Road position

simon000

What is the correct road position when you are out and about? For me I like to be at least 1 Ft away from the side of the kerb/verge just to avoid the ususal drains etc, but I have seen other riders a good 2 to 3 ft out, I know that by law you can cycle side by side so can I push myself further out? As the Highway code is, in all intense and purposes health and saftey on the road. Surely I can safely ride in the middle of the road (left hand lane), and justify my reasons if I am stopped or a disgruntled driver decides to have a word. What would they prefer me in the middle of the road or me close to the verge, hit a pot hole or another obstacle and end up under their wheels?

ddraver

1 metre is what is supposadly the correct secondary posistion (so yes 3ft) - 1 fit is certainly not anything like enough - get out into that traffic and make your presence felt!!!!

primary is the middle of the lane - delibratly to stop people overtaking - for junctions - times where it is unsafe to overtake

you ll have a much more pleasant time slightly further out!

Monty Dog

Ride where it's safest. If the inside is strewn with draincovers and debris, then avoid them. If you are riding on your own, don't ride too far out for the sake of people trying to overtake you - you are putting yourself and others in unecessary danger. The only time I generally ride in the middle is on a blind bend or when turning right at a junction - making sure there's no room for someone to come past. Finally, you are entitled to ride 2 abreast when it is safe to do so, but out of general courtesey, single-out if you're holding up traffic or the road is narrow. However, trying to make out a rational argument for why you were in such and such a position is pointless with many motorists - best just to leave them be and wallow in their ignorance.

jibi

I ride in the worn bit of road made by the cars' nearside wheels

You can usually see it even where the tarmac is only slight worn.

george

Garybee

simon000 wrote:

What is the correct road position when you are out and about? For me I like to be at least 1 Ft away from the side of the kerb/verge just to avoid the ususal drains etc, but I have seen other riders a good 2 to 3 ft out, I know that by law you can cycle side by side so can I push myself further out? As the Highway code is, in all intense and purposes health and saftey on the road. Surely I can safely ride in the middle of the road (left hand lane), and justify my reasons if I am stopped or a disgruntled driver decides to have a word. What would they prefer me in the middle of the road or me close to the verge, hit a pot hole or another obstacle and end up under their wheels?

They would prefer you out of their way usually and won't give it any more thought than that. Because of this you have to make your presence felt and take the decision, about whether or not the driver is going to overtake you, away from them. Do this by riding further out when there is not enough room for a car to safely pass.

banana_man

What are people's feelings about negotiating roundabouts? I was told that the highcode states that it is "antisocial" for a cyclist to attempt to turn right at a large roundabout (please correct me if this is not true), however i think this is complete cr*p; normally i just follow the cars in-lane because at least making my presence apparent means that i won't get flattened by some moron exiting the roundabout at silly speeds, which would probably happen if i were flapping about in the left hand lane the whole time (another thing which i think the highway code recommends).

ean

I usually ride in a position that will make drivers think about passing me. That usually puts me a foot or more to the right of grids.

BigLee1

For me it depends on the width of the road, how much traffic there is, if any cars are parked on my side of the road (then I ride so no car can get past me until I`m past the obstruction, too many near misses!) condition of the tarmac etc etc. Theres no hard & fast rule IMO. Let the conditions dictate.

Rich Hcp

I tend to ride on quiet lanes and so a foot or two from the kerb, drains permitting.

Now I know the roads I ride further out, but keep listening for traffic and try to keep out of the way. I always make a positive move out of the way for drivers so that they can see I am trying not to hold them up.

If they have given me loads of room and/or been particullay patient in waiting I give a wave of thanks.

Generally this works well and I get waves from 'regulars' as when I do my usual 10-15 mile run during the week.

If a tractor or agricultural machine is coming I generally jump off and stand on the verge. They're f*%@ing big!

felt-up

Read an interesting study a while back that noted that when overtaking, drivers unconsciously give a cyclist the same amount of space as the cyclist has left between him/herself and the kerb. So, if you're a metre out then they'll give you a metre.

I was a bit sceptical but next time you're out try it! It's uncanny! If nothing else adopting the primary road position a metre or so out from the kerb prevents cars trying to squeeze by you when there isn't room - you force them to give you a wide berth and overtake properly.

Take control!

orienteer

Worth buying a copy of "Cyclecraft" if you're not sure about positioning; there's a new edition just published.

BikeAbility teaches riders to ride about a metre out, including around parked vehicles.

When teaching kids on the BikeAbility courses, the hardest part is making them move out towards the road centre as soon as they have signalled a right turn; staying on the left , they are ignored by passing cars, despite the right signal. As we tell them, positioning is almost more important than signalling.

Roundabouts are the worst feature on a bike, but generally you should take the same position as when driving a car. The worst thing you can do is ride round the outside edge (as indicated by some misguided cycle paths!), as you will be ignored and cut up by drivers entering and exiting the roundabout.

knedlicky

Rich Hcp wrote:

I tend to ride on quiet lanes and so a foot or two from the kerb, drains permitting.

A highway engineer designs a road such that the 25 cms (=10 inches) from the curb is clear space, not meant to be used by any road-user. A cyclist is estimated to be 60 cms wide and needing a free-range width of 1 m.
It thus follows it's expected a cyclist will be 55-95 cms from the curb, which sounds good practice to me how to behave.

DavidTQ

My riding is very flexible depending on the road \ traffic \ obstructions etc etc.

As a general rule I go for 2-3' out in areas where cars can easily pass leaving a safe distance without breaking the white lines. Where things get narrower I tend to be in primary position, so that cars dont ignore the highway code and try to squeeze down without braking the white lines. When I come to a set of lights I tend to take primary position to ensure that no one trys to share the lane by squeezing up beside me when they want to turn left etc I dont filter down so much at traffic lights I prefer to hold my primary position and wait in the queue. If Im turning right across a busy road I will often pull into primary well in advance and then to the right as soon as I would start heading to the right hand side of the lane in a car.

If there is a cycle lane leading up to the lights I will NOT sit on the left hand side of any large vehicles where the driver might not be able to see a cyclist on the side of them without checking their mirrors (because they WILL NOT check their passenger side mirror), I prefer to wait back a bit.

Drivers WILL rather risk your life by passing too close rather than break the white line, if you ride in a position that means they have to break the white line you arent actually holding them up by any appreciable amount of time, but you are changeing a dangerously close poor overtaking manouvre into a properly performed overtaking manouvre, and the driver WILL give you more space as a result if they have to break the white lines anyway.

There is no guidance in the highway code as to a distance that a cycle should be from the kerb, its down to our judgement we have every right to ride where we feel makes us safest. Im not a cycle activist doing things just because I can, I just ride to make my journey as safe as possible I dont want to hold anyone up along the way, but wont compromise my safety to save someone a fraction of a second.

If occaisionally I hold other people up for a short time to make MY journey safer Im not going to sweat over it. They would lose more time if they hit me than I cost them with my road positioning. Besides which Im far from the only obstruction on the road, its a rare journey indeed for a car driver where theres not a car going slower ahead of you or a traffic queue or a set of lights... all of which will cost them more time, and the funny thing is so often they will be at exactly the same place in the queue at those traffic lights despite your road positioning costing them 5 seconds or whatever, so in fact they lose no time at all!

Many car drivers believe cyclists should ride in the gutter. These are the drivers who dont know their highway code, these are the drivers who arent aware of cyclists safety issues, these are PRECISELY the drivers that you want to make sure are giving you plenty of space, you can guarantee that these same drivers are the same ones who dont believe in leaving a cyclist as much space as they would a car... The more upset a person is by someone riding in a safe position the more important it is you were in that safe position for THAT driver.

Car drivers want to go from a to b as fast as possible, theres very few drivers out there who wont break the law to gain a few metres on the road , the fact is theres a lot of drivers out there who are very poor judges of safe distance, hence insurance premiums and numbers of crashes. We can help car drivers by positioning ourselves so they arent tempted to do something foolish and ill considered.

Whilst a motorist might well curse your existance for taking up a few feet more space, they would probably do so anyway even if you were in the gutter, they would do so if you were in a car in front of them, and what the heck would their reaction be to you driving a car up the outside of them at twice their speed within an inch of clipping their wing mirror? How often do you find theres a car in front of you slower than you away from the lights, or the line of cars is holding you up in front?

Of course its not just drivers who take risks to save seconds,,,