Out of my way!

[magnatom]

I've been really enjoying my commute recently. Virtually incident free for a good few months. Certainly nothing worth capturing on camera.

This morning I took a more direct route to work (I take this, on occasion, if I need to get in sharpish) and I had to filter through a lot of heavy traffic. I stop at some lights one car back, just as I have done on many, many times over the last 4 years without any problems from the following car.

I glance around to check the driver has seen me. There is queuing traffic 20m ahead. So no need for any driver to get past me...or so I thought...

I'm not proud of calling her a 'fat cow'. However, she seemed to think that just because I was somewhere she didn't like, she felt she had the right to drive through me....oh and overtake me way too close later on.

 

[alecstilleyedye]

pass it on to plod. if nowt else, she's clearly blocking a box junction at one point…

 

[garrilla]

TBH, I'm not sure you were in the best position.

 

[magnatom]

TBH, I'm not sure you were in the best position.

I fully expected my position to be questioned!

I have for a good few years now employed the tactic of sitting one or two cars back after filtering. I find this doesn't tend to wind drivers up as much (i.e. I don't push all the way to the front). It also means I don't have to get into the grey area of sitting in front of the stop line.

I have never, until today had a driver directly behind me not hold back for me. especially as I make an effort to make eye contact (my eyes pan around further than my camera!) and to sit slightly in front of the vehicle behind.

On this occasion I was especially surprised by her move, due to the blatantly obvious queue just 20m ahead. This is a feature of this road at this time in the morning and every driver who comes this way, (except first timers) know to expect it.

 

[garrilla]

On first view I thought you were in the inside of the RH-lane. But then on a 2nd view I realised you were on the outside of the LH-lane. It would be churlish to say you were inviting the cars behind to to squeeze inside, but it does seem to be a tactic that could go wrong in this way.


edit: I don't really understand the siginifcance of the queue 20m ahead.

 

[magnatom]

On first view I thought you were in the inside of the RH-lane. But then on a 2nd view I realised you were on the outside of the LH-lane. It would be churlish to say you were inviting the cars behind to to squeeze inside, but it does seem to be a tactic that could go wrong in this way.

It is something I am aware of, certainly. You'll notice that as soon as the lights change and just as I am about to set off I glance left. I always do this for two reasons. The main one is to check that the car is hanging back. The other less obvious reason is that it sends a signal to the driver that I 'want' them to hang back.


It would be difficult for me to count the number of times that this has worked without a problem. Thousands of times, I'm sure. The fact is on this occasion, the driver knew she should hang back, but decided,

'bu@@er it, bl**dy cyclists! Try and get in front of me, will he....oh wait a minute I have to stop 20m further down the road...oh bu@@er...off he goes.'

 

[magnatom]

edit: I don't really understand the siginifcance of the queue 20m ahead.

The significance is, why did she have to push past me, when she would have to stop in a queue 20m ahead.

 

[garrilla]

Personally, I would have put myself more into the gap between her car and the car in front and make it less ambiguous where I was going next. I expected you to you to try and overtake the 1st car and maybe so did she and in this instance the queue up ahead is irrelevant.

Anyway I hope your elbow is OK, it always hurts when the that happens.

 

[magnatom]

Personally, I would have put myself more into the gap between her car and the car in front and make it less ambiguous where I was going next. I expected you to you to try and overtake the 1st car and maybe so did she and in this instance the queue up ahead is irrelevant.

Anyway I hope your elbow is OK, it always hurts when the that happens.

I was probably more in the gap than it appears, as the camera is mounted on the right of my head (and usually points slightly towards oncoming traffic).

My elbow was fine as it was at low speed. What would be more of a concern would be if it had knocked me off balance!

 

[Crackle]

I think my only criticism, if you could call it that, is that you stopped in a narrower space than if you'd stopped just one more car back. When I watched the vid, I found myself wishing you to either stop before you did or move forward as I felt you'd stopped in too narrow a space.

All the argy bargy I've ever seen about motorbikes or bikes queueing has come about because the driver has felt their space has been invaded. By stopping so close to her I think she's become a little incensed because she feels threatenend (see Wheeledweenies blog entry here).

Doesn't excuse her behaviour mind. Just a thought for you to muse on.

 

[marzjennings]

Ok, you were way nicer than I would have been in that situation, 'fat cow' would have been just the start.

 

[garrilla]

I was probably more in the gap than it appears, as the camera is mounted on the right of my head (and usually points slightly towards oncoming traffic).

I mean really in the gap, if she'd come forward then she'd have taken your back wheel out. We'd be having a very different discussion then

 

[beanzontoast]

Mag - I'm not excusing the driver's behaviour either, but is it possible the fact you usually get away with doing what you did lulled you into feeling falsely secure? It's not the thousands of times it's worked without a problem that you have to worry about - it's the occasions when it doesn't work. Like an impatient driver. Or when a ped steps out between vehicles. Or when someone in that queue opens a car door. Or when someone doesn't use their mirror before moving...

The chance of close shaves is dramatically increased by getting into positions where at least some drivers (and there's no way of telling who they are) might not be expecting / wanting to find you - whether or not that positioning can be defended in pure cycling terms.

 

[eldudino]

I'd have taken her wing mirror off, then used an SPD to make a go-faster stripe down the side of her tractor and taken a different route to work!

 

[magnatom]

I think my only criticism, if you could call it that, is that you stopped in a narrower space than if you'd stopped just one more car back. When I watched the vid, I found myself wishing you to either stop before you did or move forward as I felt you'd stopped in too narrow a space.

All the argy bargy I've ever seen about motorbikes or bikes queueing has come about because the driver has felt their space has been invaded. By stopping so close to her I think she's become a little incensed because she feels threatenend (see Wheeledweenies blog entry here).

Doesn't excuse her behaviour mind. Just a thought for you to muse on.

I think that your psychology is probably correct. It's the my kingdom mentality and the fact that drivers don't always humanise cyclists. I think I posted elsewhere about me occasionally scratching my head, fiddling with my gloves etc, so that drivers can see me as 'more human'. I didn't do that on this occasion!

I do generally look for bigger gaps, but I didn't think any beyond the bus were any bigger than the one I took, and due to the nature of the traffic ahead I certainly didn't think that taking a slightly smaller gap was a concern. Of course, I forgot how nasty human nature can be sometimes...