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news
Near Miss of the Day 586: Texting driver oblivious to cyclist she nearly hit
There’s a phrase often used by traffic police in safety campaigns and on social media – the Fatal Four – highlighting the four most common factors behind deaths or serious injuries on the road. Drink and drug driving, speeding, and not wearing a seat belt are three, with the most recent addition to the list being using a handheld mobile phone while driving, which is what we have in today’s Near Miss of the Day video from North London as a texting driver pulls out on a cyclist, oblivious to his presence.
Dean, the road.cc reader who captured the footage, told us: “I was behind a car in the right-hand lane (right turn only by the way) on Southbury Road in Ponders End, preparing to turn right into the High Road.
“We both started moving off, and a driver in the left-hand lane (driving inside the cycle lane I might add) pulled into the right-hand lane (a right-turn ONLY lane) and cut me off, I shouted in surprise and swerved to avoid her hitting me.
“I later saw the same car at the traffic lights ahead and I realised as I was passing that she was on her phone texting. I told her that she almost hit me and how close she was to taking me out. She was unapologetic and hid her phone.
“I got home and after watching the footage back, realised she was also texting while she cut me up, and that's why she didn't even realise she almost hit me.
“If it was an honest mistake, I would have understood, we all make mistakes, but texting while driving is an intentional choice.”
> 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
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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76 comments
On a side note, it would be useful to know what camera is used in these features. Some provide much better detail than others (as here), and real world use is the best review. Maybe you could even tag the articles with the camera gear?
In my opinion the cyclist is the one in the right-only lane that chose to go straight ahead. Oh, other than the black Range Rover two cars ahead, but that's not the issue is it.
The texting driver did what is usually acceptable inside a junction as vehicles turn right which is that she can move to the next lane. Had the cyclist not broken the rules of the road (didn't turn right, did he?) then there wouldn't have been an issue.
The only right hand land was the one at the end where they are stopped at lights.
Nice victim blaming though.
I had one a few years ago. I was cycling to work when I was passed by a woman who was texting. She saw me looking at her and wound her window down. "What the fuck are you looking at?" was shouted at me. I explained that I had captured her on video texting whilst driving. She shouted that she wasn't driving fast, and it was A VERY IMPORTANT TEXT as her daughter was having a jab at school and she wanted to reassure her. She then told me to fuck off and drove off, still texting. I reported her to Lancashire Police who said they were too busy to do anything, even though I gave them HD footage of the incident with sound, and they also said that she wasn't going fast so wouldn't hurt anyone if she had a collision, and the police officer had much more important things to do than chase a naughty motorist breaking the law, whist admitting it and continuing to do so whilst driving. She pretty much said I was wasting her time being there.
Is it any wonder that I think Lancashire Police are a bunch of lazy bell ends?
Must be hard for you biker phil when you're a brain surgeon, international spy and leader of the free world . Probably working a 23 hour day delivering excellent service to everyone.
It's £200 fine and 6 points.
Are you claiming it is a trivial offence and not worth police time ?
Surely this would save police time. Dealing with this motorist sends a signal to others which will hopefully discourage this behaviour leading to less collisions and less work in future. All the work has been done for them all they have to do is prosecute.
Police on the M6 have set up a special unit driving an HGV to catch drivers doing just this. Surely using members of the public to assist saves police time and money.
And they can do the driver for swearing! Win win.
"Is it any wonder that I think Lancashire Police are a bunch of lazy bell ends"
I can only imagine he's comparing with his own incredibly high standards of service.
It seems that you are trying to making a comparison between a bunch of people who don't seem to want to do their job, and spend as much effort trying to avoid it as it would take to actually do it, and someone that you don't actually even know what they do, let alone the standard they achieve. In any case what standard Phil does his job is not the point here. We were talking about the rozzers.
So, at the risk of repeating myself....
If someone comes to you with 90% of the work done for free, and you just brush them off and don't bother finishing the job, then I would not describe that as incredibly high standards.
Everything's relative HP. That tea doesn't drink itself you know....
So lets get this straight, biker phil has provided the footage which clearly shows that the driver is texting and driving, including a perfectly clear clip of the face of the driver which would rule out the "I wasn't driving" defense. Basically what is needed is someone to process the paperwork and send out the NIP.
Some police forces simply will try everything in their power not to take any action on helmet camera video evidence. I have had a pretty similar situation, driver pulled out onto a roundabout in front of me whilst texting. I had a nice crystal clear clip of the driver and you could see they were texting at the time they pulled out onto the roundabout causing me to have to slam on the brakes to avoid them.
And a simple online check proved that the car did not have an MOT and had not paid VED, information which I handed by printout to the police station along with a copy of the video..... and they basically said..... you need an independent source of evidence to get a prosecution. We will file this in the circular file.
Whereas other forces will take the video evidence and process it and let you know that action is being taken.
no problem with someone feeling an issue has not been handled properly and escalating their complaint. I'm not a big fan of the lazy twat chat thats always on here about the police.
Do you not think that might be because the ones that didn't handle the issue properly are, er. ... the police?. Hardly worth criticising the Accrington and District Colliery Brass Band Society is it?
You never know - they might be in the same lodge...
Although clearly not in the same lodge as anyone in Thatcher's govt.......
Maybe you get the police you talk about. You keep calling them "a bunch of lazy bell ends" you get the lazy bellend police service.
That's right it's the public's fault for calling out crap service....
Mind you you might be on to something. Maybe Lancs has been trawling Biker Phils SM accounts when they should have been prosecuting offences, thereby providing themselves with an excuse as to why they didn't prosecute the offences.
" would have prosecuted, but Biker Phil has said we're lazy bellends. So we'll respond by continuing to be lazy bell ends. That'll show em! Facking public, who do they think we are, facking public servants??"*
*Please note the above is an imaginary soliliquy ofr the purposes of satire, not a representation of any statement by Lancs Police, and is not to be seen as an excuse for Lancs Police** to continue to allow crimes to go unpunished.
**Herts Police, you're doing ok, please keep it up!
what's your badge number nic? Enquiring minds want to know.
Taking focus off the fiesta for a second, what on earth was the corsa driver doing overtaking there? Near miss with the white car coming the other way. All to get to the traffic lights before a cyclist. Nice way to drive considering there's a "baby on board".
Who knows. I had one today, accelerated past me to get to the pinch point, then brakes hard due to traffic queuing the other side of the pinch point all whilst on a mobile. Doubt my camera will show enough detail through the windows.
Nice way to drive considering there's a "baby on board"
My experience is that stupid signs like that are a fairly good indicator of someone who drives with a complete disregard for other people's offspring.
Please report this to the police. Get drivers like this off the road before they kill someone.
No offence to the the guy, but Bollocks to 'Honest mistake' That's the kind of apologist crap that makes light of incident to the drivers benefit which could have very easily gone the other way.
If a driver isn't looking properly before, during and after a manoeuvre they shouldn't be on the road in the first place, nevermind that the stupid twat is on their phone into the bargain.
Report. With full prejudice.
Think you have misread. Dean was making it clear they didnt believe it was an honest mistake.
Can we make it a condition of publising these articles that the submitters state if they reported to the police or not? Seems pretty clear cut, especially in Met territory
The second point is hard to do with some forces unwillingness to follow up with the
witnessesvictims.I think Nige has an arguable point here. It could be said that NMOTD should be egregious enough that the action is clearly in defiance of the RTA, or is risking someone's safety. In either case it warrants a report to the rozzers. If the rozzers refuse to do their job that could be published too*.
*Edit: Yes I know, it frequently is.
But I don't know if the rozzers have refused to actually take action or just refused to let me know about it when they have. And as mentioned, lots of other forces have applied the same "no need to know" bit to save time for their staff.
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