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Near Miss of the Day 237: Very close pass at Glasgow Airport

Our regular feature showing close passes from around the country - today it's Scotland...

Today's video in our Near Miss of the Day series shows a driver making a a very close pass on a cyclist on a road alongside Glasgow Airport, despite there being lots of space to overtake and no vehicles coming the other way.

It was sent in by road.cc reader Alun, who told us: “I was making my way home from work and passing by the airport which is a long straight road with decent visibility.

“This nutter passed me without much concern for my wellbeing especially as there was no incoming traffic and a pig of a crosswind. 

“The chest harness doesn’t do it justice but I could feel the car pushing me away as they passed.

“The next two gave me room and at the end of the clip a van man slows down and moves to other lane (possibly a cyclist himself).”

He added: “It’s not worth reporting to Police Scotland as fiscal won’t proceed it.”

> Near Miss of the Day turns 100 - Why do we do the feature and what have we learnt from it?

Over the years road.cc has reported on literally hundreds of close passes and near misses involving badly driven vehicles from every corner of the country – so many, in fact, that we’ve decided to turn the phenomenon into a regular feature on the site. One day hopefully we will run out of close passes and near misses to report on, but until that happy day arrives, Near Miss of the Day will keep rolling on.

If you’ve caught on camera a close encounter of the uncomfortable kind with another road user that you’d like to share with the wider cycling community please send it to us at info [at] road.cc or send us a message via the road.cc Facebook page.

If the video is on YouTube, please send us a link, if not we can add any footage you supply to our YouTube channel as an unlisted video (so it won't show up on searches).

Please also let us know whether you contacted the police and if so what their reaction was, as well as the reaction of the vehicle operator if it was a bus, lorry or van with company markings etc.

> What to do if you capture a near miss or close pass (or worse) on camera while cycling

Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.

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15 comments

Avatar
No Reply | 5 years ago
1 like

Lancashire Police are a waste of time now regarding reporting near misses. Far too busy and understaffed to bother. I used to know a really great local officer who took my complaints seriously and always followed them up. Sadly she has now retired from the force. I get near misses almost every day, it really isn't worth wasting my time reporting them, calling the  101 number then waiting on hold for half an hour or more, only for nothing to happen once reported. In my experience, the very worst time to be cycling is during the morning commute. Many morning drivers are still half asleep, late, busy eating breakfast, shaving, even applying mascara behind the wheel, (Yes, I've seen all these) or generally don't care. Evening commutes are definately less scary, although there is the odd idiot coming home. 

Avatar
bikeman01 replied to No Reply | 5 years ago
1 like

biker phil wrote:

Lancashire Police are a waste of time now regarding reporting near misses. Far too busy and understaffed to bother.

More like too fucking lazy. Understaffing is now a stock excuse from public sector employees. Make a racist comment, get a parking ticket or have a major sporting event and there's always plenty of staff.

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nicmason replied to bikeman01 | 5 years ago
1 like

[

[/quote]

More like too fucking lazy. Understaffing is now a stock excuse from public sector employees. Make a racist comment, get a parking ticket or have a major sporting event and there's always plenty of staff.

[/quote]

Of course private organisations always leap to deal with complaints. Like phones, water, gas , electricity and trains. Twat.

 

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fukawitribe replied to bikeman01 | 5 years ago
1 like

bikeman01 wrote:

biker phil wrote:

Lancashire Police are a waste of time now regarding reporting near misses. Far too busy and understaffed to bother.

More like too fucking lazy. Understaffing is now a stock excuse from public sector employees. Make a racist comment, get a parking ticket or have a major sporting event and there's always plenty of staff.

Simplistic over-generalisations - that appears to be pretty stock now too...

Avatar
nicmason replied to bikeman01 | 5 years ago
0 likes

bikeman01 wrote:

biker phil wrote:

Lancashire Police are a waste of time now regarding reporting near misses. Far too busy and understaffed to bother.

More like too fucking lazy. Understaffing is now a stock excuse from public sector employees. Make a racist comment, get a parking ticket or have a major sporting event and there's always plenty of staff.

Avatar
grumpyoldcyclist | 5 years ago
0 likes

Lazy driving, no respect for others.

Please report it otherwise it didn't happen. If they don't do anything tweet them with that still image. Cheshire police are the same.

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giff77 replied to grumpyoldcyclist | 5 years ago
0 likes

grumpyoldcyclist wrote:

Lazy driving, no respect for others.

Please report it otherwise it didn't happen. If they don't do anything tweet them with that still image. Cheshire police are the same.

The best that Police Scotland will do is have a conversation with the miscreant. The Proculator Fiscal (CPS in England and Wales) will not pursue it as I wasn’t injured. Unfortunately because of the angle, height of the SUV and speed I’ve not got a clear registration.  It’s a total bugger. 

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bigbiker101 replied to giff77 | 5 years ago
0 likes

giff77 wrote:

grumpyoldcyclist wrote:

Lazy driving, no respect for others.

Please report it otherwise it didn't happen. If they don't do anything tweet them with that still image. Cheshire police are the same.

The best that Police Scotland will do is have a conversation with the miscreant. The Proculator Fiscal (CPS in England and Wales) will not pursue it as I wasn’t injured. Unfortunately because of the angle, height of the SUV and speed I’ve not got a clear registration.  It’s a total bugger. 

That is a sorry state of affairs if you have to be injured before they will do anything, so I guess if I tried to stab you but missed the police wouldn't look into that either, after all I didn't injure you, it is about time the police looked at these incidents with the same gravity as other dangerous offences, I can't see for one second a plea of "when I threw the knfie at him I wasn't actually trying to hit him" being any satisfactory form of defence.

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bigbiker101 | 5 years ago
4 likes

This must of been deliberate, I don't think it would of mattered where the cyclist was on the road, the driver just wanted to be a dick and succeeded 

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CXR94Di2 | 5 years ago
1 like

Ride central to the road,  a flashing rolling road block.  

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Accessibility f... | 5 years ago
1 like

Stop riding in the gutter.  Position yourself in the left hand tyre track.  Tough titty to any motorists who don't like it.

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giff77 replied to Accessibility for all | 5 years ago
7 likes

Peowpeowpeowlasers wrote:

Stop riding in the gutter.  Position yourself in the left hand tyre track.  Tough titty to any motorists who don't like it.

i don’t think it would have mattered where I was positioned. The f****r would have passed that close regardless. I was a hinderence in their eyes. I personally feel it was a deliberate act of intimidation. I’ve attatched a still that clearly shows a lane devoid of traffic no reason why he couldn’t have moved into that like the following traffic and especially the van at the end of the clip who actually dropped his speed while passing.  And IMHO I feel I was actually in a reasonable position and every other motorist who passed me on that stretch seemed quite happy to hold back before passing  and give plenty of room  

 

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Hirsute | 5 years ago
1 like

I get this all the time, drivers just can't be bothered and a lot of police forces aren't interested.

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dassie | 5 years ago
1 like

Possibly deliberate, definitely very poor driving.  I would personally be adopting a strong secondary road position, not that this would necessarily have prevented the close pass.

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Cam77 replied to dassie | 5 years ago
1 like

I had two near misses on this stretch of road last year, first was the car passing far too close similar to the video, and on the second, was the vehicle having to brake very heavily last minute as he realised he couldn’t follow the Argos van in front of him due to oncoming traffic. Wasn’t wearing a camera and couldn’t say how close he was to me, but looking forward/down, I was able to see the front of the car in my peripheral vision behind me…so they were obviously close.

As a result of both of these instances, I now only ride this area on a weekend morning pre 9am hoping to minimise the amount of traffic on the road.

 

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