Why we should stop ‘chaotic and confusing’ bus stops or more kids will get hurt

The group has started a petition to ban the stops and has been signed by more than 270 organisations, including Age UK and Disability Rights UK.

Sarah Gayton, Street Access Campaign Coordinator at NFB said: ‘I had only been there about an hour or so when this happened.

‘That poor little lad could have really hurt himself. And what was so shocking was that the cyclist got off and said, “Is he deaf? I rang the bell.”

‘As if that excuses it! Surely that just shows that people need to be aware of those who may be blind and deaf – and may not notice bikes coming?’

Bus users are expected to cross what is usually a small zebra crossing over the cycleway to get to the stop.

Charities have said this design makes it unsafe particularly for those with vision problems.

The NFB slammed them as ‘chaotic, confusing and dangerous places which are not safe or accessible for blind and visually impaired people to use independently’.

Transport for London rejected a call to pause the installations of floating bus stops this week, with the Mayor of London saying ‘very few collisions’ have occured between cyclists and pedestrians.

This is despite admitting in June more than a third of the capital’s floating bus stops varied ‘significantly’ from its best practice design.

But Sadiq Khan has said City Hall is ‘actively working with disabled and accessibility groups to look at improvements to the design, as well as the behaviour of road users’.

The floating bus stops are intended to allow cyclists to keep moving rather than being stuck behind buses.

He told the BBC they were installed as ‘a disproportionate number of cyclists had been injured and killed as a consequence of buses’.