A cyclist was killed by a lorry and another seriously injured just hours later in central London.
A 47-year-old man was pronounced dead at the scene after a collision at the notorious Elephant and Castle junction about 4pm yesterday. He was the fifth cyclist killed in the capital this year.
The lorry driver, 49, who stopped at the scene, was arrested on suspicion of causing death by careless driving and questioned in custody. A Met police spokeswoman said today that he had been bailed until July.
In a separate incident, City of London police launched an investigation after a man in his twenties was taken to hospital following a collision with a tipper truck in Upper Thames Street at 7.50pm.
Today the sister of a nursing assistant killed in a HGV crash last September led calls for safety improvements. Physics student Athena Karsa, 20, whose sister Maria, 21, died at Aldgate, told the Standard: “Having 30-tonne lorries sharing the road with cyclists is just an accident waiting to happen.”
Maria was one of 14 London cyclists killed last year. Her sister said of yesterday’s fatality: “It’s just a waste of life. It’s an awful way to die, nobody deserves that. Ordinary people going about their business — it’s not fair.”
Yesterday’s collision happened at the southern roundabout at Elephant and Castle, at the junction with Newington Butts. This was remodelled in 2010 as part of Boris Johnson’s controversial policy of “smoothing traffic flow”.
Moped rider Lenny Piper, who saw the aftermath of the collision, said: “They were trying to unravel the poor man from his bike. He was in the middle of the road, not near the kerb, so it didn’t look like a case of the van being in the cycle lane.”
A shopkeeper, who asked not to be named, said: “I looked out and saw the man lying in the road not moving. The police arrived within minutes and they tried to resuscitate him.”
Will Hicks, a cyclist who rides through Elephant and Castle twice a day, said: “It was a pretty horrendous sight. When you see a cyclist die like that it makes you think twice.”
Richard Reynolds, who runs the cycle safety campaign Say No to the Bodge, said: “This junction is one of Boris Johnson’s prestigious projects.
“He has lauded its safety, but it’s an accident waiting to happen — and it has happened. Boris must do something to fix this bodged junction.”
Another bystander said: “The only time there are no accidents here is when the police have it cordoned off.”
In February this year, City Hall announced plans to remove the northern roundabout at Elephant and Castle after describing it as “London’s highest cycle casualty location”. A Transport for London spokesman said today that safety at the southern junction was likely to be reviewed as part of the scheme.
Leon Daniels, managing director of surface transport at TfL, said: “The southern junction at Elephant and Castle, where this tragedy occurred, was converted from a roundabout to a signalised junction in 2010, hugely improving the facilities for pedestrians and cyclists through the area.
“We know that HGV’s are a disproportionate cause of death and serious injury and are taking a number of steps to tackle this. This includes working with the industry to ensure that HGV’s are fitted with safety equipment as standard and tough new measures that would ban dangerous lorries from central London.”
