Use right lane to enter M50S from N7 inbound?

fletch

Yesterday morning (about 5:35a.m.) I was coming inbound on the N7. Arrived at the junction with M50. Followed the roundabout around to the traffic lights to head Southbound on the M50. There was about 3 cars in the left lane and nobody in the right lane so I moved into the right lane. I'm pretty sure that the road markings indicated that you could use either the left or right lane to enter the M50 South. Well anyway, the taxi man got quite annoyed that I beat him off the lights and proceeded to blast me out of it with his full beams all the way to the Ballymount exit at which point he overtook braking the 60kph limit.
So was I in the wrong to be using the right lane?

yellow012

This is a tricky one, in theory the road markings say you can use either lane to go down the slip road but in practice if you use the right hand lane you end up having to cut into the left hand lane at the last minute to make the M50 slip road. The RH lane doen't flow into the slip road. Plus the lanes on the roundabout are constantly changing so how relavant the road markings are is a moot point.

Something similar happened to me during the week, was traveling in the left hand lane heading onto the M50 slip road, a girl in a Golf behind me decided it would be a good place to overtake and went out into the right hand lane and tried to cut back in and go down into the slip road. I stayed at the speed I was going and she ended up having to stop completely on the roundabout and wait for a gap in traffic so she could get down the slip road.

If it was me and there was only 3 cars waiting at the lights I would have queued up behind them and taken my turn its the safer option.
If the left hand lane was backed up, I would use the right hand lane but i'd be very careful how I got into the slip road. I'd be looking for a slow lorry or a dozy learner driver to zip in in front of.
BTW this doesn't excuse the taxi driver for acting like a nob.

Mitch Connor

You are right, both the left and right lanes of oposite the slip road can be used to head south bound. I haven't taken that route in a couple of months now so things may have changed though. I generally used the right lane, as there would be less traffic.

prospect

As it stands, if you are coming from Naas, and want to go sout onthe M50, you should ONLY use the right lane.

But with the lanes changing to accommodate the road works, it may have been different the day you were there.

fletch

prospect wrote: »

As it stands, if you are coming from Naas, and want to go sout onthe M50, you should ONLY use the right lane.

But with the lanes changing to accommodate the road works, it may have been different the day you were there.

I think you are confusing where I was....I was stopped at the traffic lights on the "roundabout" here

prospect

fletch wrote: »

I think you are confusing where I was....I was stopped at the traffic lights on the "roundabout" here

Yikes, my bad



I thought you were on the opposite 'corner'.

yellow012

prospect wrote: »

As it stands, if you are coming from Naas, and want to go sout onthe M50, you should ONLY use the right lane.

But with the lanes changing to accommodate the road works, it may have been different the day you were there.

Sorry I don't think your quite with it here, Fletch is talking about being on the actual roundabout itself, on the part of it that would run parallel to the M50 (just before it crosses the Luas track). There are 2 lanes here both with arrows on it pointing towards the M50 slip road.
(You are right in saying that if you are heading for the M50 coming from the Naas direction then you use the right hand lane.)

Sorry ignore - Fletch beat me to it.

fletch

Grand...thanks for all your replies guys, looks like I was in the right afterall. Just dont think the taxi man was too impressed that I got the jump on him and he mustn't have been paying attention to the road-markings, granted it was very early in the morning though
But yeh yellow012 it still doesn't excuse his behaviour. I did get my own back anyway by crawling down the slip road

yellow012

Tauren wrote: »

You are right, both the left and right lanes of oposite the slip road can be used to head south bound. I haven't taken that route in a couple of months now so things may have changed though. I generally used the right lane, as there would be less traffic.

The road layout has changed, previously traffic from the inside lane and the middle lane kinda flowed onto that slip road - every second car zipped together to get down the slip road. The way it is now is they have removed the inside lane and left the middle and outside lanes and the traffic in the outside lane has to cut into the left hand side traffic to make it,

yellow012

fletch wrote: »

Grand...thanks for all your replies guys, looks like I was in the right afterall. Just dont think the taxi man was too impressed that I got the jump on him and he mustn't have been paying attention to the road-markings, granted it was very early in the morning though
But yeh yellow012 it still doesn't excuse his behaviour. I did get my own back anyway by crawling down the slip road

I wouldn't necessarily agree with you here, when you use the right hand lane you have to cut over in front of the left hand lane traffic to make the slip road. Thats why the guy had a go at you in the first place, you cut him up.
If you clipped his car I would imagine you'd be more in the wrong than the taxi driver. He was driving along minding his own business, you were the one changing lanes???

fletch

yellow012 wrote: »

I wouldn't necessarily agree with you here, when you use the right hand lane you have to cut over in front of the left hand lane traffic to make the slip road. Thats why the guy had a go at you in the first place, you cut him up.
If you clipped his car I would imagine you'd be more in the wrong than the taxi driver. He was driving along minding his own business, you were the one changing lanes???

Fair enough but it does have an arrow on the road that indicated I could use the right hand lane to enter the M50S. Granted it is quite tight now however I did have my indicator on to signal my intention, I got away from the lights quicker than him so was in front.

Seth Brundle

Isn't there kind of three lanes there - the leftmost for M50S, the centre for M50S and Naas and the right lane for Naas?
Anyhow, it doesn't matter as he was driving a taxi! You therefore were in the wrong.

fletch

kbannon wrote: »

Isn't there kind of three lanes there - the leftmost for M50S, the centre for M50S and Naas and the right lane for Naas?
Anyhow, it doesn't matter as he was driving a taxi! You therefore were in the wrong.

No not anymore...only 2 lanes.

yellow012

kbannon wrote: »

Isn't there kind of three lanes there - the leftmost for M50S, the centre for M50S and Naas and the right lane for Naas?
Anyhow, it doesn't matter as he was driving a taxi! You therefore were in the wrong.

They got rid of the leftmost for M50 lane and we're left with what was the centre and right hand lanes. It is now very tight getting over to the M50 slip road from what was the right hand side lane for Naas.