Sadly every year several cyclists on the streets of London are killed by lorries. Amazingly tipper trucks, skip lorries and concrete lorries don’t legally have to have side guards. Typically when they turn left they have to move to the right and then turn left to make the turn. Very deceptive. Such vehicles are exempt from side guard rules in case it makes driving across rough ground tricky.

This is a picture of a 1912 bus. In 1912 they recognised the dangers of not having side guards. 1912. Coming up to 2012 and after dozens of different governments during the last 100 years side guards for all lorries is still not compulsory.

Some really responsible companies and organisations voluntarily ensure their vehicles have side guards  such as Cemex. They don’t seem to have any problems with their lorries going across ‘rough ground’.

Side guards cost around £450 to buy and have installed. Even take the cold approach of cost benefit analysis where each human life lost is calculated to cost £1.5M shows that apart from the extra fuel costs of carrying side guards the nation could still afford to equip every lorry with side guards every year and still save money.

So why does the industry decide to do this? Why don’t insurance companies amend premiums on this? Puzzling.