Is this an acceptable RLJ?

[Mad Doug Biker]

Hello, I wasn't on my bike*, just on foot, but as I was leaving from the College (Clydebank) at Lunchtime, I saw a guy on a bike pass me and head for the lights at the junction with Dumbarton Road.
His attire and bike were quite distinctive for various reasons**, but I watched him approach the lights..... and then realised he wasn't going to stop in time. I muttered something about what an eejit he was as it is a busy junction, only for him to stop a few feet ahead of the lights at the start of the junction proper, so that when the lights changed he'd have a head start.

It isn't exactly crime of the century, I know that, but is stopping ahead like this acceptable? I say this because I'd be there patiently waiting at the lights with the cars, knowing not to pass the inside of vehicles potentially about to turn.


* - I need to get that puncture sorted.... and NOT sleep in.... oh and get 'The Tank' done up for the coming winter, potentially with those snow tyres!

** - He had a yellow cycling Jacket on, branded with the logo of the College, and, with all the reflective stripes, it looked like an Altura. I'll have to enquire about them now. Secondly, he was riding a rather nice looking black Gary Fisher(?) with white rims, but then had drops with pink handlebar tape, which did make me wonder whether he had borrowed it.

If that was anyone on here, then, erm, hello.

 

[gaz]

Any vehicle crossing the solid stop line whilst the light is on red is jumping the light.
It doesn't matter if you cross the junction or not.

 

[Spinney]

This is the kind of RLJing that ASLs made 'official'.

At the risk of getting shot down, I sometimes do this if I have reached the front of a queue, although only where traffic moving off is likely to be slow or turning left anyway. As gaz said, though, it is illegal.

It also runs the risk of mowing down pedestrians crossing in front of the stopped traffic, and/or getting in the way of long vehicles turning (the stop lines are often not right up to the junction for exactly that reason).

 

[clarion]

gaz +1

RLJ is RLJ.

 

[ohnovino]

I see this all the time. It's more like making your own ASL then jumping the red (yes, I know, legally it's the white line that counts).

I don't do it or condone it, but if it's going to give them enough of a head-start to clear a tight junction before the overtakes come then I can understand why it's done.

 

[baldycyclist]

I see this all the time. It's more like making your own ASL then jumping the red (yes, I know, legally it's the white line that counts).

I don't do it or condone it, but if it's going to give them enough of a head-start to clear a tight junction before the overtakes come then I can understand why it's done.

done it sometimes myself...I don't condone it but it just makes it safer for all concerned???

 

[gaz]

done it sometimes myself...I don't condone it but it just makes it safer for all concerned???

Why do you have to be at the front?

You could easily stop behind one of the cars near the front and slip into a gap. That way you don't have to jump the light, you can hold a strong position and you also get through the next phase.

 

[Dan_h]

I sometimes do this. Generally if there is a long line of cars (more than one traffic light cycle) I filter down the right hand side of the traffic to the front of the queue, then if the traffic starts to move off I find a suitable gap in the traffic to move into, otherwise I continue on to the front of the queue and pull in a few feet ahead of the stop line, enabling me to be positioned slightly ahead and to the left of the traffic queue (assuming I am not turning right).

I do this because IMO it is safer to be in that position than alongside the cars, even if I do technically jump the light (even only by a few feet).

 

[Sheffield_Tiger]

gaz +1

RLJ is RLJ.

I'll remember that next time I'm at the Meadowhall / Jenkin Road junction http://g.co/maps/benp in in the nearside (ahead) lane with stationary cars in the right hand (right turn) lane, approaching an amber just-about-to-become-red light and without needing to turn my head I can tell from the engine note of the vehicle approaching behind a fair distance away but at speed, that he is definitely going to go for it regardless, so I went through after the change to red..and sure enough so did the car which was now VERY close behind

I'll think "no, RLJ is RLJ" and make myself a human shield and a martyr to the anti-RLJ cause


What I'm trying to say is there can sometimes be an exception to such blanket black-and-white statement (though I don't think the OP's tale comes under such an exception IMO)


What I want to know is why neither I nor the car were stopped by the poice car waiting at the head of the right hand lane


Oh and...you know what...just to anoy the really pedantic - sometimes if it's been raining heavily and there is a thick white stop line, I will roll my front wheel just over in front of it so that when I set off my front wheel isn't going onto a slippery surface. Which police station should I hand myself in at?

 

[Sheffield_Tiger]

So there he was in the car thinking "look at that bastard cyclist about to jump the red light. If he is going to, I might as well do the same."

A- I wasn't "about to" - I was "about to" stop until I was aware of what was happening behind me
B- "Everyone else is doing it so why can't we?" is a Cranberries album, not a mitigating circumstance
C- Avoiding a ton of speeding metal is a mitigating circumstance in my book and no comments on here would change my mind. If RLJing was an imprisonable offence I'd still have done it as that would still be preferable to being killed or maimed

Sorry if that upsets you and tarnishes the image of cyclists forever but that's the way it is

I once also carefully drove my car through a red light at a junction with a traffic island to allow an ambulance through. I'm bad to the bone....

 

[Dan B]

Sometimes I will filter to the front of a queue at which I know there will be an ASL, and when I get there find it is occupied by minicabs or scooters. In such circumstances I really have no compunction about stopping ahead of them if it looks like a safe place to be (and not impeding pedestrians), even if that does mean I'm over the line. "RLJ is RLJ" is a fine position to take, but it's clearly not one that e.g. the Police subscribe to, or else they'd be enforcing the law against the said minicabs and scooters intead of emulating them.

 

[400bhp]

[QUOTE 1582979"]
+1 In addition to gaz's post I would not say to pull into a gap near the front for a couple of reasons:

The gap that is there for the vehicle in front - not the vehicle in front and for a cyclist to occupy.

Therefore the gap is not suitable in the first place and you run the risk of antagonising the driver.
[/quote]

Agree.

IaM teach drivers to leave a space between the car in front too.

Sometimes I find myself occupying such a space [because I couldn't get to the front or because there isn't a safe gap squeezing between cars further up the queue] and don't like doing it.

 

[Jezston]

People who pull out way ahead towards junctions seem odd to me. It doesn't really give you much of an advantage towards anything.

What makes me laugh is when someone does this, but there isn't a second set of lights further down, so they are in front of the lights and can't see them change. So I'm stopped at the line, bloke several meters in front, lights change, he's still standing there as everyone overtakes him and he can't get back in. What's the point of that?

 

[Jezston]

I'll remember that next time I'm at the Meadowhall / Jenkin Road junction http://g.co/maps/benp

I didn't know there was a Meadowhall in Tokyo!

 

[Jezston]

Sometimes I will filter to the front of a queue at which I know there will be an ASL, and when I get there find it is occupied by minicabs or scooters. In such circumstances I really have no compunction about stopping ahead of them if it looks like a safe place to be (and not impeding pedestrians), even if that does mean I'm over the line. "RLJ is RLJ" is a fine position to take, but it's clearly not one that e.g. the Police subscribe to, or else they'd be enforcing the law against the said minicabs and scooters intead of emulating them.

Someone fill me in on the rules, but aren't you not supposed to filter down to ASLs if you can't be sure they are clear?