Near Miss of the Day 392: The (lack of) social distancing edition

Hope it's been reported, take care out there

I wonder what is so vital about the queue of stopped traffic up ahead

Utter moron. I have had the same several times.
I did have a mitsubishi driver who did an emaculate overtake who got a thumbs up but they are in a minority.

Its like they waited for the pinch point to pass. very poor driving.

The rider didn't do themselves any favours by riding far left when a central pinch point was approaching. Ride central to quickly block the inattentive driver.

Had a few like that the last couple of days, roads are quieter but still a few impatient knob heads about.
Also people ragging it because the roads are quiet so plenty of room to floor it, a Merc C63 went past my son and I, at a guess, 80+ on the local trading estate yesterday, gave us plenty of room but utterly ridiculous.

It's hard to understand how someone that stupid got a licence in the first place; did they get their mate to take the test?  All they had to do was wait a few seconds until there was space, but they had to overtake at the narrowest section.

I'd like to say that this has never happened to me, but it's all too frequent, as I'm sure most of you will know.  It once happened almost outside a police station, and my shouting and gesticulating made the driver stop, so I pointed out that his overtaking was dangerous, which he denied, so I invited him to discuss it with the police, and to my surprise he did.  I was even more surprised, nay, utterly gobsmacked, when the police officer supported him.

Although it's a whole load quieter out there, the problem of speeding (no doubt these people are all on essential trips - essential and I assume also urgent) hasn't gone away, and neither has this, I am less than surprised to see. For most of us there's no real rush to be anywhere, except the landing, the kitchen, etc.  There's never a good time to have to go to hospital - now really isn't. 

I've seen plenty of "Lycra-clad" warriors out in recent days - I agree we're not breaching the rules, either in letter or in spirit - I just think we need to be careful about now being perceived as taking advantage of the situation. I've seen on other Road.cc threads some "60 miles is normal for me", "wee in a hedge" comments, which I think are unhelpful and worst-case could be risky to how things are regulated. I don't know what the stats are, but cyclists, with no other vehicle involved, don't tend to need a paramedic - perhaps a pride Band-aid. anyway, Thank goodness for those proven health benefits. 

But cyclists are by no means the only ones. I've just been reading the Facebook chatter with the New Forest cops (Hampshire police), who are publicising the "don't drive to the Forest" message from the National Park Authority.  The fact remains that if people don't comply, it's going to get more prolonged and potentially more restrictive.

Dog owners, people on crutches, people who live on main roads, where Fido is fussy about where he walks (less fussy about where he poops IME) - all claiming to be an exception to the rules: hard to know whom to believe, whom if anyone to sympathise with.  Lovely, empty green space, just a tantalising 1 mile car drive away...

In many cases, there is a useful point about re-claiming our streets, our A roads, B roads and C roads back to what they should be: safe (and pleasant - that would make a change) for walkers, bikes, dogs, horses to be on - for instance, if you live on an A road. 

The New Forest, other than A roads, is all 40 or 30 mph - by no means universally respected, but rolling that out that would be a start. There is precedent : I only vaguely remember this myself but in 1973/4 they brought down the national speed limit for a time because of the OPEC (oil) crisis.