Red light Ken (and my road rage)

Ken Livingstone, who during his reign added 1200 sets of traffic lights to London streets, now “pledges to install traffic lights to give cyclists a five second head start,” reports The Times. Boris too “is considering early green lights,” chirps the Evening Standard, and in an editorial, it says, “this is a simple and sensible idea. We need more imaginative thinking to make our city safer for cyclists.” This pitiful coverage reveals the ignorance among editors and politicians alike of the overwhelming case for traffic system reform. (By failing to commission articles on the subject, which I pitch continually, are editors censoring criticism, and colluding in the dire peacetime casualty toll over which the system presides? (From 2001 to 2011, there have been 156 cyclists killed and 4,000 badly injured.) Reform along the lines advocated here would make roads safe not just for cyclists, but for everyone – without the “need” for expensive technology or vexatious state intervention.