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news
Near Miss of the Day 505: Cyclist praises Metropolitan Police's handling of close pass video
A cyclist who received a “thank you” message from the Metropolitan Police after his video of a close pass helped secure a conviction of a motorist not only for careless driving, but also driving without insurance has described the force’s communication with him as “a world away from the response from any other police force I've reported to.”
The footage that led to the conviction was shot by road.cc reader Joel on St-Martin’s-Le-Grand, close to St Paul’s Cathedral – an area that falls within the territory patrolled by the City of London Police, although for some reason it was the Met that investigated the report.
Filmed on Joel’s former commute home from his office in London, the video shows a motorist make a close pass on him to his left, as well as passing an electric scooter rider.
“Strictly speaking I know that the electric scooter isn't allowed to be on the road, but that's not an excuse for risking his life and mine by cutting through us as this delightful Toyota driver does,” Joel told as.
“The unexpectedness, partly because of the fact that unusually this close pass came in from the left and partly because of the sudden speed up to squeeze through, contributed to the scariness of this one – but the main fear factor was just how close he came.
“As is so often depressingly the case, it was also utterly pointless as he's then stopped at the traffic light 20 metres on – and there are at least 3-4 more sets in the next 400 metres of road along this stretch.
“Today I received the welcome news that this had proceeded to court. I received the following email – unprompted – from the Metropolitan Police on the outcome, which I thought was worth sharing in itself. Not only a courtesy to inform me of the outcome – but actually a thank you from the Met.
The email revealed that the close pass, together with the lack of insurance, had resulted in the driver being fined £660 and ordered to pay costs of £176, as well as having his licence endorsed with 8 penalty points.
The email concluded: “On behalf of the Metropolitan Police Service, I would like to thank you for your assistance in this matter and for helping us to try to achieve our policing objectives of reducing the number of killed and seriously injured on London’s roads.”
Joel said: “This is a world away from the response from any other police force I've reported to – I always get an acknowledgement and a case reference number directly from the Met, and a notification if they issue a Notice of Intended Prosecution.
“In the past I've been able to find outcomes by contacting them to enquire – but they've now gone a step further. This whole approach should absolutely be rolled out as best practice nationwide.
“As you can see, it's not a whole lot of work – the details look to be copy/pasted from the court system, along with a standard thank you text at the end. It makes a world of difference to feel that things like this are taken seriously.”
He added: “Somewhat disappointing that there seems to have been no specific penalty attached to the bit that directly affected me – ie the dangerous driving – but 8 points and a decent fine is at least a good outcome overall, and I read the outcome to be that both the No Insurance and the Driving Without Reasonable Consideration were proved in absence, which is gratifying.”
> 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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35 comments
Good sound track!
Parts of this were my 'former' commute too (nearly 9 months out of the office now...) and from the soundtrack I'm pretty sure I've shared the road with Joel before. Chapeau!
Surprise, surprise... Uber. The Kings of the Dangerous U-Turn.
Might have been nice to see the cyclist treat the more vulnerable road users with the same respect...
I mut confess, I also noticed that.....
Did you expect the cyclist to stop ? Doesn't look like a crossing, the Priam pusher is clearly eyeballing the cyclist and intends to cross behind the cyclist .
I didn't see that as an issue - there wasn't a huge speed differential and there was plenty of room for the peds, push-chair and cyclist. Am I missing something?
Same here. They walked in the road knowing the cyclist was coming and did it at a speed to enable the cyclist to go past. If he has stopped, they also would have stopped and then they would be motioning until one took the initiative.
If it was an official crossing I would have then taken a Sriacha viewpoint.
8 points - pretty steep.
I did find it slightly ironic that the cyclist goes to a lot of trouble to outline the lane and how he is (quite rightly) entitled to ride in it...and then squeezes past a bus that is in that very lane in much the same way that the car passed him (albeit on the other side).
How many people would have been injured if the cyclist had made a misjudgement and clipped the bus?
The bus would have been forced into a hedge and all the passengers would fall off. Or worse the draft from the rider would cause the bus to fall over and be run over by the following car
It could have been carnage. CARNAGE I tell thee!
Because of course, pedal-propelling 10kg of bicycle past a stationary bus at 10mph, and then waiting for the bus that isn't safe to pass to move on before continuing is just as dangerous as gunning two tons of metal at 20-30mph within 2 inches of a moving cyclist.
No, what is ironic is that you apparently don't realise how idiotic that comparison is.
Ouch!
Yeah, just as well he didn't have the caps lock on or I would have been mortally wounded.
6 points for no insurance alone. No doubt will be claiming exceptional hardship in the future.
6 points is the minimum for driving without insurance.
It's telling, isn't it, that the crime where the risk is purely potential monetary loss for someone carries at least double the penalty as the crime where the risk is that someone could lose their life or be seriously injured...
I'm not sure that's a fair comparison. Drivers can kill or maim whether or not they have insurance. The difference is that an uninsured driver may not be pay any damages awarded as a result of a collision. That could be relatively small, e.g. the cost of a new wing mirror, or it could also be hundreds of thousands of pounds for compensation for loss of future earnings and the cost of long-term care as the result of a serious incident. Both are purely monetary loss, but one is not as trivial as you make it sound, and in that sense the penalty for driving without insurance does take into account the risk of someone being killed or injured, and is high to act as a deterrent. Of course if a driver actually kills or maims, then there are separate offences, and the penalty can reflect the outcome, and can be far more severe than 6 points.
How much does a new wing mirror cost, though?
DOOR mirror
Just wanted to get that in before the Tartan Teen Sensation got here....
Depends on the car. PS: anticipating an intervention, I'm going to get in there first - it's a DOOR mirror.
The real answer can be well into 3 figures if it's a remote control heated mirror that has to be painted to match the car.
The de rigeur road.cc answer is of course 7 / 6d because wing mirrors went out with pipe smoking.
Sriracha - What do you mean? Please do explain what you are on about!
Errr ... please advise exactly how these vulnerable road users were endangered or disrespected in any way?
Great outcome and great response, which begs the question why aren't all the other police forces so effusive in their thanks to concerned citizens reporting illegality? After all, we're doing their jobs for them; all they have to do is sit at their desks, watch some vids and prosecute the drivers.
I'm pretty sure they are quite happy with getting reports of people being mugged, or theft or assault.
Well done all involved!
I love hearing "you were in the middle of the road!", always accompanied unspoken thought "so I thought I'd run you over..."
Also it's never "you were in the middle of the lane", always "road".
Yeah, and particularly stupid this context - when there is literally no other place you could be in order to travel in that direction.
Also vital to take the lane on that bit because otherwise traffic coming round from the right will squeeze you into the traffic merging from the left.
yeah, on multi lane roads you have to take the centre of the lane going where you want to go, or else you get trapped between two cars in adjacent lanes.
as to the pedestrians comment above, they were alreay crossing and so he should give way, one might argue they did not have to stop or slow their crossing so they are not impeded. I think In his position I would not have stopped but taken a line close to the left kerb, to give them maximum space.
I often find when peds are crossing and I adjust line to go behind them, they suddenly stop and retreat into my new path, keeping a maximum gap is best.
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