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I can't see you when you do that
I'll take "blaming other road users for your vehicles blindspot" for $500, Alex.
Sounds like the driver was trying to change lanes and you expect other road users to let him do so? Nah mate, if you wanna change lanes and there's traffic in the other lane then you wait.
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Nah mate, if you wanna change lanes and there's traffic in the other lane then you wait.
I partially agree with this, but there is a modal difference: if one vehicle driver decides to stop and allow the lorry to change planes then all other vehicles behind it have to wait, since it blocks the lane into which the lorry wants to change.
With bicycle traffic this doesn't follow as subsequent bikes can just nip through. It takes a lot of bikes to block a lane. (This is usually a good thing!)
Once the cycle traffic density reaches a certain point, such as Waterloo bridge at commute time, the lorry driver is very restricted in available options.
I'm not sure of what the best strategy is for the lorry driver in these circumstances. Probably suck it up and wait for a long time, with all attendant increase in frustration and ill feeling toward cycle traffic. Oliver?
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But it's not "traffic in the other lane" is it? It's filtering, and in my opinion, the highway code doesn't take London peak time into account when outlining "dos and don'ts" of filtering.
Ultimately, yes, with filtering bikes and motorcycles, that lorry needs to wait, but until someone gives way to the driver of the lorry, it could be waiting a long time. Which is going to cause a bigger issue. Then, like @mashton says, there's nothing forcing all filterers to give way just because one is, due to the size of bikes.
Realistically though, it sounds like this is more of a case of a bunch of cyclists using the LH lane to undertake the lorry, moving from RH lane to LH lane and then back to RH lane, which would put them at fault, because can you class it as filtering if there's nobody in the LH lane?
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He was being let through by a bus in the right hand lane but the cyclists who wanted to turn right just kept going through the gap created for the lorry by the bus. It was just selfish. No higher moral purpose like holding up the highway code ;) At peak time on waterloo bridge, especially with yesterday's clusterfuck on Aldwych, that lorry would have never been able to move until the last cyclist went through (which would have been ages). It would have unnecessarily held both lanes of traffic when all the cyclists had to do was wait 5 seconds.
mashton
NurseHolliday
dirac
loads of cyclists were undercutting a massive lorry who was trying to switch from the right hand to left hand turning lane on Waterloo bridge this morning. All they had to do was wait and let him through and they would have had the entire lane in front of the lorry to ourselves. Instead, after the lorry was changing lane, they all selfishly, and dangerously undertook the fella only to move back into the right hand turn lane; they were squeezing into the ever closing gap between the lorry and the road barrier. Understandably he was pretty angry: "you guys are literally nuts, are you trying to get yourselves killed...I can't see you when you do that." etc. I wasn't the only cyclist holing back who genuinely thought we were going to witness one of those horror stories involving bikes and lorries. Selfish idiots.