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Vehicles need two horns;
1) polite friendly, 'I'm here', maybe like an icecream van non-threatening tinkly sound
2) conventional, aneurism inducing, self-important, 'geddoudamywayyyy' alert.Trying to express all human intercations with a one-note system is sub-optimal.
I'm sure there's a Seinfeld episode about just this...
Had a weird interaction with a driver earlier - riding down Wickham Road, standard outside of door zone. Guy behind me honks before safely overtaking and stopping at red light 200m down the road. I stop and calmly talk to the guy about why cyclists take that position, he says 'I know, I was giving you a quick indication that I was overtaking you as I know you can't always see what's behind you'. Guy seemed like he was being genuine and I came away happy. Question is - is using your horn behind a rider a good idea in circumstances like this given that it's normally seen as aggression? After all, if I hadn't stopped to talk to the guy, I would have thought he was just another knuckle dragger who didn't like cyclists.