Please report dangerous drivers to the police - Roadsafe. Report to plod, not just whinge here.

Brave and deerfaced repped. :)

http://www.met.police.uk/roadsafelondon/

I've never done this before, and I wasnt even involved but this is standard for me from now on

"At approx 17:35 a driver driving a -------------------- aggressively overtook a cyclist on a Barclays cycle hire bike at the junction of Old Street and Central street EC1 and then made threats to kill the cyclist through the passenger window. The driver then dangerously swerved towards the cyclist before driving off. I was also cycling and witnessed this take place."

Have just reported a skip driver who jumped a red light and attempted to go through the green cyclist light when children and their mothers were about to cross on their way to school to the company's manager. He has assured me he will speak to the driver (thank goodness I managed to remember the reg number!) and get back to me. Let's see what happens.

Oh wait, akchooalz, meant I reported the driver to their company. Should I report to the police, too? Don't know if there's a point, anymore...

Having watched a Sunlight lorry jump both stop lines, I thought that I'd just mention to him that he should really have stopped behind the first stop line. Especially as I'd got him jumping both lines on my helmet camera. If he hadn't told me to "Fuck Off", I'd have left it there, as it is, the email below is with Sunlight. Should I just leave it at this (I'm quite tempted to, I suspect the response from Sunlight may be quite tough, and if its not I can always pass it over then right?)

I had a chat with another lorry driver who had done the same thing closer to home, and he was really apologetic, and said he hadn't realised quite how important the advanced bike stop bits were to cyclists, and said he'd try to keep out of them in future. Top guy that one.

Dear Sirs,

I was very dissapointed by the behavior of one of your lorry drivers today. I am a cyclist, and as such am very aware that lorries have killed more cyclists in London this year then there have been servicemen killed in Afghanistan. The behavior of lorry drivers is therefore of great concern to me.

Today (24/05/2011) I watched one of your drivers (who was drving the lorry with the registration number MX06 NGJ) fail to stop at both the advanced cycle line and the main stop line heading south at the junction of Garrett Lane with Burntwood Lane). This was at around 15:33.

I used the cycle lane to the left hand side of the lorry to pull level with the cab and inform him that he had just jumped both stop lines. His response to this was to tell me to "Fuck Off".
I would like to know if this meets the normal standard of driving and courtesy that you expect from your drivers, and what training you provide them as to how they are expected to drive around cyclists, given the particuarly high level of threat that lorrys cause to cyclists.
I would also be interested to know what technological solutions your lorries are equipped with to help your drivers avoid accidents involving cyclists.

If you would like to have the video of the incident that I have, and the GPS track that shows the times that I was interacting with your driver let me know, and I will provide them.

Yours
Mr Drem

Is this going over the top? I don't want to aggravate the lorry drivers, but there are big problems on the route that I ride with cars and lorrys just ignoring the advanced stop lines.

I should also I suspect add that I'm a cyclist who is careful to not jump red lights, but I try not to judge those who do too harshly ;) (maybe give them a slightly hacky look as I overtake them later ;))

Dear Sirs,

I was very dissapointed by the behavior of one of your lorry drivers today. I am a cyclist

That's where they'll stop reading.

Post it on YouTube and send them the link

That's where they'll stop reading.

Too pessimistic. I had a very good response from a company not long ago when I wrote to complain.

I'm willing to give them a chance to respond to me, but if the answers aren't right, or there's no response, youtube and the merry plod it will be.

To be fair, a wrong answer would be something along the lines of "LOL, U SERIOUS?"

I think that larger companies do tend to take this sort of complaint more seriously, as they are never sure exactly who you are in terms of contracts that they might want...

Too pessimistic. I had a very good response from a company not long ago when I wrote to complain.

Not really, I'm going to suggest it's a better closing paragraph than an opening one.

I am a cyclist, and as such am very aware that lorries have killed more cyclists in London this year then there have been servicemen killed in Afghanistan. The behavior of lorry drivers is therefore of great concern to me.

Not really, I'm going to suggest it's a better closing paragraph than an opening one.

Fair point, I'll switch it round next time.

I think the tone and content is fine. Not over the top and all threatening, but makes it clear you have evidence. Also although I'm usually in favour of keeping letters etc short, I think the detail you've provided and the time taken to put pen to paper-- so to speak -- indicates you are serious and likely to take it further if they don't respond appropriately. Well done!

The only thing I would have done differently is to try and keep the general discussion about cyclists and HGVs to a minimum and stick to the specifics of the incident and their company policy. Putting them on the spot about safety devices and so on might make them defensive.

Last tuppence. It is worth complaining about these incidents. A few years back I had an altercation with a black cab on Westminster Bridge whilst in my car. I complained to the public carriage office and although the process was v. long winded (the cabbie basically flipped all my allegations and said I had behaved badly) the PCO ruled in my favour and the cabbie got a warning put on his record. It took about 5 months in all, but the wait just meant the victory was all the sweeter

I'd just removed the serviceman part.

very keen to see your videos.

very keen to see your videos.

I'm just running a Muvi Atom on the front of my helmet, Amazon had them relatively cheap recently.

The quality's not great, but its not that bad either, and you can see numberplates. Might try to get a clip from todays ride in up at lunchtime if you're lucky ;)

It's always worth complaining to the company. When I worked for Brake Brothers (now Brakes), the frozen food delivery people, they had a policy of two complaints from the public about driving = instant dismissal. Now I'm sure that in today's HR culture this will have been toned down, but still I agree, companies do not want potential customers who do a Google search to have that sort of video pop up near the top of the search results.

Just a quick update to prove that it is worth contacting companies...

I had a phonecall from their Fleet Administrator (and now an email so I've got somewhere to send it to) from Sunlight to let me know that they will be interviewing the driver either today or tommorow, and that they would quite like to see my video and GPS track of the bit of the ride.

The have promised to email me again with the outcome of their investigation once they've completed it.

They earn some respect, as they do seem to be taking it seriously, I'll update with any more info when they get back to me.

right in the kisser.

Just got back a very quick response from TfL about an incident on Tuesday on Balham High Road.

A bus overtook myself and another cyclist (Hi, if you're here) as the road veered left, then veered back in before he'd cleared us. Going straight over the bike lane markers on the road pushing us both onto the curb at about 15-20mph. We both stayed up but I had my wheel touching the curb on my left and the bus scraping my right shoulder at one point.

Thank you for your communication regarding the driving standards of one of our drivers. I would like to assure you that here at Merton Garage all complaints regarding driving standards are treated very seriously indeed by the staff here in the accident prevention department.

I can inform you that as a direct result of the information you have provided in your communication, I have been able to trace the bus involved and obtained the CCTV images of the incident.

I can clearly see the incident as described by yourself and agree that the performance of our driver does not reach the standard that we would expect.

The driver has been interviewed by myself and has been disciplined for his poor performance and is receiving additional training from one of our specialist mentors to prevent a repeat of the incident in the future.

Please accept my sincere apologies for the incident, should you wish to discuss the matter further with me, my direct telephone number is [removed]

Quite impressed as I didn't send the complaint until about midnight last night.

Edit: Tip: always make a note of the time and snap the route number, registration and bus number.

Absolute cnut of a taxi driver at E&C on my way home from work today. Heading north up Kennington Park Road a Brompton rider kept RLJing and I kept overtaking after waiting for the green light (I have been known to RLJ but only when it's safe). Anyway I get to the new layout heading north at E&C and am in the CS7 lane. I'm approaching said Brompton rider at speed and check my right shoulder for any traffic in the bus lane. Nothing.

I continue to overtake the foldup nodder and continue to pass other similar riders in the Cycle lane. I'm just in the bus lane at this point when a lovely maroon hackney carriage decides to move from traffic into the bus lane (no problem there) and then continues to gain on me nearly clipping my rear wheel. I look over at him and gesture 'what do you want me to do?' I still can't move into the full cycle lane. He pushes on, now he's next to me wheel to wheel...

He shouts "Is the cycle lane not big enough for you, you cnut?!" to which I reply not so cleverly, "Not quite, how big is your taxi lane, oh, I forgot there isn't one!" He shouts more at me telling me to get off the road. He has to slow with traffic, I carry on to the ASL. When the light goes green again he races up the bus lane where the bus stops are outside the shopping centre and tries to barge me towards two busses that are pulling out.

The whole banter continued around the main island where he I went on towards borough and he disappeared to whatever shit hole he crawled out of. I usually find taxi drivers quite thoughtful, this guy was a huge disappointment to their kind.

[/rant]

I was going to report this reckless young scamp on a moped to the police, but then I somehow noticed they were already on his case:
http://vimeo.com/m/#/24578825
Wish I'd got a bit more of this chase on cam.

ITYM

Untitled on Vimeo

Edit: Also, thanks for cheering me up at work!

I'm thinking it's just lacking the Benny Hill theme music...

more cyclists in London this year then there have been servicemen killed in Afghanistan.

I agree with Ed, I don't think that bit's needed, it's a bit wanky.

But good result by the looks of it.