A shopkeeper has described how a passer-by tried to save the life of a cyclist who lay dying in the street after a horror crash with a lorry on Archway Road in Highgate.

Haq Awan, owner of Archway Dry Cleaners, dialled 999 while a member of the public gave mouth-to-mouth resuscitation to the cyclist before medics arrived to take over on Monday.

Despite their best efforts, the man, believed to be in his sixties, died at the scene.

The crash happened at 9.40am after the cyclist and a white lorry collided near the junction with Langdon Park Road.

Mr Awan, 58, said: “I came out to open my door and saw this man. I thought he might be one of my customers, but when I went near to him he was bleeding from his mouth and nose.

“I had my phone in my hand and called the ambulance. A passer-by started giving mouth-to-mouth. The ambulance arrived after about 10 minutes and the medics also gave mouth-to-mouth resuscitation but he died.”

The dead man had not been named as the Ham&High went to press, but his next of kin have been informed.

The lorry driver stopped at the scene and no arrests were made.

Mr Haq, who has run his business in Archway Road for 20 years, added: “The driver of the lorry came up and said he didn’t hear any noise but saw someone in his mirror fall down and stopped his lorry.”

The road was closed for about three hours while crash investigators examined the scene.

Police have issued an appeal for witnesses to come forward.

Ronan O’Mahoney, 35, who lives in a flat directly opposite the scene of the crash, said Archway Road had become “extremely dangerous”.

“This road is chocker with cars,” he said. “Some use the bus lane to speed and undercut other vehicles.

“It’s extremely dangerous. I’m not surprised at all that this has happened and I won’t be surprised if it happens again. It’s just a matter of time.”

Charlie Lloyd, of the London Cycling Campaign, said: “There has been a lot of cycling casualties along the A1 road which Archway Road is part of.

“It’s a main road and cyclists use it to avoid the hills, so it could have a separate section for cyclists to make it safer.”

The most recent figures available from Transport for London show that there were 246 cycling casualties in Camden in 2012, while in Haringey there were 106.

The chairman of the Highgate Society, Kirsten de Keyser, said it was vital that road safety improvements were introduced as the number of people cycling in the capital increased.

“We have just had a big cycle race in London and we know from all the surveys coming out that London is booming in terms of biking and now the leading biking city in the UK,” she said.

“There must be ways of alerting vehicles if they are too close to bikes.”

Days before, a motorcyclist and passenger narrowly escaped serious injury after colliding with a BMW estate car on Highgate Hill, near the junction with Cholmeley Park.

They were airlifted to hospital with non-life-threatening injuries after the crash at 6.45pm last Wednesday.