Close pass of the day – unhelpful, divisive and off putting

On my of my narrow country

On many of my narrow country lanes, all too true.

Pilot comments are very
Pilot comments are very transparent though. They are encouraged to report issues. They built a whole new culture on reporting errors with out stigma.
In fact they were so successful, hospitals have used pilots in an attempt to change surgical procedures and prevent horrible errors.
There was a superb 30 minute programme on radio 4 a few years ago about it.

To be fair, most of the

To be fair, most of the general news at the moment increases my stress levels.

I think that having at least some media coverage of this issue helps raise it’s profile with the authorities. I certainly thought it was useful to tell police the clip I submitted had been published – therefore arguing it was ‘in the public interest’ for them to do something about it.

I don’t think it’s road.cc’s job to fight the cause, we’ve got Cycling UK etc. for that. Although it would be interesting if they managed to interview a police spokesperson to get their response to the inaction that some forces are demonstrating.

Maybe a feature of the subscription could be a ‘hide NMoTD’ setting?!

Having submitted a couple
Having submitted a couple myself, I appreciate the feedback, even those that are critical of my own actions.

As Nelson Mandela once may have said. “I never lose, I either win or I learn.”

If I can learn from other people’s experiences then even better, and far less risk to my own scabby carcass.

Downside is that it can give the impression that cycling is more dangerous than it actually is, but personally speaking, in decades of motorcycling and driving a car I have never been put in a life threatening situation by another driver. On a bicycle and certainly in the last 3 years or so, I feel that drivers are far more likely to put me in harms way due to incompetence, lack of care or outright aggression. A camera is now basic self defence.

I just don’t look at those

I just don’t look at those posts at all now: I *know* there are loads of terrible drivers out there and I don’t need to see the videos or I’d never ride on the road again.  I don’t really see that these articles do anything to reduce close passing, perhaps they encourage sales of video cameras?

I find them useful,

I find them useful, definitely for thinking , “what could I have done in that same situation?”, and it makes me more aware of hazards to watch out for when I am out cycling. 

Lot of them get good responses from others and advice on what to do, or how they could proceed, even being able to work out the numberplates, if the car is taxed/MOT’d etc, the model of car, the name of the company written on the van, etc to help bring the careless driver to account. And its worked, you see it in a lot of the follow up comments.

I am glad Road.cc publishes them, other cycling media outlets like GCN or Bikeradar seem to paint a perfect world of cycling, which just isn’t true.

I think without them being published, you wouldnt see so much momentum towards the new press guidelines for reporting on cycling in the press, or the whole “witness/victim” thing being debated and fed back to the justice system on.

Hopefully closs passes are going to be frowed upon as much as drink driving one day.

it’s your call – other sites

it’s your call – other sites are available. 
“I for one will never subscribe to Road.cc until ‘close pass of the day’ is withdrawn.”

On the other hand, they

On the other hand, they highlight poor roadcraft and can be instructional. As a submitter of a couple of them, it also provides an outlet for discussion and lets you get the opinion of other cyclists – sometimes it helps to talk about possibly traumatic experiences out on the road and provides a sense of community (i.e. you’re not alone in getting close-passed).

Sometimes, I’m not in the mood to watch them, so I simply ignore them – I get what you mean about making you anxious about cycling on the roads.