White Mudguards

Dominion, Volume 27, Issue 190, 10 May 1934, Page 11

White Mudguards

Sir, —The statement in to-day’s' subleader that white mudguards on bicycles are easier to distinguish • than red reflectors is open to considerable argument. You do not say on whose experience the statement is based; I have a great many friends who are motorists, and with one solitary exception, they inform me that an efficient reflector, properly fitted, cannot possibly be missed. I have seen a great many reflectors screwed on in such a way that they would be visible only to aircraft, and naturally in these cases a; white mudguard would be easier to distinguish, for the simple reason that the reflector could not be distinguished at all. The remedy, however, is not white mudguards, but a proper enforcement of the present law concerning rear reflectors. Hundreds of bicycles without reflectors, or with inefficient or improperly fitted reflectors, can be seen any day in the streets of Wellington, and I cannot conceive any very great difficulty in compelling their owners to comply with the law. Traffic officers are very assiduous in prosecuting offending motorists. Why not tackle offending cyclists as well? They would be doing a great service to those cyclists who comply in every respect with the traffic regulations, but who invariably get the blame when official motordom issues- its periodical tosh about ‘‘dangerous cyclists,” “menace on the road,” etc. In a recent case it was Suggested by someone prominent in tiie local motoring world that a cyclist was run. down from, behind by a motorvehicle because he (the cyclist) did not have a light in front! Stupid talk of this sort does nothing to promote the good feeling which we all, I hope, desire to see among all classes of road users.— I am, etc., ’ ‘ ALFRED E. MILNE. Consul for N.Z., Cyclists’ Touring Club. Wellington, May 9.