Blind drivers ,who don't care

EireRoadUser

I drive all over dublin every day of the week and do my best to keep my eye out for the people who aren't as quick off the mark ,so i don't end up entangled with them.

But i also like cycling ,helmet and highly visible clothing etc.

I was cycling down a road a few days ago and a truck is coming up the road towards me. A guy comes from behind the truck overtaking it and almost knocks me off my bike .He came right accross to my side of the road and almost hits me.

He also sniggered at me as he passed ,he was in his late 50s

Cyclists aren't poor ,they're not stupid ,they're not anti-globalisationists

I actually get a buzz passing by stood still traffic and the exercise.

Bam Bam

I've seen my share of dumb cyclists.

Sometimes they go with the traffice sometimes against.

But imagine seeing them doing this in the dark with NO hi-vis gear on, absolute insanity.

EireRoadUser

YAWNNNNnnn

Anan1

"YAWNNNNnnn"

If I'm not interested in a thread, I tend to just not post. Do you go around pubs yawning at people too?

Michael G

Bam Bam wrote:

I've seen my share of dumb cyclists.

But imagine seeing them doing this in the dark with NO hi-vis gear on, absolute insanity.

I parked in Rathmines outside the Spar a few years back, and opened the door of my car. I nearly took a black man off his bike. No lights, dark clothes, black face. Not a good way of perpetuating your genes.

ballooba

I nearly T-boned a spanish looking girl off her bike in Ranelagh on Sat evening. She was cycling along in the dark on a dark bike, wearing dark "going out" clothes, no lights, no Hi Vis, not anticipating that I was going to turn right (with my indicator on) and couldn't see her.

MorningStar

I also wear all the hi vis gear and lights and encouter the blind drivers. One guy nearly cremed me when he decided the bus lane would be quicker. It was daytime and I had my gear on but obviously no lights. I encounter blind drivers daily and some drivers I know to avoid a huge amount and I saw one crash eventually.

Drivers never seem to notice cycle lanes or lines near traffic lights.

Bad cyclists drive me insane but it is getting worse as many people new to Ireland don't use anything. Very noticable increase IMHO and I guess it is just an education issue.

The_Magoo

Use to ride a scooter around Dublin, in and out to work mainly, for about a year and a half. Seen my fair share of eejits, a high proportion of whom were career drivers, taxis, buses, delivery vans, who fail to observe scooteristi, motorcyclist, or cyclists as "other road users". Now that I am a car driver I find, after my experiences on a bike, that I am much more aware of other users. I do get rather annoyed when I see cyclists zipping through red lights, and kids on scooters with their helmets sitting atop there head.
Rant over!

blorg

EireRoadUser wrote:

I was cycling down a road a few days ago and a truck is coming up the road towards me. A guy comes from behind the truck overtaking it and almost knocks me off my bike .He came right accross to my side of the road and almost hits me.

I've had the very same thing happen to me on the road to Eniskerry, along that straight bit going uphill just before the hotel/ski course. Had to swerve off the road. You just don't factor as 'oncoming traffic' on a bike.

Gurgle

EireRoadUser wrote:

A guy comes from behind the truck overtaking it and almost knocks me off my bike .He came right accross to my side of the road and almost hits me.

He also sniggered at me as he passed ,he was in his late 50s.

Every now and then, you get the opportunity to scrape along a shiny new mercedes, or put an elbow through a wing-mirror when the prick behind the wheel does something like that.
That always brightened my day when I used to cycle around the city.

mike65

Michael G wrote:

I parked in Rathmines outside the Spar a few years back, and opened the door of my car. I nearly took a black man off his bike.

Did you check your mirrors first?

Mike.

blorg

Gurgle wrote:

Every now and then, you get the opportunity to scrape along a shiny new mercedes, or put an elbow through a wing-mirror when the prick behind the wheel does something like that.
That always brightened my day when I used to cycle around the city.

Unfortunately when someone is speeding down the wrong side of the road towards you is not one of these times.

I did once have a taxi driver do the 'overtake and immediately turn left without indicating' trick however. He went straight into the side of me which left nice marks all along the side of his car. Of course he hops out and is all 'look what you did to the side of my car!' Luckily for me a garda saw the whole thing - he came over and read the taxi driver the riot act. Told the taxi driver that he would have to submit a report about it and that he would have to wait and see if he was going to be prosecuted, and that if convicted he would lose his taxi license (told me privately that he wasn't but telling the driver that and leaving it should leave him sweating for a month or so.)

el tel

Too many cyclists ride without front lights. It's impossible to see them coming from the right at junctions and no amount of reflective or high visibility gear is any good as they come out of the darkness while your car headlights are pointing across the road. At night I drive out of any poorly lit junctions like a grandma just so they can avoid me as there's no way I'll see them first.

blastman

I particularly like the way some cyclists (and pedestrians), most of whom seem to live in my town, seem to think that you can see them as they dart across in front of you, despite the fact that it's dark, they're wearing dark clothes/nothing reflective and have no lights, and there's a car coming in the opposite direction as well.

Michael G

mike65 wrote:

Did you check your mirrors first?

Mike.

Yes I did. Always do; I'm conscious of it because I'm a cyclist myself and was knocked off my bike outside the Four Courts a few years back by someone opening a door without looking. But everything about this guy was black; there was nothing to see.

Anan1

Did he have his eyes shut too?;)

*Lolly*

EireRoadUser wrote:

A guy comes from behind the truck overtaking it and almost knocks me off my bike .He came right accross to my side of the road and almost hits me.
.

Can i just say, Ive noticed alot of 'Dangerous' Over taking in the area that im currently living in, in County Kerry. people seem far to eager to get infront of the person infront of them, almost as if its all one big race. When im out in the car with the boyf (which is pretty much all the time) We see some complete *ssholes on the road. If its not some Noob on a Tight country road trying to overtake a ''WideLoad'' Lorry, Its some Idiot driving behind us at night (or should i say up our ass) Full beam, blinding me as well as boyfriend making it almost impossible for him to see the road.

And the fact that you rekon he was around 50 years old proves the fact that not all ''dangerous drivers'' are thoose young so called boy racers.

TempestSabre

Everyones as bad as the other. Is there point to these threads?

Anan1

TempestSabre wrote:

Everyones as bad as the other. Is there point to these threads?

No they're not. Some people are worse drivers than others. The point of the thread is that it makes readers think about the decisions they make when driving.

TempestSabre

Anan1 wrote:

No they're not. Some people are worse drivers than others. The point of the thread is that it makes readers think about the decisions they make when driving.

I've yet experience a driver that obeys all the rules all the time, has had no accidents and doesn't make mistakes. Ditto Cyclists. Personally I think these threads make no difference at all. They just annoy everyone.

*Lolly*

TempestSabre wrote:

Everyones as bad as the other. Is there point to these threads?

Erm yes i think there is quite a bloody good point to this thread is you opened your eyes (and your mind)

Another thing i gotta say is that i was quite shocked at the LACK of speed camera's in ireland! lol they were practically on every corner back in England

Gurgle

*Lolly* wrote:

Erm yes i think there is quite a bloody good point to this thread is you opened your eyes (and your mind)

Another thing i gotta say is that i was quite shocked at the LACK of speed camera's in ireland! lol they were practically on every corner back in England

Except of course that speed cameras have no impact on the death toll. The action most needed to reduce the death toll here is to replace the donkey tracks with roads.

*Lolly*

Gurgle wrote:

Except of course that speed cameras have no impact on the death toll. The action most needed to reduce the death toll here is to replace the donkey tracks with roads.

That may be true in the short term, but in the long run they can catch, and hopefully prevent those driving 'dangerously' from being on our roads therefore preventing possible accidents/deaths in future

TempestSabre

*Lolly* wrote:

That may be true in the short term, but in the long run they can catch, and hopefully prevent those driving 'dangerously' from being on our roads therefore preventing possible accidents/deaths in future

Catching someone doing 45 in a 40 isn't going to do anything except generate income from fines. Which is why in the UK they are all over the place where they can generate the most income, and not where they can save lives. People do well over the ton on the motorways in the UK, including the police, as recent events have illustrated. However drive through a UK town and everyone's erractically braking, and looking for signs not looking at the road, traffic, cyclists or pedestrians.

*Lolly*

TempestSabre wrote:

Catching someone doing 45 in a 40 isn't going to do anything except generate income from fines. Which is why in the UK they are all over the place where they can generate the most income, and not where they can save lives. People do well over the ton on the motorways in the UK, including the police, as recent events have illustrated. However drive through a UK town and everyone's erractically braking, and looking for signs not looking at the road, traffic, cyclists or pedestrians.

WELL you dont know that for sure.... if there only 5 over the limit whats to say they woldnt go up to 15 or even 25 over?

TempestSabre

Yes lets punish everyone for being 5mph over the limit because of something they might do :rolleyes:

Gurgle

*Lolly* wrote:

WELL you dont know that for sure.... if there only 5 over the limit whats to say they woldnt go up to 15 or even 25 over?

Sorry but thats exactly the bullsh`it line taken by the government on the subject.
Fatal accidents on motorways at 80 or even 90mph are practically unheard of.
Likewise 50mph collisions on 40mph roads and 70mph accidents on the main national roads.

Almost every fatal accident involve one or more of these three things:

a donkey track (aka 'National Secondary Route')
a truck
alcohol

And no amount of speeding fines for doing 80mph on a modern motorway (of which we actually have a few now) is going to prevent any of the above.

Anan1

TempestSabre wrote:

I've yet experience a driver that obeys all the rules all the time, has had no accidents and doesn't make mistakes. Ditto Cyclists. Personally I think these threads make no difference at all. They just annoy everyone.

If they annoy you then why do you read them?

mike65

Thread closed. Call it preventative mantainence.

Mike.