Video: Van driver filmed swerving at cyclist

Virgin Media says it is looking into an incident in which a driver of one of its vans was filmed swerving towards a cyclist who was overtaking it.

According to the timestamp on a video shot by the dashcam of a vehicle immediately behind the van, the incident took place on 29 June.

The footage, which was taken close to the Golden Days Garden Centre in Cheadle, Greater Manchester, was uploaded to YouTube on 31 July with the title, "Van Trying to Hit a Cyclist."

The description of the video reads: "Van driver trying to hit a cyclist twice. "

As the rider overtakes the van, the driver swerves sharply to the right, forcing the cyclist to take evasive action. 

The cyclist then moves to the nearside of the vehicle, unclips and has a brief conversation with the driver, who moves the vehicle to the left. 

While the general consensus on social media is that the driver deliberately swerved at the cyclist, another explanation could be that he simply did not see him and that the rider overtaking the fan coincided with the van driver deciding to overtake a vehicle in front that may be waiting to turn left into the garden centre, although that is not clear from the footage.

The incident was flagged to Virgin Media by Twitter users this morning and the company requested further details.

If you are the cyclist involved, or know who the rider is, we'd be very interested in learning what the van driver's explanation was.

Hi, Philip. Thank you for bringing this to our attention. Can you confirm where and when this occurred, please? ^ZR

— Virgin Media (@virginmedia) August 6, 2017

The episode seems is reminiscent of one we reported on that happened in April in which a van driver in Sussex swerved into a cyclist, forcing him off the road.

The driver was sacked by his employers immediately they became aware of the footage.

> Sussex van driver filmed forcing cyclist off road to appear in court