if there isn't an accident. It doesn't have to be a technological solution if there's a good alternative.

Maybe we should do the same for cyclists - decide on a measurable value for visibility and make it a crime to be cycling below that limit.

Cannot tell if serious.

But if we're going for crazy suggestions, how about we call it murder and if a person causes another person's death on the road then they go to jail for murder for a long long time.

OK, that's silly (is it?!), how about changing insurance liability to something like the system that exists in Japan, which I understand makes the larger vehicle by default liable in all road traffic incidents.

That's not bad, how about we make it criminal to operate a vehicle in which you cannot prove that you have 340' visibility (20' being maxmimally permitted blind spots).

We could even consider changing HGV use in cities, to require a dual-licence.... this isn't actually a silly suggestion... whereby the vehicle itself is licensed for operation in a city and comes with additional safety requirements, and the driver has to have additional driving tests to prove that they can operate such a vehicle in such an environment.

Wouldn't you rather move towards solutions that attack the root cause rather than attempt to criminalise large swathes of the population for no proven benefit?

Lights and wheel reflectors are mandatory in Germany, even if you only ride during the day. While this provides many accidental accidents, it doesn't do anything about the main issues, attitude and inattentive drivers. I have daytime running lights [1], reflective tyres, as well as spoke reflectors. That doesn't prevent motorists from ignoring my right of way.

[1] http://www.peterwhitecycles.com/b&m-hl.asp - I have the Eyc T Senso plus model. It has signal LEDs that are directed at oncoming traffic as well as to the sides (to some extent) to provide maximum visibility during the day. See http://www.bumm.de/fileadmin/user_upload/Katalog/B_M__Catalo...

My motorcycle instructors phrased it this way: You might be in the right, but cars have the "right of weight."

Being right won't help you too much when you're dead.

Motorcycles face many of the same problems, but we tend to be a bit pragmatic about it. The advice I got amounted to: ride like every cager out there is out to intentionally kill you, and you'll make it home at night.

I fully agree with this.

To stay alive, act like everyone is out to kill you.

Unfortunately it doesn't help us move towards a safer world by addressing any of the root causes, but it does keep more of us (poeple who use the road) alive.

When I was a child my I was crossing a one way street with my father and thinking I was smart I only looked one way. I was pleased when he noticed and stopped me crossing. Thinking I had one up on the old man I announced I didn't need to look right as it was a one way street. Dad looked straight at me and said "You only need worry about what cars are doing, not what you think they should be doing."

I'm planning on learning to ride a motorbike and when I talk with my other half about it, I say "I will be careful, I'll paranoid about EVERYONE wanting to hit me" and her reply is "Yeah, but you're a good driver", then it's hard to explain that it doesn't work like that.

I'll use this next time :)

I stopped cycling in London because I value my life. The city is not built for the amount of cyclists who are already on the roads trying to swerve between the traffic. I have seen people slamming into buses way too many times.

A can of fluorescent paint is not going to help much. Most of these accidents happen during the day anyway.

Agreed. I found the marketing a bit patronising actually.

In London the cycle lanes are painted onto the roads, you take your chances with the cars.

The paint might help to be fair. But decent infrastructure would save more lives.

Just to add to this, there have been some ideas floating recently to move the cyclers below the streets [1] or above them [2], but while the former is unworkable, it's hard to say if anything comes out of the latter.

[1] http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-31298695 [2] http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-25549789

I don't know how cyclists behave in London, but what they're doing on roads in my city is absolutely horrifying - not stoping on red lights, going full speed through crosswalks, not signaling turning, driving on road when there's a bike lane alongside and so on. They don't need to pass any driving license, so most cyclist don't even know the basic driving regulations and they've this attitude "I'm the most important user on road".

What, all of them? You mean like all the motor users who break speed limits?

Of course not all of them, motor users do much more stupid things on roads, but a) they need to pass an exam and actually know the traffic laws; b) they can loose a driving license and pay high fines; c) they pay insurence and d) even when in accident, the chance of major injuries is radically lower than when riding a bike. Cyclists, on the other hand, don't give a shit and ride however they want. If we allow cyclist on roads, why not allow skateboarders or rollerbladers - what's the difference?

Point D is absolutely ludicrous. You think the chance of major injury in a cycling accident is HIGHER than a car accident? Are you mad?

I think your understood me wrong - if you hit a car with a car in city, there's a small chance anyone will get seriously hurt, but if you hit a bike with a car, you can kill someone and it doesn't matter if it's your fault or not, it sucks anyway and you can get into serious trouble. So even thought motor users do more stupid shit, the chance someone will get hurt is much smaller, therefore cyclists should be much more careful when driving on roads, but from my experience it's the exact opposite, and it's scary.

> what's the difference?

The difference is that when you're behind the wheel of a car your in charge of a machine that can very easily kill other people.

> the chance of major injuries is radically lower than when riding a bike.

The chance of causing major injuries is radically higher. You're confusing that with the chance of the driver themselves be the subject of the injuries.

Of course there's a higher degree of accountability for drivers, as there should be.

In the United States, the fines on traffic violations are very high, which makes most drivers obey traffic laws. Since, counties and towns get a percentage of the fines--most drivers(who care about money) really do try to obey traffic laws. Plus, Americans are very prone to litigation.

That said, we do have bicycle accidents. I think a lot of our problem is narrow streets, and DMV expects bicycles to Always obey the same laws motorists are required to, at all times? For instance, my brother got a $200 ticket for riding on a sidewalk at 1:30 p.m. The street was narrow, it was a Friday, and no one was walking on the sidewalk. He thought, 'Why take the risk--I'll just ride on the sidewalk until the street widens up, and then get back on the poorly maintained road?" Well that cost him $200.

Bicycles aren't cars. They don't have the same mass in an accident. They should be given some discretion in what they feel is safe for themselfs, and the general public? That's the problem with traffic laws that don't allow any leeway. (Yes--I know there's some crazy bicyclists, but most of us just want to get to our destination safely, and without a huge Ticket. (I have noticed some motorists who seems jealous of bicyclists? It almost seems like they want to clip us? I'm a big fan a of those small rear view mirrors made for bicyclists. Once you get used to using them; they really are helpful.

I'll address each of these as a bike commuter. The underlying things to remember are that a) while cyclists are expected to obey the same traffic laws as operators of other vehicles, sometimes there are safety reasons to violate them, and b) the light weight and low speed of bicycles means that while cyclists are vulnerable to harm from motorists, motorists are not vulnerable to harm from cyclists.

Red lights: cyclists should stop for all red lights, but should not necessarily be expected to wait for the light to turn green before proceeding[0]. This is partly because of sensor-activated lights that may never register the presence of a bicycle, and partly because it can be safer by separating the cyclist from traffic waiting at the red. You should also pay attention to how many motorists run red lights (usually for 1-2 seconds after they turn) and stop signs.

Crosswalks: cyclists should slow down for crosswalks. Remember, though, that "full speed" on a bicycle is nothing like full speed in a car. You should pay attention to how many motorists also speed through crosswalks.

Not signalling turning: cyclists should signal all turns unless they are in a situation where they need both hands on the handlebars. As a motorist, you may not be in a position to judge when that is.

Not using bike lane: in most jurisdictions, cyclists are encouraged but not required to use the bike lane. There are good reasons in some cases for not using the bike lane. A bike lane that is next to on-street parking may place cyclists in the door zone[1], making it more dangerous than taking the lane. Bike lanes may also accumulate road debris and be unsafe to ride in.

Hope this helps explain some of why cyclists ride the way they do.

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idaho_stop [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Door_zone

The last point, I think, is the most important -- pedestrians in bicycle lanes are to bicyclists what bicyclists on roads are to motorists. In fact I think a lot of the time, even worse. Old ladies are sometimes not even aware they're in the middle of a bike lane.

I've lost count of the number of times I've had to slam on the brakes because a pedestrian walked right into the bike lane without looking. But my closest encounter so far has been with a (particularly stupid) cat, which I missed by mere centimetres.

"Red lights: cyclists should stop for all red lights" "Crosswalks: cyclists should slow down for crosswalks." "Not signalling turning: cyclists should signal all turns" "Not using bike lane"

Hm, I rarely have a bike ride where I do not break all four of these at some time, and regularly break all four in one go. If you approach a crossing where you want to make a left turn (riding on the right side of the road), have a clear view of traffic, and the road is free, it IMO is perfectly natural to leave the bike lane for the middle of the road (one could call that a way of indicating direction), and then diagonally cross the crossing instead of following the bike lane, which would have make me a very sharp turn. Doesn't feel dangerous, either, but maybe that's because I live in a country (probably the country) where about as many people on bicycles as people in cars were killed in traffic in 2014.

>I stopped cycling in London because I value my life

The number of deaths per year varies between 10 and 20 with about 500,000 to 1M journeys per day. More than half of those killed were on the inside of a left-turning HGV. I'm not trying to blame the victim, but I'm saying that if you don't do that than you're pretty safe.

I know its not 100% rational, but I try to minimise the amount of times I put my life in the hands of strangers. I also don't drive, and hope to never have to.

Here it is without Volvo marketing http://www.albedo100.co.uk/

Spray your cat down so it doesn't get hit by cars! And your horse, so... Yeah, not sure why you'd want a glowing horse. Scare the neighbours? Nightmare?

> Yeah, not sure why you'd want a glowing horse.

Sometimes talking about your horse to by-standing victims isn't enough - in these cases, searing the image of the horse onto their retina is your only option.

For the very same reason of course? If you're on horseback near traffic, which isn't all that uncommon in rural parts, it'd be a good idea to make sure the horse is visible.

There's a road sign for this too; https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Warning_sign#/media/File:Swe....

Couldn't resist making a GIF of that horse glowing silver:

http://gph.is/1GwKONv

Most city owners don't let their cats outside, for the rest, spraying them into irradiated kitten is a sure way to kill their social lives and turn them into big fat depressed little lightballs.

> Yeah, not sure why you'd want a glowing horse

Who the eff wouldn't want a glowing horse? Maybe if you were a horse burglar or something. But otherwise ... I'd be all about that.

"Night-mare"

And neigh-bours. I crammed two puns in there :)

Any evaluation of retroreflective safety features should start with a short overview of what retroreflectivity cannot do: improve visibility, when the object is not within the light cone of the observer's headlights. With that in mind, those impressive side shots are becoming nothing more than show, because any bike sideways in the lights will either be long gone when the car reaches the point where the paths cross, or be already way too close to avoid an accident. And head/tail visibility must be provided by active light anyway, because visibility only inside that headlight beam is never enough. Once you have active light, any retroreflectors are merely adding minor (but important) attitude/dimension/range cues and improvements by "lifepaint" over conventional reflectors will be marginal at most.

The problem is that this will only be used by those bikers who already care about their safety and behave according to traffic rules.

The fucktards driving at night in full-black clothing, without lights and reflectors, music blasting in their ears and wearing no helmet on the road, instead of the bike lanes, will not take notice of the spray (or the fact that their behavior is endangering themselves).

Now guess which group of bikers gets hit by cars more often?

(Disclaimer: I had multiple last-second-saves with said fucktards while peacefully driving around)

In London some leaked TfL research suggested that women were killed far more than men because women obeyed the traffic laws more closely, and so found themselves crushed by left-turning trucks more often when they could have got out of that situation by breaking some rules.

Can this be found online? I'd love to read that.

I ride an almost entirely black bike with no reflectors and often no lights. Mostly because I don't use it at night unless I have no other choice. I'm interested by this paint for that exact reason.

Your assumptions don't really hold up that well.

As someone else who has also nearly hit one of these fucktards (on a two lane road with a 60mph speed limit), perhaps his assumptions are not wrong, but you are an outlier.

Perhaps it's sharing too much, but the only thing that saved his life was a car half a mile in front of me making an emergency swerve that clued me in to something abnormal in that area - but I thought it was a deer and was about to resume normal vigilance by the time I caught up with the biker. An oncoming train was in just the wrong spot to let me see him by his reflectors.

His assumption holds up perfectly well. When I was in High School I had job where I drove around and made deliveries on Friday nights. Nothing sketchy, but I was out after dark a lot. During my two years doing that job, I almost hit cyclists a dozen times because they were wearing all dark colors, had few or no reflectors, no bike light and were riding on roads with no street lights. I never saw a single cyclist with a bike light (which is required by law in my city) the entire time I had this job. This has changed in the last couple years as I have seen several bikes with lights, something I am pretty happy about because I'm a cyclist too. My bike is white, has no reflectors (its a mountain bike primarily for trail use) and I refuse to ride at night because I know exactly how invisible I would be.

FWIW The Hurt Report[1] didn't find any link between motorcycle colours and crash numbers. I'd say that doubly applies to bicycles when you consider that even a small motorbike still has a fairly significant showing of coloured fairings. Reflective jackets on the other hand...

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:MOTORCYCLE_ACCIDENT_...

A motorbike is mandated to have lights and cops enforce this, in contrast to bikes where most cops tend to let Darwinian evolution happen.

> The fucktards driving at night in full-black clothing, without lights and reflectors, music blasting in their ears and wearing no helmet on the road, instead of the bike lanes

But is that the target audience of this spray? If people can't be bothered to take care of themselves, accidents may happen. Sucks. It's a self-solving problem, though.

(And as for the helmet, what the hell? Maybe it's a Dutch thing but helmets on bikes are weird.)

It's water soluble and lasts a week, from that page. Gimmick. Can't see anyone buying a can and spraying their bike every seven days.

Funny that the advert features London, where the continuous rain would wash away this paint in minutes.

Rather more that in London the problem isn't usually not being seen, it's that you're seen - as a target-cum-obstacle.

Used to cycle to work along the Victoria embankment. Scary, scary experience, every time. If people aren't throwing shit at you through their windows or hitting you in the kidney with a wing mirror, it's because they're distracted by their phone.

Somebody riding to work everyday in the UK will only have rain on 12 of those days.

Seems like there are four product types and the one for metal & concrete is permanent [1].

looking at the availability on amazon [2], seems it was developed for using on horses, which makes it easier to understand the application method.

I've had good success with reflective tape / stickers on my bikes.

[1] http://albedo100.co.uk//product/light_metallic/lm_permanent_...

[2] http://www.amazon.co.uk/Albedo100-Reflective-Spray-Horse-Pet...

The permanent one is grey in daylight, so not transparent like the temporary one.

even better, it me more visible AND makes my bike look crappy so it wont get stolen

Although I love this idea and the execution by Albedo100, I can't help thinking some reflective tape would last longer, and more cost effective in the long term. Also comes in several colours as well.

An example is http://www.amazon.de/Reflective-Stickers-Tapes-Motorcycle-Co...

Side note, but this would be great for some creative graffiti uses

This would be great for painting bicycle lanes onto cars parked in the cycle lane!

So you'd rather people leave the bike lane clear and park in the middle of the street?

Parking next to the road is a normal thing and perfectly legal as long as there is no sign or some colored line (yellow in the Netherlands) to prohibit it. If there is a bike lane, bikers will have to drive around just like any other user of that road.

Just to be sure we're talking about the same, I'm thinking of this situation: http://www.bikearlington.com/tasks/sites/bike/assets/Image/B...

With a car standing, say, here: http://snag.gy/XmuKH.jpg

It is, in fact, illegal in most places—and yes, we're talking about the pictured situation exactly.

Park somewhere else: on a side road, for example, or in a driveway.

It's easy to answer the first half of your question. No, cars should not park in the cycle lane.

It's impossible to answer your question about where to park given the limited context of the picture.

Such a shame that a car company's response to the danger cars present to cyclists is to modify the cyclist. Victim blaming at its best.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Assume_good_faith

I think it probably is in good faith, but it’s still pushing responsibility onto other road users for driver error: implicitly the logic runs something like “I didn’t see them, but they weren’t wearing reflective spray so it’s their fault I hit them.” It’s a pernicious line of thinking that if you’re a regular cyclist you realise is everywhere in the discussion of road safety issues.

You see the same thing with helmets, which are designed to reduce (not eliminate) the impact of a cyclist falling from a standing (or riding) position to the ground, ie a 12mph impact, to the point where brain damage is less likely to occur. Thanks to the v² scaling of energy that has to be dissipated, even a 20mph impact exceeds the design limits of a cycle helmet to absorb impact energy by nearly a factor of 3 which means that helmets make little difference in direct collisions with vehicles travelling at normal traffic speeds. Yet I’ve seen cyclists called out for “not wearing a helmet” when they’ve been run over by a cement truck. Cyclists tend to be a tad hyper-sensitive to victim blaming as a result of this kind of thing!

That is such a stupid attitude.

Sure, don't blame the victim. They'll be dead - but it's much more important that no one blame them!

I assume you never lock your car or your house? Because if someone robbed you you are not at fault! Victim blaming!

Pushing the responsibility from cyclists onto drivers is bad here because the responsibility not to maim and kill people with these one-ton death machines should mostly be the driver's.

After the cyclist has taken appropriate measures (riding correctly; correct lights and reflectors) there's not much more they can do to protect themselves. If they're not riding correctly that's the problem you should be trying to fix - an idiot on a bike is still at great risk of death, even if they're ultra-reflective.

Who said anything about pushing responsibility?

We are talking about if "modifying the cyclist" is desirable or not.

It might not be the victim's responsibility to act safely - yet it's still stupid if they don't.

You're assuming that this reflective spray increases safety. You're then telling people who don't buy and use this product that they're stupid. And you're not saying anything about the dangerous vehicle drivers who cause most road deaths.

The Euro NCAP safety rating was heavily updated a few years ago (2007-ish) to improve pedestrian and cyclist safety. That's why most new cars that come out have those ridiculously tall and flat noses.

Suggesting a precaution isn't victim blaming.

Its simply a "better safe than sorry" product.

Indeed. I try to be as courteous as possible toward cyclists and bikers but during the day they can be damn near impossible to notice. Making them more visible means that there would be one less accident with someone who does try to take notice of them.

Does routinely not being able to see who else is on the road cause you to drive more slowly?

How did you conclude that I speed? Do comments like that cause you to be less of a presumptuous dick?

Maybe, just maybe, humans are not biologically equipped to be moving at the speeds that we do on the roads as well as the complexity of situations faced on the road. Both you, me and the bikers. Supplementing those biological shortcomings, in any way possible, is a clear win for those who care (possibly not for people who don't and would rather just pointlessly argue by positing that people speed without never having seen them actually drive).

Maybe, just maybe, that is why robots have been shown to be better drivers and maybe until we get to the point of entirely replacing human drivers we could have less accidents as a result of supplementing our inadequacies. Despite whatever presumptuous and pointless argument people like you make in order to try make me a villain simply by virtue of me choosing to be behind a wheel and not handlebars.

Arguments like yours really make we wonder if there actually are brains in this community. That level of discussion is something I would expect from an ignorant child.

Let's assume that your juvenile outburst was, indeed, true. What have you then added to the discussion? Nothing. More visible cyclists are still more visible to the type of lunatic that I am. This means that I would more likely avoid them. Saving lives.

If all you care about is finding out who to blame, go right ahead. The rest of the intelligent world will carry on trying to find solutions.

This is only one of many things that Volvo does to improve the safety of passengers and those outside of their vehicles. I have a 2010 Volvo that has a feature called City Safety [1], an automatic braking system that prevents low speed collisions in city environments, and BLIS which indicates the presence of a person or vehicle in your blind spot. They also have a new cyclist detection system that engages the brakes [3]. I think if drivers can be more aware of others, pedestrians and cyclists, in combination with smarter vehicles that assist drivers in accident avoidance, it's a win-win.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_safety

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blind_spot_monitor

[3] http://www.techradar.com/us/news/car-tech/volvo-debuts-world...

Second this. A Volvo engineer invented the modern 3-point seat belt, then made the new seat belt design patent open in the interest of safety. as well as countless other innovations

http://www.volvogroup.com/group/global/en-gb/researchandtech...

I know, the audacity.

Soon they'll suggest drivers wear seat belts, and drive at a set speed limit!

It's not the drivers fault! It's the tree/cliff/road design's.

Anything else is victim blaming!

Where there's multiple crashes in the same place it often is the road design that's at fault, not the drivers of the cars.

One vaguely relevant example is that roundabouts are safer than 4-way crossings for cars, though I think the evidence is a bit more mixed for cyclists.

Agree. My point was changing driver/cyclist behaviour is not victim blaming, but a valid approach to solving the problem.

Road Design, car design, culture, etc are all valid factors as well.

Well, knowing that roundabouts are safer, if the manufacturer of 4 way stop-lights suggested that cars should be painted brighter colors to prevent crashes, I'd consider that in about as poor taste, and as likely to have a positive impact, as volvo trying to repaint bicycles as a PR pitch.

They could indeed start by painting all their cars with it:

https://www.change.org/p/volvo-european-commission-volvo-sho...

That wouldn't work! The paint is reflective, so it would only work if the cyclist was had a light, and asking them to do that would be victim blaming.

I wish they make a permanent variant in the future. Another question is how does rain affect the paint.

In my cyclist opinion, would like to paint his bike with the permanent variant and perhaps his clothes with temporary one.

This looks like a great product.

What's the research say?

Cyclists need front and rear lights, and front and rear reflectors. On top of that the most useful reflectors a cyclist can have are on the pedals and on the wrists. These help when a cyclist is turning; and the pedal reflectors clearly show drivers that they're approaching a cyclist.

More than that and you risk the "Christmas Tree Effect" - it's tempting to think that more is better, but you risk just confusing the driver who then doesn't take appropriate safety measures.

You also need reflectors to the sides on the wheels. Reflectors on the pedals point forward and back and while they are required (at least in Germany) I found them to be mostly useless compared to other reflectors that point in that direction.

Despite all their shortcomings, pedal reflectors are excellent communication: "this tiny taillight is not a car in the distance, it belongs to a bike and is much closer than a car at similar brightness would be"

They are also very close to the ground (closer than any other reflector), which greatly increases their exposure to light from a properly adjusted headlight. When i ride in the darkness, pedal reflectors are often the only thing preventing a collision with one of those otherwise invisible "ride like a pedestrian" ninjas.

That being said, pedal reflectors are only good for making recumbents more visible to helicopter crews with search lights. But i guess recumbents were not a topic when pedal reflectors became mandatory. Which reminds me, this whole discussion is in serious need of some Godwin's law: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anton_Loibl_GmbH

I don't know about the Christmas Tree Effect, but would recommend any cyclist to wear as much high-viz as they can get their hands on. It's more effective than bike lights IMO.

Cyclists in London are crazy: they swerve in and out of cars, onto the pavements and then back onto the roads. They cross using pedestrian crossings and they cycle through red lights like they don't apply to them.

Being able to see them better is great but even if you know exactly where they are you still don't know what they're going to do because they don't follow the same rules of the road.

Looks like a neat idea and could help a bit but not as cool as http://revolights.com which has to be my favourite bike visibility system. It's mounted on the wheels, persistence of vision based and knows when to illuminate the LEDs.

However, non of these make cycling (especially in London) safe. I wouldn't cycle in London any more as it's just too dangerous, but I did for years. I always wore high vis and a helmet and obeyed the rules of the road and I still had far too many close calls and incidents with other vehicles.

If you want to see how tragic just one of very regular London cyclist deaths is then this is on iPlayer for the next week: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b05y18wv/an-hour-to-sav...

"Putting something on that will make you scream out to drivers like me is a fantastic thing."

If Volvo understood cyclists better, they'd choose a quote like, "I'm a driver and I hate life paint. Who do you think you are looking all flashy and important?" You gotta work with the tribal dynamics, not against them.

Accidents often aren't. When you see the guy weaving though traffic down the highway, changing lanes every few seconds and accelerating and breaking seemingly at random. He will tell you of all the 'accidents' he has had. He's lying. If it's preventable and you choose not to, it's intentional.

You know, Volvo Cars and Albedo accept no liability or responsibility for any individual or individual's accident or injury by any road user or other object whilst wearing Lifepaint. Nor do they accept liability for any damage to property caused directly or indirectly by the paint and what's more, that it is transferable.

Furthermore, Volvo say that cycle safety is the cyclist's responsibility. There's more: Lifepaint is one of the many products that can aid visibility but cannot prevent accidents caused by the individual or other road users.

I love the idea, can anyone explain how it 'glows'?

Given that it reflects light back in the same direction as it comes in, I’d guess it’s based on the same principle as the 3M retro-reflective material (Scotchlite). Presumably it’s a suspension of either spherical beads or tiny corner reflectors (quartz crystals?).

It's reflective.

This is going to be used for very creative, disruptive and disturbing vandalism. I guarantee it.

Lasts only 1 week. Neat niche product.

Also, wtf did they do to site to make text not selectable?

This is clever. I can also see it being used by street artists.

Probably more use to street artists than cyclists.

Pschhhhhfrrrtshhhh WITNESS ME

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