Near Miss of the Day 788: British Transport Police apologises for "lapse in judgement" from impatient officer

Today's Near Miss of the Day comes courtesy of a road.cc reader who was on the receiving end of some impatient must get in front driving from... a police officer driving a British Transport Police vehicle. At least it was easy to work out where to send the complaint...

 The reader was riding a tandem through York when the police vehicle rushed ahead — despite oncoming traffic — resulting in "an unnecessary and uncomfortably close pass" at the narrowest point of the bridge.

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"Nothing is gained, because it has to stop for lights. It's no surprise that it's almost impossible to get the police interested in dangerous driving in York," he told us.

But that's not where this story ends because, as we would recommend all cyclists who have recorded clips of close passes, they reported it to the police, making an official complaint via the British Transport Police website.

He received the following reply:

I am in receipt of your complaint regarding the BTP vehicle passing too close to you in York. I have watched the video that you supplied and concur that the decision to pass you at that point should have been given more thought as to possible repercussions of such action. Please accept my apologies on behalf of the British Transport Police for this lapse in judgement by the officers.

It is my intention to ascertain who the officers are and ask their supervision to have a reflective practice meeting with them to review the footage and identify any learning that is to be had and reflect on findings moving forward, so that a repeat does not happen.

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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