Near Miss of the Day 474: "It's more fun to drive straight at a cyclist"

Mungecrundle wrote:

At the risk of causing dissent, but the oncoming driver was fully established in their road position to pass the parked vehicles. The video only shows a few seconds in the lead up, but if the oncoming car was in clear view for longer, then the cyclist could have slowed to allow them to complete the overtake. Slowing down didn't seem to be an option considered by either party. The only reason that the other oncoming vehicles passed safely was their reduced speed behind the other cyclist and their closeness to the parked vehicles. Not ideal given the foreseable possibility of animals, children, car doors etc suddenly appearing in that door zone. Illustrates the problems caused to moving traffic by and the roadspace given up to accomodate parked vehicles. And some people complain about cycle lanes?

Personally, I'd have slowed to let the car through at this point; he was already overtaking the parked cars and therefore the cyclist cannot expect to have priority.

Rule 163: "give way to oncoming vehicles before passing parked vehicles or other obstructions on your side of the road"

If it had been halfway down a line of parked cars, I'd have a different view; but expecting a fast moving car to slow and stop for the sake of one more car is inconsiderate in itself.  That said, the driver could also provide more space and slow down; neither party is blameless here.

alexls wrote:

Personally, I'd have slowed to let the car through at this point; he was already overtaking the parked cars and therefore the cyclist cannot expect to have priority.

Rule 163: "give way to oncoming vehicles before passing parked vehicles or other obstructions on your side of the road"

If it had been halfway down a line of parked cars, I'd have a different view; but expecting a fast moving car to slow and stop for the sake of one more car is inconsiderate in itself.  That said, the driver could also provide more space and slow down; neither party is blameless here.

Agree, really dumb cycling.

Cyclist determined to hold his speed regardless of the safety implications.

As for the right of way comment...

"The rules in The Highway Code do not give you the right of way in any circumstance, but they advise you when you should give way to others. Always give way if it can help to avoid an incident."

Yeah. My view would be what would I do if were behind the wheel instead of on my bike? That would be wait, and not expect someone to dive into a gap as I charge through.

Not sure that the driver did anything monstrous here - it's difficult to know whether they hit the brakes, but swerving into the gap between cars would have had its own risks. And I don't do that when I'm on 2 wheels either - if I'm established, and in primary due to the door zone, I would expect oncoming to cede priority (albeit whilst also fully expecting them not to....)

My tuppence worth is that this is a little unfair on the driver, the rider should have seen this as a risky situation and slowed accordingly.

*Edit* Another viewing of the clip shows that the oncoming car and rider reached that gap at approx the same moment. The driver had no other gaps to move into prior to that. I think I'd have adopted primary, come to a stop and waited to allow the driver to finish their manoeuvre. At the very least I'd not have held my speed

Agree, swerving into the gap could have had catastrophic consequences.

Driver should have slowed but cyclist put them in a difficult position and did so needlessly.

Well had the VW been driven at a more reasonable speed for the road conditions it wouldnt have to swerve to pull into the more than adequate space that was available.

I was taught if the obstruction was on my side of the road, to give way to oncoming traffic as soon as I could,there was no if there was space for us both to pass each other carry on regardless or but I'm almost through this set of parked cars cant they stop instead, if there was a gap and oncoming traffic I was expected to fully use that gap & to give way to them.

For me that principle applies whether I'm in my car, riding a bike or driving a truck, though it is funny how often when you are driving a big vehicle other vehicles will nearly always get out of your way on these calls, when you know full well theyd be driving at you head on whilst you were on your bike.

So in this video,IMO the silver VW first up is in the wrong,but the cyclist should have potentially then stopped by the same gap for the white SUV next along. The problem being otherwise its sending mixed messages to the driver of the white suv,who may mistakenly repeat the VW approach next time they encounter a cyclist in that situation,because the cyclist passes them at no real difference in gap,its just the speed was lower.

It is difficult to assess the speed of the VW, but the rider appeared not to make any attempt to slow.

Rule 163 

give way to oncoming vehicles before passing parked vehicles or other obstructions on your side of the road

Indeed, however, the VW was already well established. Insisting that the VW take the gap before passing the last car in the line seems an excessive form of making a point. It is not something I would do on either 2 wheels or 4, and would gain me nothing. I'd allow the oncoming to complete their manoeuvre.

Clearly, if I was already abreast of the parked cars before the VW entered that part of the road things would be different, but the rider wasn't. It wasn't even close-run.

Looked a pretty big gap to me. If I am driving on a road with lots of cars, I am always looking for the gaps, even if they are on the opposite side and driving at a more moderate pace to stop by the gap or pull into it.

There should however have been more footage before the clip we get so that we get the whole story as to where the respective road users were before anyone committed.

looked no bigger than about 2-3 car lengths to me, followed by 1 car then clear road. I'd wait for them.

Mungecrundle wrote:

At the risk of causing dissent, but the oncoming driver was fully established in their road position to pass the parked vehicles. The video only shows a few seconds in the lead up, but if the oncoming car was in clear view for longer, then the cyclist could have slowed to allow them to complete the overtake.

Slowing down didn't seem to be an option considered by either party.

The only reason that the other oncoming vehicles passed safely was their reduced speed behind the other cyclist and their closeness to the parked vehicles. Not ideal given the foreseable possibility of animals, children, car doors etc suddenly appearing in that door zone.

Illustrates the problems caused to moving traffic by and the roadspace given up to accomodate parked vehicles. And some people complain about cycle lanes?

My take on it is that if the oncoming driver had slowed down even slightly, and moved to the left even slightly (in the big space with no children/animals/car doors) then both could have passed without any problems.

For the cyclist to let the driver pass all the parked vehicles, he would have had to come to a complete stop. Sure, not the end of the world, but I can understand the desire to avoid it especially when there should be plenty of space for both road users to pass safely if the driver showed a modicum of consideration.

OnYerBike wrote:

My take on it is that if the oncoming driver had slowed down even slightly, and moved to the left even slightly (in the big space with no children/animals/car doors) then both could have passed without any problems.

Yep, they were driving too fast for the road conditions. If they were going at a more reasonable speed, then they could have slowed and briefly waited behind the red Audi.

It looks to me like the driver was unfamiliar with the vehicle, as they were closer to the cyclist than the parked cars (can't judge their vehicle's width?). I think they also badly misjudged the speed of the approaching cyclist. A case of 'gunning it' to make it before the bike got there, only to realise they'd got it all wrong (there's a little flick of the hand off the steering wheel as a sort of sorry perhaps?).

However, I would not deem that enough room for me to plough ahead on the bike, even with them driving slowly and more over to their left.

I think I would have probably stopped in primary before the red car to let them through - but will have deployed the folded arms and possibly 'the stare'.

Richard D wrote:

Completely par for the course now.  

Pretty much standard now at parked cars. I'm sure this one deliberately drove at Dave to intimidate him. That's worse than the usual 'car coming through don't see the bike' manoeuvre, so I hope the police do something about this one.

No collision.

(I like the way the space the driver could have pulled into was ignored).

Ive had learner drivers under tuition do the exact same,and the instructor didnt step in, albeit they dont drive quite as fast as that, only the drivers off their heads seem to like to mix the speed with it, so those arent gaps to pull in,they are just parking spaces that are temporarily unoccupied

I actually had a van driver, who I forced to stop once as I refused to concede the space, tell me he'd saved my life by not driving over me, and I should have been on my side of the road anyway, I was, he was the one driving head on at me!!!...at which point you realise there are spores of bacteria with more intelligence than some of the people we let behind the wheel of motor vehicle.

guarantee the driver will have justified that as a hierachy thing and just expected the cyclist to get out of the way for them

Stupid van driver - good on you for standing up for yourself

I wouldnt have said I was standing up for myself particularly on that one, it was just my patience at being perpetually treated like a doormat for riding a bike had worn out at that time, so I didnt yield. A different day, same set of circumstances I would react a different way.

No collision.

Therefore, no problem!

I'm sure you're deploying irony, but this is exactly the way the police and the majority of the driving population think. I once had a Stagecoach bus come so close that when I caught it up a mile later stopped in the centre of Garstang, the passengers had noticed that I was nearly under the wheels and urged me to complain. The b****** driver simply said: I must have been far enough away from you because I didn't hit you. I then went into full complaint mode, although it was before my camera days. The company claimed to have 'spoken to him'. I wouldn't be satisfied with that now, and neither should 'Dave' in this case or 'Joe' in NMotD 470- be bloody-minded, chaps, for the sake of the rest of us!

Not sure about irony, but I thought that was said about a recent nmotd (although I can't find it yet).

https://road.cc/content/news/near-miss-day-463-close-pass-driver-phone-2...

Road name at the start is Grassmere Road - a quick google finds one in Yatton which matches on streetview (cycist is travelling on the imaginatively named High Street).

Yes, that's the location

Dave