Victoria police say a cyclist hit by the rear wheel of a large truck near the Johnson Street Bridge Tuesday was lucky not to be seriously injured.
The incident was captured by a webcam at nearby Swans Hotel just before noon and shows the cyclist crossing Pandora Avenue in a two-way bike lane when the truck turns right from Store Street and makes contact.
People can be seen heading to help after the cyclist goes down.
The investigation is ongoing and no findings have been announced on right of way or other details, said police spokesman Bowen Osoko.
He noted the video shows the cyclist taking action to get out of the truck’s path. “So quick thinking probably saved that person serious injury or death.”
The cyclist was taken to hospital, he said, while the driver remained at the scene and co-operated with police.
A spokesman for Capital Bike, an advocacy and education group, said crashes during such right turns are “pretty common” and can be deadly.
“The one key thing from our perspective is these kinds of crashes are preventable with good infrastructure — which is already there — and truck sideguards,” said Corey Burger, the organization’s policy and infrastructure chair.
In many other places in the world, he said, large trucks are required to have bars or a metal plate between the front and rear wheels so someone who is hit will “bounce out” away from the wheels.
“The sideguards are there to basically stop the injury from happening.”
Burger said ICBC data shows crashes have fallen “quite a bit” since the installation of protected bike lanes, both on Wharf and Pandora. “And that’s with the increase in people riding across the Johnson Street Bridge.”
Bike traffic on Wharf and Pandora has also seen a big jump, he said.
