While sad that someone had to die in this situation, one less drink-driver on the road is always a good thing.
Your bad driving encounters
- Thread starter Stu999
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While sad that someone had to die in this situation, one less drink-driver on the road is always a good thing.
Dunno, ask any cyclist
In all seriousness, I’m now a fully fledged cam wearing king of the road throbber because on the next roundabout up from the one in the vid, I was waiting to cross and a woman drove into the back of me not once but twice, flattening me and my bike and I ended up taking a trip to hospital via ambulance.
Despite having witnesses and a statement from the police who spoke to the witnesses it still went 50/50 through my insurance.
Whether a cam would have helped my case I don’t know.
That said, even if I’m further round the roundabout in the vid, cars will still cut in at the last minute and try and push me out of the way and this happens a couple of times a week.
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Something especially important on a bike is to make sure you are seen, I don't think he is actually in the blind spot for most of the time - the van driver definitely should have been aware at some points. Also as Ashley Neal bangs on about it is better to stagger with other traffic in these situations on a roundabout.
It is hard to be sure but it looks like the left hand mirror on the van is damaged - first thing I'd be checking in a situation like that is whether I could see the driver in their mirror and if not adjust myself accordingly, there is no point being in the right and dead or injured.
EDIT: Though people looking at you doesn't necessarily mean anything - my brother gave up biking after the number of people who'd look right at him and still pull out on him like he wasn't there and eventually having a close call.
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Precisely. You need to look after yourself as no-one else is going to do it. Ashley Neal also goes on about making things 'non-events'. If the rider had just slowed down and waited a sec, everyone would have just gone about their day no problem, but instead he decided to make things awkward/difficult & call someone a ****** just because they made a minor error. It's all just so unnecessary.
As I mentioned looks to me like the mirror is badly cracked - I don't think it is a funky reflection:
Also looks like the wing mirror was probably hit or smacked against something and hasn't been adjusted (or can't).
I'd have to double check the handbook but pretty sure for our van drivers at work due to the lack of a rear view mirror they have to immediately stop and contact the duty manager, obviously can be a tricky situation if you are a small company/self-employed and it happens and/or if you are out somewhere and it can't easily be replaced, etc.
Also looks like the wing mirror was probably hit or smacked against something and hasn't been adjusted (or can't).
I'd have to double check the handbook but pretty sure for our van drivers at work due to the lack of a rear view mirror they have to immediately stop and contact the duty manager, obviously can be a tricky situation if you are a small company/self-employed and it happens and/or if you are out somewhere and it can't easily be replaced, etc.
Think I annoyed a van driver tonight - not an unusual one for me - got onto a dual-carriageway where the first bit is still 30 due to business entrances and the van behind me accelerated up to about 50 and moved out to go around me but by the time they were about to catch me the limit change to NSL came and I put my foot down leaving them sitting in lane 2 :s then the next 10+ miles they were doing this weird thing of speeding up until they caught me, getting right up behind me like 2 foot from my bumper and almost immediately slowing down so I'd leave them a good mile behind, repeat.
EDIT: Weird thing is they seemed to be sticking to the van limits in the NSL sections but doing 50-60 in the 30s and 40s... some people I just don't understand (I don't think the van was limited to 56 or 60).
EDIT: Weird thing is they seemed to be sticking to the van limits in the NSL sections but doing 50-60 in the 30s and 40s... some people I just don't understand (I don't think the van was limited to 56 or 60).
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Yeah, you didn't do anything wrong but to the unobservant van driver it probably looked like you sped up just to stop him passing.
Funny thing about that in respect of van drivers is that most of them don't even know they can't go over 60 on motorways (legally).
Depends on the van/truck - less than 7.5 tonne laden weight you can do 70 on a motorway, 60 on dual-carriageway and 50 on single carriageway NSL.
Personally think it a bit outdated for more modern vehicles to some extent when it comes to dual-carriageways - but on the other hand I wouldn't want to be pushing a loaded up LWB van around at 70+ MPH. Especially as the average company just sticks them on ditch finders and no one takes care of them - our work vans are usually on 4 completely different tyres of brands I've usually never even heard of, unless you adjust it yourself 9 times out of 10 the pressures are all over the shot and the tread leaves something to be desired despite still being within legal limits.
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Somewhere in here you'll find my best mate doesn't know that with his 7.5 ton and now he's on 12 points.
Yeah its the 50mph on a single carriageway A road which seems to catch our van drivers out at work here. Especially the car derived vans. They go just as fast as the car version so I can see why people fall foul of that law every now and then.
I find it a bit silly as most sections of single carriageway NSL where it is safe to do 60 in a passenger car it is safe to do 60 in most light commercial vehicles, some exceptions aside, and most car derived vans sticking to 50 in those situations just end up holding people up for no real good reason.
Not going to bother going into individual cases but busy on the roads today and far to many people driving atrociously.
EDIT: Had one today personally don't think any different to drink driving or using phone - driver was nattering away to the passenger, suddenly stopping to let people out at inappropriate times, pushing up to prevent people joining at times when it would be a good time to let them in, barely staying in their lane, sat for ages in the outside lane doing between ~55 and ~75 for no rhyme or reason. Eventually pulled over to lane 1 but then as I sped up to pass them suddenly accelerated hard and pulled out on me to go around a car which was still 100-200 yards in front. As we were approaching town traffic was queued up, they slowed to a stop in lane 1 while I moved to lane 2 to take a different route at the next roundabout so as to avoid the worst of the traffic only for them to pull out in front of me forcing me to get fairly hard on the brakes - fortunately I was being wary of them by that point so prepared for it. Then as we approached the roundabout they decided randomly to push back into the queue in lane 1 forcing their way in by playing contact chicken with the van beside them despite the traffic initially closing ranks to deny them...
EDIT: Had one today personally don't think any different to drink driving or using phone - driver was nattering away to the passenger, suddenly stopping to let people out at inappropriate times, pushing up to prevent people joining at times when it would be a good time to let them in, barely staying in their lane, sat for ages in the outside lane doing between ~55 and ~75 for no rhyme or reason. Eventually pulled over to lane 1 but then as I sped up to pass them suddenly accelerated hard and pulled out on me to go around a car which was still 100-200 yards in front. As we were approaching town traffic was queued up, they slowed to a stop in lane 1 while I moved to lane 2 to take a different route at the next roundabout so as to avoid the worst of the traffic only for them to pull out in front of me forcing me to get fairly hard on the brakes - fortunately I was being wary of them by that point so prepared for it. Then as we approached the roundabout they decided randomly to push back into the queue in lane 1 forcing their way in by playing contact chicken with the van beside them despite the traffic initially closing ranks to deny them...
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Car derived vans can drive like cars under UK speed limit laws.
Car derived vans and dual-purpose vehicles like many pickups - but only up to a certain unladen weight - if the unladen weight is above 2040kg (I think it is still that) then van speed limits apply.
Had a bit of a scary one - crossroads on a dual-carriageway... location where a lot of fatal accidents happen including the partner of a friend a few months back - was following 2 cars who were inconsistent speed wise and dwindled down to about 60 for no apparent reason, as I got abreast of them they started speeding up again closing down my options - usually I try and avoid overtaking through junctions like that. As I'm approaching the junction a car shoots out from the right and only just stops before crossing or entering my lane and despite getting on the brakes as a precaution I only had about 40 feet to slow in if they had continued - would have still hit them at best part of 60 MPH.
The dual-carriageway was designed in a very different era - I do wonder how many people need to die there before something is done about it.
The dual-carriageway was designed in a very different era - I do wonder how many people need to die there before something is done about it.
About 50% of my 36 mile return commute is dual carriageway. It is the A1 that goes for about 50 miles of the main link between Belfast and Dublin. There are literally scores and scores of those little side roads and main roads that just lead right on to the main carriageway.
A few of the worse ones claimed a number lives over the years and they eventually created sliproads for them. At least once every 6 months we get road closures due to the inevitable accidents.
Yesterday I had an iX1 EV that could clearly see me, pull out of a side road from the right side of the carriageway and sit in the outside (right) lane. I saw what they were doing but was unsure if they would do the sensible thing and go into the left lane to allow me to overtake. So I slowed down and was moving over to the right to give them space.
I had to brake a bit harder when it was clear they were going to just stay in the overtaking lane until they got up to speed. They then used the power of their EV to accelerate to 70 without any consideration for the accident they almost caused.
Like I said, 7:30 on a foggy Sunday morning and only a few cars about. They could easily waited about 5 seconds until I had passed. But nope, let’s take stupid chances that are utterly idiotic. When we got to a roundabout and had to stop, I pulled alongside and there was two kids in child seats in the back. The kicker is I recognised the driver as one of my work colleagues and I am his manager.
He’s a good guy and we get on very well. I’ll have a few words of advice for him today just to shame him
A few of the worse ones claimed a number lives over the years and they eventually created sliproads for them. At least once every 6 months we get road closures due to the inevitable accidents.
Yesterday I had an iX1 EV that could clearly see me, pull out of a side road from the right side of the carriageway and sit in the outside (right) lane. I saw what they were doing but was unsure if they would do the sensible thing and go into the left lane to allow me to overtake. So I slowed down and was moving over to the right to give them space.
I had to brake a bit harder when it was clear they were going to just stay in the overtaking lane until they got up to speed. They then used the power of their EV to accelerate to 70 without any consideration for the accident they almost caused.
Like I said, 7:30 on a foggy Sunday morning and only a few cars about. They could easily waited about 5 seconds until I had passed. But nope, let’s take stupid chances that are utterly idiotic. When we got to a roundabout and had to stop, I pulled alongside and there was two kids in child seats in the back. The kicker is I recognised the driver as one of my work colleagues and I am his manager.
He’s a good guy and we get on very well. I’ll have a few words of advice for him today just to shame him
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Soldato
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Always awkward when your anonymous interactions become, er, nonymous
When I was a new driver, my brother in law was a bus driver (he's an instructor now). I had a work vehicle - bright red Smart with stickers all over it. He said "I saw you driving in oval, you crossed the lights while I was waiting at the perpendicular"
"Oh, how was my driving?"
"one dimensional
"
When I was a new driver, my brother in law was a bus driver (he's an instructor now). I had a work vehicle - bright red Smart with stickers all over it. He said "I saw you driving in oval, you crossed the lights while I was waiting at the perpendicular"
"Oh, how was my driving?"
"one dimensional
"