Originally Posted by
Paul Barnard
You'll have to ask Joey. The concept of not seeing a law abiding cyclist is both foreign and frightening to me. He excuses motorists for inattention on a regular basis, just as he exalts the rule of gross tonnage.
Have you not heard the same thing regarding hundreds of auto accidents over the years? Drivers pull out in front of oncoming vehicles on a regular basis because they "didn't see them." This happens daily in every jurisdiction of substantial size.
I don't believe these drivers get into such accidents intentionally. And while I'm sure some of them are exceptionally careless, it's a pretty broad cross section of society that offers this "excuse." Some of them really did look and somehow didn't register the oncoming vehicle. I've never been in an accident of that nature, but over the years there have been certainly times when I saw another car at the last minute and thought "where the heck did he come from." Hasn't this ever happened to you?
Although you say it is foreign to you, I suspect you've seen enough human behavior in your time to understand this is a flaw inherent to the species. I don't think this is well understood but there is some research on the topic (just a random abstract to note the nature of the effort):
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35872002/
So yes, sometimes a driver won't see a cyclist. I ride with flashing lights to help reduce the chance of that happening. But I recognize it may happen nonetheless. It's not excusing inattentiveness, it's just recognizing the realities of the road.