>>Judge held the pavement to be shared
I've popped back in after a long break as I guessed this issue might be discussed here and I remembered there was someone who was good at linking to the proper recorded court documents such as the judges actual summary rather than the media reported version. Was that Bromptonaut?
Anyway it's of particular interest as I've known this location well for over 40yrs, drive past it several times a week and the CCVTV footage was taken from the complex that includes mum's doctors of the past 20yrs.
The road in question is a two lane one way inner ring road of the older parts of Huntingdon. The path in question is a footpath not a shared path/cycleway and I'm surprised the judge felt unable to clarify by taking that position. It seems both police and local authority felt unable to say for certain so with a death on their hands took the easy option that it might have been deemed shared which the judge seems to have echoed.
To explain why I don't believe it was ever intended to be shared use anywhere near the incident...
There is a footpath either side of these two traffic lanes... both paths never wider than a medium width and in places hardly the width for two pushchairs to meet.
The footpath the other side of the two traffic lanes is clearly marked with the blue pedestrian/cyclist symbol signs. On average these are placed every 56m and face both directions.
The footpath on the side of the incident has no such signs from its start in the direction the pedestrian was walking and just one sign if you were walking from the other direction and that is on a totally different section of the ring road three junctions and 400m away.
So I'd draw the inference the section of the incident even taking in several hundred meters either side was not shared use.
My second issue is allowing for the slight restriction of the path located lamp post at the point of the incident the path wan't wide enough for a cyclist to meet and pass a pedestrian without risk of clipping them unless they placed their wheels so close to the kerb there was a risk of falling off the kerb anyway. So unless the deceased cyclist was intending just to run into the pedestrian I'm not sure how they intended to pass. Certainly not in control of the bike or riding with due caution because the correct course of action would have been to stop so their own actions a huge contributory factor.
Lastly... and this may be controversial... as a driver using this section of road you need to drive with 110% due care and attention as it's busy with folks using all sorts of conveyance to and fro shops, doctors and the residential area. To run over someone who fell/stumbled into the immediate nearside section of the road was... how shall I say... more than unfortunate.
But as I said at the start... I've posted more to see if anyone can get a link to the actual court record of judgement.
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