Near Miss of the Day 913: "Heart-stopping" moment as cyclist barely manages to make through gap after oncoming car driver follows overtaking van, ignoring cyclist

Jimmy Ray Will wrote:

Totally understand the no further action on this one.

Van was already established passing the parked cars, trumping priority.

The car was guilty of blindly following the van when they were unlikely to be able to see the road ahead, however, the cyclist was equally guilty of exactly the same... blindly riding into a space they could not see was clear. 

Lesson for all parties. 

However, the car driver went against the advice in the Highway Code on overtaking (rule 163):

Quote:

Overtake only when it is safe and legal to do so. You should

• not assume that you can simply follow a vehicle ahead which is overtaking; there may only be enough room for one vehicle
• give way to oncoming vehicles before passing parked vehicles or other obstructions on your side of the road

The cyclist made the mistake of not being able to stop in the distance that they could see to be clear, but they weren't endangering anyone other than themselves.

hawkinspeter wrote:

The cyclist made the mistake of not being able to stop in the distance that they could see to be clear, but they weren't endangering anyone other than themselves.

To play Telegraph's Devil's advocate for a moment, it could have been a crossing pedestrian, rather than an oncoming car, that was obscured by the van.

mdavidford wrote:

hawkinspeter wrote:

The cyclist made the mistake of not being able to stop in the distance that they could see to be clear, but they weren't endangering anyone other than themselves.

To play Telegraph's Devil's advocate for a moment, it could have been a crossing pedestrian, rather than an oncoming car, that was obscured by the van.

I would dispute that as the pedestrian would have had to be running behind the van to have kept out of sight of the cyclist. Possibly someone on roller skates holding onto the back of the van, but then there's plenty of space for the cyclist to avoid a pedestrian anyhow.

I think certainly it would be totally unrealistic to expect that if there is a fifty-metre line of parked cars for every driver - or indeed every cyclist - to wait patiently at one end while the car in front drove through, wait for them to clear the end of the line and then proceed.

Except in this case it's not a line of parked cars. The van had got past the line of parked cars, there is then a large gap and then a single parked car. If we ignore the previous parked cars and start from scratch the van and the driver behind are passing a single parked car with a cyclist coming down hill towards them "established" on their own side of the road in the center of their lane. Are you saying that, at any distance from a parked car, as long as you move to the other side of the road you are committed (or is it established) and other road users should give way.

You can't ignore the previous parked cars as the van driver is clearly, and quite reasonably, making a single overtake of them and the single car. There is time and space enough for them to do this and the cyclist can see exactly what's going on and has ample time to slow; the van has indisputably reached the point to overtake before the cyclist and therefore has no obligation to pull in before the final car. It's notable that the cyclist makes no complaint about the van driver as there is nothing to complain about here. Having seen the van coming from a considerable distance the cyclist should have slowed and waited for the driver to return to their own lane before passing it; had they done so they would have seen the oncoming car and there would have been no conflict. I'm hardly the world's biggest driver defender, nor the biggest fan of the police in terms of their readiness to refuse to act on bad driving, but I can entirely understand their refusal to act here; at worst the fault is evenly divided. Again, as I said above, it's useful to reverse positions: if the cyclist had been following the van and a car driver coming the other way had not slowed sufficiently to let both vehicles through but carried on at a speed which meant they just missed the van as it pulled back in, putting them in conflict with the cyclist behind, whose side would we be on there?

Rendel Harris wrote:

Again, as I said above, it's useful to reverse positions: if the cyclist had been following the van and a car driver coming the other way had not slowed sufficiently to let both vehicles through but carried on at a speed which meant they just missed the van as it pulled back in, putting them in conflict with the cyclist behind, whose side would we be on there?

I don't think swapping the car driver and cyclist works in this scenario due to the difference in sizes - the size of the van would easily shield a cyclist following it as the car driver would need to be further away to give enough room for the van driver to pull back into their lane.

So how big does the gap have to be before it is not a contunous line of parked cars?

Bungle_52 wrote:

So how big does the gap have to be before it is not a contunous line of parked cars?

Big enough for a car to pull into

What? That's just rubbish. If you have to move over to the right hand side of the road to avoid an obstacle you should always give way to oncoming traffic.

The fact is that some drivers believe that cyclists should always give way to them.

You give way _before_ committing to the narrow section of road. It's unclear from this video whether the cyclist was in view before the drivers moved into the road narrowing.

Exactly.
Even here in The Netherlands (the much lauded 'promised land of cycling') this is a totally common manoeuvre. Not very close, not a very high speed, no sudden sideways movement. Nothing much to see here.

It is steep enough and rough enough that a quick (downhill!) stop is far from a formality.

Doesn't the concept of committment come into play here? As I understand it if an oncoming vehicle has already committed to overtaking parked vehicles before you reach them then they have priority, is that not correct?

It's always useful to take a boot on the other foot approach to these scenarios, if a cyclist was following another vehicle past a line of parked cars and then was confronted with a car which had assumed that the oncoming vehicle was the only one there and so continued rather than stopping to let the cyclist through as well, what would we say about that?

That's reasonable.  On re-viewing this one it does seem that it would have been prudent for the cyclist to have at least slowed a bit more before the van driver had returned to their side of the road.  They don't seem to have left much space.  It seems to me they are acknowledging this by moving left just before the van passes.

So a case of "discretion the better part" for the cyclist here?

As for the following car is also quite close to the van but maybe not too close in the "can't see my mirrors?  I can't see you" sense.

The cyclist and the van driver do manage to pass each other OK (with note above).  Then we have "only proceed if you can see that the way is clear" and "commitment".  Certainly neither the cyclist nor the car driver could see the road ahead.  (Both could only see the van).  At the point where they first saw each other (arguably too late) I think both were committed to the "manoeuvre" - but the driver was on the wrong side of the road AND there was space to their left.  I think the advice is that in conflict where two parties have committed the party who's least inconvenienced by doing so should move out of the way at that point.

Probably both should have slowed further or stopped and certainly the driver shouldn't have just trucked on through, regardless of whether the cyclist was wise to continue or not.

Yep, it's in Rule 163:
"Overtake only when it is safe and legal to do so. You should give way to oncoming vehicles before passing parked vehicles or other obstructions on your side of the road"

There is no legal requirement to give way either - it's only advisory (i.e. not a MUST). Giving way only occurs before overtaking, not during. Unfortunately, the video begins with the van already overtaking the line of parked cars, so we can't see whether the cyclist was in view before they began their manoeuvre.

Some people think that if the obstruction is on the 'other side' of the road, then they have priority. Yet if the road is narrowed by an obstruction, that section doesn't really have two sides anymore, it's just a single lane; a narrow section of road similar to a country lane.

Perhaps the van driver could have pulled into the gap between the parked vehicles, but then perhaps they were aware of the following car and that gap wasn't big enough for both vehicles.

The crucial thing is this bit: "The rules in The Highway Code do not give you the right of way in any circumstance, but they advise you when you should give way to others. Always give way if it can help to avoid an incident."

From the video footage, the cyclist could not see that the road ahead was clear, but didn't adjust their speed. That could be deemed careless cycling on their part.

I do get annoyed at bad driving that puts cyclists at risk, but this is a situation where the risk can be easily mitigated by the cyclist adjusting their speed slightly, so they are able to stop in the distance they can see to be clear.

HoarseMann wrote:

Yep, it's in Rule 163:
"Overtake only when it is safe and legal to do so. You should give way to oncoming vehicles before passing parked vehicles or other obstructions on your side of the road"

...

From the video footage, the cyclist could not see that the road ahead was clear, but didn't adjust their speed. That could be deemed careless cycling on their part.

I do get annoyed at bad driving that puts cyclists at risk, but this is a situation where the risk can be easily mitigated by the cyclist adjusting their speed slightly, so they are able to stop in the distance they can see to be clear.

There has to be more blame put on the car driver as they decided to perform an overtake maneouvre when they had close to zero visibility of the road ahead and thus couldn't determine if they had time to complete the maneouvre safely or not. The cyclist was merely travelling forward in their lane and whilst that doesn't give them priority per se, I wouldn't consider it careless to not correctly guess that a car driver was driving dangerously.

There seems to be different standards at play here - expecting a cyclist to predict that a hidden car driver was overtaking, but forgiving a car driver for overtaking when they couldn't even see the road ahead.

hawkinspeter wrote:

The cyclist was merely travelling forward in their lane

Now I don't agree with that. At the point the road narrows due to parked cars, there are no lanes anymore. It's just a narrow section of road.

There's no expectation that a cyclist needs to predict a hidden car, they just need to ensure the road ahead is clear before they commit to it.

The driver was already established. It's not like they swerved at the last minute.

HoarseMann wrote:

hawkinspeter wrote:

The cyclist was merely travelling forward in their lane

Now I don't agree with that. At the point the road narrows due to parked cars, there are no lanes anymore. It's just a narrow section of road.

There's no expectation that a cyclist needs to predict a hidden car, they just need to ensure the road ahead is clear before they commit to it.

The driver was already established. It's not like they swerved at the last minute.

I get your point, but I disagree. To my mind, the road user performing a maneouvre (e.g. an overtake of parked cars which involves using the other side of the road) should take care that it is safe to do so. The cyclist wasn't performing any kind of maneouvre, but should maybe have slowed more so that they could stop within the space that they could see to be clear. I'd say that the cyclist was certainly established on the road (also didn't swerve at the last minute), so the car driver should not have begun their overtake until the cyclist had gone past.

In general, I'd say that an obstruction on your side of the road means that you should give priority to the unobstructed side and certainly, performing a maneouvre that forces other road users to brake/swerve/stop to avoid a collision is simply bad roadcraft.

I think the points of debate here is where the overtake began and whether an oncoming driver/rider can assume that a vehicle will pull into a gap.

If I had been driving I would have pulled in, or performed an emergency stop if it was clear the cyclist was not slowing. If I had been cycling, I would have eased off until the road at the pinch point was clear.

There is a line of parked cars near me that are just before a tight bend, it's not actually possible to see around the bend if there's nothing coming before starting the overtake. I often begin the overtake when it's clear, only for a driver to come around the bend and drive into the road narrowing, expecting me to reverse up the line of parked cars because I'm on "their side of the road". They are wrong to do so.

The key is to ensure the road ahead is clear before committing and understand that yielding at parked cars/obstructions is not actually a legal requirement. You can't expect other vehicles to yield in the same way they should for give way markings at junctions (which are a legal requirement).

Apportioning blame for any collision that might occur will be a toss up as to who did the least to avoid the other. 

HoarseMann wrote:

Apportioning blame for any collision that might occur will be a toss up as to who did the least to avoid the other. 

I'd consider that in any collision, the party that was performing a maneouvre should be held more responsible as they are creating the hazard.

Is exiting a narrow section of road more or less of a maneouvre than entering a narrow section of road? It's debatable and very dependent on circumstance.

HoarseMann wrote:

Is exiting a narrow section of road more or less of a maneouvre than entering a narrow section of road? It's debatable and very dependent on circumstance.

Yes, but using the opposite side of the road would make it more of a maneouvre. In this situation, the parked vehicles are only on one side of the road, so it's clear which direction of traffic should have priority - I think it would be less clear-cut if a road had parked vehicles on both sides, leaving just a single car's width free in the middle.

Also, this particular scenario is directly addressed in the Highway Code Rule 163:

Quote:

Overtake only when it is safe and legal to do so. You should

• not assume that you can simply follow a vehicle ahead which is overtaking; there may only be enough room for one vehicle
• give way to oncoming vehicles before passing parked vehicles or other obstructions on your side of the road

I don't think that's the case at all. They are not using the opposite side of the road. The parked cars have narrowed the carriageway so that it is effectively a single lane. There are no 'sides of the road' at that point.