They seem to grow faster these daysIn my day kids weren’t allowed to drive.
Your bad driving encounters/irritations
- Thread starter Stu999
- Start date
I saw a biker get hit by a car at the weekend at a blind junction. The reason the junction is blind is because the trees and bushes are obscuring the view of the joining road. So many people have complained to the council to cut the foliage back and they have done nothing.
Is there something wrong with drivers of MG cars? (the newer style from the last 4-5 years).... They drive in an absolutely appalling and aggressive fashion. Is it anger issues over having to drive an MG? 
Similar with Dacia drivers, albeit to a lesser extent.
Yes I know I am generalising
Similar with Dacia drivers, albeit to a lesser extent.
Yes I know I am generalising
I hope they were OK?
We have a mini roundabout in town that has a totally blind section form the right due to buildings. When giving way to the right, you literally can’t see anything coming until the very last second. Yet I have had cars that fly out of the blind section without any signs of slowing and then give off at me for not giving way.
Is there something wrong with drivers of MG cars? (the newer style from the last 4-5 years).... They drive in an absolutely appalling and aggressive fashion. Is it anger issues over having to drive an MG?
Similar with Dacia drivers, albeit to a lesser extent.
Yes I know I am generalising
I think it's more just a cheap small SUV thing - Nissan Juke drivers are the same, more often than not they seem to be driven in a less than stellar manner!
Yesterday morning and this morning's rush hour while on my way to work has been very poor. Not just taking 30 minutes to drive a single mile, but the amount of bad driving within the heavy traffic has been consistently insane.
The back to school traffic has well and truly returned
Going to be a few unhappy parents at my daughter's school.
Last week, just in time for kid's going back the council have fitted 2 "covert" cameras (not very hidden but they look like the nearby traffic monitors) covering the entrance and the pelican crossings to capture all the parents that park on the yellow/white zigzags
Just had a someone nearly go in to the back of me at a traffic light controlled junction. I was second at a set of lights and the lights went green, off we go but the car in front stopped almost instantly because they mistook the red light just after turning left as being for them. I thankfully saw this move and broke safely. The car behind me clearly wasn’t paying attention and almost hit me and then the driver leaned on the horn in anger and I could see in my rear view mirror they were giving off at me. I pointed to the muppet in the Sportage up ahead who had idiotically stopped at a red light with no solid white line.
So by now the lights for our exit go red and of course the clown in the Sportage finally sees a green light and thinks “oh I can go now” and as I am past the solid white line I carry on out of the junction. Unfortunately the person behind was stuck at the now red light and their face was also incredibly red with anger. I did feel their pain.
I genuinely despair at how many people are totally oblivious and ignorant of even the most basic Highway Code rules and regulations.
So by now the lights for our exit go red and of course the clown in the Sportage finally sees a green light and thinks “oh I can go now” and as I am past the solid white line I carry on out of the junction. Unfortunately the person behind was stuck at the now red light and their face was also incredibly red with anger. I did feel their pain.
I genuinely despair at how many people are totally oblivious and ignorant of even the most basic Highway Code rules and regulations.
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Is there something wrong with drivers of MG cars? (the newer style from the last 4-5 years).... They drive in an absolutely appalling and aggressive fashion. Is it anger issues over having to drive an MG?
Similar with Dacia drivers, albeit to a lesser extent.
Yes I know I am generalising
MG & Dacia's biggest sales are to Motability due to their low price.
Make of that what you will in terms of who's driving them.
Initially was thinking this sounds like the ol' hit into the back of me insurance scam, but after reading your situation again, it just sounds like the Sportage driver was completely ignorant.
That’s exactly what it was. They just thought “oh red light” and stopped. To be fair the car behind me was also beyond the solid white line at time the Sportage finally moved off, but by then the traffic from the right had quite legitimately blocked their exit.
So instead of 4 or 5 cars getting out at a busy junction, only 2 managed it. Then people wonder why we have traffic flow problems.
Another major impact on traffic flow is the utter ignorance of the merge in turn rules. The number of people who sit in the left lane “queuing” while the right lane is free. Then when people like me use the right lane to avoid blocking junctions and roundabouts, we get dirty looks for “queue jumping”. Or even worse the self appointed road warrior clowns who pull out and straddle the lanes to stop us. They also tend to be the ones who get upset because the traffic is backed up on to busy junctions and roundabouts that happens to have two merge in turn lanes at exits to help mitigate that very issue.
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Video from the other night:
At the start the Qashqai's auto-dipping system is a bit **** and sees the 2 illuminated bollards as car headlights from a certain angle and dips, hence off to start with, I only saw one of the red flashes as the cyclist pulled out of the junction and my initial thought was I was seeing just the nearside rear light of a car pulling out at an angle and went to dip, then realised there was no car there.
I seem to encounter a lot of cyclists with no hi-vis, no proper bike lights around here hence the main reason I bought a dashcam in the first place.
If they'd have been wearing even one piece of hi-vis even my dipped beams would have been showing them up plainly.
At the start the Qashqai's auto-dipping system is a bit **** and sees the 2 illuminated bollards as car headlights from a certain angle and dips, hence off to start with, I only saw one of the red flashes as the cyclist pulled out of the junction and my initial thought was I was seeing just the nearside rear light of a car pulling out at an angle and went to dip, then realised there was no car there.
I seem to encounter a lot of cyclists with no hi-vis, no proper bike lights around here hence the main reason I bought a dashcam in the first place.
If they'd have been wearing even one piece of hi-vis even my dipped beams would have been showing them up plainly.
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low hanging fruit ... but if it was a car with fsd type system these mistake red light lane attribution - still drivers fault though.
so it looks like your'e auto lights were dazzling the oncoming driver and he flashed you(rather than road irregularities) , then,
that although you spotted&slowed for cyclist, who was cycling outside of road boundary, you accelerated past(nsl?) despite oncoming vehicle.
I wear high vis, but the number of drivers who leave me a big margin, whilst the oncoming driver is cowering in the gutter.
No my lights were dipped before they appeared - my dashcam has some low light processing which blooms out headlights - that isn't them flashing at 18 seconds just the image processing changing with the cyclist passing between the oncoming car headlights and the camera.
They pulled the bike onto the pavement and were stationary away from the road.
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ok - generally i've got zero tolerance for people using auto dimming systems on winding roads - a human has recognised beam of oncoming car approaching bend and dimmed their
lights before they round the bend pro-active, but auto-systems are too late, reactive;
on roads with frequent oncoming traffic, most that I drive, if you are using high beams it takes time to adjust when you need to turn them off ie unsafe.
so invariably I don't use them at all.
lights before they round the bend pro-active, but auto-systems are too late, reactive;
on roads with frequent oncoming traffic, most that I drive, if you are using high beams it takes time to adjust when you need to turn them off ie unsafe.
so invariably I don't use them at all.
You can see at 16 seconds I manually dipped before the car came into view, normally I'd have probably dipped for the cyclist as well in case they need to look around but with them almost invisible in the dark I wasn't taking chances - the dashcam makes them look more visible than they actually were.
The auto-dipping on the Qashqai, at least that era - some of the newer ones are better, is pretty bad really - takes anywhere from 0.5 to 5 seconds to react when you manually move to main beams which it really shouldn't and gets a few false positives, unfortunately you can't separate the functionality from the normal auto lights which are handy to have on.
The auto-dipping on the Qashqai, at least that era - some of the newer ones are better, is pretty bad really - takes anywhere from 0.5 to 5 seconds to react when you manually move to main beams which it really shouldn't and gets a few false positives, unfortunately you can't separate the functionality from the normal auto lights which are handy to have on.
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That is probably the worst bike 'light' I've seen. The delay between flashes is horrendous. It almost makes me think there is a fault or the battery is on the verge of dying. I think the rider knows there is something up with it as he gets on the pavement and stops.
I suppose he at least had a light. I'm always amazed at the number of people around here on bikes without lights and it's not kids, all people old enough to know better. I don't know why they'd take such a risk with their own safety.
Flashing lights do draw attention, but I don't think they're at all suitable for unlit roads, really a solid light is also needed too so drivers can judge speed and distance too.
I do quite a few miles on my (road) bike and over winter use lights with a solid, constant light, but they also have a pulse flash every second (or I can set 3 pulses for unlit areas). Best of both worlds.
I do think there is a disconnect with cyclists who don't drive and assume us motorists don't have to contend with visibility issues, like rain or reflections on the windscreen, etc.
Yeah something I've always said especially on the roads around here, from the dashcam footage I noticed they were fiddling with something at the front after pulling the bike onto the pavement so may have been a technical issue but still hi-vis or even light coloured clothing would have gone a long way there.
Agreed.
It could be he has his lights connected to a Garmin (bike computer) which can control on / off, patterns, etc. Garmin have quite a few lights and some even include rear radar if you want to know when vehicles are approaching and that’ll trigger the light to brighten / flash in a different pattern. I didn’t think they had a suicide mode though…
It’s actually pretty difficult to find cycling gear without at least some sort of hi-vis marking nowadays. I think cycling fashion over the last decade or so has been moving towards darker colours, which is fine in the middle of a sunny day, but awful for low visibility or dark conditions. Most kit does at least have hi-vis stripes to compensate though, as manufacturers realised people won’t be able to buy more gear if they get squashed.
As you say light colours also help, I’ve got a couple of bright red tops I use in autumn / winter or when it’s generally miserable out (it is the UK after all).
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I had a bit of a weird one this morning on my usual A road. I'm plodding along at the back of a chain of traffic at 50 ish and the car behind me starts flashing their lights, like a lot. I check and there's no emergency vehicles needing to pass so I start to wonder what they want. They clearly want to get my attention perhaps even to stop. It's a single carriageway A road so I can't stop right away, they're still frantically flashing at me and I can see them in the rear view mirror waving their arms as if inviting me to play some charades. I don't understand what they're trying to tell me, give us a clue Lionel Blair.
So I turn off the music and listen for any unfamiliar noise - nothing. The car's not making any smoke (it's an EV) and doesn't smell on fire (it's an EV) and it feels fine, there's no unusual vibration and the TPMS is telling me at all tyres are still inflated. I don't remember cutting anybody up or being an inconsiderate driver on this up until now uneventful journey so I really don't know what this incessant flasher wants. I decide to stop at the next opportunity and hopefully they'll stop too and tell me what the **** is so important to get my attention.
So I pull in to a layby about 450 yards later. They don't. Arrgh! I get out and check the car all around - there's nothing wrapped around a wheel or any illegal immigrants hiding underneath the car. The undertrays are still in place and everything looks fine. I get back in the car and continue my journey never knowing. If only I had a rear view dashcam installed then at least I could try and decipher their morse code and semaphore at my leisure.
So I turn off the music and listen for any unfamiliar noise - nothing. The car's not making any smoke (it's an EV) and doesn't smell on fire (it's an EV) and it feels fine, there's no unusual vibration and the TPMS is telling me at all tyres are still inflated. I don't remember cutting anybody up or being an inconsiderate driver on this up until now uneventful journey so I really don't know what this incessant flasher wants. I decide to stop at the next opportunity and hopefully they'll stop too and tell me what the **** is so important to get my attention.
So I pull in to a layby about 450 yards later. They don't. Arrgh! I get out and check the car all around - there's nothing wrapped around a wheel or any illegal immigrants hiding underneath the car. The undertrays are still in place and everything looks fine. I get back in the car and continue my journey never knowing. If only I had a rear view dashcam installed then at least I could try and decipher their morse code and semaphore at my leisure.