Near Miss of the Day 802: The most pointless overtake ever?

Exactly, like when someone pulls out on you at a junction or on a mini roundabout: if you have to brake to avoid a collision then they did not have room to safely carry out their maneouvre.

What, the other Merc driver, who overtook despite the big centre-line keep left arrow? They were shifting!

well spotted, that was awful driving, I wonder if the lefthooker had started indicating left before (nearly) pulling out for the overtake, and the driver of the dark car (as so many do) took this as a carte blanche to save a millisecond by overtaking at a junction whn they clearly could see everything.

That's a damn good question! I think there are some drivers who basically fail to register cyclists as road users. They see them, but that's it, and they see them as static objects. A bit like they see a litter bin on the pavement - it's there, but not really relevant to their driving decisions, and having seen it once there is no need to look again.

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Well put.

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I'm sure if you asked them about the incident, their perception would be that they'd left plenty of space.

I see quite a few passes where oncoming cars have had to brake or swerve, even stop, and I suspect that the driver still files it as "well judged" in their memory banks.

IanMSpencer wrote:

I'm sure if you asked them about the incident, their perception would be that they'd left plenty of space.

Yes, I've lost count of the number of times when I've shouted out in shock and surprise at a close pass, only for the driver to stop and tell me that they gave me plenty of room.  If they have such poor spatial awareness, should they be allowed to drive?

Had a driver yesterday attempt to pass on a narrow road, as i turned to shout "No!", saw the front bumper was no more than 2 inches from my leg, had they carried on with that pass, theyd have hit me. I can't begin to imagine how poor their spacial awareness was to drive like that, but I suspect drug driving had to be a major factor.

I watched a young man walk out of a pub last night, get into his car and light up a fat joint before driving away.
It was so blatant that it had to be habitual, an action carried out subconsciously.
No one else seemed to give a shit, but I reported it ASAP.

When my daughter was on patrol in Sheffield, it was quite regular for her to issue fixed penalty notices for smoking pot in cars. As the police had no budget for drug testing kits, they only had one alcohol breath test kit for all the patrol cars at the time, she could not stop them from driving.

I'm sure many cyclists using back lanes and quiet corners come across wide-eyed pot smokers who are going to drive once they've toked up. Either end of the pedestrian bridge by J5 of the M42 is a popular spot for example, and we quite often will comment on the reek of wacky backy when cars pass us.

IanMSpencer wrote:

When my daughter was on patrol in Sheffield, it was quite regular for her to issue fixed penalty notices for smoking pot in cars. As the police had no budget for drug testing kits, they only had one alcohol breath test kit for all the patrol cars at the time, she could not stop them from driving. I'm sure many cyclists using back lanes and quiet corners come across wide-eyed pot smokers who are going to drive once they've toked up. Either end of the pedestrian bridge by J5 of the M42 is a popular spot for example, and we quite often will comment on the reek of wacky backy when cars pass us.

Could she not have hauled them back to the police station for a blood test when she could smell alcohol on their breath?

Cycling into work, every morning I can smell weed wafting out of at least one car with it's windows open.  But then that's Bristol...