Responsible bikers set an example over safety and speed

After passing my motorcycle test in 1957 at the age of 16, I have owned and ridden bikes ever since, and still do, and support your article (Yorkshire Post, February 28) about high 
speed motorcyclists in East Yorkshire.

The article was both well-timed and well-balanced, and hits the nail on the head when it refers to a small number of idiotic and irresponsible bikers who bring the majority into disrepute.

Motorcyclists are part of a great community, as testified by the high numbers of riders who congregate at the many biker rendezvous points dotted around our countryside. Part of that community are the police motorcyclists to whom you refer.

Humberside Police, with whom I have no connection, promote Safe Riding courses (www.saferroadshumber.com) and do a good job promoting motorcycle safety, not only by placing roadside signs, but by fostering good relations with all those in the biking fraternity.

It is a sad fact however that, despite their endeavours, their message does not always get through. The penetrating sound of high revving motorcycles speeding round the Driffield bypass on late summer evenings is an awful invasion into the peace of dusk, resulting in the reputation of responsible, sensible bikers taking a real battering. Your article refers to consultation with the bike magazines, and herein lies much of the problem. Sports bike magazines should accept a high degree of responsibility for dangerous riding, in that the front covers display bikes pulling wheelies, the inside pages being liberally filled with photographs of the “flat-out-Erics” heeled over at unbelievable angles on rural public roads where there is a very great chance of an unexpected encounter with a tractor, a couple of sheep or, horror of horrors, an oncoming car with a family of kids. Track days on closed circuits are available throughout the country for this type of riding, where other road users are not endangered. These are the events which should be promoted by the sports bike press, where you can get your knee down, but not on public roads. A more responsible attitude and a greater emphasis on safety and consideration for other road users by the biking press, would play a great part in introducing a bit of sense into those who appear so easily influenced by such magazines.

From: Gerald Hodgson, Spennithorne, Leyburn.

CHRIS Bond’s article (Yorkshire Post, February 28) vividly highlights the carnage caused by irresponsible motorcyclists in and around East Yorkshire.

Unfortunately, we suffer the same problem in the Dales. Any weekend afternoon in spring and summer I can hear the roar of these lethal machines two miles away on the A6108 near Middleham. The completely unnecessary noise they make (presumably virtually removing the silencers) is another factor but the main complaint is the danger to other road users and the cost to tax payers of picking up the bills for the inevitable accidents.

I know two men who ruined their lives when young in motor bike crashes, one paralysed from the chest down, the other severely affected mentally. I freely acknowledge that there are many quiet and responsible motor bikers but I suppose it is a forlorn hope that the rest will be inspired by next year’s Grand Départ of the Tour de France to ditch their environmentally damaging machines and take to the healthy, and equally exhilarating, alternative of pedal power?