Near Miss of the Day 412: Parcelforce driver goes for non-existent gap

Unsurprisingly, given that the closure of non-essential shops means even more shopping than usual is being done online, there are a lot of delivery vans on the roads at the moment - and, not for the first time since lockdown started, one features in our latest Near Miss of the Day video, which comes to you from West London.

The clip was filmed by road.cc reader Nick, who told us: "Riding back to the office after a meeting in South London. Riding North on Oldfield Lane North in Greenford and avoiding most of the potholes, I had just crested the bridge over the canal and was passed by a black Honda CRV (cutting things a little closer than I would have liked between me and the traffic island).

"Nothing that unusual there – I have been riding on London roads for many years. But then, on his tail came the Red Parcelforce sprinter who had either not seen me or the traffic island and now had nowhere to go. He just stuffed the van into the non-existent gap and hoped!

"I have taken the audio off the clip as I was a little upset!"

He continued: "After he turned left into Currey Rd, he drove on for 100m and then pulled up to make a delivery. I explained to him that some cycles have front and back video cameras and I would love to be a fly on the wall at the showing of the video at his disciplinary hearing.

"I have of course also made the complaint to the Met Police," he added.

> Near Miss of the Day turns 100 - Why do we do the feature and what have we learnt from it?

Over the years road.cc has reported on literally hundreds of close passes and near misses involving badly driven vehicles from every corner of the country – so many, in fact, that we’ve decided to turn the phenomenon into a regular feature on the site. One day hopefully we will run out of close passes and near misses to report on, but until that happy day arrives, Near Miss of the Day will keep rolling on.

If you’ve caught on camera a close encounter of the uncomfortable kind with another road user that you’d like to share with the wider cycling community please send it to us at info [at] road.cc or send us a message via the road.cc Facebook page.

If the video is on YouTube, please send us a link, if not we can add any footage you supply to our YouTube channel as an unlisted video (so it won't show up on searches).

Please also let us know whether you contacted the police and if so what their reaction was, as well as the reaction of the vehicle operator if it was a bus, lorry or van with company markings etc.

> What to do if you capture a near miss or close pass (or worse) on camera while cycling