Bad driving, lane discipline, undertaking & the LAW

[ChrisCurvyS]

Sadly I spend nearly alll of my commute on dual carriageways and motorways - few obs:

1 - As others have said, spend as little time as possible alongside vehicles in other lanes. Unless you're overtaking them, make sure you're either a good few feet in front or a good few feet behind.

2 - Think the outside lane hoggers are split between those who are just oblivious to the Highway Code/what's going on around them (most) and those who see you behind them and deliberately set out to annoy by lingering.

3 - One thing that's not been mentioned is people who've been sat behind a slower vehicle for ages but suddenly decide to pull out as you're coming up behind them, even when there's nothing behind you so they could have waited just a few seconds to save you a lot of hassle.

Having said all that, don't forget about 1 in 10 people on the road are driving illegally (much more in some areas) so expecting them to keep abreast of the Highway Code is probably a little unrealistic.

[yorkie_chris]

Originally Posted by ChrisCurvyS

Having said all that, don't forget about 1 in 10 people on the road are driving illegally (much more in some areas) so expecting them to keep abreast of the Highway Code is probably a little unrealistic.

About 1 in 3 in Bradford and it shows.

Originally Posted by ChrisCurvyS

Having said all that, don't forget about 1 in 10 people on the road are driving illegally (much more in some areas)

Originally Posted by yorkie_chris

About 1 in 3 in Bradford and it shows.

Never realised it was this high. We really should move towards the European system whereby insurance, MOT are an obligatory sticker in the windscreen much like our tax disk, and it's the law to carry your license at all times when driving.

If this were the case police could just stand in the road and wave cars into a layby for a 2 minute random check, and take illegal drivers off the road there and then. That ratio would quickly drop.

It IS law to carry your licence while driving, the police are just pretty lenient on it.

As for the insurance and MOT, tax discs are bad enough in the days of computers, they should eb able to get that info from the reg without needing us to muck about with a silly bit of paper.

Originally Posted by Spank86

It IS law to carry your licence while driving, the police are just pretty lenient on it.

As for the insurance and MOT, tax discs are bad enough in the days of computers, they should eb able to get that info from the reg without needing us to muck about with a silly bit of paper.

You're right about the licence, you're supposed to carry the photo I.D. and the counterpart at all times.

As for the MOT, insurance and tax, they do use an ANPR to check the car/bike/vehicle has these things, but, for some reason only tax discs remain as the a need for physical representation

[yorkie_chris]

Originally Posted by Spank86

It IS law to carry your licence while driving, the police are just pretty lenient on it.

I thought it was in law that you also have the option of a producer, which in practical terms mean no it isn't law that you have to carry it about.

The computer databases are notoriously innaccurate. Try out the insurance one on your vehicles here http://www.askmid.com/

If you started seizing every car that was wrong on the computer database, you'd have some very angry law abiding people.

I'd still want a bit of paper to show I'd paid my money.

[yorkie_chris]

I've got a traders policy and can add vehicles to MID without much if any checking as to whether I own it or not, it wouldn't exactly be hard to use that with nefarious intent.

Originally Posted by yorkie_chris

I thought it was in law that you also have the option of a producer, which in practical terms mean no it isn't law that you have to carry it about.

Like I said, the law says you have to carry it but the police only issue a producer if you fail to so theres not much in the way of punishment.


It's also law that you cant cycle on footpaths but theres no punishment for that either (footpaths, not footways).

Originally Posted by yorkie_chris

nefarious

Even I as the author of the most waffling posts on the forum, had to google that one.