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OPINION

Cycling and the law: How is a judge likely to assess a claim for compensation following an accident caused by a pothole during a sportive? An example from case law

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Mark Hambleton, cycling solicitor, talks us through a recent case involving a claim for compensation by a participant injured during a high profile sportive

As a personal injury solicitor who represents injured cyclists as well as being involved in sportives myself, a topic that often comes up is: ‘how might a participant’s claim for compensation be dealt with should a rider be injured during the event?’ The short answer is that it depends on the cause of the accident.

I don’t bring this up just out of personal interest, but also to challenge the perspective of those who believe we have a ‘compensation culture’ in this country; something I’m always keen to dispel by looking logically at real-world examples to show that having an accident doesn’t automatically lead to an award for compensation.

One such real-world example, involving the Prudential RideLondon 100-mile sportive, caught my attention as an ideal way to demonstrate how the legal test for accidents caused by defects in the road is applied.

The case involves an accident during a closed road sportive that could happen to any of us and, most importantly, the decision eventually reached by the courts stands as a good legal test which judges should apply in the future when analysing the duties of a highway authority to maintain our roads.

I found the case particularly interesting because it works through the legal test judges should apply when analysing the duties we, as participants, are owed by local authorities, and the weight that should be given to evidence from event organisers and, in this case, Thames Water as well.

The accident

So, what happened? On 4 August 2013, during what is perhaps the biggest closed road sportive in the country, with 16,000 riders in attendance, Mr Hilliard was injured when a depression of 30mm (more than an inch) in the centre of a lane and near to a water hydrant cover caused him to fall off his bike.

Subsequently Mr Hilliard brought a claim against the relevant highway authority, Surrey County Council, alleging they had failed in their duty to maintain the highway. The following precautions had been taken before the event:

  • RideLondon organisers had carried out inspections of the road and reported defects to the Council. Surrey County Council’s policy was that anything over 40mm in depth was repaired. Other defects were to be monitored for deterioration;
  • Thames Water had commissioned an inspection of the road on receipt of notice from the Council. They looked at the road surface from the perspective of a pedestrian, and logged the defect which caused Mr Hilliard’s accident as a ‘trip hazard’; and
  • RideLondon organisers then carried out a further inspection of the course before the event and the defect which caused the accident was not mentioned.

What was the decision?

The lower court found the Council had failed to maintain the road, and as a result Mr Hilliard was awarded £38,500 in damages. However, this decision was then appealed by the Council and the decision as to whether the Council had breached the duty to maintain the highway was reconsidered.

The Council’s appeal was successful, and Mr Hilliard did not receive any compensation for his injuries or financial losses. Why the change?

First of all, the judge hearing the appeal set out the correct test as to whether or not the Council had failed to maintain the highway. It required an assessment of whether it was more likely than not that the highway authority had failed to maintain the road in such a state of repair so that it was reasonably passable for the ordinary traffic of the neighbourhood without its physical condition causing a potential danger.  This test has been explored in other cycling cases that I have written about elsewhere.

Next, the judge dealt with the reference in the Thames Water report to the defect constituting a ‘trip hazard’. The judge hearing the Council’s appeal felt that undue weight had been given to this by the first judge, given that the report made mention of this in the context of pedestrians using the road, and was not the test to be applied when considering whether the road was dangerous for ordinary traffic.

Finally, the judge referenced that, before Mr Hilliard had his accident, 12,400 riders had passed the defect without any issue – another piece of important evidence as to whether the road was ‘reasonably passable for ordinary traffic’ and the inspection by the RideLondon organisers shortly before the event did not identify the defect.

The decision in context

Mr Hilliard’s case can be contrasted with the case arising out of the tragic death of mother of three, Mrs Kate Vanloo, in January 2016.  Mrs Vanloo was cycling home from a training ride with her triathlon club when she struck a pothole which caused her to fall from her bicycle into a collision with an oncoming vehicle.

The pothole Mrs Vanloo struck was 4 inches deep, extended the width of the road and was concealed by a puddle. In other words, she didn’t stand a chance.

Inspection and maintenance of the highway was the responsibility of Warwickshire County Council, and the pothole had been identified as requiring repair prior to this incident. Inexplicably, the Council did not repair it within the proper timeframe and, when the repair was eventually ordered, the subcontractors went on to repair a different pothole.

The most depressing part of all this is that Mrs Vanloo’s death was entirely avoidable. The Council has been ordered to pay £388,000 – to her dependants, relatives and the estate. I don’t know those precise details about the award and Mrs Vanloo’s circumstances.

The distinction to be drawn between these cases is that the pothole in Mrs Vanloo’s case rendered the highway dangerous for ordinary traffic, and on analysis of the Council’s own records, should have been repaired before any of this happened.


As a cycling accident solicitor, I feel very sorry for Mr Hilliard. He was very unlucky in that he was injured through no fault of his own as a result of encountering a defect in the road during the sportive. Unfortunately it was too small a defect for him to be successful in his claim for compensation.

However, I tend to agree with the judgment in this case, especially because over 12,000 riders had passed this point in the road with no issue. If Mr Hilliard had been successful it would likely have imposed too high a standard of repair for local authorities to meet.

Perhaps this case demonstrates that we don’t really have a ‘compensation culture’, despite what some newspapers might have us believe, and that there are many injured cyclists like Mr Hilliard who have been extremely unlucky but ultimately lose out on compensation for their injuries and consequential losses if they are unable to satisfy the judge that liability is proved.

After taking up cycling to commute between Bristol and Bath, Mark has seen all sorts of incidents and has become a keen advocate for cycling and protecting the rights of cyclists.

Mark is now lucky enough to combine his passion for cycling with his day job as a cycling solicitor at RWK Goodman.

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7 comments

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Rick_Rude | 4 years ago
2 likes

Damn. Claimant went from looking in the Ferrari showroom to AAA Used Cars of Cleckheaton. Hope he didn't make any spending plans.

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dave atkinson | 4 years ago
6 likes

I'm looking forward to the 'lots of other people managed it so you should be able to' argument being applied to drivers who hit cyclists on the open road.

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joules1975 replied to dave atkinson | 4 years ago
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dave atkinson wrote:

I'm looking forward to the 'lots of other people managed it so you should be able to' argument being applied to drivers who hit cyclists on the open road.

+1

Indeed, I'd imagine there are a whole load of scenarios in which that arguement could be used, and I like the fact that it's kind of insulting too, in a 'well you were the only one .... therefore who's the idiot?' kind of way.

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Izaak30 | 4 years ago
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Having seen yesterday’s crash involving Vos and reading this article, I wonder if she and everyone else could conceivably win a case against who ever? Clearly a pothole caused the accident ...

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joules1975 replied to Izaak30 | 4 years ago
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Izaak30 wrote:

Having seen yesterday’s crash involving Vos and reading this article, I wonder if she and everyone else could conceivably win a case against who ever? Clearly a pothole caused the accident ...

If I understand the article correctly, the answer is probably no. The pothole the CCC rider hit, while shaped in a way that caused a rider to fall, was small compared with the overall width of the road and is visible from sufficient distance to avoid (by small ish line change, even if change of speed would be required to make line change safely).

The issue with the crash looks to me more a case of the lead rider avoiding the hole but not warning those in her wheel. It could just have easily have been a branch or other object blown into the road.

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atgni replied to Izaak30 | 4 years ago
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Izaak30 wrote:

Having seen yesterday’s crash involving Vos and reading this article, I wonder if she and everyone else could conceivably win a case against who ever? Clearly a pothole caused the accident ...

Maybe, she was 2nd on the road. There weren't 12,000 in front of her, just 1.
Of course the race organiser has called it a racing incident and denied it was a pot hole. (They had inspected the course, so maybe can't admit they missed a pothole.) A number of other riders said it was a pothole.

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Awavey replied to atgni | 4 years ago
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atgni wrote:
Izaak30 wrote:

Having seen yesterday’s crash involving Vos and reading this article, I wonder if she and everyone else could conceivably win a case against who ever? Clearly a pothole caused the accident ...

Maybe, she was 2nd on the road. There weren't 12,000 in front of her, just 1. Of course the race organiser has called it a racing incident and denied it was a pot hole. (They had inspected the course, so maybe can't admit they missed a pothole.) A number of other riders said it was a pothole.

 

was it a pothole, or a depression like a sink hole forming though ? I actually wondered if hitting, lets just call it a hole, compromised the wheel integrity or tyre in someway and it was that which led to losing control of the bike, which is even more complicated to judge on.

 

but one thing I wondered though as its now every cyclists favourite surface dressing season of the year, if the council workers do such a botched job on a section of road surface dressing, that it is actually a pretty dangerous surface to ride on a bike, due to the amount of loose chippings that migrate into the cycle lanes or build up kerbside, which are never worn down,swept up or compressed into the tar surface by the heavier traffic.

Are the council liable if you crash then ? because then the argument of but x many vehicles use this road and were fine, but because they dont drive on the bit of road you are on leaves you...where does fault then lie ? the council who must have signed off the road? the highways department for not enforcing their rules properly ? the firm they contracted to do it ?

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