Near Miss of the Day 187: Cyclist persuades police to launch close pass operation - then has his close pass video rejected

When police in Northamptonshire announced recently that they would run a close pass operation targeting drivers who overtake cyclists too closely, it was thanks in part to the efforts of one road.cc reader who lives in the county.

Back in May the cyclist, Dave, met with the force’s chief constable and showed him a video compilation of close passes he had experienced on the county’s roads, which ultimately led to its safer roads team devising Operation ClosePass, launched last week.

So you can imagine Dave’s frustration when he was told that no action would be taken against the driver of the van in the video above who made a very close pass on him.

He told us: “A week after Northamptonshire Police finally run Op ClosePass with TV and press coverage, the reviewing officer commented that he felt I (the cyclist) was riding too far into the road, and was satisfied that the driver gave enough room.

“Not a great start to the campaign if this is considered to be a safe passing distance,” he added.

> Near Miss of the Day turns 100 - Why do we do the feature and what have we learnt from it?

Over the years road.cc has reported on literally hundreds of close passes and near misses involving badly driven vehicles from every corner of the country – so many, in fact, that we’ve decided to turn the phenomenon into a regular feature on the site. One day hopefully we will run out of close passes and near misses to report on, but until that happy day arrives, Near Miss of the Day will keep rolling on.

If you’ve caught on camera a close encounter of the uncomfortable kind with another road user that you’d like to share with the wider cycling community please send it to us at info [at] road.cc or send us a message via the road.cc Facebook page.

If the video is on YouTube, please send us a link, if not we can add any footage you supply to our YouTube channel as an unlisted video (so it won't show up on searches).

Please also let us know whether you contacted the police and if so what their reaction was, as well as the reaction of the vehicle operator if it was a bus, lorry or van with company markings etc.

> What to do if you capture a near miss or close pass (or worse) on camera while cycling