Safe Speed Forums

Suppose you're approaching a roundabout and your view of traffic on the roundabout is obscured. You can take one of two subtly different standpoints. You might think:

a) "I'm going unless there's traffic on the roundabout" or

b) "I'm stopping unless there's no traffic on the roundabout"

Is there a term (in psychology perhaps?) for these different styles of approach?

I have quite strong thoughts about the better approach, but I'll keep them to myself until we've had a few votes.

This poll has no fixed time limit.

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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

Seems a bit like asking if the glass is half full or half empty . Still, it made me think about what I do when approaching roundabouts, or at least what I should probably do. If I'm brutally honest I'm not sure if the line between the two options isn't a bit blurred in reality. Could you provide another button marked "depends"?

It is hard to say. I plumped for 'I'm going unless someone is on the roundabout', which is probably the less safe option. But I'd like to take the chance to qualify it - I'll only think that if I have a clear view of the other entrances to the roundabout from a long way off. If it's in a busy town, or there's a wall or another vehicle blocking my view, then it would be dangerous to continue assuming the coast is clear, and so I don't.

I do, however, think it's important to avoid being one of those people who stops unnecessarily at roudabouts when it's obviously clear. They're spending a longer period of time in the 'danger zone' with a greater speed differential between themselves and other traffic.

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-mike[F]
Caught in the rush of the crowd, lost in a wall of sound..

It maybe that I need better definitions or something, but I am convinced that there's an important driver attitude factor that underlies this poll question.

Trying to cut it down to the basics, we're talking about a situation where a driver is approaching a give way situation, and for the time being has no knowledge whether or not the road is clear to continue past the give way. This is commonplace at T junctions and roundabouts.

Type a and type b drivers have different plans. Type b drivers are braking smoothly to stop at the give way line. Type b drivers are planning a path or a potential path past the give way line.

You can spot type b drivers because when they find that they do have to give way they have to increase braking effort to stop at the give way line.

There is no type c. We are all either type a or type b. In some situations differences in the circumstances may enable us to behave differently, but that's usually to do with knowledge of the potentially conflicting traffic stream. We have to apply the test BEFORE we have that knowledge. At junctions where the knowledge arrives early or late it's hard to tell the difference between As and Bs.

I strongly recommend type B behaviour. It's less stressful, smoother and gives you more time to observe the potentially conflicting traffic. Type Bs are less likely to be rear ended because they do not have to adjust their braking when conflicting traffic appears.

Several highly experienced drivers I've been conversing by email with haven't really understood the distinction. I feel I have more work to do to get this observation whipped into a form that everyone properly understands.

It's probably one of those case where a subtle underlying attitude pops up as quite a wide range of behaviours, and I'm not at all sure if I have yet identified the most basic form of it.

These attitude factors are very important in determining an individual's accident rate. We have seen various "attitude proxies" in driver training methods that appear to succeed because they cause planning to take place a few precious tenths of a second sooner. This observation seems to me to fall into a similar class.

Comments welcome.

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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

Very interesting topic, Paul, especially when you start really analysing it.
To start with, I think that two aspects must be very clearly distinguished:
- the THINKING part
- the DOING part.
The DOING part is simply what the driver actually does, and needs no further explanation here.
The thinking part is, I believe, quite complex, and I think that any decent driver is constantly visualising and assessing various "what if" scenarios. The action actually taken would be the one appropriate for the "selected" scenario. The scenario "selected", and the number of assessments/selections per time-unit would be related to driver skill. This raises an interesting point, namely that how good a driver is can vary from moment to moment.
This also means that in the hypothetical roundabout situation a driver will start off as type "B" (preparing in his/her mind for the possibility of having to stop, though not necessarily actually DOING anything different yet) and then become type "A" as more information is received.
So what I would consider to be a dopey driver would not switch to "A" until they had stopped at the line then reassessed the situation because the "A" scenario was not seriously entertained by them up to that point. A non-dopey driver would select the scenario for "A" probably much sooner because he/she would be considering that scenario much sooner and took it seriously as an option at an earlier point. Obviously a good driver would only select the "A" scenario after they were convinced that it was safe to do so, and up to that point would be selecting "B" scenarios meaning that they could gently stop at the line if the situation required that.
Therefore the answer is Gatsobait's "C" , it depends!

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p.s. I am still absolutely floored by Paul's death. May 2008 be the greatest ever for SafeSpeed. His spirit lives on.

Well, I'm a type B, at least I am while I'm sitting at a keyboard . In the real world I expect I switch between the two depending on visibility, local knowledge, conditions at the time etc.
If I'm reading this right it seems then that what you're really asking is when approaching a roundabout or junction are we mentally prepared to stop? I treat give way lines as meaning 'be prepared to stop', and off the top of my head I can only think of one roundabout that doesn't have give way lines (and that's only on one approach). So when I'm coming up to a roundabout I tend to use engine braking to slow down gently, while covering the brake so I can stop if I see the roundabout is occupied. I will only start to accelerate again if I see that there is a clear path. Sometimes of course I can see if there's a clear path quite a way off, but roundabouts with this sort of visibility are rare. Having said all that, I drive slightly differently in Mrs Gatsobait's car as it is relatively gutless and engine braking is not as effective. I tend to come off the accelerator much earlier and try to approach the give way lines gently on the brakes in 2nd so that if there's space I can still accelerate into it without having to swear at the car for being so lame in 3rd . Does that make me an A type or a B type? In Mrs Gatsobait's car I think I'm definitely a B. In mine I'm not so sure. Tricky. If you just asked everyone "When approaching a junction or a roundabout are you prepared to stop?" we'd all say yes and you wouldn't find out anything about attitudes.

I've recently see the "Roadcraft" video, and they cover the point in this thread with the phrase:

"Planning to stop but looking to go"

Seems spot on to me.

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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

Having 'observed' my behaviour over the last few weeks, I wish to change my vote. From gut reaction, I originally voted: "I'm going unless there's traffic on the roundabout", on the basis that I don't stop at roundabouts if I don't have too. (It's one of my bug bears that some people seem to treat roundabouts as if they have STOP signs. )

As other posters have already stated, either statement is probably too simplified, but I now know that: "I'm stopping unless there's no traffic on the roundabout", is far closer to my actual behaviour.

I agree Paul, "Planning to stop but looking to go" is probably a much clearer way of putting it.


Kaz

When training to become a driving instructor I was taught to plan my junctions so that on approach you guage the visibility and select the correct gear based on whether you think you will need to stop.

I was taught that on approach to a junction with good visibilty into the junction and a clear road you select second gear(or Higher dependent on situation) approach the line using PSL,MSM etc and continue smoothly. On a junction with poor visibility you aould approach with a view to stop selecting first gear on approach at a speed that will allow you to stop on the line but if conditions dictate also allow you to continue.

Just as a matter of interest I failed my first test due to "speeding" amongst some other minor faults.

I am currently awaiting my retest