Not everyone’s crap at signalling – while out battling the wind on the bike this afternoon. man on an old tractor approaching from side road to the right, giving me a nice clear left turn hand signal, and slowing at the junction until I’d gone by 😀

However, the folk who think that indicating right, while joining the motorway = any traffic in lane one, MUST slow or move to lane 2.
Are oxygen thieves!

But surely that’s how it should work! If you’re on the approach ramp, and accelerating up to motorway speed in order to match the flow of traffic, then it should be accepted practice for traffic approaching any access point in the inside lane to indicate and move over one lane to allow joining traffic to do so safely.
Otherwise if traffic had to crawl down the approach ramp, driver looking into their mirror to try to see a gap in approaching traffic, when things are busy it’s inevitable that said vehicle will just arrive at the broken line and come to a halt, along with all following traffic, until a large enough gap appears to allow them to accelerate from a dead stop up to motorway speed, which, I’m absolutely convinced, result in major pile-ups the length and breadth of the country.
I drive hundreds of miles a week, mostly on the M4/M5/M6, A30, and A303, and its my observation that pretty much all traffic observes the convention that any vehicle approaching the motorway or dual-carriageway does so at around 50-60mph, indicating as it does so, and approaching traffic on the main carriageway starts indicating right and moving across one lane to allow the joining vehicle to do so safely, thus allowing them to settle in before moving out to overtake slower traffic like trucks or cars cruising below the maximum posted speed.
This is what happens, it works just fine, and anyone who thinks this system is wrong and should be changed needs a slap!
Or maybe everyone but the poster is wrong…

Try driving in Spain.
I hired a car in Gran Canaria last week I’m convinced the only other people indicating at roundabouts were other tourists. Three times I got cut up by people going all the way round the roundabout from the right most lane.
UK driving is a paragon a virtue by comparison

Yup. My dad lives in gc and you get to his town off a dual carriageway with roundabouts. It is universally accepted that you take the right hand lane to turn left. You get used to it.

Try driving in Spain.

Try learning the rules for driving in Spain. They are different from UK. One that I like is that you MUST stop to allow groups of cyclists though even if you have priority if they were a car. Or something like that.
Sometimes people will stop mid roundabout as that is how the older roundabouts were marked out.
Some of their rule do, however, defy logic.
But rest assured that you, and not them, is in the wrong when thinking British.

You’re meant to judge your speed going down the slipway so that you arrive at the end in perfect position to slot into the 2 second gap that everyone in lane 1 has between them then either move out to overtake or the person behind should blend out of the throttle to recreate that gap or overtake you.

In theory. If you leave a 2 second gap while going 70 you’re pretty much guaranteed to have 3 or 4 cars fill it, every time so CountZero’s system is the safest way in reality.

Of course whilst Drivers are bad, when it comes to indication Cyclists are by far the worst, I can’t remember the last time I saw one stick an arm out.

Trolling?

If so you’ve caught me – clearly there’s a difference in the method required to indicate and the effect doing so has on the control of the vehicle. I indicate a lot less on a bike – in low stress situations where bike control isn’t an issue I will try to indicate where it helps other road users, but where it gets more difficult other road users can sod off – I’m only indicating where it enhances my safety. Nor will I indicate in circumstances where it might encourage others to do something which endangers me.

Try the turn on the left of the picture, and the other driver will try to kill you.

Also, the I’m intending to stop signal with your arm out window, the looks yiu get when they park right up behind you as its your fault when they relise they have been delayed for 2 seconds.

and people chopping off blind corners and dont give a chuff….

Personally I’d go with the lane markings and ignore the arrows, because the two quite clearly contradict each other and the arrows are at best ambiguous (for a start, looking at your pic, the left turn arrow and straight on arrow on the roundabout correspond quite neatly with the left turn arrow and straight on arrow a bit further down the road on the exit you’re taking). Hence I’d do what everybody else is doing and start in lane 2 – to me that also makes the most sense if there were no road markings.

So how about this one? https://goo.gl/maps/AiepYA1QM4F2

In case it’s not clear for those looking on a phone screen, that roundabout has 4 exits with one to the left and one to the right of the major one. The major exit is slightly past 1, so should you indicate right to take it? It irritates me when people do so – especially when they feel that also means they should be in the right hand lane on the entry to the roundabout, which should be for people actually turning right, and the exit is onto a single lane (they’re upgrading it as you might see if you move around in streetview, but for now it’s still a single lane). Personally I feel that on any roundabout which has 4 exits roughly corresponding to the nicely spaced directions (ie this only doesn’t apply if there’s close to or more than 180 degrees between two adjacent exits) then you should indicate as if they were nicely spaced.

That google link’s amazing!

Personally I’d go with the lane markings and ignore the arrows, because the two quite clearly contradict each other

They don’t though, as my annotated diagram shows, you can use that roundabout in accordance with the arrows and lanes, it’s just that at least 50% of people don’t.

I disagree – where you’re suggesting changing lanes from the left to the right the lane markings quite clearly show a route off the roundabout from the 2nd lane, whilst in order to change lanes you’re crossing a long dash. If you remove the arrows, the lane markings clearly show that the correct route into the right hand lane of the exit is from the 2nd lane of the roundabout.

The lane markings taken on their own are ambiguous, that’s very true, but surely you can’t just decide to ignore the arrows and road signs because they don’t fit your interpretation of the lane markings?

That’s a rhetorical question obviously because I know the answer is that people do and then they get all angry and horn tooty about folk like me being “in the wrong lane” as they turn left from a clearly marked straight-on-only lane. 😕

But yeah I think whoever did the road markings should have extended those hatchings at the exit so they clearly blocked off the right hand lane, that would have been a lot clearer.

Mind you, this is Gateshead where my suggestion that if they didn’t want people driving on the pedestrianised road by the quayside then they should put the sign on a bollard in the middle of the lane, not tucked away on a signpost, was met with: “we can’t do that, people would drive into it” 🙄

Elong Musk will have it all sorted out within the decade.

I agree with the OP, too many cyclists don’t bother indicating, it’s not just those with child seats on the back though.

What’s worse though is you get some who just stick their hand out and move without even looking 😯

Try learning the rules for driving in Spain.

Well you seem to have them well figured out

One that I like is that you MUST stop to allow groups of cyclists though even if you have priority if they were a car. Or something like that.

I bow to you superior knowledge, sir

here in down under melbourne drivers rarely indicate when pulling out from parking at the side of the road – especially if no parked car is in front of them – been told reason for this is “that they are not changing lanes”

f’ing crazy you can be about to turn right and suddenly there is a car coming straight at you with priority or you are crossing the road and the car just drives straight at you

The lane markings taken on their own are ambiguous, that’s very true, but surely you can’t just decide to ignore the arrows and road signs because they don’t fit your interpretation of the lane markings?

Sorry Graham, I’m with the other two on this. That fork in the road is clearly feeding traffic in either direction. If you were to do your orange lane change and there was a collision, I’d posit that you’d be in the wrong as you were the one changing lanes into one that’s already occupied. If that exit was supposed to be fed solely from the left lane on the roundabout then it would be one lane splitting into two further ahead.

This sort of ill-conceived vaguery on roundabouts is really common. Many a time I’ve been following the signs and it instructs you to be in lane X for exit Y, so change lanes to the left, then find round the corner that the next set of lane markings suddenly tell you that the lane you’ve just vacated can go round the roundabout or take the exit after all. I’ve seen it on motorway exists too, overhead signs telling you lane 1 for the next exit, then when you get there there’s a feed off from lane 2 as well. (Off the top of my head, I think Northbound over the Thelwell Viaduct does this, but I might be misremembering.)

I think whoever did the road markings should have extended those hatchings at the exit so they clearly blocked off the right hand lane, that would have been a lot clearer.

I think you want the road changing to fit with your interpretation. What needs to happen is either the second lane needs to be blocked off as you say (creating an unnecessary pinch point) or the road markings need amending to be clearer.

CountZero – Member

But surely that’s how it should work! If you’re on the approach ramp, and accelerating up to motorway speed in order to match the flow of traffic, then it should be accepted practice for traffic approaching any access point in the inside lane to indicate and move over one lane to allow joining traffic to do so safely.

I think the point is do you assume they’ll move over and carry on regardless? I join a dual carriageway on my way home and sometimes have to wait a while to get onto it, some don’t move over as there’s a care already in the right lane, some don’t move over because they don’t seem to want to. I once saw a lady drive straight on without stopping causing a Merc driver to slam on her brakes. Not great.

Oh, and,

Even if you’re actually right, I can see little point in making people negotiate it in the manner you describe; it makes far more sense to me to have two lanes of traffic flowing round the roundabout. The only reason I could see for doing it your way would be if that second-lane exit tended to get logjammed and backed up onto the roundabout preventing other traffic from going right (and even then, there’s a third lane they can use).

But surely that’s how it should work!

There’s an argument for that’s how it should work, but it contravenes THC. It’s the responsibility of merging traffic to join the existing flow, not of those on the main road to be changing lanes out of their way (though it’s often a good idea given the penchant for folk to try and join a 70mph road doing 40mph).

When I was taking lessons I was taught that if you can’t merge, you should stop. It was never really explained what the hell you’re supposed to do next when you’re parked up at the end of a motorway slip road, mind. (Fortunately) in a quarter of a century of driving I’ve never seen anyone actually do that.

In real life you find the best gap you can to merge into – there will always be one if you adjust your speed. The point is that you can’t just indicate right and move onto the motorway ignoring the other traffic – if you’re joining it’s your responsibility to find a gap to move into and adjust your speed accordingly. By all means indicate right in the hope that somebody will give you space but you can’t expect it – personally I’ll always adjust my speed to find a gap even if that means slowing down to pull in behind a truck.

Though like all things on the road (and in other aspects of life) it mainly comes down to following Wheaton’s Law – both for those joining and those already on the motorway.

Yup, agreed.

Cougar – Moderator

When I was taking lessons I was taught that if you can’t merge, you should stop. It was never really explained what the hell you’re supposed to do next when you’re parked up at the end of a motorway slip road, mind. (Fortunately) in a quarter of a century of driving I’ve never seen anyone actually do that.

Really? I’ve seen it often, never had to do it myself except in nose-to-tail jams though. What you do is, you stop on the slip road, and you wait for a suitable opportunity to join safely. Which might be a while, but that’s just how that goes.

Cougar – Moderator
There’s an argument for that’s how it should work, but it contravenes THC

Exactly one of the points I was making. People thinking they can re-interpret THC according to their own logic.

aracer – Member

In real life you find the best gap you can to merge into – there will always be one if you adjust your speed. The point is that you can’t just indicate right and move onto the motorway ignoring the other traffic

Which is what I see each time I drive the Mway.

– if you’re joining it’s your responsibility to find a gap to move into and adjust your speed accordingly. By all means indicate right in the hope that somebody will give you space but you can’t expect it – personally I’ll always adjust my speed to find a gap even if that means slowing down to pull in behind a truck.

Totally agree. The onus is on the car joining the Mway to merge with the traffic already there, esp wrt matching road speed.

Of course during the last decade or so, I see folk who drive how they think the rules should be, as demonstrated by some of the posts on this thread. In this particular situation, these drivers appear to believe it’s the responsibility of traffic in lane one, to make a space for the car joining lane one. Which makes perfect sense to them?
😕

Now extrapolate this behaviour and you get cars float down the slip road, activate the “indicator of immunity” and then proceed to join lane one without any evident regard for traffic already in that lane. It’s crazy and probably goes some way to explaining why folk then decide to sit and cruise in lane two.

What appears to be logical to some drivers, actually leads to a complacent expectation that lane one cars will jump out of the way for traffic joining the Mway.

Wrong and dangerous.

Sorry Graham, I’m with the other two on this. That fork in the road is clearly feeding traffic in either direction.

Despite the fact that you are not permitted to turn left from the other lane?

I think the issue here is that you, the other two (and in fairness a lot of people that drive that roundabout in reality) are looking solely at the lane markings in isolation, making your decision, and then discarding the other factors (road signs and arrows) which contradict your decision.

It’s like a tiny Dunning-Kruger effect 😀

If you consider it as a whole first (i.e. lane markings, arrow markings, road signs, lane widths) and then make a decision then it has to be a traffic flow like the one I pictured, because that doesn’t violate any signs or instructions.

Two points:

1) if you were driving up to this roundabout having never seen it before, and you knew you wanted to end up in lane 2 of the first exit, would really ignore the three separate sets of arrows telling you to use the left lane for first exit on the off chance that you could duck across from the straight on only lane?

2) let’s imagine this same road layout as a traffic light controlled junction instead. Seems a bit simpler that way. You are saying that the arrows are wrong and that drivers in lane 2 can actually go left at this junction?

You can add to the list:

People thinking it’s OK to use a phone so long as their car is stationary – if that happens to be just around a blind bend with the car still on the road, then obviously that’s still fine.

People thinking that hazard lights are really “all rules no longer apply lights”. As long as hazards are on, you can apparently just stop wherever you like (see above).

Roads around Business Parks/Industrial Estates not being thought of as real roads – so no need to indicate, look what you’re doing etc.

The standard of driving has dropped appallingly in the last decade – but with the Police having very little resource to actually enforce the rules it is hardly surprising that idiots think they don’t really matter.

Traffic on the motorway, not the sliproad always has right of way and traffic on the sliproad should always give way to traffic already on the motorway. But the sensible thing for cars already on the motorway to do is to show courtesy and move over into lane 2 regardless (provided it’s clear and safe to do so) to assist someone who might be attempting to join the motorway from the sliproad.

Seems I’m one of the rare people that whilst driving on the motorway pre-empt possible traffic merging when approaching a slip road ahead, and move over into lane 2 (provided its clear) before I can even see if there’s anything on the sliproad. If I can see lots of traffic attempting to join the motorway, if it’s quite busy, or if it’s a mixture of faster cars and slow moving trucks, then I’ll move over into lane 3 well before the sliproad to give everyone, and me, a bit more room.

the merging question can get quite big….

https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-meaning-and-symbolism-of-the-line-People-are-afraid-to-merge-on-the-freeways-in-the-novel-Less-Than-Zero

anyway back to the vagueness and roundabouts which is the highway code

Not sure this picture is correct.

Ime, the middle lane would have a double headed arrow, one for straight ahead (as shown) but also an arrow head curving out to the left.

Seems I’m one of the rare people that whilst driving on the motorway pre-empt possible traffic merging when approaching a slip road ahead, and move over into lane 2 (provided its clear) before I can even see if there’s anything on the sliproad.

So you move lanes when there is nothing to warrant it? There’s nothing like an unpredictable lane change to keep everyone on their toes.

I must have missed the no entry sign or whatever it is specifying that.

I already pointed out the aspect of road markings which suggests to me that you shouldn’t be changing lanes at the point you are – I’d suggest if anything that is more “prohibited” than turning left from the 2nd lane, which doesn’t involve crossing any lines.

So you move lanes when there is nothing to warrant it? There’s nothing like an unpredictable lane change to keep everyone on their toes.

Nope it’s called thinking and planning ahead, something you sound like you probably can’t get your head around if your driving style is focused on just reacting to ‘unexpected’ stuff that seems to happen to you.

Thinking and planning ahead = checking whether the 2nd lane is clear and whether there is traffic on the slip road so that you are ready to change lanes if necessary
Changing lanes because there’s a slip road ahead = moving lanes unnecessarily

The thing is, if there is traffic approaching in lane 2, then by changing lanes in the way you do you are potentially causing an obstruction for no reason, if there is no traffic in lane 2 there’s no reason to change lanes early.

Just because other drivers (like me and Davidian) don’t change lanes even when there is nothing on the slip road doesn’t mean you’re the only one thinking and planning ahead.

Nope it’s called thinking and planning ahead,

Nope, that’s what aracer is describing, you’re just doing something robot fashion, quite possibly completely unnecessarily.

1) if you were driving up to this roundabout having never seen it before, and you knew you wanted to end up in lane 2 of the first exit, would really ignore the three separate sets of arrows telling you to use the left lane for first exit on the off chance that you could duck across from the straight on only lane?

2) let’s imagine this same road layout as a traffic light controlled junction instead. Seems a bit simpler that way. You are saying that the arrows are wrong and that drivers in lane 2 can actually go left at this junction?

I’m generally with the other 3 (?) on this – sorry Graham! But

1) If I had never seen it before, I’d definitely follow the arrows on the road. But if I was trying to make a journey like yours (i.e. to wind up in the RH lane of the exit) I’d probably be grumbling about the road markings as I left it!

2) I’d say yes, seems perfectly reasonably for cars in the middle lane to go left there. In fact one could probably argue that it may help reduce traffic queue lengths, rather than squashing all the left-turners into one lane?

and a question of my own here –

3) Are road arrows advisory, or are they instructions? Genuine Q, as I don’t know – but the answer could change the frame of this debate 🙂

GrahamS – Member

Thoughts?

You’re approaching a r’about with three lanes.

One lane for left.
One lane for straight ahead.
One lane for right.

You want to turn left.

Only on STW is this open for debate. 😆

As an aside, the decision on lane choice is made on approach to the r’about.
Anyone advocating influencing that decision on information that you don’t yet know to exist is a bit silly. 💡

doris5000 – Member
3) Are road arrows advisory, or are they instructions? Genuine Q, as I don’t know – but the answer could change the frame of this debate

Good Q. I’d assume (eek) that like all the other paint the relevant authority drops on to the road, it’s an instruction.

Yellow lines
Red lines
Yellow boxes
Chevrons
Zig zag lines
Pedestrian crossing
etc.

Interested to know the true answer though.

Ime, the middle lane would have a double headed arrow, one for straight ahead (as shown) but also an arrow head curving out to the left.

It would if you were allowed to turn left, but on the roundabout I’m basing this on the middle lane only has a straight on arrow, which I take to mean “this lane is straight on only”:

I already pointed out the aspect of road markings which suggests to me that you shouldn’t be changing lanes at the point you are

Why’s that? You have to cross lane markings like that all the time on a multi-lane roundabout, otherwise you’d never be able to escape the lane closest to the centre.

Granted I probably wouldn’t change lanes right at the mouth of that exit if I could avoid it, because I know from experience that people do swing in there from lane 2 on the roundabout, BUT bear in mind that street, Charles Street, isn’t very long and is often queued solid in both lanes right back to the roundabout exit, so sometimes it is either change lanes there where there is room or cause further gridlock by trying to change lanes a few metres later in solid traffic.

turning left from the 2nd lane, which doesn’t involve crossing any lines.

Yes but it does involve completely ignoring the lane arrows telling you not to do that.

The Highway Code is pretty clear that “When taking the first exit to the left, unless signs or markings indicate otherwise signal left and approach in the left-hand lane” – and in this case the arrow markings only reinforce that rule.

Would you ignore the arrows on that traffic-light version I drew and turn left from lane 2? How about if it was a filtered light? Would you move off from lane 2 on a left filter?

looks like Pistonheads have done the advisory / mandatory one-

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?t=1489271

The consensus seemed to be that they are advisory, but if failing to follow them caused you to inconvenience another vehicle than you could be done for a breach of XYZ.

Unless of course, the only 2 remaining traffic cops in the UK were on their tea break. In which case, fire away…