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Near Miss of the Day 875: Red-light jumping driver almost hits cyclist, responds with denial and abuse
Update 26/09/2023:
The cyclist involved finally heard a response from Greater Manchester Police who revealed the report would result in no further action. Alex, who had described the force's approach to dealing with camera footage reports of dangerous driving as "opaque", said the outcome was "very depressing".
He told us: "Police responded that the light was not red so no further action. Very depressing response from Greater Manchester Police. Their exact words were: 'No further action was taken in relation to this matter. Unfortunately we could not see what the traffic light colour was for the Audi.' I replied to them that the light was red and showed a screen shot. Not heard anything back."
Original story follows...
A nurse in Manchester was cycling to work this morning when he was almost hit by a motorist who drove through red lights at a pedestrian crossing, and then went on to swear at the cyclist and deny that the light was red. Unfortunately for him, the cyclist had got it on camera.
Alex has been cycling to work ever since he became a nurse 10 years ago — and the route he was on today has been part of his daily Monday to Friday commute for almost a year now.
Coming up to Rochdale Road from Russet Road in Greater Manchester at just past 8AM today, he stopped and waited for the light to turn red at the pedestrian crossing, so he could join the main road safely. But as he was about to do so, an Audi driver jumped the light and came very close to hitting him.
When he let out an exclaim pointing at the state of events to the motorist, he was met with a deluge on abuse and denial.
"I'm unfortunately used to it, but in my opinion this was very good footage of someone doing something very naughty," Alex told road.cc.
Rochdale Road, Greater Manchester (Google Maps)
As visible in the video, the Audi driver is stationary and waiting for the drivers in front of him to pass. When the light turns amber, there's still another vehicle in front of him, which goes straight ahead just as the red light comes on.
"When I turned they decided to run the red light and almost hit me," he said.
He can be heard saying: "It's a red light mate!"
The driver replies with: "Oh f*** off! No, it f****** wasn't!"
Alex said: "The thing I think is a bit different about this is that the offending car is so clearly captured being stationary behind the red light and so they have very intentionally driven through it. It was no simple accident or episode of inattention."
Russet Road, Greater Manchester (Google Maps)
He told road.cc that he has submitted the footage to Greater Manchester police and is awaiting a response, but his experience with them has been "hit and miss" so far.
"If I had to describe their responses in one word it would be opaque," said Alex.
> 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 Twitter or 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
Adwitiya joined road.cc in 2023 as a news writer after graduating with a masters in journalism from Cardiff University. His dissertation focused on active travel, which soon threw him into the deep end of covering everything related to the two-wheeled tool, and now cycling is as big a part of his life as guitars and football. He has previously covered local and national politics for Voice Wales, and also likes to writes about science, tech and the environment, if he can find the time. Living right next to the Taff trail in the Welsh capital, you can find him trying to tackle the brutal climbs in the valleys.
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86 comments
These are two separate things, the junction negotiated by the cyclist, and the light-controlled pedestrian crossing. I'm not sure that the cyclist is entitled to rely on the lights, he should satisfy himself his own junction is safe to traverse. The car driver may or may not be guilty of an infraction at the pedestrian crossing, but does that have any bearing on what the cyclist does? Suppose it had been a regular zebra crossing, with pedestrians clearly waiting to cross, every expectation that Audi-man should be stopping, but then doesn't.
My betting is that this is MGIF. Audi-man thinks, if I wait for the lights then that cyclist is getting in front, can't let that happen, so since I've nosed over the line already, go for it.
Both car and bicycle moving slowly. This was not a near collision and really no big deal. Driver was a d*ck though, no need to use his horn or shout even if he thought he was in the right. He was slow to move off, he should of expected the cyclist to move into the space he left.
As the cyclist moves into the lane the car is around four metres away (the zigzag markings are each 2m long). Four metres at 10mph is one second, about the time it takes the cyclist to cross the lane, so it's a fair assumption that the car and the rear of the bicycle came into pretty close proximity. It's not a terrifying, could-have-been-killed miss, obviously, but equally clearly there is a risk of a bump. If they were nowhere near each other, why did the car driver react as he did?
Maybe this kind of thing is rare in most of the UK. In Paris it is the standard riding style through dense traffic. People are always pushing, cheeky at red lights, etc. That type of slow, lets-play-chicken "near-collision" happens to me 10 -20 times a day, the motorists aren't d*cks though and ignore you.
FTFY. Let's not normalise horrendous English.
Do not pass go. Do not collect £200. Go straight to SNAP.
What a fukunt.
Had he know he was being a terwat to an NHS nurse, I'm sure he would've been more contrite.
Well. You'd hope so.
He should be pistol whipped.
I am not suggesting this is relevant here, but...
On my old London commute, there was a controlled pedestrian crossing on Holloway Road where I eventually realised that the traffic lights on each side did not turn red at exactly the same time - traffic on the souhtbound side would be stopped a couple of seconds before the northbound (or vice versa, I forget). It wasn't a massive differential, but it was enough that occasionally pedestrians would give abuse because they thought I had RLJd when I hadn't. I have no idea if this setup was intentional, or a timing error, but it has made me slightly more cautious about stepping out just because I can see one side is red.
Have you reported it?
No - (a) I genuinely wasn't sure if it was intended to operate that way. Both road signals went red before the pedestrian signal went green; just not in perfect synchronicity; (b) haven't cycled there since Covid, so couldn't say if it's still the same.
A dangerous abusive dick head in an AUDI? That's not something you see every day . . . .
There was an Audi driver selling his toy on fb marketplace the other day, complete with pictures of it parked on double yellow lines and blocking the pavement.
This Audi blocks the view of peds/drivers by parking on the pavement next to the pelican crossing zig zags every day. I saw this picture online and thought with police attending a serious crash yesterday and having to pass the police tape over the bonnet of the car they might have a word with the driver and it wouldn't still be there on Monday morning . . . .
Monday morning and guess what? . . . . .
Half expecting the driver to spout some bullshit about established red lights. Hopefully they will be prosecuted.
Appalling driving, but I doubt they'll get done for breaching a red light. They went over the stop line when the light was green, then sat in the crossing (blocking it, with a cyclist waiting to cross). Technically, they didn't breach the stop line when the light was red. They might get done for inconsiderate driving, but equally, I could see the police also prosecuting the cyclist for breaching the give way markings.
Not sure about that. I think that the whole of your vehicle has to be over the line before the light turns red (ref), and I don't think it was.
Interesting. If the articulated vehicle is max 18 m, and the shortest amber light is 2.75 seconds, assuming that the light turns amber right as the front of the vehicle passes the stop line, the vehicle would need to be travelling at (18 m / 2.75 s) = 6.5 m/s = 14.6 MPH to clear the stop line before the red. Not a problem if traffic is flowing freely.
But wait, at for instance 20 MPH the stopping distance for an HGV is 88 ft* (26.8 m). So if the light changed to amber when the vehicle was 26.8 m before the light, it won't be able to stop in time. If the driver proceeds at 20 MPH (8.94 m/s), though, he'll cover 24.6 m in 2.75 s, putting the front of the vehicle still behind the stop line.
I don't see how a driver can comply with this version of the law.
* can't find an authoratative number source for this, but there is definitely a range of speeds where the vehicle is going too fast to stop before the line, and too slow to make it entirely through, in 2.75-3.25 seconds, because it's not travelling much more than its own length in that time
Interesting stuff from both Tom_77 and andystow, thanks. I was wondering the same about whether the driver's front bumper had passed the white line. Now I know it makes no difference...and also the highway code is somewhat faulty in this regard!
I think that website is incorrect. Looking at the law, it's quite clear that the only thing that matters is the stop line and whether you can proceed past it or not.
If the light is green you can proceed past the stop line, if the light is red you must not proceed past the stop line:
They went over the stop line when the light was green, then sat in the crossing (blocking it, with a cyclist waiting to cross). Technically, they didn't breach the stop line when the light was red
This is tripe!
I could see the police also prosecuting the cyclist for breaching the give way markings
This is also tripe. Motorist guilty. Probability of any police force in the vicinity of Lancashire prosecuting him, however, approaches zero.
https://upride.cc/incident/t90jdt_audiwithcaravan_rljatspeed/
I wish it were. I don't expect a prosecution of the cyclist would get anywhere, as the vehicle was stationary when they moved past the give way and did appear to be waiting. Any sensible court would throw that out.
But I know how some police can overly analyse the actions of the cyclist in these situations, often dependent on how many reports the cyclist submits to them. You would be in trouble if it were Lancs police!
But it clearly says in the HC there they shouldn't do, that so how is that not careless driving ?
It probably wouldn't meet the threshold for careless. Even driving instructors can be caught out... https://youtu.be/J87dSUyZc2Q?feature=shared&t=3660
Only because the police or cps wont pursue it, yet the police guidance on driving offences even cites just mistakenly driving through a red light as an example of careless driving.
I don't think it technically counts as driving through a red light. The stop line was crossed when the light was green.
What it does breach, is rule 192 of the highway code, which says you should not stop in the crossing area. However, this is not illegal like running a red light, just contrary to the advice in the Highway Code. I do think it would amount to inconsiderate, possibly careless driving, but whether the police would actually prosecute for that single instance, I'm not sure. Most likely they would be given 'words of advice'.
I submitted a video which showed a driver waiting in the ASL box at a red, including them then driving through the red light and pedestrian crossing. Police saw zero issue with it 🤷♂️
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