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news
Near Miss of the Day 626: “Clear and deliberate swerve” – but driver only gets warning letter
Today’s video in our Near Miss of the Day series saw a cyclist get what he described as a “clear and deliberate swerve” from a driver – but the motorist only received a warning letter from police.
The cyclist, road.cc reader Pompey Cyclist, had moved out into the road to pass a skip placed on the left-hand carriageway when the driver of a Honda Civic made a close pass on him and immediately cut back in across the rider.
“Clear and deliberate swerve here, yet Derbyshire Police only send the driver a letter ‘educating them’ as if they need to be told it's not okay to attack vulnerable road users with your car,” he told us.
As one of the commenters to the video points out, “Why would someone driving pass a vulnerable road user when there is a big container ahead of them? Could have waited only a few seconds before passing safely.”
> 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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12 comments
Forgetting about the skip, it was close. Be interested to know what the relative speeds were.
Hate to be that guy, but this seems to be a bit… exaggerated?
The pass isn't that close, imho. Even here in The Netherlands, where the infratructure is great, and drivers generally ride with caution for cyclists, no one would bat an eye when a car passes you like this.
If you're using a computer to view the footage, pause the action at around 19 secs (yellow skip).
Then use the "," and "." keys to move backwards/forwards one frame at a time.
Then, you'll see the driver deliberately swerve left, when they could and should have just gone straight forward for a few more seconds.
The problem with action camera footage, is the super wide lenses, with can give the impression of false distances, and make things look further away than they really are.
i.e. the car in the footage.
I'm not sold on the swerve being clearly deliberate, other than an attempt to get back on to the left side of the road quickly.
But are we missing some of the context here ? Is that the same Honda passing both times?
Well ... that would still make it a deliberate swerve. The fact that it is not specifically aimed at the cyclist doesn't mean they haven't deliberately cut in on a more vulnerable road user when they shouldn't have.
well maybe its better to call it "cut up" then, what I didnt want to end up putting was thats not deliberate at all, because obviously the driver is making deliberate decisions/choices there.
but it doesnt feel like when they overtook they added an extra swerve towards the cyclist to make it a "clear deliberate swerve".
The swerve wasn't intended to be hostile. The driver urgently needed to get over to the left because the road was about to go round to the right and his view was blocked by the house. Obviously he shouldn't have overtaken before a corner when the left lane was filled by a skip and a cyclist, but he wasn't trying to be aggressive. He just fucked up.
I'm inclined to agree with this, first clip - meh. second clip is quite close, but consider the view of the cyclist past the pub, then consider the driver is much further over to the right and therefore can see much less of the road round the bend.
It's a bad overtake for sure, but I don't think any malice is involved. Car is likely closer than it looks. Problem is that many drivers don't consider that the bike is still moving forward, once they are in marginally front they think they can just move left as they are 'past the cyclist'
That should never be a defence for something like this. Literally the first lesson my driving instructor taught me (even before I started the engine) was never to make any kind of manouevre on the road unless you were certain you could do it safely for you and anyone else around you.
Any doubt whatsoever, wait.
That advice has served me well for 35 years.
You've been waiting to perform a manouevre for 35 years?
Clearly, Mr Honda had thought that Pompey Cyclist ought to have Danny Macaskilled his way up onto the skip, over it, and down the other side...
'I ride a bike too, yeah, and would easily bunnyhop that skip on a TT bike' - Mr Honda