MONDAY'S Evening Press had an item headed Fine Threat For Cyclists. Any driver in York will be well aware of the real hazard that unlit or inadequately lit bikes present at this time of year.

Each evening as I drive up Huntington Road, I lose count of the number of illegally-lit bikes that I pass. Very often I see the same person cycling towards town on an unlit bike, with a dark anorak hood pulled up over his head, on a bike without any lights at all.

The Highway Code says the car horn should be sounded to warn other road users of your presence. Perhaps every driver should practise this to advise those riding inadequately-lit bikes that they have been seen and to warn them against undertaking the Kamikaze-style swoops across the carriageway that so many cyclists employ.

The errant cyclists would end each journey with ears ringing, but perhaps that would be incentive to spend £10 on a set of lights.

Keith Elliott,

Stratford Way,

Huntington, York.

Updated: 11:08 Thursday, December 08, 2005