'Van cuts up police car and gets pulled over.'

[mph1977]

Bigends said:

mph1977 said:

panholio said:

I can make my example a bit clearer for you mph1977 if you like as you seem to be struggling. One that happened to me today in fact.

I am approaching a roundabout, a police car has just entered coming from my right. I pause as they are not signalling (no lights or sirens on either) but they leave the roundabout at the exit I'm coming on at. Not the end of the world but annoying and bad driving in my view. Had they been showing their left indicator I would have proceeded with caution and the flow of traffic would have been improved.

I see it regularly. My point is that all police cars should be driven in a manner that sets an example. The video in the OP is another police officer not setting an example.

and do you know the driving grade held by the driver ? or if the vehicle was in fact driven by a holder of the office of constable ?

much as it would be nice for everyone who drives marked police vehicles to attend at least the first week if not more of the response course on a pass / fail basis ( as NHS /VAS and responsible PAS none emergency ambulance drivers do ) the costs in doing so are not felt to be a priority

My force only requires a check drive prior to new drivers being allowed out in patrol vehicles -so they have no initial training - they cant attend any incidents graded immediate. Response courses come later.

that's exactly the point i'm making , plus PCSO and most other police staff ( save some CSI and if the crash investigation team has police staff) will never have the business case to get a response course .

[SK425]

Phatboy317 said:

SK425 said:

Phatboy317 said:

I'd rather someone indicated unnecessarily, than not indicated when they ought to have.

I agree. The first isn't really a problem in itself. I think what underlies people's concerns though is that indicating unnecessarily might be the result of not thinking properly about communication. As long as the driver is thinking about good communication, that's fine. If they aren't, that's a problem - but the problem is with the thinking, the unnecessary signal is just a symptom.

Many drivers were taught to always signal before turning, and they now do it automatically.
Of course, the fact that they do so automatically doesn't mean that they don't think about the rest of their driving.

I think that's the point. "Signalling automatically" sounds a lot like it's synonymous with "not thinking about communication" - driving by rote instead of by reason. It might not be what you mean, but I suspect that's what triggers the leaping in to respond to that sort of suggestion.

[heebeegeetee]

hora said:

He should have slowed and waited not squeezed through the cyclist. Why are people so impatient in such circumstances?

I agree.

[steve j]

The way I see it, the van was ahead of the police, the police should merge in turn and allow the van to enter the lane. But, the pushbike slowed the vans progress, the van should have anticipated this, also no indication from the van that he was going to merge. The police were far to close to the van, if the van had braked sharply to avoid the bike a rear end collision may have occured, I think it was poor driving by both.

[Red Devil]

If you go back to the post by Martin4x4 on page 2, a look at Google Streetview shows clearly the existence of the bus lane. However I doubt that the hours of operation on the blue plate are visible from that distance so, from a defensive driving perspective, one should assume that it operational until one knows otherwise and that any traffic in the inside lane will need to merge. Any local knowledge one may have (that the bus lane is in fact not operational at that specific moment) is fraught with danger because it assumes that all other drivers do too.

Furthermore, even if it is legal to enter a bus lane (because the time restriction permits it) one should never assume that other drivers are clued up. In my experience very few bother to read and act accordingly. Round my way, most of them are totally oblivious and just stay in the outer lane like line of sheep about to be penned.

Therefore the driver of the police car should anticipate that the van might need to avoid driving into the bus lane. At no time is the police car fully alongside the van. I was taught that the driver behind is best able to control any gap, should be ready to react to whatever develops in front of them, and be able to plan accordingly.

If the van driver was tugged for not indicating then, imo, the police driver should first question his/her own manner of driving. A little more restraint and we would not be discussing the incident because it simply wouldn't have happened.