Cycling Mikey vs the Fiat: right, but …

Last week some videos went around showing a road safety activist (some call him a vigilante) named Michael van Erp, AKA Cycling Mikey, trying to stop a Fiat 500 going the wrong way up a partly closed road in west London and getting his bike knocked over and his property strewn over the street. The footage attracted the attention of some right-wing newspapers, some social media lawyers and some social media driving instructors, some of whom have criticised Mikey’s behaviour in the past and been blocked. Much of the commentary has been gleeful, as if Mikey “finally got his comeuppance”, and includes suggestions that Mikey broke the law by pushing his bike out to obstruct the Fiat, or “threw his bike into the road”, and ignores the multiple offences committed by the driver of the Fiat, which should not depend on Mikey reporting it. A YouTuber called Big Jobber, who has worked in the insurance industry, gives a fairly balanced explanation of the whole incident here.

Specifically, the driver of the Fiat, who had a child in their car, drove through a road that was clearly closed in the direction they were travelling in (the exit side had been closed because of roadworks; the entry side remained open, and there were numerous “road ahead closed” warning signs along the road at every junction, including at least one that was a viable diversion), then drove at a pedestrian who was in the process of entering the road ahead, causing damage to his property, then drove off without stopping; the latter is called “failing to stop after an accident”. This was witnessed by a number of bystanders, some of whom indicated that they recognised Mikey and some of whom also recorded their own footage. There will be other camera footage (shot by the local authority and the police) showing that the Fiat was in the area; if the social media footage is not good enough, that surely will be. Some of the commentators have suggested that Mikey’s actions constitute contributory negligence that will count against him if he has to claim on his insurance, but the Fiat driver’s actions were indefensible and plain criminal.

I have not much time for Cycling Mikey in the main; he is best known for riding around looking for people doing things they shouldn’t, such as using their mobile phone at the wheel, and publishing it online and sending the footage to the police. I have sometimes questioned how he has so much time to do this. I wrote about this in a previous entry on ‘snitching’ a couple of years ago, though I didn’t mention him by name then; most of the people he catches are stationary, not in motion and he was the classic example of the self-righteous snitch. But there’s also a world of difference between an inconsequential breach of the law and using your vehicle to barge someone out of the way — as a weapon — because you don’t have the patience to do what you should have done in the first place and find another route. The only crimes in this video were committed by the Fiat driver, and there were many of them.