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Toltec
PostPosted: Fri Mar 05, 2010 17:47 
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Picked this up via PH

http://edinburghnews.scotsman.com/news/Driver-swerved-in-front-of.6127072.jp

Edinburgh Evening News wrote:
A WORRIED driver swerved in front of an unmarked police car in a bid to stop it overtaking, a court heard today.
Graeme Allan, 37, thought road markings meant you could not pass another car but when he was pulled over by police he was informed they meant there could be overtaking.

Sheriff Mhairi Stephen told Allan it was a foolish manoeuvre and his driving fell below the standard expected by a careful and competent driver.

She fined him £160 and put six penalty points on his licence.

Fiscal depute Malcolm Stewart told Edinburgh Sheriff Court: "It was 1.30am and police were on duty in an unmarked patrol car and they came up behind Allan who was driving along the A7.

"They decided to overtake him and he swerved from his lane into the path of the police car as if to try to prevent the overtaking manoeuvre."

The court heard the police driver had to pull into the other lane to avoid a crash.

Mr Stewart said: "Police stopped him and he took exception to the overtaking manoeuvre because there were road markings that he thought the police should have taken notice of but it was pointed out to him that the road markings meant there could be overtaking."

Allan, of St Andrews Way, Gorebridge, admitted driving carelessly on the A7 roadway between Eskbank Road and Hardengreen Roundabouts, Midlothian, on June 17 last year.

He was originally charged with dangerous driving but the Crown accepted his guilty plea to the lesser charge of driving carelessly.

His defence agent Jim Grant said: "He and his partner had been visiting friends.

"His partner who was eight months pregnant was in the rear of the vehicle.

"There was a police car at the back of them but it was unmarked, nothing to indicate it was part of Lothian and Borders Police.

"In any event he gets a bit worried about it getting close to the back of him and he veered over but then came back as soon as he realised.

"Clearly with his eight months pregnant girlfriend he wasn't going to participate in any dangerous manoeuvre to jeopardize her or his baby."

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Steve
PostPosted: Fri Mar 05, 2010 18:06 
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This says so much of the handful of folks who live by (what they believe is) the letter of the law regardless of how arbitrary the use of that law is, and are happy to 'enforce' it no matter what. You can bet that person is at the front of the 'speed kills' brigade.

Never mind that it was perfectly safe to overtake, it sounds like that blocking manoeuvre was itself was absolutely dangerous. :loco:

Quote:
"There was a police car at the back of them but it was unmarked, nothing to indicate it was part of Lothian and Borders Police.

Do you think that driver would have veered if the cop car was marked? :scratchchin:

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graball
PostPosted: Fri Mar 05, 2010 18:50 
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I agree wholeheartedly, it was a VERY dangerous manouvere by a very foolish and dangerous person who should have been made an example of. I have seen many examples of such foolishness when I have been overtaking in the past, usually the other driver noticeably speeding up for no good reason other than to be bloody minded. People like this who attempt to take the law into their own hands (made especially wrong by the fact that they don't even know the law anyway) should be banned.

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.
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Johnnytheboy
PostPosted: Fri Mar 05, 2010 19:17 
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Pulls classic angry-dad road-captain manouevre, & gets collared. That's made my Friday.

He probably thinks he's the safest driver on the road. Anyone care to guess the car? My money's on a Zafira.
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Johnnytheboy
PostPosted: Fri Mar 05, 2010 19:22 
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I've had a look at Google Maps. I can work out which the Eskbank Roundabout is, but not the Hardengreen Roundabout. In any case, running north and south from the former, there is no more prohibitive road marking than long dashes.

Muppet.
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graball
PostPosted: Fri Mar 05, 2010 20:06 
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This is exactly why we need more trafpol to get these dangerous fools off the roads.

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.
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Toltec
PostPosted: Fri Mar 05, 2010 20:40 
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It certainly gives me a little hope that all is not lost.

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graball
PostPosted: Fri Mar 05, 2010 20:56 
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Quote:
I've had a look at Google Maps. I can work out which the Eskbank Roundabout is, but not the Hardengreen Roundabout. In any case, running north and south from the former, there is no more prohibitive road marking than long dashes


i would guess it might be the bit running south from the Eskbank roundabout, the bit with three lanes and broken lines alongside a solid white line which would mean no crossing from the one side but ok to cross from the southerly direction.

It's still no excuse though and the guy should be made to resit his driving test.

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.
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graball
PostPosted: Sat Mar 06, 2010 11:00 
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Quote:
"Clearly with his eight months pregnant girlfriend he wasn't going to participate in any dangerous manoeuvre to jeopardize her or his baby."


Not like pulling in front of an overtaking car then??

The more I read this story the more angry i get and the more ridiculous this person appears.
He believes that the other car shouldn't have crossed the line to overtake him but he does exactly that to prevent an overtake?

I would have locked him up myself.

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.
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Toltec
PostPosted: Sat Mar 06, 2010 12:15 
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Could have done with plod this morning. I had just come off a rab and was accelerating up to speed when I saw a car reversing out of a drive on the far side of a parked car. I had already moved out to pass the parked car but held my speed down to about 25 to make sure the driver reversing had seen me, next thing a Jeep that had come off the rab a hundred yards behind me accelerated past me at 40+.

So he over took me while I was overtaking a parked car towards a reversing car.

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dcbwhaley
PostPosted: Sat Mar 06, 2010 13:02 
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toltec wrote:
So he over took me while I was overtaking a parked car towards a reversing car.


Perhaps you should have moved out to block his overtake :)

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malcolmw
PostPosted: Sat Mar 06, 2010 14:07 
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Last night I was driving along a rural A class road in a 40mph limit with a small Citroen in front and a Range Rover behind. The car in front signalled to turn left quite a long way from the junction coming up so I just slowed and dropped back to allow them to turn and me to maintain a roughly constant speed. At this point the RR overtook me and the left turner.

I, of course, immediately accellerated and stuck 10inches from his bumper for the next few miles. The cheek of the man overtaking me. :wink:

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Toltec
PostPosted: Sat Mar 06, 2010 17:49 
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dcbwhaley wrote:
toltec wrote:
So he over took me while I was overtaking a parked car towards a reversing car.


Perhaps you should have moved out to block his overtake :)


By the time he caught up the reversing driver had stopped moving so could have accelerated and left him on the rhd side approaching a rhd bend :twisted:

Didn't occur to me at the time though.

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Odin
PostPosted: Sun Mar 07, 2010 09:51 
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IMO there are way too many of these 'self-appointed' traffic police! On a journey I do regurlarly there is a stretch of road that is NSL, however it appears that most of the boneheads around think it is a 40 limit. I have lost count of the number of times I have been blocked when attempting to overtake these muppets! We need more patrols to catch these idiots, who clearly don't realise that they are driving extremely dangerously.

On a side note:
Quote:
he wasn't going to participate in any dangerous manoeuvre to jeopardize her or his baby

Curious choice of wording, is there a dispute about paternity? Surely that should be his and her baby, or indeed their baby?
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graball
PostPosted: Sun Mar 07, 2010 10:06 
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Quote:
I have lost count of the number of times I have been blocked when attempting to overtake these muppets!
Take their numbers and report them. If you have a pasenger with you try and get it filmed.

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.
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adam.L
PostPosted: Sun Mar 07, 2010 10:13 
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I have had that too. There is a nice unclassified road around here with one flat run long enough for me to overtake on. Twice I have had my perfectly safe overtakes blocked there. :loco:
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graball
PostPosted: Sun Mar 07, 2010 11:01 
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I must be lucky in this part of the world ( although a lot of people seem to think that NSL means an average speed of 40MPH and a max of 50MPH), I don't get people deliberatly stopping me overtake but do get the odd pillock who thinks it's fun to speed up a bit and I get the odd pratt who flashes their lights at you after you've passed them, can't see the point of that, if I hadn't already noticed him , I wouldn't have overtaken them in the first place...;-)

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.
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Johnnytheboy
PostPosted: Mon Mar 08, 2010 11:03 
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Odin wrote:
IMO there are way too many of these 'self-appointed' traffic police!


The PH phrase - which I like - is "Road Captains".
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hairyben
PostPosted: Thu Mar 11, 2010 22:08 
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Odin wrote:
IMO there are way too many of these 'self-appointed' traffic police! On a journey I do regurlarly there is a stretch of road that is NSL, however it appears that most of the boneheads around think it is a 40 limit. I have lost count of the number of times I have been blocked when attempting to overtake these muppets! We need more patrols to catch these idiots, who clearly don't realise that they are driving extremely dangerously.


Could not agree more.

Had it in the past - driving horrifically underpowered vans, which require a carefully planned overtake- only for some muppet to block/speed up etc and turn a safe, sensible overtake into a dangerous situation. I've come >< that close to losing my rag completely and doing something very, very inadvisable. Because lets call it what it is- a deliberate attempt to endanger your life.

What motivates these people? The general consensus is they think they're "policing" the road and stopping an "offence"- how ironic. I -like anyone with sensible attitude to driving- will slow down and cede ground to a dangerous overtake- evan with my "spitefull" cap on, I still don't care much for playing a supporting role in the sad tale of some idiots inevitable downfall.

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RobinXe
PostPosted: Thu Mar 11, 2010 23:14 
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I'm not sure its ALL Road Captainry, I also get the feeling that, in these contentious days on the roads, a lot of people feel wronged by an overtake, like you have denied them pole position or something. People need to realise that everyone on the road shares the same objective, to reach their destination with a maximum of safety and a minimum of delay; we're all on the same team!

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