Why do some cyclists use the entire lane, use fog horns, and flashing lights?????????

Johnmcl7

brat wrote: »

I trust she's OK John.

She's fine, thanks for asking - I think it was fairly low speed and the bike seems to have taken the brunt of the damage. The driver immediately stopped and admitted they were at fault and when my sister said she was ok and didn't need to go to A&E the person took her and the bike to her workplace to make sure she was ok. She came round later with money to replace the bike as promised so while it wasn't good she hit my sister, at least the driver stopped, made sure my sister was ok and made sure to sort her bike.

John

Retrogamer

custardy wrote: »

What about the drivers who say they hate cyclists?

Judging by the comments from motorists in this video, there is an abundance of them.

https://www.facebook.com/143233165824638/videos/562919743855976/?comment_id=563367237144560&ref=notif&notif_t=video_reply

prowla

brat wrote: »

Of course.
The general instruction in the highway code is to keep to the left. This general rule applies, but is not in any way prescriptive or instructional when any other safety or view advantage applies. This should (must) be abundantly clear to anyone who drives a vehicle on the road.

If the road has no lane markings you should keep to the left of the road, and allow other vehicles who can pass to pass on your right. However, constantly keeping as left as you can manage will deny you views, especially on left hand bends or approaching nearside junctions, so the 'general' advice is bad. Keeping to the left of a lane on a left hand bend will also give you much less time to react, and will also place you more directly in the path of a slower moving cyclist who may be hidden behind the hedge around the left hander that you're hugging. If a cyclist keeps in to the left in these circumstances, s/he too will not be seen by approaching motorists until late, allowing motorists less time to react.

If the road has lanes, your interpretaton would demand that you keep to the left of the lane, whatever the general circumstances. I would agree with that (as a very basic default) if the lane is very wide, but on a standard (say) 4 metre or less lane, it would be inappropriate to drive to the left of the lane, because you woud be coming too close to the kerb. Driving school instruction in these circumstances is clear, that you should drive centre lane (unless the lane is very wide). You would fail your test if you drove too far to the left.

Roadcraft has quite a lot to say on the subject. in chapter 7. It says

Roadcraft continues at length about appropriate road positioning, but not once does it suggest you should keep to the left hand side of a lane. Its general advice is to be flexible about lane position, and adjust it for safety and view..

Drivers must be free to adjust their lateral road position for safety, so if there is no approaching traffic or nothing in the adjacent lane, and a lot of pedestrians, or parked cars or nearside junctions, then the correct adjustment would be to move to the right to balance safety. Motor cyclists are guided to move to whatever position offers them the best safety and view. They would immediately fail a test if they stuck rigidly to the left of a lane.


It should be crystal clear to all road users that their lateral road/lane position depends on many factors.
If you engage your brain for a second or two, you will realise that hardly any motorist or motor cyclist in practice interprets that Highway Code advice in the way you do. But you're happy to accuse cyclists of failing to adhere to it.
You somehow insist that cyclists (and cyclists alone) ignore this 'rule', presumably for some non-cycling purpose, such as inconveniencing motorists.

That is where your argument becomes disingenuous. If you properly understood the primary and secondary positions and why the governments cycle training scheme includes it for instruction to the assertive confident cyclists who are happy cycling in traffic, you would change your tune.

Cyclists will (when hazards are reduced) move to the secondary position, which is to the left of the lane, to allow freer movement of faster traffic. However, when there is a need to use the centre or the right of the lane, ie when hazards or their manoeuvres dictate, they have every right to do this.

The primary purpose of the primary position is NOT to inconvenience motorists - far from it. It actually makes life a little easier for them, because they don't have to consider the inappropriateness of passing the cyclist at that point, because the cyclist is making it clear to them.

Brain engaged - thanks for the tip, much appreciated...

The rule says that you should keep to the left; it does not say that you must stay at the left at all times, regardless of whether there is a hole in the road, hazard, a parked car, or whatever, and indeed the HC covers that.

However, if you engage your brain, you will (hopefully) see that advising people to drive in the middle of the lane (aka "primary position") all of the time specifically contradicts the HC.

With brain engaged, it is still hard to quite grasp the logic in your last sentence that driving in the middle of the road is actually helping the motorist; that is really quite laughable.

The assertions in that post do certainly help me understand the mentality of that inconsiderate subset of cyclists, however.

prowla

Strider590 wrote: »

Ok, you need to try cycling a while to understand the error in this statement............

If a cyclist stays left and then has to keeping moving right to avoid drains, pot holes, doors, etc, then what's going to happen is they're going to get killed.

They'd appear to be swerving all over the road for no reason, because drivers aren't looking for these hazards. You'd get some nut case who'd just assume the cyclist was just deliberately being a c**k and would pass too close, swerve at the cyclist, throw an object, cut in front and get out to punch them, or something similar.

In all honesty, it doesn't matter what a cyclist does, drivers still hate them, so the best way to ride is to take a strong position and give yourself plenty of room JUST in case you do come across a psycho.

You need to read the thread (eg. post #148) before you make assertions.

The use of emotive language like "hate", "c**k", "nut case", "get out and punch" is no contribution to the discussion whatsoever.

The bottom line is that there are rules of the road, as defined in the Highway Code, and there is a subset of road users who believe that those rules do not apply to them.

esuhl

Johnmcl7 wrote: »

She's fine, thanks for asking - I think it was fairly low speed and the bike seems to have taken the brunt of the damage. The driver immediately stopped and admitted they were at fault and when my sister said she was ok and didn't need to go to A&E the person took her and the bike to her workplace to make sure she was ok. She came round later with money to replace the bike as promised so while it wasn't good she hit my sister, at least the driver stopped, made sure my sister was ok and made sure to sort her bike.

John

Glad to hear it wasn't too bad. Bloody frightening, though, even if she wasn't too badly hurt.

The only time I was hit by a car (which stopped at the give-way line, then tried to accelerate through me as I passed), I injured my hand so I couldn't write down any details. The driver offered to take me to A&E and then changed her mind. She drove off having given me false details. The police weren't able to trace her (although they didn't try hard -- I spoke to the person whose details she gave, and she appeared to know who had hit me).

Anyway, I broke my £600 glasses, needed repairs to my bike, and couldn't get out of bed for three days, having bruised my spine.

I'm definitely thinking about getting a camera to protect me in future. And a deafeningly loud horn too!

esuhl

prowla wrote: »

The bottom line is that there are rules of the road, as defined in the Highway Code, and there is a subset of road users who believe that those rules do not apply to them.

Most of them being motorists.

prowla

esuhl wrote: »

Most of them being motorists.

Feel free to start a thread about motorist road-hogs using fog horns and flashing headlights...

Richard53

The HC says 'keep to the left', not 'keep as far to the left as possible':

keep to the left, unless road signs or markings indicate otherwise. The exceptions are when you want to overtake, turn right or pass parked vehicles or pedestrians in the road

I had always assumed that this advice was far more basic than some people are giving it credit for. The HC was first published in 1931, before the first driving tests, and it was 18 pages of general advice to people who had never driven a motor vehicle before: the generally-accepted 'rules of the road'. Basically, if you meet someone on a road, in case you were thinking of passing them on the right, it is customary to pass them on the left, for everyone's benefit. The advice has remained in the HC ever since, because it is still relevant.

trinidadone

prowla wrote: »

Feel free to start a thread about motorist road-hogs using fog horns and flashing headlights...

LOL,now that did tickle me

esuhl

trinidadone wrote: »

LOL,now that did tickle me

Me too! Tee hee! :rotfl: