Time Trial

It was an old building of red brick and sandstone block work; one that had stood longer than those around it.  A weathered facade displayed the colourful shields and crowns of office and the words Court House were engraved in the light stone arch above a grand entrance. To the interest of no one - except a middle aged man manacling his cycle to railings that ran along the front of the building - the time it took someone to walk the length of those railings was the same as the time a lorry could move in the queuing traffic, start to stop.  No one, except the cyclist, seemed to notice these rush-hour lorries accelerating and braking.  And it was only he that looked up to see how far a lorry would travel from standstill to standstill.

Inside, another day of business was about to get under way.  High up in the main hall, the court clock ticked away the seconds towards ten o`clock, while solicitors, police officers and witnesses mingled with the accused below.  The ushers called out names, solicitors confided with clients, and officers chatted. When Ten o`clock arrived the court sessions began and the hall settled into nervous waiting.  A court list had been posted giving the names of the accused and what they were accused of.  Court One was to hear a matter of dangerous cycling.

The proceedings got under way in a time order dictated by the Clerk of the Court.  The magistrates entered; Court One stood. The accused (referred to by the clerk as the defendant) was ushered into the witness box situated to one side of the magistrates’ bench, above the long tables reserved for the solicitors.  Everyone else, the public and press, was seated towards the rear of the courtroom and on the same, lower level as the solicitors.  As time moved on the defendant took the oath, swearing on the New Testament, and confirming his name as Mr Stone.  Not only did he deny the charge, he told the court that he would be defending himself.

A few moments later Mr Stone took his place at the opposite end of the table occupied by the prosecuting solicitor and a police officer, the sole witness for the prosecution, took to the witness box.  His methodical progress from the entrance, round the back of the main seating area and along the side wall below the tall windows, was followed by everyone.  The officer - in the rhythm of name and number, of date and time, of where and why -  gave the court his evidence.

He was an experienced traffic policeman, trained in all aspects of enforcement including speed detection. He was driving his police car on a thirty-mile-an-hour speed limit road approaching a pedestrian crossing. The cycle was ahead of him, on the left and moving quickly, a racing type with the rider looking in both posture and appearance like a racing cyclist.  The cyclist had his head down and was pumping away at the pedals.  The road was flat.  They approached the pedestrian crossing.  A young woman was on the pavement to the left, pushing a child towards the zebra crossing in a `baby buggy` type push chair.  The cycle went over the crossing just as the front wheels of the buggy were on it.  He believed the child would have been seriously hurt had it been hit.  He stopped the cycle beyond the crossing and reported the cyclist. The cyclist, he said, was travelling at a speed of about 20 miles-per-hour.

The officer was asked by the prosecuting solicitor to clarify that at the time the pushchair was on the crossing.  He answered that it was and that the cycle was two seconds from it at the time.  Mr Stone was then given the opportunity to question the officer.

“You say the push chair was on the crossing when I crossed it?”

“That`s correct”.

“All of it?”

“No, as I have said, just the front”.

“How far would you say I was from the crossing when the front of the chair entered onto the crossing?”

“About ten feet”.

“Which is about three metres?”

“Yes”.

“Are you sure it was three metres?”

“Yes, I believe it was about that”.

“You say I was travelling at twenty miles-per-hour?”

“Yes”.

“Was this as I went over the crossing or after?”

“For the whole time. I used the display on the speed detection device in my car to record the speed before I stopped the cyclist”.  The officer was addressing the Magistrates. 

“You say a lady was pushing a child on the crossing”.

“No, she wasn`t on it.  The front of the chair was on the crossing. There was also someone on the other side”.

 “Did that person walk onto the crossing?”

“Yes”.

“Did the woman with the child actually step onto the crossing?”

“No, she saw the cyclist just in time and stopped at the side, pulling the chair back”.

“You say you understand the speed detection equipment in your vehicle.”

“That`s correct”.

“Do you understand the relationship between speed, time and distance, and how average speed is the time taken to cover a distance in a certain time?”

“Yes, as I said, I have been trained in all aspects speed enforcement”.

“Then tell me, please.  You say the front of the push chair was on the crossing when I was two seconds back and three metres away.  How fast was I travelling, using this information?”

The officer was quiet. He looked at the magistrates but got no help in formulating an answer.

“Let me assist you”, Mr Stone said.  “It took me two seconds to cover three metres. That means I was travelling at a rate of one and a half metres every second.  My speed, then, was about three miles-per-hour.  That`s walking pace, and not twenty miles an hour.”

“Well, no, but... .”

“How did you measure my speed?”

“I used the speed digital display on the vehicle`s enforcement equipment.  It`s calibrated and totally accurate”.

“But how did you relate your speed to mine”.

“I don`t understand what you mean”.

“You followed over the crossing when there was someone on it, crossing from the other side?”

“Well, no, I stopped but so did they. They stood on the crossing and let me pass, and I followed the cycle and stopped it beyond the crossing”.

“So, when you say I was travelling at twenty miles an hour, that`s the maximum speed you reached in order to catch up with me?”

“Yes, I suppose so”.

“And as you stopped on the crossing and then accelerated to twenty miles an hour, your average speed over the distance from the crossing, where you stopped, to where you reached me was less than half that, depending on how quickly you slowed. In any case, probably greater than my average speed.  Remember what was said earlier, my speed was only three miles an hour from your opinion of my time and distance from the crossing”.

The officer didn`t answer - for a moment, he didn`t appear to be able to say anything.

“In fact”, Mr Stone was now addressing the Magistrates.   “The woman hadn`t entered the crossing, she had stopped while I passed by at low speed.  The officer, by his own admission, had driven over the crossing with someone on it, the person crossing from the other side...”.

Outside the traffic was moving freely after the morning rush hour.  People on the footway were passing the front of the building, and lorries trundled along at a constant speed.  No one gave a second thought as to how far they, or any other vehicle for that matter, had travelled in the time it took someone to walk past the front of the building - except the middle-aged cyclist, releasing his cycle from where it had been chained.