Lane Awareness on Roundabouts?

[mrk]

It is mildly annoying, but doesn't happen often down here. Thankfully when it does, it's usually with an open stretch up ahead anyway, so I can just overtake and continue on my way.

A prime example tonight which reminded of this thread actually, young woman in the wrong lane, doesn't indicate. Then moments later at a smaller roundabout, at the very end of the exit going round with my nose on the left lane alongside her rear bumper on the right lane, she begins to move in forcing me to brake... When I overtake and am side by side, she looks at me as if to say "what's the issue ".

I don't really care if people cut in front of me because they are in the wrong lane, but I need clear indication before the manoeuvre so I can lift off and give a little room, or just be prepared for it.

Bad lane discipline, not using your mirrors and lack of indication should be equally as punishable as texting whilst driving. Both can cause accidents with the same tragic outcomes.

 

[Jono8]

This is why I avoid going parallel with people on roundabouts. But if I'm driving a banger I just stand my ground and if they hit me, sucks to be them.

+1

I always make a point of hanging back! The amount of room some people will take up is shocking really.

Yep, after a ridiculously near miss involving someone completely cutting across me i just hang back now and make sure i am never alongside someone on a roundabout. There are just too many people who are just all over the place on the roundabouts on my way to work to risk it.

 

[Lustral]

It is mildly annoying, but doesn't happen often down here. Thankfully when it does, it's usually with an open stretch up ahead anyway, so I can just overtake and continue on my way.

A prime example tonight which reminded of this thread actually, young woman in the wrong lane, doesn't indicate. Then moments later at a smaller roundabout, at the very end of the exit going round with my nose on the left lane alongside her rear bumper on the right lane, she begins to move in forcing me to brake... When I overtake and am side by side, she looks at me as if to say "what's the issue ".

I don't really care if people cut in front of me because they are in the wrong lane, but I need clear indication before the manoeuvre so I can lift off and give a little room, or just be prepared for it.

Bad lane discipline, not using your mirrors and lack of indication should be equally as punishable as texting whilst driving. Both can cause accidents with the same tragic outcomes.

I know exactly where that is ... happens all the time.

 

[Holst1981]

I try very hard to avoid being beside other cars on roundabouts.

I will never overtake.

 

[MM-Seat]

Roundabouts seem to be a consistent source of bad driving. I do think a lot of them are poorly designed however.

 

[gEd]

Sorry it's a bit late and i've had a beer or 2 but I'm really struggling to see what this driver did wrong. You were both in exactly the same (straight ahead) lane as you went through the lights and you both went through the same arch, without crossing any white lines. From the position of your car, it looks like you were assuming that they were going to peel off right but they gave no indication that they were going to do this. (confused)

 

[mrk]

Sorry it's a bit late and i've had a beer or 2 but I'm really struggling to see what this driver did wrong. You were both in exactly the same (straight ahead) lane as you went through the lights and you both went through the same arch, without crossing any white lines. From the position of your car, it looks like you were assuming that they were going to peel off right but they gave no indication that they were going to do this. (confused)

The road markings are what direct the flow of traffic in a specific lane. Red heads into the A32 toward Gosport/Stubbington etc, yellow heads to A27 West only toward central Fareham

If she'd accelerated to get into the A32 lane ahead of me then that would have been fine as she'd have acknowledged she was in the wrong lane, and made /safe progress/ to get into the correct lane without cutting anyone up. but she dawdled and decided to change lanes lastminute.com, and without indicating.

The problem here is the same as what others experience, people doing silly things at the very last moment.

Reality is she should have gone round the roundabout and then got into the correct lane. This would have taken an extra 10-20 seconds. Had I been accelerating with mild throttle at the time then there's no doubt she would have gone into the side of me.

 

[gEd]

The road markings are what direct the flow of traffic in a specific lane. Red heads into the A32 toward Gosport/Stubbington etc, yellow heads to A27 West only toward central Fareham

If she'd accelerated to get into the A32 lane ahead of me then that would have been fine as she'd have acknowledged she was in the wrong lane, and made /safe progress/ to get into the correct lane without cutting anyone up. The problem here is the same as what others experience, people doing silly things at the last minute.

Reality is she should have gone round the roundabout and then got into the correct lane. This would have taken an extra 10-20 seconds. Had I been accelerating with mild throttle at the time then there's no doubt she would have gone into the side of me.

It would perhaps have been more helpful if the right lane had a right arrow in it, rather than a straight ahead arrow as the driver, literally went straight ahead, Their error was to not match the road number on the lane to the sign, easily done if you are not familiar with the area. You were in the same lane as the car ahead (or to be more precise, straddling the white line) so why was it ok for you to go through that arch but not the car head???

 

[mrk]

Because it's one lane going round the which then that turns into two at the traffic lights. You can see my left indicator start blinking as we approach the lights in the gif to notify traffic that I am sticking to the A32 lane.

My point still stands, if you're a new driver to that area, or just are generally in the wrong lane, go round the roundabout again and get in the correct lane. Or if you've got the horse power to do so, make use of it so when you do change lane, traffic behind you has a big enough gap to not be cut off. Nobody would be annoyed by the latter, progress is made by all parties involved after all.

 

[gEd]

So (according to your diagram) should you not have been in the left lane if that was the correct lane to be in, in order to go through that arch? What if there were cars in the left lane that also were going to drive through the same arch (andf come in from your left).

[edit] you were both in the wrong lane, the difference is that you knew it and they didn't , hence why you indicated to show that you were going to deviate from the normal route (to go right) which at a complex junction, with cars coming in from your left, seems risky.

 

[mrk]

[I'm only still up because I found myself watching a hilarious YouTube playlist!]

I am not sure quite how you're coming to your conclusions given I've literally annotated and describe exactly how that junction works

Let's try making it clearer.

* Blue lines are traffic lights
* Before traffic light #1, it's only one lane going round

After passing traffic light #1 I indicate left and stick to the A32 lane and switch of indicators once I'm on my path for the railway arch, it's the point of 'no backsies' by then anyway. You don't necessarily have to indicate after passing light #1 if you're just filtering into either lane anyway, because the right lane only goes toward A27, and earlier (right of the image) A32 is road-marked as Gosport, so shouldn't take a genius to work out that the A27 road marking at traffic light #2 isn't in actual fact, Gosport.

Once again, I'm having to repeat myself, but she should have indicated left when approaching traffic lights #2. I would have seen that indication and extended some courtesy for merging. We all find ourselves in the wrong lane from time to time, it's up to how we deal with it that makes us observant drivers or not.

 

[Jokester]

Isn't the assumption here that the other driver knows the road names? If they don't know the names and are merely folllowing the road arrows then they would be completely oblivious to them making a mistake.

For me that's just bad road markings, as said the arrows should point right as well if that is the direction the applicable A road is going.

 

[Jono8]

I too was wondering what the white car had done wrong when i first saw the gif. The road markings look very misleading.

 

[Dis86]

Isn't the assumption here that the other driver knows the road names? If they don't know the names and are merely folllowing the road arrows then they would be completely oblivious to them making a mistake.

For me that's just bad road markings, as said the arrows should point right as well if that is the direction the applicable A road is going.

Can't recall what it's like up in Scotland (assuming you're up there!) but where I am we get a 30ft sign before the junction which has a graphic representation and shows the road numbers. Then at the junction we have 20ft arrows with the road names painted on them.

 

[Simon]

Driving through on amber was a bigger issue than the white car confused by awful road markings

 

[gEd]

Yes, I hadn't got to that bit..

 

[Kenai]

Big issue with roundabouts now is increasingly confusing road markings and over complicated lane systems.

The junction to join the M271 by Nursling in Southampton has just been redeveloped to accommodate the huge new Lidl distribution centre and the roundabout has gone from a simple 2 lane system that worked ok to one that flips flops from 2 to 4 lanes back to 2 depending what route you're taking, with confusing straight on and right turn markings. It's chaos trying to drive round it now because the lanes just don't work for where people want to drive and think they should be able to drive based on normal roundabout rules. I'm sure it all made sense to a group of engineers in a planning office somewhere though.

 

[Lopéz]

The road markings on that video are really not very good. Plus you both ran an amber light, by some margin, when it looked safe to stop.

 

[Entai]

Personally I would have said that both the OP and the white car were equally wrong, in that the OP did not have his car completely in the left hand lane, at any time until well after entering the yellow hashed box area.

Had the OP followed the red line on his drawing in post #51, and been fully in the left hand lane before point marked 2 then he may have had more of an argument, but pretty much until entering the yellow box he was right behind the white car, so both equally in the wrong lane, and has been said both passed through on a full amber with more than plenty of time to have stopped safely at the lights at point 2, preferably in the correct lanes, which is why maybe the OP did not stop, as he was a that point straddling both lanes, so could not have stopped safely.

 

[mrk]

I moved into the left lane after the second lane separation line before the #2 lights, there are only two lines before then anyway, and there was no other traffic on the left or behind me, only the white car in front, so I just started indicating before the lights (the beginning of the first lane separation line) and then filtered into lane 1 which is enough time for the car in front to see the indication and headlights in both middle and left side rear view mirrors.

I admit the junction/roundabout itself is horrendously marked, and was only "revamped" to satisfy access to the big Tesco when that was built several years back. Look at how it used to look vs now:

I also admit going through the amber was maybe a bit naughty. but certainly not illegal and I crossed the line before it turned red whilst carrying the same steady speed, nor did it cause a nuisance for any surrounding traffic, for which there was hardly any. Like I said, I don't really care how people go about getting themselves into lanes or taking junctions, as long as some form of indication is given if they're close to other traffic, or if they just speed on through without being an issue to surrounding traffic!

Edit*
My mistake was probably assuming that the white car driver was staying right and going into the A27, even though they followed me round the roundabout where markings clearly showed that the A32 was the lane they needed to be in. They should still have indicated.

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