Near Miss of the Day 694: King of MGIF drivers just has to get in front at congested roundabout

I was cycling through Islington a few years ago, when the police were stationed at major junctions in an effort to blame cyclists for all the deaths reduce cyling deaths, when I arrived at the front of a three-lane traffic queue to find the ASL filled with three cars.  I filtered ahead and positioned myself in lane 1 primary, ahead of the stop line, but behind the pedestrian crossing. A helpful PC told me to dismount and walk my bike, on the pavement, back behind the stop line, but did absolutely nothing when I pointed out that I'd crossed the stop line because the ASL was full of cars.

IanMSpencer wrote:

The only place advanced cycle stop areas work is London. Everywhere else, motorists just see red at cyclists "pushing in". I've rarely risked taking advantage of them because the result is invariably a punishment pass.

Do they work in London? Presumably they "work" for some people but I'm not sure who. Evidence suggests they're problematic at best [1] [2] and we should be moving away from, not towards these to safer and more attractive / convenient infra.

I guess they "work" for some drivers who drive into them, especially when the paint is worn or traffic's nose-to-tail. If you weren't particularly confident and didn't manage to change lanes by the time you've got there? Are you going to be happy to hop off your bike and push / carry it sideways * in front of a line of revving cars / trucks?  If you were bullish you could actually do that with a similar amount of beeping at many traffic lights, ASL or no.

* Maybe you were in the gutter on the left hand side because traffic and lack of confidence in beingin bully your way across?  There's rarely space in the ASL to cycle across and position yourself properly - especially where these cover 3 lanes.

chrisonatrike wrote:

Do they work in London? Presumably they "work" for some people but I'm not sure who.

From my limited experiences of driving in London, ASLs seem to work quite well for mopeds and motorcycles.

chrisonatrike wrote:

IanMSpencer wrote:

The only place advanced cycle stop areas work is London. Everywhere else, motorists just see red at cyclists "pushing in". I've rarely risked taking advantage of them because the result is invariably a punishment pass.

Do they work in London? Presumably they "work" for some people but I'm not sure who. Evidence suggests they're problematic at best [1] [2] and we should be moving away from, not towards these to safer and more attractive / convenient infra.

I guess they "work" for some drivers who drive into them, especially when the paint is worn or traffic's nose-to-tail. If you weren't particularly confident and didn't manage to change lanes by the time you've got there? Are you going to be happy to hop off your bike and push / carry it sideways * in front of a line of revving cars / trucks?  If you were bullish you could actually do that with a similar amount of beeping at many traffic lights, ASL or no.

* Maybe you were in the gutter on the left hand side because traffic and lack of confidence in beingin bully your way across?  There's rarely space in the ASL to cycle across and position yourself properly - especially where these cover 3 lanes.

Most of the time the ASLs work ok in London. I use them a lot. Most drivers now seem to understand what they are. When I'm on my motorbike I stay out of them but I've actually had a couple of drivers telling me to move into them, to which I've politely declined. Delivery riders on scooters tend to use them, which I find annoying whether I'm cycling, on my motorbike, or in my car. But at least it gets them ahead and out of my way when the lights change I suppose.

Glad to hear it works for some. I've very rarely seen them used for part of their stated design purpose (by cyclists to shift lanes). In Edinburgh they're moderately used by cyclists and scooters. But they're also used by cars a pretty high proportion of the time. Some of that is excusable since they're losing visibility. Paint wears off fast if you're running thousands of motor vehicles over it per day.

Not knocking them if they're already there and people feel they help. I just think they're an old and deficient design.  We should not still be tentatively suggesting having a few more of these but retiring them to the road design museum and bringing in much better junction designs (video from 2010!). If needed * take a Cyclops from Manchester or some other design from there.  The last ones I saw from TfL (some time back) were still in the ASL era.

* Because we seem to have major "not invented here" issues in the UK - these things are utterly impossible until someone here's made a poor copy of someone else's old idea and given it a different name - then it's "advanced design"!

IanMSpencer wrote:

The only place advanced cycle stop areas work is London. Everywhere else, motorists just see red at cyclists "pushing in". I've rarely risked taking advantage of them because the result is invariably a punishment pass.

This. I'm seeing aggression and punishment passes directed at me for daring to use these lanes.

AlsoSomniloquism wrote:

Police wouldn't do anything I suspect anyway, but especially as Brett then also committed a traffic offence by going straight on from the left hand turning lane. 

Or alternatively the police might not be able to do anything.... as YE67WKW doesn't seem to exist on the gov.uk road tax check website

TriTaxMan wrote:

AlsoSomniloquism wrote:

Police wouldn't do anything I suspect anyway, but especially as Brett then also committed a traffic offence by going straight on from the left hand turning lane. 

Or alternatively the police might not be able to do anything.... as YE67WKW doesn't seem to exist on the gov.uk road tax check website

Good spot.
Would that make it a false/illegal number plate or one that belonged to a "government agency"?

Although it looks 6 months ago if timestamp is correct so might have been written off with that driving or resubmitted under a personalised plate. 

TriTaxMan wrote:

AlsoSomniloquism wrote:

Police wouldn't do anything I suspect anyway, but especially as Brett then also committed a traffic offence by going straight on from the left hand turning lane. 

Or alternatively the police might not be able to do anything.... as YE67WKW doesn't seem to exist on the gov.uk road tax check website

Strange. It is recognised at regit.cars. But if you click through there is no record.
https://www.regit.cars/car/YE67WKW

Cached data, if you use the same site HPI checker, that also complains about the Reg.

Yes, I sort-of realised that, but just to show that it was once so registered, its not a totally fictitious plate.
I still don't get why it does not show up on Hpi or DVLA. Find some random old car photo on the Web and run the plate, it shows up, like this beauty E430MLS. Hasn't been taxed since last millennium, it's got to be dead and burried, but still shows up. So how does the merc vanish from radar?

Cause the reg changed to a vanity plate. Car is still live, reg is not.