Drivers, repeat after me: Must Pass Cyclist...

[andy_wrx]

It's not just cycles though, is it ?

The same mentality applies on coming across a car with L-plates on...

Obviously a learner will be a slow obstruction, just like a bike is, so the immediate reaction is to pass it, regardless of whether it's safe to do so or if it actually gets you anywhere quicker.

Personally, if I see a learner I'm happy to hang back
- not only does it seem courteous to someone who may be nervous enough without me cutting them up in passing them or driving right on their bumper
- but from purely selfish reasons, if they are going to make some sort of driving error then I want to be behind them with plenty of room to avoid them rather than right on their bumper or in front of them and have them running into the back of me !

 

[HJ]

20 mile an hour in traffic ! That worries me Palinarus. I took this up to relax and chill out. Am I expected to keep up with city traffic ?

Don't worry city traffic doesn't generally go that fast, I find it is normally quite easy to keep an average speed which is fast than the average speed of rush hour traffic... It is all part of the fun of cycle commuting

 

[LondonCommuter]

Rather than start a new thread let me hijack this one with how one driver (J111 MRC) committed multiple traffic violations in the clear spirit of this thread on my way home tonight.
1. Overtakes me going down Primrose Hill, just like so many before, only to have to slam his brakes on because of traffic calming (speed bump and narrowing with island) so I then have to brake.

... I catch up and overtake at traffic lights

I feel a car behind me. Sixth sense tells me its him. I actually delayed overtaking a slower cyclist because I had premonitions of road rage, then got bored, looked behind me, signalled and overtook, hearing impatient revs.

2. He shoots past me too fast, as the road is about to swing sharply to the right, and there is a zebra crossing just round the corner. Having overtaken, he slams brakes on to avoid killing a pedestrian.

3. Foot down, whizzes off, but its narrow with parked cars on either side, he's too far over into oncoming traffic and overcorrects. Clips the back of a parked moped. I heard what sounded like the rear light being broken.

I catch him at the next lights and tap. He winds window down

4. He's tapping away on his phone/bberry. Wasn't bothered when I told him he'd hit a moped. Accused me of dangerous driving. Looked slightly aghast when I told him his number plate.

Avoid J111 MRC.

Of course the car's a massive 4 wheel drive and the driver wears a cravat but that doesn't make it more annoying

 

[Bollo]

Reported on here a while ago when I had a guy try to overtake from some lights when I was at all points right behind the driver in front. Never any room to overtake into. None at all. He nearly ends up in a head-on with the approaching traffic and ....... blames me for fully integrating with the rest of the traffic.

 

[Bollo]

But I'm getting concerned! Two pages in and there has not been one post "putting the other point of view". Like the ravens in the Tower of London, cyclechat may crash forever if somebody doesn't have a pop soon!

 

[hackbike 666]

Nothing wrong with magnatoms maneuver.

 

[purplepolly]

If you'd been a bit faster then you wouldn't be in the way would you?
.

No, no, no, he should have been going slower, that would have made it easier for the driver to overtake.

It really makes me wonder though, I mean, what on earth was the point of trying to overtake in order to join a traffic queue? There should really be a common sense section in the driving test.

 

[Black Sheep]

I occasionally drive the church mini bus and had to go through kenilworth which had some road works,

I stopped short of the light as i knew another van would not fit past me if i went and queued right behind the other car,

i was not pulled in to the kerb, i had my brake lights showing and was amazed to see three cars just come straight past, one of whom didn't fit fully past me at first due to traffic coming the other way (light still red) I didnt let the fourth get past, i just decided to join in the blocking traffic off or i'd be sat at the lights for another round and have the same thing happen

 

[Black Sheep]

It's not just cycles though, is it ?

The same mentality applies on coming across a car with L-plates on...

Obviously a learner will be a slow obstruction, just like a bike is, so the immediate reaction is to pass it, regardless of whether it's safe to do so or if it actually gets you anywhere quicker.

Personally, if I see a learner I'm happy to hang back
- not only does it seem courteous to someone who may be nervous enough without me cutting them up in passing them or driving right on their bumper
- but from purely selfish reasons, if they are going to make some sort of driving error then I want to be behind them with plenty of room to avoid them rather than right on their bumper or in front of them and have them running into the back of me !

I too hang back, you have no idea how far off passing their test the driver is, could even be the instructor driving!

my fiancee was forced by her mum to have P plates on her car for the week after she passed her test, in that time she got cut up so badly the car was nearly written off and had many people nearly rear end her due to their stupidity

at the end of the week she begged her parents to let her drive without the P plates.

 

[palinurus]

Don't worry city traffic doesn't generally go that fast, I find it is normally quite easy to keep an average speed which is fast than the average speed of rush hour traffic... It is all part of the fun of cycle commuting

Wasn't city traffic either, it was small market town traffic on the local bit of A-road that leads to a motorway junction. It's normally free-moving but with enough traffic density to limit the speed to around 20 (although on the way home tonight it was stationary- there was some flooding or something)

 

[boydj]

Had a similar incident to Magnatom's today myself in Paisley's one-way system. There's a fifty-yard stretch where two lanes cross through a set of lights and lane 1 splits into two about half-way towards the next set of lights, giving two straight ahead lanes and one left filter lane. I normally hold the middle of lane 1, which lets me end up in the middle of lane two as the left filter splits out, since I am going straight on. You need to be on your toes and assertive here as there are always cars trying to get into the left filter lane from the rightmost lane.

I had just passed the start of the left filter lane when a guy tried to overtake me in the right lane and then cut across, but I was keeping up, more or less, with the cars in front of me so this clown had to slow, cut in behind me and ended up stranded in lane 2 as nobody would let him in. I should add that at no point did he get any more than the bonnet of his car level with me, so there was no possibility of me letting him in. When I looked back, he was sitting in the middle of the junction waiting for the lights to stop the traffic so he could get round the corner.

Hopefully the embarrassment (tks to wiki for the spelling) might persuade him that it's better to get into the correct lane early and that trying to steal a march on the other drivers does not always work. And maybe he's also learned that bikes are perfectly capable of keeping up with other traffic when the roads are busy.

 

[nilling]

I indicate therefore I am...she still hardly made the lane

 

[Night Train]

I've had WVM do that to me too and I was in a car going straight on while he was wanting to turn left.

 

[magnatom]

Thanks for the comments guys. I used to have problems with this junction (see , here, and here) where I would be cut up, but taking the lane a bit earlier seems to have sorted the problem. The fact that she hit her horn at least meant she had seen me!

So, col, where are you? Will you come on this thread and admit that my cycling was ok here, or was it still my fault?...

 

[Arch]

Riding in this morning, stopped at the back (ok, actually inside the box, just) of a yellow box junction in a queue, in a secondaryish position. Can see lights, traffic is about to move off ahead.

Van behind squeezes past me on my left to turn left into the road the box junction is across. Low speed, the van having been stopped behind me, but made me jump. And I was moving anyway, within about 2 seconds.

Gave the woman driving it a look, but I don't suppose she noticed.

I must start wearing the camera again.