Middle lane driver hit by lorry

[Satsuma]

Story here about the author's RTA with a lorry: https://www.theguardian.com/world/comme ... y-dejevsky

Just me, or does anyone else wonder about this sentence in the sequence of events:

Three weeks ago I was involved in a collision with a lorry on the M20 in Kent. I was driving, it was early evening, dark, and the road was wet. A lorry came up fast on my inside and indicated it wanted to come out. Both the middle and right-hand lanes were busy and I had nowhere to go.

So the OP was driving on a motorway in lane two, at a speed which meant an HGV had both the room and time to approach and start passing them in lane one?

Of course he should have not hit them, but what were they doing there in the first place? You want to drive slower than a haulage truck, fine (within reason). But don't use lane two for it. And certainly don't go bitching about what the police did or didn't do after the event.

Sats

[chas49]

I agree with your thoughts - she was probably in the "wrong" lane. It sounds from her description as if there were other cars in the same situation - not that that makes it right!

However, the fact (apparently) that the police didn't want to investigate who was responsible for a potentially serious accident remains valid.

Of course, if they had investigated (and we don't know that the case isn't waiting in someone's 'pending' tray), they might have charged both drivers with driving without due care and attention (RTA 1988, s3). The CPS guidance at http://www.cps.gov.uk/legal/p_to_r/road ... iving/#a31 says:

In some cases, particularly where there has been a collision, the evidence will show that more than one driver was at fault. It will be necessary to establish that there is evidence from an independent source against any driver who is to be charged, but the possibility of charging more than one driver remains if both have failed to comply with the statutory standard.

[Generali]

Story here about the author's RTA with a lorry: https://www.theguardian.com/world/comme ... y-dejevsky

Just me, or does anyone else wonder about this sentence in the sequence of events:

Three weeks ago I was involved in a collision with a lorry on the M20 in Kent. I was driving, it was early evening, dark, and the road was wet. A lorry came up fast on my inside and indicated it wanted to come out. Both the middle and right-hand lanes were busy and I had nowhere to go.

So the OP was driving on a motorway in lane two, at a speed which meant an HGV had both the room and time to approach and start passing them in lane one?

Of course he should have not hit them, but what were they doing there in the first place? You want to drive slower than a haulage truck, fine (within reason). But don't use lane two for it. And certainly don't go bitching about what the police did or didn't do after the event.

Sats

The way I read it the journo was in the inside/left lane which is a perfectly reasonable place for her to be and the truck was pulling on from a slip road.

I spent a little while many years ago as a driver's mate on articulated lorries and the attitude of all the drivers I sat with on entering a motorway was, 'I'll pull on and the cars have to get out of the way coz I'm bigger'.

[redsturgeon]

The way I read it the journo was in the inside/left lane which is a perfectly reasonable place for her to be and the truck was pulling on from a slip road.

I spent a little while many years ago as a driver's mate on articulated lorries and the attitude of all the drivers I sat with on entering a motorway was, 'I'll pull on and the cars have to get out of the way coz I'm bigger'.

Yes, that's the way it reads to me too.

John

[Satsuma]

Apologies. Having now cleaned my glasses I can see I misinterpreted the article

That said, whilst understanding the HC doesn't oblige anyone to make way for slip-lane-joining traffic (I think?), its surely courteous and defensive to anticipate the likelihood of it in advance? Unless it was standstill, she should have had some opportunity to move across. And what HGV do you know that goes so fast so as to give you no reaction time at all?

And then, if the carriageway was so busy she had nowhere to move at all, how come it wasn't a multi-vehicle, multi-lane pileup?

I think her article also annoys me because her point about the movement towards making mobile use socially unnacceptable has got lost as a footnote at the end of the article.

Sats

[redsturgeon]

Apologies. Having now cleaned my glasses I can see I misinterpreted the article

That said, whilst understanding the HC doesn't oblige anyone to make way for slip-lane-joining traffic (I think?), its surely courteous and defensive to anticipate the likelihood of it in advance? Unless it was standstill, she should have had some opportunity to move across. And what HGV do you know that goes so fast so as to give you no reaction time at all?

And then, if the carriageway was so busy she had nowhere to move at all, how come it wasn't a multi-vehicle, multi-lane pileup?

I think her article also annoys me because her point about the movement towards making mobile use socially unnacceptable has got lost as a footnote at the end of the article.

Sats

I'd certainly agree that an alert driver probably should have anticipated this event and either braked or made other adjustments.

John

[ThirdWay]

I don't feel the article is clear as to whether the lorry started off on a slip road or lane 1.

On the subject of slip roads, I'm of the belief that an awful lot of them are not built to a sufficient length. I encounter some short on-coming slip roads on my regular drive. Sometimes with the sheer amount of traffic you end up parallel with a vehicle on the slip road. You then have maybe 3 seconds to decide whether to ignore this other vehicle or to speed up or to slow down or to change lane. I try to take the most helpful option but it's often a fine line, depending on what is around you.

Surely government has a part to play in road safety in regards to putting more of the motoring tax take into the infrastructure. A lot of these roads were designed for an age when there was a lot less traffic.

[didds]

Surely government has a part to play in road safety in regards to putting more of the motoring tax take into the infrastructure. A lot of these roads were designed for an age when there was a lot less traffic.

Or then again they could work towards removing vehicles from the roads by helping provide/encourage ways for people to commute other than by car, or even people not travveling dozens of miles to an office etc.

Simplistically (and I appreciate its a little more involved, but nonetheless) If everybody involved in office work worked from home one day a week, generalising that is a 20% reduction of such commuter traffic EVERY DAY.

didds

[Lootman]

So the OP was driving on a motorway in lane two, at a speed which meant an HGV had both the room and time to approach and start passing them in lane one?

The HGV should not pass a vehicle on the inside. If there is a vehicle ahead of you in your lane then you are supposed to pass it on the right. So I'd argue (leaving aside the slip road issue) that the HGV would be at fault both for the collision and for the manoeuver.

That said, when a motorway exceeds a certain level of congestion, the entire concept of lane discipline breaks down of necessity, as lane changes can become risky. So the situation can sometimes arise where the left lane is the fastest and the right lane is the slowest. In that case, drivers who are not in the left lane should not feel obliged to accelerate, even if they safely could.

Perhaps we should just adopt the US model where you can legally pass on either side. It would be less risky to do that if drivers were used to it and expected it.

[Satsuma]

Simplistically (and I appreciate its a little more involved, but nonetheless) If everybody involved in office work worked from home one day a week, generalising that is a 20% reduction of such commuter traffic EVERY DAY.

Even allowing people to work slightly more flexibly than "9-5 in the office" would help.
By and large most "backroom" office jobs could be done any time of the day (or at most with some core hours if required). They could be done at 6am, 12pm or 9pm. But so many people are forced into this stupid regime of being present for fixed hours, no deviation.

Even allowing, say 8-4 or 10-6 would help ease the roads a bit.

I am so lucky that my company is flexible. I can and do work where and pretty much when I want. I generally keep a few core hours in the weekdays, but outside that it ebbs and flows according to business need and other life stuff going on. For that reason, I can count the number of times I've had to commute in rush hour in the past 10 years on one hand, despite being in full time employment throughout, with office premises available to me.

Surely every car off the road at peak times is better for both the individual as well as the remaining people who really DO have to work to fixed shift times or hours?

Sats

[ThirdWay]

Or then again they could work towards removing vehicles from the roads by helping provide/encourage ways for people to commute other than by car, or even people not travveling dozens of miles to an office etc.

Simplistically (and I appreciate its a little more involved, but nonetheless) If everybody involved in office work worked from home one day a week, generalising that is a 20% reduction of such commuter traffic EVERY DAY.

didds

Well I agree. But I've yet to hear any of the main political parties pushing for a better work/life balance with less commuting and shorter or more flexible hours. The Tories would happily work the population into the grave, Labour and the Lib Dems are too clueless to think up anything innovative...

[didds]

Sats and Thirdway - agree with you both.

Its seems such an obvious thing to at least try... I guess from a govt perspective there is little they can do to promote such that companies that don;t do it would jump on board - tax breaks maybe. The first thought there is that then costs tax revenue... but that would be offset by not needing to continually expand infrastructure maybe.

The advent of driverless cars could see some solution here .. ? in that cheaper "hires" could be used by sharing rides with what would otherwise be total strangers and no dependent on arranged car shares. Live in basingstoke and got to get to Sunbury? 4 in a car picked up en route from pickup #1 through to dropoffs in sunbury. or whatever

didds

[didds]

But we are digressing...

[Slarti]

So the OP was driving on a motorway in lane two, at a speed which meant an HGV had both the room and time to approach and start passing them in lane one?

The HGV should not pass a vehicle on the inside. If there is a vehicle ahead of you in your lane then you are supposed to pass it on the right. So I'd argue (leaving aside the slip road issue) that the HGV would be at fault both for the collision and for the manoeuver.

That said, when a motorway exceeds a certain level of congestion, the entire concept of lane discipline breaks down of necessity, as lane changes can become risky. So the situation can sometimes arise where the left lane is the fastest and the right lane is the slowest. In that case, drivers who are not in the left lane should not feel obliged to accelerate, even if they safely could.

Perhaps we should just adopt the US model where you can legally pass on either side. It would be less risky to do that if drivers were used to it and expected it.

If it is moving queues of traffic then it is quite legal to pass on the left, as long as you don't change lane to do so.

And the situation where lane 1 is the fastest is more than just sometimes it is most of the time because so many drivers want to be in the "fast" lane, rather than only moving out when they need to. Oh, and the tailgating doesn't help.

Slarti

[Lootman]

If it is moving queues of traffic then it is quite legal to pass on the left, as long as you don't change lane to do so.

And the situation where lane 1 is the fastest is more than just sometimes it is most of the time because so many drivers want to be in the "fast" lane, rather than only moving out when they need to. Oh, and the tailgating doesn't help.

Agreed. The hypothetical example I was describing is where a vehicle is in the middle lane, wishes to overtake the vehicle in front, and moves into the left lane to do so, then rejoins the middle lane after the overtake. That's not allowed.

In situations where the left lane is moving faster than the centre lane, then I don't believe that anyone has an obligation to change anything. The faster vehicle doesn't have to slow down and the slower vehicle doesn't have to increase speed.

It's tempting in some busy situations to just sit in the centre lane as long as you maintain a reasonable speed, particularly if there are a lot of exits and entrances on the left and a lot of HGV's.

[Nimrod103]

So the OP was driving on a motorway in lane two, at a speed which meant an HGV had both the room and time to approach and start passing them in lane one?

The HGV should not pass a vehicle on the inside. If there is a vehicle ahead of you in your lane then you are supposed to pass it on the right. So I'd argue (leaving aside the slip road issue) that the HGV would be at fault both for the collision and for the manoeuver.

That said, when a motorway exceeds a certain level of congestion, the entire concept of lane discipline breaks down of necessity, as lane changes can become risky. So the situation can sometimes arise where the left lane is the fastest and the right lane is the slowest. In that case, drivers who are not in the left lane should not feel obliged to accelerate, even if they safely could.

Perhaps we should just adopt the US model where you can legally pass on either side. It would be less risky to do that if drivers were used to it and expected it.

The M20 is almost all 3 lane. There is no mention of slip road. I would have thought a much more likely scenario is what I frequently see. The slow lane contains mainly lorries, some of which go slowly, and there are largish gaps between them. Cars occupy the middle and outside lanes. Slightly faster lorry (going downhill, or uphill with considerable momentum and not wanting to brake so as to conserve fuel) rapidly closes the gap with slower lorry, then at the last moment, and with little thought pulls out into the middle lane. Other cars scatter.

[Alaric]

The slow lane contains mainly lorries, some of which go slowly, and there are largish gaps between them. Cars occupy the middle and outside lanes.

The implication of the Highway Code is that you are supposed to cross into the inner lane, only moving out again when you catch up the next lorry. Drivers don't do this as often as they could because of the fear of being trapped behind the lorry, unable to move out because of a constant stream of overtaking traffic in the other two lanes. The other headache that can be caused is when one lorry tries to overtake another one with perhaps a speed differential of only a few MPH. This can force all the cars into the outside lane and cause bunching.

Staying in the middle lane when going past a slip road makes sense as it leaves space for those joining the motorway.

[Slarti]

The other headache that can be caused is when one lorry tries to overtake another one with perhaps a speed differential of only a few MP Day.

FTFY


Slarti

[didds]

the fear of being trapped behind the lorry, unable to move out because of a constant stream of overtaking traffic in the other two lanes..

This was the issue I always felt with two lane autobahns when I lived in Germany back in the early 90s.

You could either be in the outside lane being flashed incessantly by Herman the German two feet off your rear bumper or sit inside squeezed between two juggernauts doing 80 kph unable to get out again as HtG belts past at 200 kph. I hated traveling on 2 lane autobahns, and I was a bloke in his mid 20s at the time playing Bundesliga Rugby.

didds

[Hallucigenia]

The way I read it the journo was in the inside/left lane which is a perfectly reasonable place for her to be and the truck was pulling on from a slip road.

She says later that the police helped her to get to a junction, which suggests (but doesn't guarantee) that she wasn't near one at the time of the accident. Also the way she says that both lanes 2 & 3 were busy sounds like she's ruling evasion by changing lane into lane 3 or a sharp acceleration/brake in lane 2. I think she was in the middle lane and got caught in the blind spot of a LHD truck (very common on the M20) in lane 1, probably driven by a knackered driver (ditto).

That's not to say the M20 doesn't have some really nasty junctions - London-bound at Leeds Castle is one of the nastiest I know. It often has as much traffic on the slip road as on the main motorway, and local depots mean that a lot of the joining traffic is made up of trucks which immediately struggle on the uphill motorway - it's one of the few places I routinely move across into lane 3 pretty much regardless of the time of day, as the odds are there will be both trucks joining and cars trying to jump into lane 2 directly from the slip road, and they are usually paying more attention to their fellow joiners than the traffic on the motorway.