Near Miss of the Day 674: “The driver is going to have to inconvenience someone,” say police – that “someone” was a cyclist

“The driver is going to have to inconvenience someone,” said the police worker who reviewed the poor driving featured in our Near Miss of the Day series – that “someone” was of course a cyclist, and we are glad it was just an “inconvenience” he suffered.

Here is the reply that road.cc reader Richard got from Gloucestershire Constabulary when he sent the footage to them. 

Thought your readers may be interested in my latest submission to Gloucestershire Constabulary for your NMOTD. I have attached a copy of the video I sent in and below is the reply I received.

“I’m not going to prosecute the driver.

“Initially he has left plenty of room. The opposite carriageway is clear. The van then appears from the mini roundabout and the car is already quite far passed you. At this point the driver is going to have to inconvenience someone because of the situation has developed in a way the driver didn’t foresee.

“Because of this it wouldn’t meet the threshold for careless driving as the driver hasn’t been careless they have been the victim of unforeseen circumstances.”

An interesting take on a close pass that put the cyclist in danger, don’t you think?

> 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