Shared Middle Lanes
Discussion
I’m sure this has been discussed before but I’ve no idea what these are actually called so didn't find anything with a search. I’m talking about one of these…
This particular stretch is notorious for (fatal) accidents, I think there were 28 accidents in one year recently, for bonus points it crests a hill and is not particularly straight, a few years back they reduced the length of the ‘shared’ lane but this just seemed to move all the crashes to a smaller area. I’m not sure if they’re common across the country but we have a few around Wiltshire and everyone seems to have tales of witnessing near-crashes on a regular basis.
My assumption has been that nobody has priority over the central lane aside from whoever was there first, although I think most people treat it as though the direction of travel with two lanes split by broken lines has priority. What are the insurance implications on a stretch like this when crashes occur? I guess crashes are caused by cars from opposite directions could moving out at roughly the same time, even if there is a reasonable distance between them with the closing speeds and seemingly general reluctance to abort an overtake it can escalate quite quickly.
This particular stretch is notorious for (fatal) accidents, I think there were 28 accidents in one year recently, for bonus points it crests a hill and is not particularly straight, a few years back they reduced the length of the ‘shared’ lane but this just seemed to move all the crashes to a smaller area. I’m not sure if they’re common across the country but we have a few around Wiltshire and everyone seems to have tales of witnessing near-crashes on a regular basis.
My assumption has been that nobody has priority over the central lane aside from whoever was there first, although I think most people treat it as though the direction of travel with two lanes split by broken lines has priority. What are the insurance implications on a stretch like this when crashes occur? I guess crashes are caused by cars from opposite directions could moving out at roughly the same time, even if there is a reasonable distance between them with the closing speeds and seemingly general reluctance to abort an overtake it can escalate quite quickly.
rb5er said:
Thats not a "shared" lane. That is for one direction of traffic to use.
No wonder there are accidents if people don't know what the solid lines indicate.
The irony is strong in this one. The solid line just indicates that the traffic travelling top to bottom in the photo can't use the 'third' lane.No wonder there are accidents if people don't know what the solid lines indicate.
Edited by ukaskew on Thursday 28th April 10:32
yonex said:
It's pretty obvious who has priority though? The problem is people either ignore the lines or don't know what they mean?
The highway code on broken white lines just says..."This means you may cross the lines to overtake if it is safe", there is nothing specific to 'suicide lanes' that I can find and crawler lanes have no specific rules either, the lines are the only enforceable element. Surely in this case that rule applies equally to both directions of travel? The solid white line only exists to stop vehicles nearest to that line crossing it.
Either way, say a car pulls out from the 'single lane' side to overtake very shortly before a car pulls out from the other side, who's at fault if they have a head-on?
Edited by ukaskew on Thursday 28th April 10:53
p1stonhead said:
The person who crossed the line from the single lane would be at fault. They shouldn't have crossed the line without making sure they are not going to hit anything.
Arguably it was 'safe' to pull out at the time they decided to do so, they were not going to hit anything until a car on the other side decided to pull out to also overtake. Rightly or wrongly people here overtake on the single lane side all the time (even when there is traffic on the other side). The concept is inherently flawed unless it's somehow enforced that it can only be used when the road is completely deserted.
Surely a driver on the two lane side also has a duty to check that their overtake is safe? As far as I can tell there are no special rules relating to crawler lanes, you should still only be crossing the broken white lane if it's safe to do so (much like turning left out of a junction, you should always look left as well as right as there could be traffic on the wrong side of the road, i.e. passing a parked car)
BugLebowski said:
what hope does the general public have?
None, apparently (same stretch of road pictured): http://www.wiltshiretimes.co.uk/news/2134415.a36_c...xRIEx said:
I don't think it's flawed, it's no different to the concept of overtaking on any other road which allows it: don't overtake if there is a vehicle in the lane you want to move in to - it's common sense, surely?
p1stonhead said:
Yes they do! The side with two lanes can treat it like a dual carriageway. The side with a single lane have to 'overtake' into the middle lane only when safe to do so.
This is exactly the point I'm trying to get at. If the middle lane is empty at the time the car on the one lane side pulls out, surely the onus is then on the vehicles on the two lane side not to move into the middle lane? They don't have blind authority to do as they wish with 'their' middle lane, and surely would be at fault if they did so into an oncoming vehicle.
Edited by ukaskew on Thursday 28th April 11:31
rxe said:
I should be able to overtake in Lane 2 without any fear of a head on. The drivers in the downhill lane are able to overtake if the lane is clear.
Can you not see the problem with this statement? If the middle lane is empty the downhill vehicle can indeed safely and legitimately overtake using the middle lane. The problem comes, as you've clearly stated, when the uphill driver in 'lane 1' overtakes without any fear of a head on.How can the two lane traffic use the middle lane with no fear of a head-on, when the road markings quite clearly allow oncoming traffic to also use that lane?
So, returning to my original post...
"My assumption has been that nobody has priority over the central lane aside from whoever was there first, although I think most people treat it as though the direction of travel with two lanes split by broken lines has priority."
Reading 60+ replies from apparently knowledgeable driving folk, it's pretty clear why this is an accident hotspot and it would appear my assumptions are correct (particularly the second point).
I'm willing to bet many of the accidents occur because people on the two lane side assume they have 'priority', and blindly move into the middle lane into oncoming vehicles.
"My assumption has been that nobody has priority over the central lane aside from whoever was there first, although I think most people treat it as though the direction of travel with two lanes split by broken lines has priority."
Reading 60+ replies from apparently knowledgeable driving folk, it's pretty clear why this is an accident hotspot and it would appear my assumptions are correct (particularly the second point).
I'm willing to bet many of the accidents occur because people on the two lane side assume they have 'priority', and blindly move into the middle lane into oncoming vehicles.
skahigh said:
Not sure how you got to that.
There's clearly a great deal of disagreement about the issue of priority.
Nothing official linked to has implied priority for either 'side', secondly the general consensus here confirms my second point regarding who believes they have priority.There's clearly a great deal of disagreement about the issue of priority.
anonymous said:
[redacted]
Surely this is exactly the problem? You can't use those two lanes without consideration when oncoming traffic can legitimately use that very same lane when it's safe to do so. Safe would imply 'empty', which it would be until some muppet on the other side moved into it with consideration.Yet another death on the stretch of road I mentioned in my original post...
http://www.wiltshiretimes.co.uk/news/15537474.A36_...
I drive this stretch at least twice per day now, it’s lethal. For every fatal crash there are probably 100 near misses or at the very least butt clenching moments. As soon as we heard of a fatal crash in our office basically everyone said ‘Black Dog Hill’ without needing to check.
For all the road safety shenanigans with 20mph limits etc they could literally eradicate 99% of incidents on this single stretch by filling in the dotted white line on one side.
http://www.wiltshiretimes.co.uk/news/15537474.A36_...
I drive this stretch at least twice per day now, it’s lethal. For every fatal crash there are probably 100 near misses or at the very least butt clenching moments. As soon as we heard of a fatal crash in our office basically everyone said ‘Black Dog Hill’ without needing to check.
For all the road safety shenanigans with 20mph limits etc they could literally eradicate 99% of incidents on this single stretch by filling in the dotted white line on one side.
Edited by ukaskew on Sunday 24th September 21:28
Gassing Station | General Gassing | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff