Near Miss Conclusion

[Chrus600]

Please, just stop with the arguing.

Azzer; yes, it could be construed that staying put and letting the van pass was the best course of action.
It's also a valid course of action to get on the gas, because there is a second where you can see down the road and see it's clear.

As such, you're both right. Erring on the side of caution is fine, but having the gumption to get out of dodge is also alright.

But seriously, stop arguing!

 

[Yarek]

At what point did he have chance to pull out?

Right before the van did (you know, while he was bitching at the guy.) If there's room for a van to go, there's room for a bike to do it too.

Put it this way, if a van had done the same to you, unexpectingly just appeard up next to you, would you still pull out? No.

Yeah, I would have known there was a gap big enough for me behind the car that was going by. The van sat there MORE than long enough for me to pull out, and so I would have done so.

So the 'yelling' comment is utter crap. He looked right, by the time he had looked forward the van infront had made his move & the van next to him decided it was time to pull away before Lewis had chance.

Wrong again. Twist gas rather than open mouth. There was plenty of space to get out from beside that van and be safe (I know this because a van pulled out into the same space and had a lot of room around it, and it's a LOT bigger than the bike.) If the rider didn't know there was enough space behind the car that was going by before the van pulled up then that would be his fault for not having proper situation awareness. I don't have to be able to see to my right when I make a left turn, I make it a habit to find gaps in oncoming traffic more than 1 second away from the intersection I'm at.

Yes, the van driver was impatient and certainly should not have done what he did. But all this "I had no time to go anywhere" bullshit is precisely that. There was room for a 15ft van a few seconds after the van pulled up, I'm pretty sure there was room for a wee little bike at the time the van appeared.

There's clearly something wrong with you... You do realise that a left turn in the UK is equivalent to a right turn in the US and if you don't have to look left before making a right turn in the US you're clearly going to end up roadkill.

I don't see what's so difficult to understand here - he pulled to the line and by the time he looked right to check his way was clear there was one van crossing his path and another proceeded to overtake him and block his view. Prior to that there was a car moving at as yet undetermined speed which may have been crossing his path.

Your response and the attitude you present in it is pathetic. This is the last I'm going to say on this particular subject.

 

[Trinith]

I don't have to be able to see to my right when I make a left turn

Erm the traffic is coming from the right... So yeh you do...

No, like I said, I've found my hole well before I pull out. Generally within a second or so of pulling up to the intersection. All I have to do is take a quick glance a second or two ahead of time to make sure no one has pulled out and filled that hole.

 

[Trinith]

There's clearly something wrong with you... You do realise that a left turn in the UK is equivalent to a right turn in the US and if you don't have to look left before making a right turn in the US you're clearly going to end up roadkill.

And yet I've only had one close call at an intersection when I was turning, and it was because I wasn't looking straight ahead. You're obviously so right, I've been run over soo many times because I don't actually know what's going on around me. Like I've said 3 times now, it's called situational awareness. Being able to see what's going to happen before it happens and things like that.

I don't see what's so difficult to understand here - he pulled to the line and by the time he looked right to check his way was clear there was one van crossing his path and another proceeded to overtake him and block his view. Prior to that there was a car moving at as yet undetermined speed which may have been crossing his path.

Should have known what was going on behind the van that was crossing while he was sitting behind the yellow thing. That's my entire point. To quote YOU, I don't see what's so difficult to understand.

Your response and the attitude you present in it is pathetic. This is the last I'm going to say on this particular subject.

Lol, maybe one day I'll be concerned about what someone on the internet thinks of me. Today isn't that day though, sorry to burst your bubble.

 

[AZZ3R]

Im not arguing, the first post was an overview of what happened in them 6seconds.

Trinith- In my frist post it said. "Jan 2011', Lewis was an inexperianced rider" so where would he have all this experiance from of road postioning & awareness ?i t takes years to almost develop a sixth sense on a bike, being on a scooter didnt help, your saying an inexperianced rider should have reacted in that 1 second your going on about? By the time he had looked back the van had moved, covering Lweis's vison from the right.

Im not against what spacial aweareness Lewis should have, but the tuck coming up the road Lewis didnt know it was indicating because the van had blocked his view of it.

Your not taking into account he's on a scooter & he was inexperianced.

 

[Trinith]

Your not taking into account he's on a scooter & he was inexperianced.

That's a good point and it's about time someone managed to say something that didn't make them sound butthurt.

I don't know how long it takes to develop that awareness. I was taught to do it by my driving instructor almost a decade before I ever got a bike in the first place. Due to multi-lane intersections and the sheer number of huge vehicles where I come from it's very common to not be able to see what's coming up immediately. To not know ahead of time means you would be sitting there forever waiting for a clear view. Thus the need to be able to find the needed hole before you even get to the intersection.

Hopefully by know he's learned that waiting until it's your turn to find a hole is a bad idea.

 

[Bikermole]

Can everybody just shut the hell up
I think in both mine and Lewis' case, hindsight is such a wonderful thing. Yes, maybe we should have done something differently, but we are young, we are still alive, so we can learn from it.
As for all the bitching, just stop. It's just a case of too many ego's in one place, things get misread, or misunderstood, and it happens way too much at the moment. Its the second time in a week that something small that I've said has created a massive argument and for that I apologize (if you dont know what I'm talking about, dont worry)

I started this thread to show that sometimes, we should get over the whole 'no-one cares' that goes with company vans and near misses.

I'd appreciate no more bitchy comments.

 

[Trinith]

I started this thread to show that sometimes, we should get over the whole 'no-one cares' that goes with company vans and near misses.

I'd have to say that you should never assume that no-one cares. Especially if you have it on video. I would hope that anyone would take the minute that it takes and write an email or make a phone call when that kind of thing happens. There's only one way to make people stop driving like that, and that's to (at least try to) punish them for doing so. To say nothing in such a case is pretty close to condoning the action.

 

[ElliotReidMD]

 

[Yarek]

Best post ever?

 

[POPE5HAT]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rk9WHasIZk0[/youtube]

 

[OoxTruExoO]

In Bikermole's case: I think you both should've pulled away and moved to the left hand lane as soon as possible, provided it wasn't laned traffic and you needed to be in that lane. It's a habit you will learn with time and experience. However, that doesn't justify the van driver's driving. I'm glad you were both ok, and got a good result from it.

In Lewis' case: He had an L-plate on at the time, and that makes him a target for some drivers. He did the right thing by sitting at the junction and just letting the arsehole go. Better than taking the chance to pull out in front of the lorry that he has now lost sight of. The title of the video is a little extreme, but the van driving is not justifiable. He wouldn't have pulled that manoeuvre if it was a car in front taking that extra half second to make sure it was safe to proceed.

These are my opinions, for whatever they may count.

 

[rickster303]

In Bikermole's case: I think you both should've pulled away and moved to the left hand lane as soon as possible, provided it wasn't laned traffic and you needed to be in that lane. It's a habit you will learn with time and experience. However, that doesn't justify the van driver's driving. I'm glad you were both ok, and got a good result from it.

In Lewis' case: He had an L-plate on at the time, and that makes him a target for some drivers. He did the right thing by sitting at the junction and just letting the arsehole go. Better than taking the chance to pull out in front of the lorry that he has now lost sight of. The title of the video is a little extreme, but the van driving is not justifiable. He wouldn't have pulled that manoeuvre if it was a car in front taking that extra half second to make sure it was safe to proceed.

These are my opinions, for whatever they may count.

your right they where learners so still learning no point being too critical

 

[ElliotReidMD]

I'm not going to make any judgement on any video posted in this thread but I will say this.

We're all human, bikers and cagers, and we make mistakes. Where us bikers have to be the bigger people is accepting when we make mistakes and learning from them as if we don't eventually we're fucked. Everyone who's rides a bike or who has ridden a bike has made an error. I'm sure even Mr Nottingham is not 100% perfect in his riding 100% of the time. Everyone who drives a car or has driven a car has made an error. I include myself in both instances.

What I'll never do, as I've seen some riders do on various forums, is automatically stick up for a rider who has obviously done the wrong thing. I don't care what a person is travelling on/in, if they're at fault then they are at fault.

I could list quite a few instances in vlogs posted by members of these forums where I feel the vlogger has done something stupid and I know you could all do the same going through my vlogs.

To sum up, lets try and learn from any errors we make as we do make errors and not get ourselves hurt or killed.

Now where's my bucket of popcorn?

 

[Mateusz1308]

good job!

 

[CurlyBlakey]

I'm not going to make any judgement on any video posted in this thread but I will say this.

We're all human, bikers and cagers, and we make mistakes. Where us bikers have to be the bigger people is accepting when we make mistakes and learning from them as if we don't eventually we're fucked. Everyone who's rides a bike or who has ridden a bike has made an error. I'm sure even Mr Nottingham is not 100% perfect in his riding 100% of the time. Everyone who drives a car or has driven a car has made an error. I include myself in both instances.

What I'll never do, as I've seen some riders do on various forums, is automatically stick up for a rider who has obviously done the wrong thing. I don't care what a person is travelling on/in, if they're at fault then they are at fault.

I could list quite a few instances in vlogs posted by members of these forums where I feel the vlogger has done something stupid and I know you could all do the same going through my vlogs.

To sum up, lets try and learn from any errors we make as we do make errors and not get ourselves hurt or killed.

Now where's my bucket of popcorn?

I could not have put it better in a million years.