Safe Speed Forums

!> If the one joining adjusts their speed properly then the existing traffic shouldn't need to.

2> Does this mean that the motorist in lane one should skank into his brakes because the one joining feels that priority is theirs? Balls!

3> How the hell would you know. You are too busy trying to make them slow down

4> It's obviously better than yours. If you are so busy looking at lane 3 then how the hell do you expect to know what is in your immediate vicinity?

5> So why did you not accelerate a little and merge in front? You are clearly an idiot who does not think at all. Let alone before you act.
You are, clearly, precisely the type this post was aimed at.
When you do finally wipe someone out, I would almost wish to be there as a witness. I would not be very nice about it. You obviously do not deserve the privilage of a license.

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Once a Cornishman, always a Cornishman

No it is not a thought. You read the code as a pedant would.

Many peanut packages say that people with nut allergies should not eat the product. It is basic commonsense.
If something says "Should" then it generally means that it can have disastrous effects not to heed a warning.
How many times did your parents substitute the word "should" for "must"?
"No, dear, you really shouldn't throw bricks at the police."

That is pedantry at its best. You are clearly one of those that Boss described. Read it to suit yourself and sod the rest of the world.

Some of you on here sound truly dangerous.

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Once a Cornishman, always a Cornishman

I agree totally with bobthedog. He obviously knows what he is talking about unlike the other muppets in this thread.
Why should I defend my driving abilities against someone who makes up his own interpretation of the highway code?

I have held a licence for 17 years, 12 as an LGV class 1 driver on night trunk work in the UK. I have NEVER had an accident, never lost a load, never had a shot load from having to brake excessively, never caused an accident e.t.c e.t.c e.t.c.

The rules are the rules. If you do not know how to join a motorway then stay off of them. If you can not merge in then you must stop at the end of the slip. This is an emergency because if you were to continue then you would die.
As a professional driver I may opt to use the hard shoulder if needed but then I would only do this if the circumstances forced it.

Please read the highway code as it it written and not as your mother read it to you. Drive according to its rules and not your own and all will be well.....unless you meet yourself joining the motorway in which case can I stand on the hard shoulder and listen to your argument with the person you collided with.

You can argue all you want in this thread but it does not make you right. It shows you up for what you really are.....a limp wristed do gooder who thinks he knows best. You do not like the highway code as it is written so you change it in your own head.

fnegroni



What the hell does the above quote have to do with joining a motorway? You are simply pulling up quotes from the highway code an trying to use them to justify your wrongness.

You really need to study the laws of the road more and spend some time in a truck.....or even better....spend some time on a motorway. I bet you are one of those camper van owners who only ventures onto the motorway once a year for the annual holiday. You drive at 35 mph and think that everyone overtaking you is a bloody maniac.

If you continue to argue that you are right and that traffic already on the motorway SHOULD be compensating for the joining traffic then get a life. Most well mannered people WILL give a little and let people in and others will not so learn to live with it.

Commendable, but what about the people with similar/greater levels of experience who've also remained accident free whilst following their own interpretation of the code w.r.t. joining the motorway?. If things were as black and white as you seem to believe they are, you'd be in a minority of people with an accident-free record, whilst all of us who adapt the rules and guidance in the Highway Code to suit the specific circumstances of each journey, and each section of each journey, would be adding to the accident stats left, right and centre. We're not. Why not?




If you absolutely physically can't get your vehicle into a safe gap in L1, because the traffic on the main carriagway has completely blocked you, then stopping on the slip/using the hard shoulder clearly are the only options remaining to you. But the discussion here isn't about what happens in this very specific circumstance, it's about how the traffic both on the slip-road and the main carriageway ought to generally behave in order to allow the free flow of both sets of traffic, regardless of what it says - or doesn't say - in the highway code. If we all drove according to the exact same interpretation of the code, and ONLY to what was contained in the code, the road network would be a pretty hideous place to be.

e.g. You arrive at the give way line at the end of a minor road, and you wish to join the traffic flow on the major road. The major road is a busy throughfare, with nose to tail traffic for extended periods during the day. You've just arrived as one of these periods has kicked off, and you're now looking at a seemingly endless stream of traffic passing by leaving no gaps large enough for you to safely join. Using only the contents of the Highway Code, explain how you intend to join the main road within the next 10 minutes.

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Chris

Hi BOSS,

Yeah you are quite right, and this is a problem across the whole road network. Drivers will interpret the rules in a way that suits themselves, the more assertive will take advantage of the cautiousness or 'doing the right thingness' of others. Two work colleagues of mine engaged in a furious row one morning after one of them had spotted the other making their way up the left lane of the exit sliproad past the traffic queueing to turn right and slipping in to the traffic on the roundabout to turn right himself. The guy who had waited in the queue was convinced that the other had broken the law or at least infringed the highway code because 'convention' says if you are turning right at a roundabout you use the right hand lane where one exists.

In my line of work I live and die by bloody rule books. I, and minds immeasurably superior to mine, have wasted many hours of productve work trying to decide whether the inclusion of the simple word 'should' in a line of text is mandating that I do something or merely making it optional.

Yes, they are not Give Ways, they are merges. That is why the HC uses the phrase "Give Priority", not "Give Way".

The best way to look at it is as two lanes on the motorway going down to one, not as a T-junction.

Also bear in mind that at many junctions there is more than one merging lane, with the lanes separated by "tiger-tail" hatched areas, so if merging from Lane 2 the options of continuing along the hard shoulder or stopping at the end of the slip road are not available. In these circumstances someone on the main line insisting on his right of way come what may could be close to murderous.

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"Show me someone who says that they have never exceeded a speed limit, and I'll show you a liar, or a menace." (Austin Williams - Director, Transport Research Group)

Any views expressed in this post are personal opinions and may not represent the views of Safe Speed

Put all this together to get the least pedantic and most pragmatic version of the rules:

• When joining a motorway, motorists should give priority to traffic already on the motorway.
• When approaching a junction, motorists should be watchful for others who wish to join the motorway. Except in emergencies, it is an offence to stop on the carriageway, slip road, or hard shoulder and an offence to drive on the hard shoulder. So, joining motorists are obliged to make every reasonable effort not to stop or drive on the hard shoulder. Therefore, you should adjust your speed and position to let joining traffic merge.

IOW, there are two teams in this game, which is one where both teams need to work together!

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Will

Quite right. It's been carefully crafted and developed over 70 years by pedants.

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

That's what I do: provided the traffic already on the motorway has left a gap where I can safely join, and travels at a predicatble and constant speed past the juction, then I can join safely by adjusting my speed accordingly. That is what I did a few days ago, and the basta*d decided to accelerate and trap me, because, like you, he thought it was not my right to join in front of him. For the record, I was joining at 70mph: the slowest I have ever joined a motorway in my life.



The priority should be around merging safely: if I have spotted a safe gap, and I am about to mergein, the traffic has no right of restricting that gap, and has to maintain that gap when passing the juction: predicatble safe driving.
I may be travelling at 130mph on the motorway if there is noone around, but as I am approaching traffic ahead of me, I need to make sure that they know I am approaching, and most likely slow down: the traffic ahead has very little ability to judge my approaching speed: I don't mind slowing down to a little above their speed (which is what they would expect me to do in normal circumstances) and accelerate back up to my previously higher speed once I got past them



Maybe I was not clear enough: I join at a speed that is in line with theirs, if not higher, and use the entire slip road to make sure they a) see me b) can also move lanes well in time if need/want to. I have never held anybody up when joining or indeed leaving the motorway and I don't think there is anything wrong in expecting the same favour from others.



Because, contrary to your abilities, mine enable me to judge all three lanes at once. You are definitely one of thos motorists that holds people on the slip road and makes them stop: BRAVO!



Are you absolutely bonkers? I accelerated enough to be well ahead of him and at his same speed: he was the one who accelerated as I was joining. I did not wipe him out: _he_ tried to wipe _me_ out, because he thought, like you, that he had every right to stop me from joining the motorway. He saw me in the distance, and thought to himself: ah, that guy is joining the motorway, what does he think, that he can just join without waiting for me to go past him? no way, I am going to teach him a lesson... etc... etc...



Well mannered people with a little brain will.
People without brains won't.
Simple enough.
I didn't even imply that I did not have to adjust my speed: I did, and this guy basically decided stop me from joining the motorway.

So we are no longer arguing over who has right of way and the correct procedure on motorway slip roads.

You were up against one of lifes Spam on that day and sadly the world is full of people like that. All we can do is put up with it or try the following:
Take down the registration number of anyone driving in such a manner and inform the police at your earliest convenience. I have on occasion contacted the police over dangerous drivers on our roads and the police do pay them a visit.

We all know, or most of us do, the correct procedure on joining a motorway. We also know what should happen when joining a motorway. The highway code did not sadly include methods of dealing with the knobheads on the road at the same time.

This is remarkable. Do you have any special links to the police? How did you find out that the motorists which you reported were, indeed, contacted?

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Malcolm W.
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not represent the views of Safespeed.

http://www.highwaycode.gov.uk/12.htm (particularly 122, 124 & 125) has some good advice on this

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Will

Well, well, well.

I have read this thread with great interest, and have noted some very good points being made..

However..

In my own experience i would say that the biggest obstacle that everybody needs to get across when joining a motorway, is their own ego's..
In my view, 7 out of 10 incidents concerned with entering a motorway are caused by inapropriate speed, the remaining 3 are usually people that cannot be seen to be settling down for second place behind someone thats driving slower than they are..

Too many people seem to intepret the highway code's rules and guidelines to suit there own circumstance and situations.
Giveway lines mean, GIVEWAY, wherever they maybe..

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Dave

1. when joining ANY carriageway, does it not say that you should not force other road users to change speed or direction? therefore, L1 has priority.

2. isnt this the same forum that recently had people complaining about trucks being in L2? and now you are complaining that we dont move over to allow people to join?

this site is beginning to disappoint me. i thought you lot were good drivers. it is becoming apparent that there is a distinct lack of consideration and understanding with regards to the professionals amongst us

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Richie

SSAFA supporter
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=126025031585

Scanny, Shaky and Boss.

Read what the fnegroni or whatever it is said earlier in the thread. It was along the lines of joining at the same speed as those in lane 3. A recipe for disaster and make no mistake. Saying he or she watches all 3 lanes, then to suggest that I cannot!
Lane 3 for God's sake!

Also states that he has only joined a motorway at 70mph on 1 occasion in his life! Well think of this. All trucks over 7.5 tonnes GVW are required to have an RSL fitted limiting their road speed to 56 mph, or has it gone down now? 2 large vehicles running in lane 1 with 100 feet between them and some idiot in a Vectra comes steaming out of a slip at 70+ mph. The car suddenly needs to be in lane 2 in a hell of a hurry thus making someone elses life difficult for a few seconds.

Those already on the motorway have priority over those joining. END OF STORY!!

Some of you on here know me. You know what I do for a living and where I do it. Some of you know why I decided that the morons on the roads in the UK were simply beyond a joke. I guess I had better enlighten this character before he starts getting personal.

So. I was an Owner Driver in the UK. I employed people to drive trucks for me and paid them wages. I contributed to the system in ways most can scarcely understand. I am damned good at what I do. I have taken large vehicles to places most won't take their cars, and have driven in weather which makes anyone in Britain stay at home with candles ready and tins of soup in case they are without power for a day. I have been to places with trucks where the wildlife can write these vehicles off just because you sounded the horn to make them move.

You have absolutely no idea how good or bad my driving is, but I do. I have managed to drive through Blizzards where you cannot see more than 20 feet ahead, and which may go on for hundreds of miles. I have driven on pack ice that is on the roads for 6 months at a time.

The only accident I have had was when some stupid woman tried to drive over a traffic island on my blind side and I bent her car virtually in half.

I am, I reiterate, damned good at what I do, and, as you may have guessed, I am a driver.

Don't start trying to insult my abilities. I drive in accordance with the law and the codes. I sold up because drivers in the UK got so utterly deplorable that my drivers had places they would refuse to drive.

You have openly admitted, however, that you exceed speed limits simply to join the motorway. You have suggested that you drive at almost double the limit and, yet, you have the nerve to suggest your skills are better than mine?

Don't make me laugh!

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Once a Cornishman, always a Cornishman

You got personal before I even had a chance to, but after your post, I am even more enlightened as to why you find driving so unbearable.



Please explain what the speed I join the motorway at, or the speed I cruise at, has to do with how safe a driver I am? I said that I cruise at a speed much higher when it is safe, and slow down to a speed easy for traffic ahead to predict when I come to overtake slower traffic.

Shouldn't the traffic in L1 try to accomodate for joining traffic?

From the earlier posts, it seemed some thought L1 should not take any action and all responsibility is in the hands of the traffic joining the motorway. It was even suggested that traffic on the slip road should stop if necessary, or use the hard shoulder. This is, IMHO, a recipe for disaster.

As much as you think being in L1 gives you the right to not let peple join safely, that's wrong.

The whole point of having a motorway and slip roads is to keep the flow of traffic "flowing". Hence why there are no T-junctions. They are slip roads so that both traffic on it and on the motorway can co-operate.

If I see two big lorries up each other's arse I join well behind them, at their speed, which is well below 70mph.

If on the other hand I find regular traffic, I make sure I spot enough of a gap so I am not just joining L1 and sit there, but can proceed to overtake and join the faster moving traffic, safely. May that be just a few mph above the L1 traffic, but enough not to hold anybody up.

I made a mistake and I am sorry. I was exagerating when I said I only joined the motorway once at 70mph. What I should have said is that I rarely join the motorway at such a speed to just about make it into L1 and without having a good look at all 3 lanes of traffic.

I still think if we used the same policy as on a racetrack's pit lane, there would be less of an issue about who has the right of way.

P.S.
The more driving experience you have, the less you brag about it...

There are huge misunderstanding in this thread. Let me try and get it sorted out. We need to step back a bit and examine some principles.

Firstly, it is obviously right that drivers should know the rules, understand the rules and obey them.

Secondly, any decent driver must be continuosly prepared to deal with problems that may arise when others don't obey the rules. This is a massively important part of practical road safety, and also a fundamental principle of 'defensive driving'. We want to be as safe as we can be even when others make mistakes.

Thirdly, any decent driver will make substantial efforts to ease the progress of others when possible. It's called courtesy and consideration, and it's also a fundamental priciple of practical road safety. We need to co-operate together.

Fourthly, Slip roads are NOT demarked from motorways with 'give way' lines. There is NO give way sign at the end of a slip road. Stopping at the end of a slip road is bloody dangerous and best avoided. The rule in the Highway code is that 'priority should be given' to traffic on the motorway.

Now all this can be put together into safe and sensible behaviour...

For vehicles joining motorways

- Accelerate to match the speed of vehicles already on the motorway.
- Adjust your speed so that you can position yourself alongside a gap in L1 traffic
- If you are unable to merge because of dense traffic in L1, this is an EMERGENCY and you should continue onto the hard shoulder looking to merge as soon as possible. DO NOT stop at the end of the slip road unless traffic ahead is stopped or nearly stopped.
- If you mess up merging any resulting crash will be your fault.

For vehicles already on the motorway

- If driving in L1 as you are approaching the on ramp, move out to L2 if possible to make it easier for vehicles to merge. (Third principle above.)
- If it isn't possible or practical to move out, be ready to adjust speed to assist those merging. (Second and Third principles above.)
- If someone is trying to merge near you and making a hash of it, do anything you can to make the situation safe. If you plan ahead, usually the most you'll even need to do is a minor speed adjustment.

And the overriding or underlying fundamental to all of the above:

Having priority will not save your life if someone else is screwing up. It's down to every individual to do their best to ensure safety even when others are screwing up.

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

I agree with Paul's comments on this, but after being on another website I found this:
http://www.drivingtestonline.co.uk/mway.html

This guy is a retired driving examiner. I agree the dotted lines aren't give way, they are give priority to, and stopping on a sliproad is bad bad, but still, thought that was interesting.

I actually totally disagree with:



It's not a give way line, a give way line is a double broken line, this is NOT a give way line, nowhere in the highway code does it say this is a give way line.

It's actually an offence to stop on a sliproad isn't it, unless it's an EMERGENCY, and in that case you could either stop at the end or use the hard shoulder, IMO hard should would be much easier to use, because it's going to be great fun joining a motorway from a standstill...

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Mike

Well I've never read such a load of drivel from so called professionals in all my life!

Like some other contributors to this thread, I am also a wagon driver.

You can twist and turn the Highway Code rules as much as you want, but the fact remains that regardless of whether the dotted lines mean "give way" or "give priority" it's one and the same thing. If the vehicle in L1 doesn't want to move over to let you join then tough $h!t. Nowhere does it state that vehicles on the main carriageway MUST/SHOULD move over to allow slip road vehicles to merge; that is the responsibility of the merger to sort out.

What's cocked up this country's ways of merging onto motorways are the overly considerate wagon drivers that move over into L2 to accomodate the simpleton car drivers coming down the slip roads that don't know how to drive. If the wagons stayed in L1 then eventually the simpletons would get it into their tiny heads that if they want to stand a chance of joining the motorway then they need to engage their brains and adjust their speeds to merge properly, which of course is the main problem. This would then stop every merging vehicle bringing the whole motorway to a stand still because wagon in L1 moves into L2, which then causes the middle-lane hogging Rover driver doing 1mph more than the wagon to cack his load and move into L3 still doing 57mph, thus causing all the 90mph BMW drivers and rep mobiles to slam on and drop their razors into their cups of coffee that they've got balanced between their legs which has now slopped and burnt their nads....

For the record, on long down hill or flat slip roads I don't move into L2 for anything. If you can't manage to adjust your speed to merge in 400yds+ of tarmac then you shouldn't be on the road. This doesn't just apply to cars and vans, it also applies to my fellow colleagues who seem to think that they've got some God given right to L1 and whatever is already in there MUST move out of the way to let them merge.

For short slip roads or a heavy stream of traffic on the slip road, I will move over if there's a gap to move in to, other than that I will attempt to maintain the same speed in the hope that the joiners will realise they're not going fast enough and get their toe down a bit more, but I will ease off slightly if necessary. What I won't put up with are the Rover and Peugeot 106 drivers that tootle along the slip roads at 30mph and then expect me to slow down or move over to accomodate them - that's just all wrong. If they do decide to risk their life and pull out in front of me to test my brakes then they're extremely stupid and are dicing with death and they'll instantly find their burrholes filled with 100dB of air horn plus quite possibly finding themselves pushed on to the hard shoulder as I come past them. If it's good enough for one.....

All that remains for me to say for now is this:

To those people who think they've got a right to join and cause vehicles on the main carriageway to slow down/move over : would you still drive the same way if it was a police car in L1?

Rixxy

Thankyou Rixxy.
To say give way is different to give priority is sheer nonsense. The person who called my abilities and qualifications into question is wrong.
If anyone considers that merging at 70+mph between two trucks, doing 56 mph, is safe then they are deluded. They will have to pull out into lane 2 immediately and will not have time to adjust their speed, should the need arise, without hitting the middle pedal hard.
Merging at, say, 60 would give them much more time and not frighten the crap out of the truck driver behind them. Surely this is obvious?

I think that the majority of people posting to this thread drive in a bubble 100 feet long, 14 feet wide. All they see is 100 feet in front and a few feet either side. I.e. the 100 feet ahead of them on a motorway. They have no idea what is going on in other lanes or behind them and they don't care.

I spend some of my time in city traffic here. Some of the motorways have 8 lanes in either direction yet people tend to realise things can get dangerous in a real hurry.

In New York, there are 24 lane highways and people are still more courteous than they are in Britain. That's New York City where the usual question is something like "do you know the time, please, or should I just go F*** myself?"

Fngeroni. Now you say you exagerrated. I tend to agree that 70mph is on the low side for a maximum, but you are not in a position to obey one law, disregard others then go on forums trying to teach people infinitely wiser than you how to drive. Those that have agreed with my original post seem to all be professional drivers. People who probably know a thing or two about how to drive with courtesy, caution and foresight.

They have to deal with people disregarding their own and others safety all day, every day. As for the reason I left, it's because I am better than that, and I don't have nearly so many idiots to watch out for here. I can easily drive 700 miles a day here and not have to slow down for some idiot demanding priority once in all those miles.

Worth it just for that.

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Once a Cornishman, always a Cornishman