I can only go by what you have said.

You said that you will straddle lanes to prevent someone from overtaking if you deem the overtake not to be on if on the approach to a merge point.

Ergo, you are putting yourself in a position of harm - you don't know if that car is overtaking or out of control.

By moving in front of a car that could possibly be overtaking or careening down the road experiencing some form of mechanical difficulty you are putting yourself in harms way.

If you want this in a pure vehicles and roads manner, then vehicle A staying in L1 at the merge point is safer for all concerned than vehicle A moving to straddle L1 and L2. By straddling L1 and L2, vehicle A is reducing the available road space for vehicle B to pass it. If the driver of vehicle B has made an error of judgement, then by vehicle A being incorrectly placed on the road, the driver of vehicle A has increased exponentially the risk of collision either between vehicle A and B or vehicle B and a piece of street furniture.

If vehicle A had simply kept as far left as is safe to do so, vehicle B may have had a brown trouser moment, but they are both driving home to their respective families A and B. If vehicle A was placed incorrectly, causing vehicle B to impact road furniture at speed, then either family B may end up missing father B, or totally unconnected vehicle C, driving towards the merge point on the other side of the road may end up with a vehicle B-shaped dint in his car. All because of vehicle A's actions.

Savvy?

Just to impart a bit of humanity in this - I don't know you from Adam, so I'm not having a go at you. You must understand that the manner of which you've described your actions is pretty much contrary to the topic of the thread and as such, it's like going (for want of a better example) head on with someone.

I'm simply trying to make you aware that, as good as your intentions may be - your actions are not conductive to a safer merging experience for everyone. I know you said you'd had a close call, and as such I can understand your dislike of criticism as you obviously feel safer doing what you are doing, but there are situations where incorrect road placement will hide more than it shows, and that could end up being bad for one or more drivers.

The least thing anyone wants is a PHer snuffing it or causing someone else to snuff it through their own or not anticipating others incorrect actions on the road.

I've read back over my posts and find that although the content is sound, the delivery maybe not so, it is for that I'd like to apologise if you think I have made a personal attack - I haven't, however I do still find the manner in which you have described your actions surrounding the whole merge point behaviour incorrect.

Not IME. Early merging usually means the traffic continue to move through the merge point at or near the limit. Early merging is usually easier because the gaps are bigger (traffic bunches up as a result of people merging late and forcing others to brake)

It is extremely difficult to merge late when there is a big speed differential between the lanes, for various reasons. Drivers do not leave a big enough gap. If somebody decides to takeover into this gap the person behind has to brake to make the gap bigger. The late merger also had to brake to avoid crashing into the car in front (because of the speed differential). And that's before you introduce issues of attitude and ego; I've seen ignorant twunts drive over hatchlings just to get ONE car in front when there's a 300 yard gap behind available for the merge.

I get what he's saying, yes. I don't quite see why nobody else does.

He's saying that if there's a road where an inconsiderate driver might try to squeeze in an unsafe overtake, then positioning his car in such a way as to suggest (consciously or sub-consciously) that there isn't room for the overtake will improve overall safety.

Everyone seems to be taking that as him saying he'll pull out and dangerously block an overtake already in progress which I haven't seen him say anywhere. Drivers can give and pick up a lot of cues and intents from other cars' movements and positioning.

As to all the speculation about "what if the overtaking vehicle has had brake failure and isn't trying an overtake at all?", well, I assume he's going to be looking in his mirror. If someone approaches at speed clearly intent on an overtake despite his positioning (perhaps because of extremely unlikely brake failure), then he can always move left again and safely get out of the way.

He's trying to suggest to others that the last minute pass isn't on before it happens, rather than trying to block a pass in progress.

Yes. I think there's a happy medium here. Merging in the last 10 or 20 meters is going to be inefficient and reduce flow rate if the traffic is moving at any sort of speed (above 5 or 10 mph).

Merging 1 mile before restriction increases risk of tailback reaching a previous junction, and increases stress and aggro between drivers who think they should merge at the first merge point, and those who think they should merge at the last.

Merging maybe a few hundred meters before the restriction, give or take, is probably ideal. The give or take is key. Some people will go a bit earlier, some a bit later, all in an efficient way. Merging at the last possible point gives no option of merging later, and so causes more stops in the flow.

If the merge has happened miles too early, then the HGV straddling approach could help to move the merge point nearer to the restriction, and back into the ideal zone (as 2 lanes of traffic follow the HGV for a mile before merging in turn when it pulls in).

So essentially you have the straddlers saying "what we're doing is helpful", everyone else saying "what you are doing is illegal, and unhelpful" and yet the straddlers still believe they are in the right...

It honestly is beyond belief.

As I mentioned earlier as well straddlers are potentially causing problems further back due to loss of traffic storage.

So no. Straddlers, and at least AJB and Countdown are saying that straddlers aren't necessarily in the wrong.

But anyway, it's not exactly surprising that people who think they're right are saying "I think I'm right", and other people who think the first people are wrong but they're right are saying "I think you're wrong and I think I'm right". That's kind of how debates tend to go.

No, L1 goes faster in front of the straddler, because nobody is merging with it. L1 speeds up, L2 slows down to the now-faster crawl. Overall flow is the same, or better if people were trying to merge in the last few meters of L2.

So that is two "pro" straddling, vs how many against?

Can I ask just how often you use the motorway network, the pro straddlers, and what your average mileage per year is?