2 into 1 lane crush: what would you do?

[hertsbiker]

Right, Mrs Biker was driving the panzer. Accelerating at about 90ish on the bypass road. Car behind decides to overtake as the 2 lanes close down to 1 lane. So he is inching closer as his feeble motor can't hack it.

Blokey is now almost along side, & Mrs Biker decides to brake to let him go past.

He goes in front & immediate slams on the brakes to about 40-50mph.

I flick the headlights onto death-ray mode (remember we are atleast a foot taller than most tall cars). He pratts about & resumes driving.

Question: did Mrs Biker do the right thing? or should she have floored it & left matey boy to drop back? (we have a top speed of 115, and can easily reach it on standard gearing).

I was livid ! - he shouldn't have tried it on, and in my opionion he only did it 'cos it was a girly driving and not a bloke.....

C

[SpudGunner]

Well from my understanding, a panzer is a tank?

So I would have got the missus to fire a shell at the tw@ and blown him and his car up.

That would teach him a lesson

[dicky]

Had this the other day with an old git in his Rover 200, he had to merge into my lane. Thtas's what the road markings said, he wasn't going to give up. So being the adult and courteous driver i am I floored the pedal and didn't give in. I mean a white van loose a battle when in the right.
He did see sense but was not impressed.

If the arrows say merge into a lane then those in the lane have right of way, easey peesey

Hi spud you alright

[joospeed]

Sign of the times

Same thing merging onto motorways etc : if you're joinging the motorway you shouod be adjusting your speed on the approach so as to match the speed of the cars in lane 1 (if there are any .. another topic!!) rather than waiting until the last broken dot on the merge line before pulling out anyway and :hopesfornocrash: ..
doh!

[alans]

please correct me if i am wrong but if you are merging from the right, don't you have right of way, the opposite of joining a motorway where the cars on the motorway have right of way?

[Steve-B]

there is all kinds of stupid on the roads these days...

i watched a woman HIT a lorry behind me the other day in Langley as she merged from the right into him. then she and her passenger had the stones to get out of their car and have a go at the lorry driver, when they were clearly in the wrong.

shame they don't do IQ tests for drivers these days.

[dicky]

alans said:

please correct me if i am wrong

In that case I shall, it depends which way the road markers are going, ie if the big arrow points to the left you give way and merge into that lane.

>> Edited by dicky on Sunday 7th December 00:51

[alexf]

I haven't figured out the quoting stuff yet.. anyway:

I can answer this one from recent experience.

I was happily in the middle lane of a 3 lane tunnel in Switzerland the other day. Truck on the inside line, BMW in the outside, both dead level with me. The inside lane started to feed off (there had been plenty of warning), and at the last minute the truck driver suddenly started to switch lanes into mine! . I floored it but almost didn't make it and had to edge in to BMW driver's lane who went mental as he thought I was being a t**t (fair enough if he didn't realise what was going on). All of this happened way to fast to get on the horn, lights etc and the truck driver was clearly committed to the lane switch because of the oncoming divide.

BMW driver then chased me down the road gesticulating wildly, but wasn't sure if he was still upset or just being a BMW driver . After all, they do own the fast lane don't they? .

If the road had been clear behind maybe I'd have slammed on the brakes instead, but there was a tailgater right up my wotsit (I believe there's some law requiring it over here).

Thankyou TVR for saving my life. If they ever do try to impose speed limiters on us, you can guess what will happen to mine.

PS: This is my first post so Hi to all you guys who make these forums so interesting (and sometimes hilarious). If it wasn't for PH I might actually have to do some work in the daytime...

[Mark in Ireland]

[quote] The inside lane started to feed off (there had been plenty of warning), and at the last minute the truck driver suddenly started to switch lanes into mine! . I floored it but almost didn't make it and had to edge in to BMW driver's lane [quote]

As there was plenty of warning...your words, why were you still in the way of the lorry....the lorry had to move over. You should have anticipated what was going to happen and either accelerated past or slowed down. If you've never driven a lorry take it from me they take ages to get up to speed and most lorry drivers don't see the point in slowing down to accommodate any other driver on the road especially when most other road users usually have the ability to accelerate easily past lumbering lorries.
I'm sorry about being blunt here but you need to more aware of what is going on around you when you drive...you need be able to anticipate what other road users are going to do, even before they know themselves.

[jenkinsd]

Mark
I think alexf point was that the lorry found himself in the wrong lane (which was going in the wrong direction) and rather than slow down and wait for a break in the traffic to correct lanes he decided to pull out.

I assume you live in Ireland, having lived in Dublin for 16 years I can honestly say (and I'm sure you will agree) that lane is a concept that Irish drivers have not got to grips with yet!

I now live in Italy and 'commute' to Switzerland (Basel) where I am currently working so I know a little about the Swiss roads.

Alexf
Do you have 'countermeasures' for the Swiss speed locations? I have just re-tuned my Bel 990i and it works a whole lot better, in addition I have a PDA with GPS, TomTom and PoI Synch

Cheers

[Chrisgr31]

Hmmm lets take the extreme example here. Dual carriageway merges to single lane, dual carriageway busy, arrows point from right to left. Some people here appear to be saying that those in the right hand land should stop an give way to all the traffic in the left.

Surely what should happen is that as they approach the merge point the traffic in the right hand lane should slow to filter into the left hand lane in turn.

That doesn't mean traffic in the right hand lane should try and lunge past the traffic in the left. But should slow and merge properly.

This does of course assume the traffic in the left doesn't close up the gaps!

[alexf]

Mark in Ireland said:

As there was plenty of warning...your words, why were you still in the way of the lorry....

I meant he'd had ages to move into my lane when I wasn't there, and appeared to be headed down the slip road, so I was driving on as normal (passing him, not fast but not crawling). My guess is that he wasn't paying attention and suddenly realised he wanted to go straight instead, so did a last minute lane change, either without looking or without spotting me (I know it's hard for them to see you when you're alongside and the Tiv is hardly a big car - Taimar).

I've always been careful around lorry drivers (actually every driver here - they're terrible. Swiss motorway entry technique for example is hilarious - drive up slip road nice and slowly, then stop at end and wait for a gap, then crawl on! ).

Jenkinsd, as for countermeasures, I've got the tomtom/POI stuff too, which warns me of a few cameras I've got programmed in, but nowhere near all of them. I got scamera'd twice in the last week!! Both in annoyingly low limits on motorways (should be variable limit but they don't seem to want to bother). I don't mind here though - I just pay and forget about it, as they don't give points

[jenkinsd]

Alexf
Driving from Milan to Basel you get to see lots of Swiss speed camera technology, was flashed at night once approaching Gotthard tunnel (towards Milan) by front and back facing cameras

Don't know if they will bother letting the Italians know (still driving on a UK licence), since I tuned the 990i for Ka wide band seems to pick up most cameras from a reasonable distance

Last Monday I was being particularly good, the detector told me there was Ka band about. 30 secs later it stopped, and not a camera in sight, just then a police BMW overtook me, he must have been doing close to 200 . Funnily enough the anchors went on just as he came out of another tunnel where I knew there was a camera.

Looks like their plod plays those games too

[Mark in Ireland]

Quote....I assume you live in Ireland, having lived in Dublin for 16 years I can honestly say (and I'm sure you will agree) that lane is a concept that Irish drivers have not got to grips with yet!

You're dead right there!!!! Roundabouts are still causing problems too but absolutely no lane control. Since speeding points have been introduced people will sit in the outside lane at 60mph and won't move causing huge tailbacks. Driving standards over here are really bad.

[Cooperman]

My flying instructor always taught us fledgling pilots:
"Here lies the body of Andrew Jay,
He died maintaining his right of way".
It's just as true on the roads!

[mcflurry]

In Germany they used to have Public information films for a zip code; everyone let one vehicle through, and then ALL the traffic keeps moving - easy peasy

[SpudGunner]

oops Hello Dicky and a very Merry Christmas to you!

[streaky]

mcflurry said:

In Germany they used to have Public information films for a zip code; everyone let one vehicle through, and then ALL the traffic keeps moving

In Jersey (CI) we had 'filter alternately' as far back as I can recall.

Mark in Ireland said:

I assume you live in Ireland, having lived in Dublin for 16 years I can honestly say (and I'm sure you will agree) that lane is a concept that Irish drivers have not got to grips with yet! You're dead right there!!!! Roundabouts are still causing problems too .

When is Ireland going to switch over to driving on the right? And is the plan still for lorries to change on Monday and cars the following week?

Streaky

[jessica]

Mark in Ireland said:

[quote] The inside lane started to feed off (there had been plenty of warning), and at the last minute the truck driver suddenly started to switch lanes into mine! . I floored it but almost didn't make it and had to edge in to BMW driver's lane [quote] As there was plenty of warning...your words, why were you still in the way of the lorry....the lorry had to move over. You should have anticipated what was going to happen and either accelerated past or slowed down. If you've never driven a lorry take it from me they take ages to get up to speed and most lorry drivers don't see the point in slowing down to accommodate any other driver on the road especially when most other road users usually have the ability to accelerate easily past lumbering lorries. I'm sorry about being blunt here but you need to more aware of what is going on around you when you drive...you need be able to anticipate what other road users are going to do, even before they know themselves.

Identicle thing happened to me on the M6 going home from Bt&P. I think the Audi TT Driver who's lane i had to squeeze into thought i was just a girlie in a car I couldn't hack.If ever he reads this sorry mate the lorry nearly took us both out!!
Still feel bad about it now. but wasn't my fault...

[bluepolarbear]

mcflurry said:

In Germany they used to have Public information films for a zip code; everyone let one vehicle through, and then ALL the traffic keeps moving - easy peasy

Most efficient way of merging traffic. I believe it is law in some countries. Never catch on here with our "queue here" mentality.