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news
Near Miss of the Day 209: Close pass followed by abuse
Today's video in our Near Miss of the Day series shows a motorist making a very close pass on a father and son cycling through a village in Somerset earlier this year - which he followed up (not shown in the clip) by stopping further down the road to give them verbal abuse.
It happened in February in Peasedown St John to road.cc reader Steve, who told us:
“I was out with my 11 year old son (who's a member of local youth cycle club Sulis Scorpions) and this occurred not too far from home.
“I could hear the car coming up from behind us (my son was behind me) and it appeared to coming at some speed (it's a 20mph limit) and as this is slightly downhill we were already doing around 20mph.
“The car came past us right at the traffic island, brushing my son and not far off me either – very scary for both of us.
“The driver stopped just down the road and shouted at us for being ‘f**king annoying cyclists who think they own the road’.
“We moved on a little shaken and he followed us and confronted us two more times – again all on the extended video if you are interested.”
Steve added: “I lodged the incident with Avon & Somerset police and once they had the video they investigated and then prosecuted the driver for driving without due care and attention.”
> 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
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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15 comments
Good to hear of the prosecution. These days, following a quick glance back in good time, I always try and take the lane through pinch points, sometimes indicating before doing so.
Glad you had a prosecution of that twerp. Nasty pass and to carry on bleating away at a young lad & his Dad is completely out of order.
Had a similar incident today where a clown tried to pass on entering a calming measure. Dropped back when he realised he couldn’t get past in time without punching his front suspension through the wheel arch. Then squeezed by to get through the next calming measure. To get caught at lights. The resulting conversation had me accused of being in the middle of the road and he had me on camera. I told him fine and that his footage would show him contravening numerous guidelines in the HC whereas I was cycling as recommended by police and advanced drivers. By now the lights had changed and I just told him to drive on as it wasn’t worth it.
While we can all be glad that the police took some action, this sentence leads me to think that something more could have been done “We moved on a little shaken and he followed us and confronted us two more times....."
Once might have just been a mistake, but to confront two law-abiding citizens twice more shows a level of disregard for normal human behaviour that warranted some further charges: threatening behaviour perhaps, but I'm sure there must have been something more he should have been charged with, resulting in at the very least a hefty fine and serious financial penalty. Just wondering that if I declare cycling as my religion, would that mean he could be prosecuted under religious hate laws?
Allowing this level of cyclist hatred merely encourages it.
Exactly. You have to wonder at the fit state of this person to drive if he was that wound up by the cyclists there. They looked to be cycling at close to the 20mph limit anyway. All he had to do was hold back for 1 second and he could speed pass easily, Instead he actively decided to endanger the life of an 11 year old boy.
Pretty normal driver behaviour for that part of Somerset.
Feck - contributory factor of poor road design sticking the cyclist in the gutter. There's a couple of those pinch point bypasses near me - I never use them for just that reason. They're there for a reason (road is too narrow for 30mph side by side traffic) so I take the same position as a driver would when driving around them. Means I stay in primary and discourage drivers from trying to squeeze past on the bend.
What is the point of that thing, other than to tell cyclists 'get in the gutter and stay there'?
The "point" of that thing is traffic calming, whereby a car travelling in the same direction as the cyclist has to give way to oncoming traffic, while allowing the cyclist to continue. they work fine, IF drivers follow the highway code . . . as in give way, then at the following pinch point simply drop in behind for 2-3 seconds then pass safely.
Those things are horrendous and I don't use them.
This one - https://goo.gl/maps/URpVsvjCkAS2
is round the corner from my office, and is *always* full of broken glass.
Glad to hear there was a prosecution - it would be good to know the details.
Well done the plod for acting on this. Good news for once.
I guess we should be thankful for small mercies, but a charge of driving without due care and attention sounds pretty feeble to me for a case that includes shouting and swearing at (threatening?) a child.
"again all on the extended video if you are interested"
Can't see a link to this.
And searching for various permutations of close pass, feb and Peasedown don't get any hits.