Reminds me of this one I had a while ago… about the same gap to the verge here and the pretty coloured car was going about 40mph. I got no response from Hants Police’s Twitter feed

Is it common sense for the police to perpetuate the myth that cyclists are not visible? That’s just dangerous victim blaming bullshit I’m afraid.

Didn’t say that though. Said that you were less visible than a 12 m^3 metal box with bright lights on each corner.

committed to the gap

Needs to be on a T-shirt

can’t see how funding affects decision making.

If I remember rightly you’re a teacher – if the number of pupils in your school increased by 20%, ASN demand increased by 10% and the number of teacher / staff reduced by 10% are you really saying this would not have an impact on the decision making over which support to give to which children, which incidents of bullying you deal with and which you don’t. Pull the other one.

The hopping on the pavement thing, I do it only if convenient, no pedestrians, and doing so makes passing more convenient for both.

So although i said in that circumstance I would have hoped on the kerb, cyclists should not be expected to instantly jump out of the way of other road vehicles.

People in general need to be better at leaving their egos behind when on the roads!

Think that’s it for all the obvious stuff!

I do the hop on the pavement thing too, if there’s a drop kerb convenient.. I once did it to get out of the way of a bunch of primary school kids doing cycling proficiency training. I’m pretty sure their teacher shouted at me to not ride on the pavement!! Twonk! (Can’t swear by it as had music on).

For me he could have slowed and passed wider – he had room. Yet he aggressively passed close and quite fast for the road conditions (wet / narrow).

If he’d been on his driving test I don’t think the instructor would have passed him having done that.

Would expect the police to have at least issued a warning in this scenario.

Well yeah. A real story in a tea cup.
Until its a 13 year old that was on the bike and they get killed by a driver of a 1.5 tonne missile on the wrong side of the road who couldn’t give a shit about the safety of someone else.

This was so similar to a situation whilst out cycling with two of my children – aged 13 & 15 near the start of the lockdown in the middle of the day. I was approximately 10 metres behind them. It was an access road to a beauty spot with cars parked on the opposing side.

My children had started cycling down their side of the road and then a vehicle entered the road – who could see them and only needed to wait a minute. Entitled middle age woman in SUV tried to drive past parked cars and would not reverse. She started shouting. I didn’t swear and asked her how often she started driving down the wrong side of the road at children on bicycles.

A bystander stated that I was threatening a woman – despite not being in anyway aggressive. He then threatened to move my children physically. Then I saw red and said if he approached us I would defend them against assault. He then reiterated his baseless statement. Eventually we rode past the now reversed car and left. That was after many threats by driver and bystander – despite isolation requirements.

I’m not proud of this – but had it carried on, I would have decked someone.

those saying you had right of way are wrong. You have right of way if the obstacle is on the other side of the road

Again – the rules changed this year. Priority is based on vulnerability.

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/the-highway-code/introduction#ruleh3

Reminds me of this one I had a while ago… about the same gap to the verge here and the pretty coloured car was going about 40mph. I got no response from Hants Police’s Twitter feed

😲 wow.

Did you have lights on your bike? I can’t see the flash reflecting off anything?

Neither party slowed, both self righteous, not sure who was in the wrong legally

however I know cars tend to hurt people on bikes so I would have got out of the cars way it’s better to to be fit and well and not just dead and legally right

What would the driver have done if there was a car going the other way, or a motorcycle? Surely if you’re on the wrong side of the road, overtaking, you need to be able to stop within the distance you can see to be clear.

This

I live in amongst a lot of narrow country lanes. Often people are “committed” to a section where cars cannot pass each other. What happens? THEY BOTH STOP assess the situation and then adjust accordingly.

I live in amongst a lot of narrow country lanes. Often people are “committed” to a section

yeah, it’s very unfortunate language as it implies the driver has no choice but to continue straight on and is therefore absolved of any blame/responsibility. People seemingly often forget a car has a brake as well as an accelerator! As you say, he also has the choice of just stopping.

also,

Again – the rules changed this year. Priority is based on vulnerability.

I was going to say that the language was quite vague/wooly (and indeed it is for the majority of that section) but the rules for H3 really couldn’t spell it out any clearer!:

You should stop and wait for a safe gap in the flow of cyclists if necessary. This includes when cyclists are:

approaching, passing or moving off from a junction
moving past or waiting alongside stationary or slow-moving traffic

Them townies just don’t understand your country ways.

Couple of years ago, I was driven into by an idiot in a scabby truck, who went for a gap that was too narrow for both of us (I was already in it, broad daylight). Destroyed my front wheel. I took pics of him and his truck, as he was arguing with me. He then drove off. Police attended, took all details, then nothing for months. Eventually they contacted me to say the driver had been prosecuted for having no insurance. I asked them what had happened to the stuff like driving without due care, failure to stop following a collision, etc. Their response was that they had decided not to prosecute due to ‘lack of evidence’. I had a passerby and a family who lived in the house adjacent, as witnesses. They never even took statements from any of them, despite me giving all details. The upshot was that the no insurance thing was easy to prove (he’d admitted driving at that time due to my photo evidence), so they’d gone for the low hanging fruit. As I hadn’t been injured in any way, they weren’t bothered with chasing up the failure to stop etc (criminal offence, so needs more thorough and lengthy investigation). Left me out of pocket by a £200 or so front wheel. Not too bad considering, but still.

Police resources are very stretched, and officers are under pressure to get ‘results’ that bring in as much revenue as possible. I get all that. But they’re still **** useless though.

Just another case of a cyclist being treated as a second-class citizen with an idiot driver knowing they can get away with it.

Yesterday I contacted a national company via their message system (no phone number anywhere) saying I wished to speak with someone about the poor driving by one of their lorries. Didn’t tell them what exactly but it was on a motorway being upgraded to “smart” (ho ho ho) and they were speeding in a narrow lane. Radio silence but will persue.

While I understand why the OP is pissed off by this but I actually think the police looked at it, thought that no one was hurt or property damaged and that they had better things to use their finite resources for.

@ configuration. It’s not the Police that decide on the offences to prosecute, its the CPS. So the officers will offer all the evidence, and the CPS will decide which offence to move forward with to prosecute.
https://www.cps.gov.uk/cps/news/cps-says-role-cps-deciding-whether-charge-individual-criminal-offence
So again, cops that arrest drug dealers, murderers, rapists, Paedophiles, serious assaults, deal with social care issues, domestics, vulnerable elderly people, missing children, suicides etc etc. So yeah, the Police are useless.

So the officers will offer all the evidence

how can they offer evidence they haven’t bothered to collect 🤔

Its clear to me that you are right, and the driver is wrong. had you not squeezed over he would have hit you.

I live next to a police officer, and he gets really irritated by accusations of police not pulling their weight, or doing the right thing. In his view (as i understand it), they have limited resources, and pressumably a low level misdemenanor like that takes resources away from catching real baddies.

Not sure i agree myself. Your fat-head mate will continue to drive and behave like a **** because he is never confronted about it. I dont see why the police cant issue points with minimal admin for clear cut cases like that.
He was wrong, you were right, have a point on your licesne (him). Done and dusted.

@ configuration. It’s not the Police that decide on the offences to prosecute, its the CPS. So the officers will offer all the evidence, and the CPS will decide which offence to move forward with to prosecute.

Nah. They didn’t even bother to investigate. They had all the evidence they needed, they chose not to act. Went for the no insurance thing cos it’s nice and easy and requires minimum work. They even used the evidence I provided them, and had the bloke not admitted guilt, I would have been required to attend court to testify. However, they failed to collect any other evidence, made no effort at all to speak to witnesses, then let the 6 month limit on action lapse. Left me in a situation that even if I had taken out a private claim against the driver for damages, without the police even charging him for any offence other than the no insurance thing, I’d have most likely got nowhere. So I’m £200 down because someone else broke the law. You can guarantee that if you shoplifted £200 worth of stuff from Tescos or wherever, you’d be up before the beak.

So yeah, the Police are useless.

Unless you shout at a funeral…

he should’ve slowed down and given way.

This. Looking ahead, even if he had not seen you, he should still have slowed ready to come to a stop. Possibly let you pass, or acknowledge and thank you that you had done the same. There is a place to let you pass on their left, since you had right of way, and the gap on your left too. Should never have come to emergency and evasive action.

A polite word from an officer would have been a good outcome.

Didn’t say that though. Said that you were less visible than a 12 m^3 metal box with bright lights on each corner.

Still not true cyclists are just as visible.

and yes I did have lights on, always do, despite how it looks on the video it wasn’t actually dark. Had a hi viz gillet on as well.

In this case there’s nowhere for oncoming traffic to stop either, it’s effectively a single track road, so the onus would be on both road users behave appropriately. Driver should have at least slowed.

I’m not sure about towns but I’m pretty sure that on single track roads the right of way belongs to the shiniest Range Rover

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/the-highway-code/introduction#ruleh1

Ok I apologise for the length of this but I think our safety is a worthy discussion. What I’ve copied and pasted below is taken from government guidance on the above website. I’ve added my own experience based interpretation;

“Many of the rules in the Code are legal requirements, and if you disobey these rules you are committing a criminal offence… Such rules are identified by the use of the words ‘MUST/MUST NOT’…

…failure to comply with the other rules of the Code will not, in itself, cause a person to be prosecuted… This includes rules which use advisory wording such as ‘should/should not’ or ‘do/do not’.”

As with any changes to the Highway Code, the changes around hierarchy have been largely ignored, misunderstood or misrepresented. Depending on your personal interests some people are treating the changes as MUST, when in actual fact a lot are SHOULD. For example:

Rule H3 – Rule for drivers and motorcyclists
You should not cut across cyclists, horse riders or horse drawn vehicles going ahead when you are turning into or out of a junction or changing direction or lane, just as you would not turn across the path of another motor vehicle. This applies whether they are using a cycle lane, a cycle track, or riding ahead on the road and you should give way to them.
Do not turn at a junction if to do so would cause the cyclist, horse rider or horse drawn vehicle going straight ahead to stop or swerve.
You should stop and wait for a safe gap in the flow of cyclists if necessary. This includes when cyclists are:
* approaching, passing or moving off from a junction
* moving past or waiting alongside stationary or slow-moving traffic
* travelling around a roundabout

This all sounds pedantic and wearisome; the law is very pedantic. The subtleties of the meaning of one particular word in a whole Act or Section can often be what some people call “loopholes” but actually the difference in MUST & SHOULD are the difference between what is criminal and what is not criminal. A decent legal representative will know this and exploit this.

None of this detracts from the responsibility of ALL road users, including pedestrians, cyclists and horse riders, to have regard for their own and other road users’ safety.”

This could therm be interpreted as, even if you are technically in the right, if you did not take steps to protect your safety and placed all of the responsibility into the hands of other roads users, then you could be seen as negligent to your own safety, which would help mitigate any offence the other road user may have committed.

For example, a little while ago there was a lengthy discussion on this forum about a cyclist who got knocked off his bike; one early morning a driver had jumped a red light and hit a cyclist who was travelling through the junction. Unfortunately, it was hours of darkness and the cyclist wasn’t using lights. The upshot was that the driver got minimal sentencing and the cyclist got a hugely reduced payout. Yes, the Highway Code says the motorist MUST stop at the red light, but (contentiously) had they been able to see the cyclist they could’ve either stopped or taken avoiding action. I AM NOT SAYING I AGREE, I am merely pointing out that the law expects you to also look after yourself. This is the law, it can often seem counterintuitive, and it is always frustrating but it is the law.

I think pertinent to this thread:

Rule 152
Residential streets. You should drive slowly and carefully on streets where there are likely to be pedestrians, cyclists and parked cars. In some areas a 20 mph (32 km/h) maximum speed limit may be in force.

Again, this word SHOULD; though I personally think he was going a bit quick, and would’ve struggled with a child stepping out from between cars, he would just as readily argued that he did drive slowly. Without an actual speed or an independent witness who could describe the manner of driving it’s very subjective and boils down to tit for tat.

What this all means is that when the Police Service cannot meet basic demand, when there is huge shortage in available court time caused by Covid backlogs, massive staff shortages and budget cuts within criminal justice, Police officers have to make decisions on what jobs have a realistic chance of prosecution. I was once bollocked by a senior officer for legitimately claiming overtime and told I am “a guardian of the public purse”. His expectation was that I worked for free because budgets are tight… I say this because this cop may well be dealing with numerous domestic abuse jobs, sexual offences, internet fraud, public order, theft & criminal damage type jobs, all of which need their attention and most of which will end up in court and none of which will they have the time to give their full attention. In your case they’ve made a decision based on all of this. It may not be the decision you wanted but it’s not unreasonable.

Not sure i agree myself. Your fat-head mate will continue to drive and behave like a **** because he is never confronted about it. I dont see why the police cant issue points with minimal admin for clear cut cases like that.
He was wrong, you were right, have a point on your licesne (him). Done and dusted.

A warning letter couldn’t cost much could it?
I am big enough and ugly enough to look after myself but kids should feel safe riding bikes on a road like this which is simple a big circle of houses, it’s not on a route anywhere and it’s a 20mph limit but they are not due to **** like this. People die due to **** like this. Given the climate and obesity crisis making active travel a safe option should damn we’ll be a priority for the police.

Now I will admit I could have stopped and in retrospect what I should have done is stay primary and stop. However I could tell from distance due to the lack of slowing and the lack of moving over that this was an idiot, so that option would have, at best, ended in a confrontation so it seemed pointless, had he just adjusted position like I did and even better slowed a bit we could have all carried on happy.
Had I stopped at the side of the road like many say here I would still have been skimmed by a car and it would still have been very unsafe so why would I?

OP – you asked for opinions. Some people agree with you, some don’t.

Take it further with Police if you want. Arguing on here won’t change the current outcome.

I blame the teachers.

OP – you asked for opinions. Some people agree with you, some don’t

Thanks tips!
It’s called a discussion, some people raised some good points I wished to respond to.

I blame the teachers.

Always a very good fall back option 😄

a road like this which is simple a big circle of houses, it’s not on a route anywhere

So it’s fairly likely the driver lives somewhere nearby? Sausages, bombers, wee, etc.

So it’s fairly likely the driver lives

It is, which was another reason to report it, although not seen the car parked anywhere…I do have spare bombers…
In other news my complaint has led to a NIP being sent out so I am pulling the video

Reading about this made me angry: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-bristol-63134820 and the initial incident isn’t that dissimilar to the OPs. I just don’t understand how a driver that turns around, chases the cyclist down and deliberately knocks them off then gets out of the van and punches them unconscious only gets a suspended sentence, he even has history of the same behaviour! He won’t even get sacked for doing it in the company van as his father owns the company.

Edit: obviously not the police being useless on this occasion though – it’s the judge that has a lot to answer for.

it’s the judge‘s interpretation of the sentencing guidelines that has a lot to answer for.

As ever, a news report doesn’t cover all the facts a judge and jury had access to, but this one seemed very odd.

In other news my complaint has led to a NIP being sent out

👍

Reading about this made me angry: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-bristol-63134820 and the initial incident isn’t that dissimilar to the OPs. I just don’t understand how a driver that turns around, chases the cyclist down and deliberately knocks them off then gets out of the van and punches them unconscious only gets a suspended sentence, he even has history of the same behaviour! He won’t even get sacked for doing it in the company van as his father owns the company.

I had near identical assault in Sheffield. The Magistrate kicked it up to crown court as the use of a car and punches moved it straight into something more serious. The driver/assailant got a year inside.
Was released after 6 months – and was back inside within a week as he gave someone at the pub a good shoeing apparently.

That Bristol video is nasty to watch. 56yr old v 2 thirtyish idiots. I know there are guidelines on sentences and the prisons are full, but a suspended sentence is laughable.
Badge of honor to dickhead thugs like him

Might see if the decorators have an online presence and add a nice Google review

Not that it excuses their behaviour, but I think Mr Punchy there says something like “you hit my mirror again“? I wonder if there’s previous which they might’ve used as a defence?

The car driver was to blame. Yes, he was passing parked cars but should have been using due caution and having seen the gap on his left been ready to slow and move into the gap when he saw oncoming traffic. Not speeding past the gap. Being “committed” does not remove his need to consider oncoming traffic.

I suspect his driving would have been different had it been an HGV coming towards him.

Leaving that aside. With plenty of low ramps onto the kerb and no other users on the pavement I would have been up on it. Always a useful option whether legal or not.

In other news my complaint has led to a NIP being sent out

Don’t worry OP. We’ll all come & visit you when you are inside.

Dropped kerbs aside, if I tried to “just hop up” onto a parallel kerb I’d likely stack it. At best I wouldn’t be confident in my ability to a point where I’d be preceding the manoeuvre with the word “just.” I never quite got the knack of getting a bike off the ground.

Granted, falling over the kerb is likely preferable to being under the wheels / fists of a gammony cockwomble, but still.

huge shortage in available court time caused by Covid backlogs

Not at all, they’re caused by government deciding to defund the system.