Cars not signalling off roundabouts

[mjr]

Spot on. If you've missed another road user, blind spot or not, you need to see an optician, clean the plasticiser film off the insides of your windows and use the fan on speed 1 to clear the condensation that attracts, raise your seat for a better view, wake up or just get a car with better all-round vision. Blindly signalling in hope is not good enough; a driver should know exactly what other road users are around them and signal as necessary to make those users aware of their intentions. Drivers who signal unnecessarily are bumblers in my opinion.

I don't care about your opinion of me. I do care that if you aren't infallible (and I suspect you aren't) then every mistake you make means you've not signalled to someone who would benefit, perhaps me.

Meanwhile, I may be signalling to no one sometimes, but that means no one cares that I'm signalling.

Also, how would you know that I signal to no one? If you're there, I'm probably signalling to you!

 

[Sea of vapours]

Also, how would you know that I signal to no one? If you're there, I'm probably signalling to you!

In the circumstances we're discussing - a motor vehicle negotiating a roundabout and my making a choice to move/continue, or not, as a cyclist based on their use of a signal or lack thereof - I'm not about to enter the roundabout unless I actively think the signal is for me. By that I mean that I've made eye contact with the driver and that they've put their indicator on. i.e. that they are unequivocally signalling to me, not simply doing it since that's 'the thing to do', based on whatever scheme of 'correct signalling' they believe in. As mentioned up-thread, more than once, acting on someone's flashing light signal in a way which puts you in front a a tonne+ of fast-moving metal whilst on a bicycle, where the signal may be misleading, seems rather too trusting for my liking. That's been nicely demonstrated repeatedly by the wildly varying ideas as to what is 'correct signalling' so far described in this thread.

 

[recumbentpanda]

“I’m not about to enter the roundabout unless I actively think the signal is for me.”

Another millisecond snap judgement though isn’t it? And lists like this one are full of tales of drivers who made eye contact and drove through the cyclist anyway.

Like many here, I would treat all signals with the same degree of suspicion, eye contact or not.

In the end though, I don’t see any resolution to debates like this. There are just too damn many cars and too many of them going too fast for either strategy to really work. The only real solution is the hardest one of all -an end to car-sick culture.

 

[lazybloke]

If I've understood @YukonBoy correctly there are the things he refers to, which obscure the view to the right on approach installed on this roundabout.
http://www.streetmap.co.uk/map.srf?...archp=ids.srf&dn=704&ax=517062&ay=157285&lm=0
A243 approach to M25 J9 from the South in Leatherhead

I've not driven round there for a year or so, but I think the aim is to force you to slow down on approach by delaying your "is it clear to my right" decision until you are right on the RAB.

Or perhaps they are just ornamental concrete installation art.

They are fences, car height so lorry drivers can see over, but everyone else has to slow. Slower should be safer, but I can imagine unintended consequences - not least a drop in traffic flow and an increase in emissions. Plus it looks terrible on crash map.
There are 8 approaches in all (staggered, so 2 roundabouts). Most of them have bad sight-lines.

Edited to add: the fences have been there for years.

 

[Mr Celine]

By that I mean that I've made eye contact with the driver

SofV "Good, she's making eye contact with me, her signal must be for me"
Driver "That's a cool pair of shades, wonder where he got them"

If the driver is looking at you they're not looking where they're going. Watch the wheels. That's where the car is going.

 

[Bazzer]

That sounds somewhat perverse (and potentially dangerous). Source ??

Certainly happens a couple of miles or so from my home. The Council use camouflage netting which terminates (of the top of my head), 3 - 4 metres from the junction, on at least two roundabouts. It forces drivers to slow down and look, (assuming they are not complete bell ends), rather than assuming the gap they see at 100m, will remain by the time they get to the roundabout.
Bizarrely, the same Council levelled a rose hip hedge which served the purpose, not a mile from one of those with camouflage netting.

 

[mjr]

Certainly happens a couple of miles or so from my home. The Council use camouflage netting which terminates (of the top of my head), 3 - 4 metres from the junction, on at least two roundabouts. It forces drivers to slow down and look, (assuming they are not complete bell ends), [...]

I think I've spotted the flaw in the council's thinking!

 

[Ming the Merciless]

The others have it, barriers, walls, hedges etc. So the driver cannot see if anyone is on the roundabout to their right as they approach. Some also stop you seeing the other side of the roundabout.

 

[2sheds]

I have cycled and driven, when taught to ride a bike, my Dad said " just assume every other road user is an idiot, don't trust them" never have never will, no accidents in 40 yrs ( that's probably torn it), just assume all others don't know what they are doing, ride safe

 

[Johnno260]

I have cycled and driven, when taught to ride a bike, my Dad said " just assume every other road user is an idiot, don't trust them" never have never will, no accidents in 40 yrs ( that's probably torn it), just assume all others don't know what they are doing, ride safe

This is the exact same advise I was given by my Mum.

Making that assumption saved me on my partial commute this week, approached a side road, the guy looked straight at me, and pulled out anyway, in anticipation I had already moved towards the center of the road so it gave me time to swerve into the hatched area in the center.

As for the women who threw a complete fit as I was turning right on a mini round about and forced her to give way to the right, I can’t explain her issue, she approached the roundabout on my left and got upset followed me into a supermarket car park and went postal on me.

 

[2sheds]

This is the exact same advise I was given by my Mum.

Making that assumption saved me on my partial commute this week, approached a side road, the guy looked straight at me, and pulled out anyway, in anticipation I had already moved towards the center of the road so it gave me time to swerve into the hatched area in the center.

As for the women who threw a complete fit as I was turning right on a mini round about and forced her to give way to the right, I can’t explain her issue, she approached the roundabout on my left and got upset followed me into a supermarket car park and went postal on me.

Good for you, you avoided an ambulance and hospital