I love it* when drivers try and force you over/to stop when you’re on a bike and have right of way. they wouldnt do it to a car so why to a bike. I’ve sat wheel to bumper until they backup more that once

Personal pet peeve of mine too, helps when I have the trailer attached and can genuinely reply with “this one doesn’t have a reverse gear, yours does”

Going back to the transit and trailer story earlier in the thread. This happened to me one day: I was driving up a singletrack road in the arse end of nowhere, car coming towards me sails straight past a passing place and proceeds to stop in front of me and refuse to move. Thing is I was driving a minibus with poor rear visibility and towing a huge trailer full of canoes, kayaks and kit. I tried to explain to the man that I had no chance of reversing it and the he only needed to reverse 20m at most, but no, he wouldnt move. So this is what I did – unloaded the trailer, walked all the kit back to the nearest passing place, pushed the trailer back to the passing place, reversed the minibus back to the passing place but left it so that he couldn’t get past – i then hitched the trailer up and reloaded it before moving slightly to allow them to squeaze past in the ditch. Took around 50 minutes to resolve – it was a lovely day and a nice part of the world. 😀

/highfives wanman

Driving in my car today I had a situation where I was in the right and the other driver was in the wrong.
Needless to say I had the last laugh.

I once offered the keys of the LWB transit with a 15ft trailer on the back to the person who as refusing to back up.

The record at my old outdoor centre, 8 miles up single track road, with passing places full of snow, was reversing a mile to the nearest farm to allow passing – in 17 seat transit and 20′ canoe trailer…. Man up 😉

On that same road our staff were trained well how to avoid being forced to try and pass at inappropriate places by tourists not wanting to reverse. I once had a chap kick off that the minibus would not reverse, so he got out to get all shouty at the female driver. The five minibuses behind (that he has not seen) were all driven by tall, fit male staff, two of whom were 6′ 4”+… You should have seen how quickly he headed back to his car and reversed.. 😆

jam bo » I once offered the keys of the LWB transit with a 15ft trailer on the back to the person who as refusing to back up.

I’ve got out and offered to reverse the car for the other driver in a similar situation, because I assumed they had a problem with that.

I’ve had this problem several time while towing cars down narrow lanes.
I have had to reverse the other car three times now as the driver is unable to reverse it themselves.
On another occasion the other driver managed to reverse into a ditch, so I had to unload the car I was towing, tow them out of the ditch and the load up my car again. Needless to say, it was my fault that they were unable to drive properly…

I just remembered driving along the road below Stanage (just past the plantation car park).

Car appears coming the other way. I can see the tarmac is not wide enough to pass at speed and there’s no way I’m putting my wheels on the very sunken verge so I slam on the brakes. The other car obviously thinks he’s got enough ground clearance and goes to swerve round me. Cue god awful scraping sound and a rapid halt. I felt bad for him but I’d stopped already well short and was nothing I could have done. 🙁

I used to live in a rural area where all the roads were those pretty little singletrack lanes with a bit of grass growing along the middle. One of the locals refused, and I mean refused point blank, to reverse. More of a stop than a stand off, after a while it became normal that whenever you met this guy, you reversed (cars, tractors, tractors with trailers- I learnt to reverse a trailer myself) and it wasn’t an issue.
I’d love to have seen you guys pull up and sit down on the side of the road with this guy. 😀

Cue god awful scraping sound and a rapid halt. I felt bad for him but I’d stopped already well short and was nothing I could have done.

I had one of those a couple of years ago, I’d stopped and a Range Rover dragged itself down the side of my car. Then, sodded off! Swine.

Just spent 200 miles riding mostly single track roads in Sutherland.

2 incidents of young men revving furiously behind me, trying to overtake, not liking it when I take primary, all within 20 metres of a passing space.

The vast majority of drivers were great, if some (pimped Land Rovers) were driving way too fast and had to emergency stop on seeing me after a blind summit/corner.

I love it* when drivers try and force you over/to stop when you’re on a bike and have right of way. they wouldnt do it to a car so why to a bike. I’ve sat wheel to bumper until they backup more that once.

My road’s a bit of a mare for this. A couple of time I’ve rightly stopped my car to give way to an oncoming bike only to be overtaken by the car behind which then forces the bike onto the pavement. Both times at the traffic lights at the end of the road I’ve got out and asked the driver if they know why I’m annoyed?

The mum with the kids in the car started with ‘there was plenty of room’, which when I pointed out that if he hadn’t mounted the kerb she’d have hit him became ‘well he should have been on the pavement anyway’ which ultimately became ‘fxxx off’ (in front of her kids) as the lights changed.

The scruffy builder type on the other occasion was conversely ‘yes, my mistake, not paying attention, sorry’

It is true what was said, some people have become so self obsessed they’ll refuse to admit an error and argue the indefensible rather than say sorry.

Sounds like a challenge – where can I find him?

Had a similar one in Duddingston Village in Edinburgh.
Bit of a rat run through Holyrood Park/Arthur’s Seat leading to a tiny wee village street with various cars parked down one side. If you’re heading east you can be stuck for ages waiting for a chance to go.

Well, a guy heading east couldn’t wait any longer and took his chance, except I was already abreast of some parked cars, heading west.

Stand off!

He beeped the horn a lot and waved at me to go back.

He was in the wrong and felt like being a dick so, turned the engine off.

This angered him.

He got more angry when I started reading my book.

Problem was, he had been impatient on a bend and other cars had followed him.

So about 10 cars had to back up, all the way back to Holyrood Park.

Once he eventually backed up, I took my sweet time starting up the MX5, took an extra minute to comb my hair and flounced past him.

Haha – he was very shouty.

Happy to report that my drive to work was incident-free this morning (I did come in early though so the school-run and rushing to work late brigade hadn’t appeared yet).

johndoh – Member

Happy to report that my drive to work was incident-free this morning

So was mine but jesus, there was an absolute heap of cock heads on the road last night when I went out for a ride!

I used to live in a rural area where all the roads were those pretty little singletrack lanes with a bit of grass growing along the middle. One of the locals refused, and I mean refused point blank, to reverse. More of a stop than a stand off, after a while it became normal that whenever you met this guy, you reversed (cars, tractors, tractors with trailers- I learnt to reverse a trailer myself) and it wasn’t an issue.
I’d love to have seen you guys pull up and sit down on the side of the road with this guy

Was he a big angry bloke? Known for gettign his own way locally? On the ride up the road past Craggs in Hebden a 4×4 drove down the hill and sped up, aimed right at me. I waved my hand in the air as he passed and he slammed on, leaned out said something then slammed it back up in reverse. He then jumped out. He was in his mid 50’s- a big bloke. Looked like a farmer or local character who was used to getting his own way. I took my helmet off to talk to him. He was jabbing the air and shouting. Said it was his road/his right/bikes weren’t allowed. I asked him to why driving at someone was right? Stayed calm which must have spooked him abit as he suddenly switched to (looking at his watch) ‘I dont have time for this’.

He looked like the sort of bloke that’d beat you up in his early years but now would keel over from a heart attack from too much excitement/adrenaline.

The road loops up and over past all the farms then brings you round the reservoirs if you know it? Strictly speaking its a road but isn’t for bicycles for some reason.

I hope he bloody calmed down. If I hadn’t gotten out of the way he’d have glanced me with his wing.

I had a similar stand-off with a school run mum. I turned the engine off and started to read a book. When she finally backed up, I slowly went past and took a look at her. She was staring dead ahead, refusing eye contact, but I noticed her knuckles were white grasping the steering wheel.

Never mess with a chilled-out driver 😀

Had a couple of stand offs in pinch points where I’ve had priority and got to the point first on my bike but driver has kept coming, it’s tempting to sit/stand and wait them out but as I’m a bit vulnerable I’ve just stopped long enough to make the point, then squeezed passed or mounted the kerb while making a few choice comments.

IIRC coming back from kentmere down that long singletrack road, old lady coming the opposite way, there was a passing place about a car length behind her but she sat staring straight ahead until we reversed a hundred or so meters back to a gate.

[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xm_tnMmRTFk[/video]

It’s not only Britain that idiocy rules on the roads. This video became viral in Germany earlier this year. The car driver would only have to reverse 5 metres and all would be OK. But no. 😕

Is disappointed – was hoping for road rage lorry driver ploughing through the car 🙂

I have no idea what the car driver was hoping to achieve there. I think I’d have turned the truck engine off and started on a book.

Was he making a stand because the lorry had cut the corner?

(That’s beyond my German ability, sorry)

Was he making a stand because the lorry had cut the corner?

No one knows. You can’t hear what the car driver is saying but he/she obviously refuses to reverse and is also quite rude to the lorry driver as you can hear him saying repeatedly ‘Please stop insulting me’. I would imagine that is the case though. It’s fairly typical German stupidity as they are obsessed with who has right. I have seen in the past two drivers risking each others lives when one stupidly tried to overtake where there wasn’t a big enough gap in the oncoming traffic and the car coming in other direction refusing to slow down because they were in the right. It very nearly ended in tragedy. 😯

pretty little singletrack lanes with a bit of grass growing along the middle

We call them Landing Strip Lanes down our way 😉

i’ve got 22 miles of singletrack road to drive on monday apparently. need to survey the delivery route for about 8 x 4-5 tonne bits of kit for a tender we are going for.

Could be fun if the tourists are out n about.

Was he making a stand because the lorry had cut the corner?

I did wonder. Is it possible for a truck that big to make it down there without cutting the corner tho? or has he cut it more than he needed to?