How do drivers in <Your Town Here> React to Filtering?

[Nomisf]

So I saw this video in the YouTube thread,

And it got me wondering,

I learnt to ride in London, where filtering is the norm and becomes natural quite quickly. I am used to a little bit of friction from the odd driver, but nothing more as I generally ride quite timidly and rarely push my luck with gaps etc.

Since I moved back to Reading however, I have noticed a lot less tolerance for filtering. While there are a large majority of people who leave a gap, or move over I have also been dangerously blocked, verbally abused, chased and hassled once, and even had one gentleman get out and try to push me off the bike for "Breaking the law on queue jumping" .

I am now wondering if this is a reigonal thing, is it just due to the sudden explosion of summer bikers, does it get worse as you move away from London?

Curious to see other peoples thoughts on the places they commonly ride ?

 

[Nomisf]

For a little background, the motivation behind my post was an experience on Saturday on the following bit of the A33 through Reading.

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@51.4...4!1sq95lXVGJAW081PZBBKoSaQ!2e0!7i13312!8i6656

Traffic was tailed back almost a mile, and completely stationary - I was riding with a pillion on the Pan Euro with no luggage. Its quite wide road, and the centre gap is more than large enough even for the big bike- but on no less than 4 seperate occasions in less than 5 minutes a car actively moved to close the centre gap, one while I was directly alongside. I was being followed by another bike 2-up, which actually came very close to going down thanks to a red faced middle age man in an Audi.

To top it off, the guy at the front wound down his window to have a right old moan about queue jumping, then proceeded to do his best to intimidate and block me down the remainder of the road, weaving around at well over the speed limit with a few feet between him and my rear wheel. I didn't rise to it, as the safety of my partner on the back is paramount to me, but it made my blood boil.

Maybe it was just a combination of a one off day, the traffic and the heat - who knows.

 

[Nomisf]

Meh... I spent a lot of time geeking out on things like Roadcraft and learning when it is/isn't advantageous to undertake various manoeuvres. Seeing exceptionally high statistics on certain things obviously colours one's opinion... but despite having actually been rear-ended and never had an incident while filtering, I still find the latter gives a LOT more in the way of close calls, with cars pulling out being a very close second. It just tallies with the stats and if I'd not been paying attention at the time(s) I'd have been just another statistic many times over.

I'm starting to wonder if I may have seen you riding around Reading, as it sounds like quite a distinct riding style you have developed - Any chance you have seen a clapped out Y-Reg Red Deauville charging about with a fat guy on top ? Thats me