The Zone of Relative Safety
Discussion
Advanced driving isn’t just about getting a car smoothly and quickly down the road – it’s also (and predominantly) about safety. The safety of yourself and your passengers, and the safety of everyone else we’re sharing the roads with.
Improving your observation and planning skills will allow you to spot dangerous and risky situations earlier and to make suitable plans in how to deal with these situations. But there is another principle which – if you add it to the mix – improves your safety even more and should help you to avoid being involved in somebody else’s accident:
The Zone of Relative Safety
A zone of relative safety is an imaginary “bubble” or “area” around your car which you should aim to keep free of any other road users or other hazards. Try to imagine that your car is surrounded by an invisible force- field. Or imagine that your car is actually a little bigger than it actually is. This, in essence, is the principle of a zone of relative safety.
The size of the zone is variable – it can be smaller on slower and congested roads and larger on faster, more open roads. Your plans can then be made with a view to keeping everything outside this invisible area – and so there is much less chance of anything colliding with your car.
Let’s have a look at a few simple examples:
If you’re driving along an urban road, you’ll be scanning ahead and looking into each junction which joins the road you’re on. If you see a car approaching one of these junctions ahead to the left, what would you normally do?
The vast majority of drivers will do nothing – they’ll just continue along, in the centre of their lane, and drive past the car in the junction.
A more advanced driver, however, will link their observations of the car with a possibility that it will pull out. As they get closer to it, they’ll look for some other visual clues – are the wheels turning or stationary? Can they see the other driver? Is the driver looking in their direction?
Alongside these improved observations, using the zone of relative safety can give us just a little more time to react should the car start to move. Instead of continuing straight along in your lane, you should – if it’s safe – move towards the offside of the road. Up to and sometimes over the centre - lines of the road. If you make this offside move, you’ll get a slightly better view of the car in the junction, they will get a slightly better view of you and you’ll increase the space between the cars which would give you more time and space to react if the car suddenly pulls out.
It probably won’t pull out, but if it does, the zone of relative safety can make the difference between an accident and a sharp intake of breath.
Here’s another example:
If you’re driving past a line of parked cars, there is always a possibility that a pedestrian, child or animal may cross carelessly from behind one of the parked vehicles, or that someone may carelessly open their door into your path. Most average drivers won’t give this much thought – if they can get through the gap and past the parked cars, that’s all that matters.
Advanced drivers, however, will be looking for a range of other visual clues. They’ll be looking underneath the parked vehicles for movements and feet. They’ll be looking for brake lights going off, which might indicate a door about to open, and they'll be looking to the left and right of the parked cars for inattentive pedestrians and animals.
If we introduce the zone of relative safety into the mix, the driver will imagine one of the car doors opening, and give enough space – if it’s available – for a door to open without making contact with their car.
The zone is easily defined in these circumstances – it is just larger than the length of an open door.
Cyclists are a good example too. Most drivers (unintentionally in most cases), pass too close to cyclists. Even if they look steady and experienced, it only takes a bump in the road or a pothole to set a cyclist wobbling and you should always take this possibility into account when passing them.
I imagine the cyclist laid on their side – which is where they’ll be if they fall off.
If I cannot pass a cyclist without leaving enough room for them to fall off without hitting them, I’ll wait behind them until there is more space. So in this case, the zone of relative safety is the height of the cyclist laid width- ways across the road.
I’m sure you get the idea. Try using the zone of relative safety as part of your driving plans.
Improving your observation and planning skills will allow you to spot dangerous and risky situations earlier and to make suitable plans in how to deal with these situations. But there is another principle which – if you add it to the mix – improves your safety even more and should help you to avoid being involved in somebody else’s accident:
The Zone of Relative Safety
A zone of relative safety is an imaginary “bubble” or “area” around your car which you should aim to keep free of any other road users or other hazards. Try to imagine that your car is surrounded by an invisible force- field. Or imagine that your car is actually a little bigger than it actually is. This, in essence, is the principle of a zone of relative safety.
The size of the zone is variable – it can be smaller on slower and congested roads and larger on faster, more open roads. Your plans can then be made with a view to keeping everything outside this invisible area – and so there is much less chance of anything colliding with your car.
Let’s have a look at a few simple examples:
If you’re driving along an urban road, you’ll be scanning ahead and looking into each junction which joins the road you’re on. If you see a car approaching one of these junctions ahead to the left, what would you normally do?
The vast majority of drivers will do nothing – they’ll just continue along, in the centre of their lane, and drive past the car in the junction.
A more advanced driver, however, will link their observations of the car with a possibility that it will pull out. As they get closer to it, they’ll look for some other visual clues – are the wheels turning or stationary? Can they see the other driver? Is the driver looking in their direction?
Alongside these improved observations, using the zone of relative safety can give us just a little more time to react should the car start to move. Instead of continuing straight along in your lane, you should – if it’s safe – move towards the offside of the road. Up to and sometimes over the centre - lines of the road. If you make this offside move, you’ll get a slightly better view of the car in the junction, they will get a slightly better view of you and you’ll increase the space between the cars which would give you more time and space to react if the car suddenly pulls out.
It probably won’t pull out, but if it does, the zone of relative safety can make the difference between an accident and a sharp intake of breath.
Here’s another example:
If you’re driving past a line of parked cars, there is always a possibility that a pedestrian, child or animal may cross carelessly from behind one of the parked vehicles, or that someone may carelessly open their door into your path. Most average drivers won’t give this much thought – if they can get through the gap and past the parked cars, that’s all that matters.
Advanced drivers, however, will be looking for a range of other visual clues. They’ll be looking underneath the parked vehicles for movements and feet. They’ll be looking for brake lights going off, which might indicate a door about to open, and they'll be looking to the left and right of the parked cars for inattentive pedestrians and animals.
If we introduce the zone of relative safety into the mix, the driver will imagine one of the car doors opening, and give enough space – if it’s available – for a door to open without making contact with their car.
The zone is easily defined in these circumstances – it is just larger than the length of an open door.
Cyclists are a good example too. Most drivers (unintentionally in most cases), pass too close to cyclists. Even if they look steady and experienced, it only takes a bump in the road or a pothole to set a cyclist wobbling and you should always take this possibility into account when passing them.
I imagine the cyclist laid on their side – which is where they’ll be if they fall off.
If I cannot pass a cyclist without leaving enough room for them to fall off without hitting them, I’ll wait behind them until there is more space. So in this case, the zone of relative safety is the height of the cyclist laid width- ways across the road.
I’m sure you get the idea. Try using the zone of relative safety as part of your driving plans.
I do a lot of motorway driving and try to keep a good sized bubble around me, esp at high speed. I avoid going 3 wide regardless of which lane i'm in. I use the width of my lane when passing lorries providing the OS is clear. I make a full lane change when there is something in the hard shoulder whether that be broken down lorry or a single person.
Gassing Station | Advanced Driving | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff