Near Miss of the Day 538: Close pass driver hangs back when they realise they are being filmed

Have you heard of PassPixi? It’s a magnetic plate or adhesive sticker that you can put on your pannier, the back of your jacket, or basically anywhere a driver may see it, and with a logo similar to that found on speed camera signs, it alerts drivers to the fact that the cyclist ahead is equipped with a camera – and, by association, that any bad driving may be caught on video.

One rider who has invested in one – and it’s not a large outlay, coming in at £8.99 for the magnetic version, or £5.50 for the adhesive one (plus postage, in both cases) is road.cc reader Joel, who filmed the video here in our Near Miss of the Day series.

With footage shot front and rear, you can see that the motorist is about to perform a dangerous overtaking manoeuvre before, presumably spotting the PassPixi logo, thinking better of it and holding back until it was safer to pass the cyclist.

“I got a camera partly in the hope that some drivers would see it and opt not to make dangerous passes,” Joel says in the description to his video on YouTube.

“The problem is, most don't see the camera – at least until they've already put me in danger. So when I saw the PassPixi patches, I knew I wanted one. I don't want footage of dangerous drivers – I only take footage of dangerous drivers because I don't know how else to stop them putting my life at risk – until now.

“This guy sees me coming round the roundabout – but starts pulling out anyway. He realises he can't quite get in front of me, so he pulls out right on my back wheel instead.

“Watch how quickly he drops back as my back comes into his line of sight and he sees that big neon camera sign though! Worth every penny!

“No I didn't get a discount or anything for posting this,” added Joel [and for the sake of transparency we should make it clear that road.cc doesn’t, either – “just genuinely so happy that my rides are safer every day for this small outlay.”

> 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