wake up call

Mick said:

So I'm riding home this morning and Mr blue WRX is approaching
from a side street on the left, he slows down and short of making
eye contact appears to take a good look down the road past me.

I alway assume that someone entering from a side street hasn't
seen me and I make sure I have enough braking room. And I did
the same this morning, started slowing but thought, nah, he's
seen me, so I get off the brakes. Then he pulls out. Straight into
the middle of the three lanes!

I brake as hard as I can but rather than t-bone him I turn right.
I still have no idea why I did this. It could have been a very bad
move if there had been cars behind me. I manage to avoid him
enough to only bounce of the side of his car with my left shoulder
and elbow. Somehow I stayed upright but ended up in the 3rd lane.

[censored] wad is beside me with this blank look on his face and I'm
swearing loud enough to wake the dead. He takes off and I take
off after him. A futile effort of course and I'm [censored] that I didn't
have the presence of mind to get his rego. Fscker!

Moral of the story - please don't get complaisant folks.

Shaken,
Mick

This is due to interesting but potential dangerous quirk in our brain. If you're looking for something, your brain tends to filter out other stuff. This guy was obviously looking for *cars*, and just missed you due to this effect even while looking straight at you. This happened countless times to me too while commuting, although none quite as almost-dead as your case.

Probably nothing to do with him being a dickwad. Motorists have to be re-trained to look for *anything* instead of just cars.

jur said:

Probably nothing to do with him being a dickwad. Motorists have to be re-trained to look for *anything* instead of just cars.

Touching on the awareness issue, here's one POV + comments about getting the German drivers license:
http://www.ibiblio.org/rdu/a-germdl.html

Going back to the Connecting Cycling Conference (Melb) in February, Dr John Pucher mentioned that 30 / 40% of the questions in the German drivers license directly related to peds/cyclists interaction. Similar questions here in Australia? *cough*

jur said:

This is due to interesting but potential dangerous quirk in our brain.
If you're looking for something, your brain tends to filter out other
stuff. This guy was obviously looking for *cars*, and just missed you
due to this effect even while looking straight at you. This happened
countless times to me too while commuting, although none quite as
almost-dead as your case.

Probably nothing to do with him being a dickwad. Motorists have to be
re-trained to look for *anything* instead of just cars.

Subcionciously they may be scanning for danger. Fit one's bicycle with
a large, visable lance. Or, make eye contact. They sometimes look
"through" you rather than "at" you, and often misjudge how fast you can
ride. A classic for this is Canterbury Rd in Melbourne, at the Maling
Rd intersection in Canterbury. The rider intent on survival
approaches this intersection with extreme caution!

On 2006-07-06, jur (aka Bruce)
was almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea:

Quoted message said:

Mick said:

[censored] wad is beside me with this blank look on his face and I'm
swearing loud enough to wake the dead. He takes off and I take
off after him. A futile effort of course and I'm [censored] that I didn't
have the presence of mind to get his rego. Fscker!

Moral of the story - please don't get complaisant folks.

This is due to interesting but potential dangerous quirk in our brain.
If you're looking for something, your brain tends to filter out other
stuff. This guy was obviously looking for *cars*, and just missed you
due to this effect even while looking straight at you. This happened
countless times to me too while commuting, although none quite as
almost-dead as your case.

Probably nothing to do with him being a dickwad. Motorists have to be
re-trained to look for *anything* instead of just cars.

Except that he caused a collision with potential injury involved
(How's your shoulder and elbow, Mick?), and failed to stop and
exchange details and/or render assistance.

Dickwad may well have not been paying appropriate attention, but he
still broke two laws, and thus remains a dickwad.

--
TimC
I read [.doc files] with "rm". All you lose is the microsoft-specific
font selections, the macro viruses and the luser babblings.
-- Gary "Wolf" Barnes

cfsmtb said:

Touching on the awareness issue, here's one POV + comments about getting the German drivers license:
ibiblio.orga germdl.htmlOpen ↗

Going back to the Connecting Cycling Conference (Melb) in February, Dr John Pucher mentioned that 30 / 40% of the questions in the German drivers license directly related to peds/cyclists interaction. Similar questions here in Australia? *cough*

You've jogged my memory. When I was serving in Germany a UK licence was sufficient to drive over there, however the British Army placed an additional requirement on its soldiers, we had to gain a British Forces Germany' (BFG) licence.

I believe this was largely due to the prevelance of the give way to the right rule which is the standard applied to any junction which has no other markings (remember, they drive on the right in Europe). In order to gain a licence you had to correctly determine who had priority in a number of scenarios. Nothing unusual there, the interesting thing though is that a number of the examples featured a bicycle, quite often in a position of priority.

I'm not 100% sure of that, it's been a while but I'm pretty sure that was the case back in '96 at least.

TimC said:

Dickwad may well have not been paying appropriate attention, but he
still broke two laws, and thus remains a dickwad.

gold!

No probs with shoulder or elbow - thanks TimC

Mick said:

So I'm riding home this morning and Mr blue WRX is approaching
from a side street on the left, he slows down and short of making
eye contact appears to take a good look down the road past me.

Mick

Chances are, he lives in that side street. My last physical interaction with the fron end of a car happened about 7:30 in the morning within about 500m of the bloke's home. I think I have read somewhere that a very high proportion of road incidents do. People get in the car and get going before their brains have really switched on.

I'd just been passed by a bus. I suspect Mr Driver saw the bus go past and thought OK, coast is clear not seeing me 50m behind the bus going much the same speed.

Your driver is probably looking for cars about 100m out he doesn't see on so he thinks OK. A bike at 50-60m just isn't a part of his thinking.

RoryW

Mick said:

So I'm riding home this morning and Mr blue WRX is approaching
from a side street on the left, he slows down and short of making
eye contact appears to take a good look down the road past me.

I alway assume that someone entering from a side street hasn't
seen me and I make sure I have enough braking room. And I did
the same this morning, started slowing but thought, nah, he's
seen me, so I get off the brakes. Then he pulls out. Straight into
the middle of the three lanes!

<snip>

Shaken,
Mick

I was hit in a similar situation, except that the driver actually saw me and afterwards said "I thought you were going to stop!" She waited until I was level with the right hand corner of the car before accelerating and turning right across three or four lanes on one of Adelaide's busiest roads while I got carried across the road on top of her bonnet before being thrown off as she straightened up. I was very lucky that there was a large break in traffic, or even with my cat-like flight skills I wouldn't be typing this today.

TimC said:

Dickwad may well have not been paying appropriate attention, but he
still broke two laws, and thus remains a dickwad.

Quite. 🙂

That makes me a dickwad also. I probably break laws each day most without even knowing.

deejbah said:

I was hit in a similar situation ...

glad you're ok.

That's the worrying part. I know way too many cyclists who have been hit by
cars.

quote='Mick''deejbah said:

I was hit in a similar situation ...

glad you're ok.

That's the worrying part. I know way too many cyclists who have been hit by
cars.[/QUOTE]It is worrying. After being injured twice on the same stretch of road on the same day a year apart, I am an assertive but defensive rider and encourage all other people I know taking up cycling to be the same. As you say, as cyclists, we can't afford to become complacent.

Bleve said:

Quoted message said:

Probably nothing to do with him being a dickwad. Motorists have to be
re-trained to look for *anything* instead of just cars.

Subcionciously they may be scanning for danger. Fit one's bicycle with
a large, visable lance. Or, make eye contact. They sometimes look
"through" you rather than "at" you, and often misjudge how fast you can

There's also a question of arc. Riding on the left its easy to be
missed as drivers and even cyclists look further out.
I pass one left sidestreet at 40-50kmh and, if no car behind, position
myself about where I'd be sitting if I was driving. Places me
thoroughly in arc.

Andre

jur said:

That makes me a dickwad also. I probably break laws each day most
without even knowing.

Nah, Jur, you're OK. He broke laws in a very serious manner that threatened
another person's life. That is what makes the true dickwad.
--
Cheers
Peter

~~~ ~ _@
~~ ~ _- \,
~~ (*)/ (*)

"Peter Signorini" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

jur said:

That makes me a dickwad also. I probably break laws each day most
without even knowing.

Nah, Jur, you're OK. He broke laws in a very serious manner that
threatened another person's life. That is what makes the true dickwad.
--
Cheers
Peter

~~~ ~ _@
~~ ~ _- \,
~~ (*)/ (*)

TRANSLATION - Please open your pocket, jur, so I can [censored] in it. Let's pat
each other on the back.

Brent said:

TRANSLATION - Please open your pocket, jur, so I can [censored] in it. Let's
pat each other on the back.

In case anyone hasn't noticed, it's school holidays (you can tell, Pete
Sig posts more :-) . Obviously we're getting the usual range of idiot
trolls. Please ignore them (I know I'm not, I'm trying to alert the
regulars).

Regards,
Big Billy Goat Gruff.

--
Dave Hughes | [email hidden]
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate
-Steven Wright

Random Data said:

In case anyone hasn't noticed, it's school holidays (you can tell, Pete
Sig posts more :-) . Obviously we're getting the usual range of idiot
trolls.

You'd think teachers would have better things to do with their time...
;-)

Parbs

Random Data said:

Brent said:

TRANSLATION - Please open your pocket, jur, so I can [censored] in it. Let's
pat each other on the back.

I'm most definitely NOT a turkey-slapper!!

Quoted message said:

In case anyone hasn't noticed, it's school holidays (you can tell, Pete
Sig posts more :-) .

???? I went to work on Friday, going to work tomorrow. Which state are you
in?

Quoted message said:

Obviously we're getting the usual range of idiot
trolls. Please ignore them (I know I'm not, I'm trying to alert the
regulars).

Jur is not a troll, as far as I know. He posts regularly to the BV cycle
discussion forum, or someone using the same name:
http://www.bv.com.au/forums/profile.php?mode=viewprofile&u=873

--
Cheers
Peter

~~~ ~ _@
~~ ~ _- \,
~~ (*)/ (*)

Peter Signorini said:

Jur is not a troll, as far as I know. He posts regularly to the BV cycle
discussion forum, or someone using the same name:
http://www.bv.com.au/forums/profile.php?mode=viewprofile&u=873

Victorians/Trolls it's hard to pick the difference... ;-P

Parbs - *unning and ducking for cover

On 2006-07-09, Peter Signorini (aka Bruce)
was almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea:

Quoted message said:

Random Data said:

Brent said:

TRANSLATION - Please open your pocket, jur, so I can [censored] in it. Let's
pat each other on the back.

....

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Obviously we're getting the usual range of idiot
trolls. Please ignore them (I know I'm not, I'm trying to alert the
regulars).

Jur is not a troll, as far as I know. He posts regularly to the BV cycle
discussion forum, or someone using the same name:
http://www.bv.com.au/forums/profile.php?mode=viewprofile&u=873

No, Brent, not jur.

--
TimC
My cats are forbidden from walking on my computer keyboard on the desk
when I'm asdfjjhhkl;ljfd.;oier' puyykmm4hbdm9lo9j USING IT. --unknown