Are drivers becoming more intolerant?

This issue has been debated several times over the years and on several cycle related forums.

I am a lone cyclist and have been for many many years having built and ridden many bikes from the naked frames on both fixed wheel and 5,6,7,8,9 and 10spd Campagnolo and Shimano drive chains.

As a 72 years+ still active cyclist I can only really speak truthfully from the perspective of both the cyclist and a car driver;of which I am.

I live out in rural Bescar,Scarisbrick,West Lancashire and see/suffer and see what goes on on a daily basis when the 'make believe' Peloton takes over the narrow country lanes.

I have no choice but to use these lanes in order to access the main routes through the local area.

Bunching up and several abreast is common place and stupidly when negotiating the many bends that often only permit the careful passing of one car in each direction and many with 'Traffic Calming' measures and especially the many many narrowings - these are often approached in the style of 'Suicide Jockies' or exponents of Kamikaze practices.

I often wonder whether the cyclists of today have ever read the Highway Code and the sections that allude to cyclists in particular or do they work on the premise that the car driver is always guilty/at fault until proven otherwise in a court of law.

I currently have two bikes - one a 51cm Steve Goff dropped bars and the other a 50cm Bianchi Via Nirone 7 Alu Carbon built as a Flatbar Hybrid. They were both built from naked frames and both run on 10spd Campagnolo with Triple Stronglight Chainrings and 140mm Thorn (SJS Cycles) cranks.

This issue has been debated several times over the years and on several cycle related forums.

I am a lone cyclist and have been for many many years having built and ridden many bikes from the naked frames on both fixed wheel and 5,6,7,8,9 and 10spd Campagnolo and Shimano drive chains.

As a 72 years+ still active cyclist I can only really speak truthfully from the perspective of both the cyclist and a car driver;of which I am.

I live out in rural Bescar,Scarisbrick,West Lancashire and see/suffer and see what goes on on a daily basis when the 'make believe' Peloton takes over the narrow country lanes.

I have no choice but to use these lanes in order to access the main routes through the local area.

Bunching up and several abreast is common place and stupidly when negotiating the many bends that often only permit the careful passing of one car in each direction and many with 'Traffic Calming' measures and especially the many many narrowings - these are often approached in the style of 'Suicide Jockies' or exponents of Kamikaze practices.

I often wonder whether the cyclists of today have ever read the Highway Code and the sections that allude to cyclists in particular or do they work on the premise that the car driver is always guilty/at fault until proven otherwise in a court of law.

I currently have two bikes - one a 51cm Steve Goff dropped bars and the other a 50cm Bianchi Via Nirone 7 Alu Carbon built as a Flatbar Hybrid. They were both built from naked frames and both run on 10spd Campagnolo with Triple Stronglight Chainrings and 140mm Thorn (SJS Cycles) cranks.

I reckon car drivers have got more tolerant since I habitually started using a camera. I'm not sure the car drivers realise it is a camera and behave different, but I know it is there and am conscious of being squeeky clean / 100% in the right if something does happen.

So I guess maybe it is I that has become more tolerant knowing I am under surveillance...

I dont know if drivers have got worse in the last few days.  Here in Outer SW London there has been so little traffic since the schools broke up that its been difficult to tell.  However since I started commuting a moderate distance (5 miles) I have been increasingly intolerant of bad driving. It'll be interesting to see what happens when the schools are back in September  

Some of them can't work out hazards or think beyond the end of a bonnet.

Had one last night who didn't like me cycling next to the centre line. Well the road is narrow, there are parked cars both sides, sometimes 2 cars cannot pass. You cannot see far enough ahead to know that someone isn't coming the other way and since it a busy road someone is nearly always coming the otherway.

I know, I'll move over, you overtake, then find that you are now going for a headon, so just pull back in front of me and slam the brakes on and hope I don't hit your precious motor.

Or an amusing squirrel based picture.

If you read the comments on this proposal on the safe passing law you'll despair.

https://www.petrolprices.com/news/driving-close-cyclist-leads-fine/#respond

You are just creating conflict vonhelmet.

Lie prostrate before our motorist overlords.

This morning I was waiting at the lights st a crossroads. The driver opposite wanted to turn right, so across my path. The lights turned green so I moved off. She drove forward and made to turn them had to wait for me, and sat there shaking her head at me. Like, what?

150 miles a week in and around Manchester... commute every day...

In my opinion there's just more c*nts about in general- whether they are driving, riding bikes, jogging, walking dogs, whatever. Some people are just arseholes who think the world revolves around them.

I mostly ride in Lancashire and my impression is (allowing for more traffic on the roads) drivers in general are better than they were 20, 30, 40 years ago. I definitely feel there are more who understand cycling and are genuinely (sometimes even excessively) considerate. But maybe the very few really bad ones are getting worse.

Tolerant of cyclists? The drivers  are way better than they were. Even with the increase in traffic in the last, say, 40 years I reckon that most drivers are better in their attitude towards cyclists.  However the amount of traffic has considerably increased so there are way more on the roads. Driving standards are dire. Most people don't indicate, don't use the Highway Code and are impatient.

I have the highway code section applicable to bicycles saved as a bookmark on my phone web browser. It's handy to have as a reference if someone challenges you and you somehow manage to engage in conflict/ debate/ conversation [at traffic lights or junction maybe].

You get dickheads in vehicles, on bikes and on foot. We just have to live with it. It’s a tough one to expect everyone to share the roads in perfect harmony. It’s not going to happen. The only way to achieve this is segregation, I can’t see that happening either, not everywhere anyway. 

IME in Hertfordshire  car drivers have been giving a better amount of space more often but still there are the frequent knobjockey's who simply have no idea. 

Monday, old fart in a big BMW, overtakes me with about 12" to my elbow whilst the whole of the other lane is clear, slows and he shouts something whilst I'm next to him and then he has to stop at the red light less than 75m away from the first incident so I'm sat right behind him.

Just why?

As above it's the wrong uns that stick in your mind but I have noticed that there are more better overtakes than in previous years, it's just that the bad ones are bad and large vehicles such as HGV/PSV are actually getting worse, those are the ones that are going to and actually do the most damage.

it'd be useful to see the stats comparing years to see if those larger vehicles are increasing, decreasing or remained static in deaths/serious injuries of vulnerable road users as well as other motorists.

I think all road users are getting more aggressive to each other; cyclists are more vulnerable so feel it the most.

My opinion is that its to do with a societal switch towards 'selective ignorance' and being easily offended.

The two work hand in hand on the roads to polarise behaviour. 

The selective ignorance is a big one for me. The internet provides us all with information at our fingertips. We can find out anything we want with the click of a few buttons. However, all this information, all this opportunity to learn is both daunting and demoralising - suddenly you know just how little you know. So, as a natural counter to this, you deliberately avoid educating yourself and choose ignorance, claiming its OK to be ignorant and / or you can't trust any information source and its better to go on gut. 

A classic line during the brexit campaign (think it came from Gove) was that 'the british people are fed up with listening to experts'. What a sad state of affairs.

Anyway, this spills into how people drive. They claim ignorance of the rules (although they all had to pass a test to prove they were aware of them) and prefer to drive in a way their gut believes to be right, even if that is well below legal requirements... but its OK, because, experts...

Then the age of being offended... this relates to the above in my opinion. We are all more aware than ever that other people may know more about something than we might. Allowing yourself to conduct in debate and discussion potentially exposes your unselected ignorance. Therefore, to save embarrassment and/or feeling stupid, you avoid considering a situation by instead becoming instantly angered and offended by it... so you fuck up driving, or someone's actions cause you to question your driving competence, you naturally attack first, ask questions... well never. 

Society tells us its OK to be angry, its OK to be stupid... how do you think that makes people behave? 

Not sure it's intolerance but there seems around here to be an increasing inability to navigate right turns. Road signs, walls, grass verges, kerbs, all showing damage from where drivers have failed to make the corner (i.e. turned in too fast). A lot of it may well be confirmation bias but on one stretch of road (A338 from Ringwood to Fordingbridge) three of the junctions have damaged infrastructure.

I don't remember London drivers being quite so aggressive to cyclists back in the late 80s and early 90s as they are now.

Maybe I'm wrong.

Mind you the casualty statistics were far worse then. And the traffic gridlock London suffered was bad as well.

Can't say I've noticed any tangible difference on London roads but there is more traffic (bikes, white vans, private hires), so people may be more wound-up. Intolerant coverage of cycling/cyclists does seem to be more widespread too. 

Conversely, there's also more cyclists and headcam footage about too - it may be that we're just seeing more of others' bad experiences and assuming its more widespread than it is.

I think we've become the new minority that it's "ok to hate".

You can't be racist or sexist anymore as there are very strict laws against That Kind Of Thing, but it's ok to hate cyclists because the papers, social media, the law, and governments seem to let you get away with it.