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Re: Help settle an argument
Posted: 10 Jun 2015, 7:39pm
by robing
kwackers wrote:foxyrider wrote: +1
which exactly how I saw that, it wasn't a 'nasty' toot but what I term a 'warning' toot - ie 'be aware I'm behind you'
Optimistic!
It wasn't a warning toot - a warning toot is by it's very nature a 'toot', i.e. short. That was a beep, a beep that had little to do with warning anyone and more one to say "excuse me young man, you're in my way" (or something like that).
I wouldn't even put money on it that the driver didn't just assume they were two friends riding side by side rather than one overtaking the other.
Overall though you'd have to be very generous and (imo) just a bit green to think the driver was doing it for anything other than annoyance that the cyclist was in the way.
It's not as if the cyclist swerved out or anything - he more drifted over slowly a couple of feet after the lorry. In fact had the driver intended to leave anything like the space he should have he'd have still cleared both cyclists easily and with no drama.
All of this is completely based on supposition.
Re: Help settle an argument
Posted: 10 Jun 2015, 8:05pm
by Tonyf33
AlaninWales wrote:Tonyf33 wrote:At 38 seconds the cyclist is further to the right in his lane than previous as he approaches the pedestrian refuge and his impending overtake.
So, the car behind should have
a) seen that the cyclist was moving further right BEFORE either of them reached the refuge/narrowing and thought why and think hazard, assess and slow down if need be.
b) being able to judge the speed of the rearmost cyclist and anticpate that he would catch the chap in front right at X point at or around that HAZARD (i.e. the narrowing)
c), took foot off gas for 1-2 seconds, indicated after mirror checking and proceded to do a safe overtake AFTER the hazard.
The motorist has no right to overtake at that point, whether there is nough space or not. I would never ever overtake a cyclist at a pinch point like that, what if the cyclist had to swerve for some reason, lost their balance on a windy day, where can you go as a motorvehicle IF that happens...into the pedetrian island is where OR hit the cyclist.
Could the cyclist have shoulder checked, sure, but is there an absolute obligation for motorists to do so when they overtake or make any manoeuvre in their 1.5+ton of killing machine?
Given the cyclist has priority the motorist admonishing the cyclist is well out of order.
What in the video evidences that the motorist did try to overtake?
Where did I say that he attempted to do so?
Re: Help settle an argument
Posted: 10 Jun 2015, 8:08pm
by Tonyf33
foxyrider wrote:pwa wrote:For all we know the motorist could be holding back and doing all the right things and, like us, marvelling at the reckless idiot cycling just in front of him / her. The beep of the horn is wrong but understandable, and expresses disapproval of the circus act he / she has just witnessed.
+1
which exactly how I saw that, it wasn't a 'nasty' toot but what I term a 'warning' toot - ie 'be aware I'm behind you'
Why 'toot' at all, there's no reason to 'warn' is there, none whatsoever, not if as some are saying the motorist is doing all the right things and holding back?
That's a get out of the way admonishment sounding of the horn and to think otherwise is nieve at best
Re: Help settle an argument
Posted: 10 Jun 2015, 8:26pm
by kwackers
robing wrote:All of this is completely based on supposition.
Nope. It's based on 50 years of cycling and observation and what I'd consider a realistic interpretation of the video.
I've had exactly the same happen to me - apart from the falling off and the 'V'. Had cars race up behind me when I'm 'taking the lane' and beep in exactly the same sort of way.
Re: Help settle an argument
Posted: 10 Jun 2015, 8:41pm
by pwa
Toots and beeps are far from perfect as a means of communication, and that is a good reason for drivers to avoid using the horn except where the law allows: as a warning, to make things safer. Kwackers takes the view that the horn was sounded as a way of communicating "Get out of my way", whereas I feel it was merely an expression of annoyance and dismay at dangerously erratic use of the road. We will never really know which, if either, is correct.
Re: Help settle an argument
Posted: 10 Jun 2015, 9:46pm
by AlanJ
The overtake maneuver occurred after the pinch point, the car MAY have just been starting to make it's overtaking maneuver by moving into the opposite lane (or at least straddling the line, ie overtaking too close but maybe not dangerously close).
That is supposition I know, I'd glance behind or at least check my mirror before overtaking because I've met the poor drivers as well. Demonizing the driver doesn't help and allows others to just discount it as driver hate. The cyclist made some bad mistakes, the driver probably also made mistakes.
Re: Help settle an argument
Posted: 10 Jun 2015, 10:16pm
by kwackers
AlanJ wrote: the driver probably also made mistakes.
No probably about it. They did what lots of drivers do and didn't think ahead.
Seriously - if you're coming up on two cyclists and a pinch point then you don't have to think too hard to understand what that might mean and what you need to do.
Suppose the cyclist had swerved to avoid a pot hole or something?
If the driver had been driving like they're supposed to have been then there wouldn't have been an issue.
Re: Help settle an argument
Posted: 10 Jun 2015, 10:19pm
by kwackers
pwa wrote: dangerously erratic use of the road. We will never really know which, if either, is correct.
Dangerously erratic? Did we both just watch the same video?
Dictonary wrote:Erratic: not even or regular in pattern or movement; unpredictable.
Nope, doesn't fit the dictionary definition.
Firstly it was a perfectly smooth action, he smoothly moved out around 2 feet - I move more than that to avoid crap in the road!
Secondly it was entirely predictable - to anyone who's driving with their brain engaged.
Re: Help settle an argument
Posted: 10 Jun 2015, 10:24pm
by robing
Looking at the video again, I think the cyclist doesn't like being overtaken by the other cyclist. You can see he really puts down the hammers then and is so desperate to pass him he overtakes recklessly.
Re: Help settle an argument
Posted: 10 Jun 2015, 11:00pm
by AlanJ
kwackers wrote:AlanJ wrote: the driver probably also made mistakes.
No probably about it. They did what lots of drivers do and didn't think ahead.
Seriously - if you're coming up on two cyclists and a pinch point then you don't have to think too hard to understand what that might mean and what you need to do.
Suppose the cyclist had swerved to avoid a pot hole or something?
If the driver had been driving like they're supposed to have been then there wouldn't have been an issue.
So the cyclists isn't at fault?
Re: Help settle an argument
Posted: 10 Jun 2015, 11:01pm
by AlanJ
Mind you both bike overtake maneuvers were pretty close as well
Re: Help settle an argument
Posted: 10 Jun 2015, 11:15pm
by stephenjubb
how about bus drivers tailgating you? I've had that, if I fell off straight under the wheels even though we are both doing less than 10mph
Re: Help settle an argument
Posted: 10 Jun 2015, 11:41pm
by ferdinand
Looking at the video again, imo the driver did hold back through the pinch point and not attempt to overtake until afterwards, which shouldn't have been tried though. Should have held back for longer.
There's no interaction until the cyclists are level with the side road.
It would be an excellent video for instruction and second by second discussion in a group exactly because it is so ambiguous, with so many possible interpretations.
The road design is also very tight there, as shown by the narrow cycle lane and also the lack of any buffer between the traffic lane and the bollards. There's literally no room for error. I think - would need to measure to be sure - that the layout is right on the zone between 'room for a single lane' and 'room for single lane and cycle lane side by side'.
As discussed, a single lane might be better there. Many of the pinch points in my area have 40-80cm of extra room on the rhs between the lane and the bollards.
Ferdinand
Re: Help settle an argument
Posted: 10 Jun 2015, 11:55pm
by AlanJ
ferdinand wrote:Looking at the video again, imo the driver did hold back through the pinch point and not attempt to overtake until afterwards, which shouldn't have been tried though. Should have held back for longer.
There's no interaction until the cyclists are level with the side road.
That is the point I was making. Both overtaking maneuvers occurred at roughly the same time.
I also take the toot as both annoyed and warning but that really is speculation.
Re: Help settle an argument
Posted: 11 Jun 2015, 7:41am
by pwa
Kwackers objects to my use of the word "erratic" to describe the cyclist's riding. Well I do have a dictionary and I am fairly happy with the word. If I had been following that rider for more than a few moments I would have begun to wonder what he was going to do next. I suspect that if I had used that word about the actions of the driver, Kwackers would have been less inclined to object.
We don't get any view of the driving until the pass has happened, and we do not know that the driver tried to pass at the pinch point. To criticise someone for something they may or may not have done is daft. The video shows some appalling cycling and a driver using a horn in a manner not approved of by the Highway Code.