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Near Miss of the Day 156: Fixed penalty for close pass driver

Our regular feature highlighting close passes caught on camera from around the country – today it’s Swansea

Our latest Near Miss of the Day video is one that resulted in the driver involved being convicted.

It happened in Gowerton, Swansea to road.cc reader John who submitted it to Welsh road safety parnership GoSafe under their Operation Snap initiative.

The outcome? A fixed penalty for the motorist for driving without due care and attention. 

We know from what our readers tell us that it can be a bit of a postcode lottery about whether local police forces take action in relation to video footage submitted to them - so it's good to see a result here.

> 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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5 comments

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zero_trooper | 5 years ago
0 likes

Well that was an easy bit of process! I wish that other police forces would be so positive and act on such concise, but solid evidence.

The GoSafe website says that video evidence is reviewed by an experienced police officer and if an offence established, details are passed on to a Central Ticket Office, which presumably covers all of Wales. Spot on!

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grumpyoldcyclist | 5 years ago
2 likes

That is very bad, well done to the Welsh police forces uniting against drivers like this.

Also take note Cheshire police who told me there is no law against drivers passing cyclists too closely   

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BehindTheBikesheds replied to grumpyoldcyclist | 5 years ago
1 like

grumpyoldcyclist wrote:

That is very bad, well done to the Welsh police forces uniting against drivers like this.

Also take note Cheshire police who told me there is no law against drivers passing cyclists too closely   

Did you feel fear of harm, answer yes, ergo that is a common assault, at the very least it would be a public order offence. Maybe you should take a sledgehammer with you, swing it near the coppers head and say there's no law being broken because obvs a close 'pass' with a deadly weapon isn't against the law,  twats!

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bikeman01 | 5 years ago
5 likes

There you go English police forces, it is possible to prosecute without clear images of the driver's face and half a dozen, independent witnesses.

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burtthebike | 5 years ago
9 likes

JHC, that was close.  Great news that action was taken against the driver, and they should consider themselves very lucky they aren't facing a much more serious charge.  Mind you, I don't suppose they would have been convicted of dangerous driving by a jury of drivers.

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