Near Miss of the Day 860: Van driver almost takes cyclist out …
The cyclist was pedalling down Brighton Road in south London when a driver with a business van hooked left and cut across him with a dangerously high speed, and when the cyclist posted the video leading the business getting review bombed, its response was more threatening than apologetic…
The Croydon-based cyclist, who goes by the name of CycleGaz onTwitter is a cycling campaigner and frequently documents cycling in London (‘the good times and bad’).
The incident took place on in August last year, when he was cycling on the, wait for it, cycle lane in Brighton Road. As he was about to reach the junction at Riddlesdown Road opposite the Royal Oak Centre, a lorry van swerved to take a wider line and maintain higher speed before cutting across left in front of CycleGaz.
CycleGaz had to slam down on his disc brakes, which left marks on his tyre. He said: “If I was not hyperaware, on a bike with hydraulic disk brakes, and extremely experienced at using said brakes, this would have resulted in a collision that would have left me with serious injuries.”
He told road.cc that he had reported it via the Met police website and received a standard response after a few days that a Notice of Intended Prosecution had been sent to the registered keeper of the vehicle. When he requested an update in March, he was informed that only a Driving Awareness Course had been issued to the driver.
This is what I’m worried about. The junction needs to be fixed so nobody gets hurt!
— CycleGaz™ (@cyclegaz) April 12, 2023[1]
Yup, was planning on carrying on around, not turn left.
— CycleGaz™ (@cyclegaz) April 12, 2023[2]
I wouldn’t be. My partner was was crashed into (in her car) side on by a vehicle running a red light. She needed to be cut out and required surgery. Driver got awareness course. But on the same junction there’s a camera that if you go over the white line a fraction, 3 points £90
— Mark Brotherhood (@MTBrotherhood) April 12, 2023[3]
One reply also pointed out that his heart rate, which is visible in the video, jumped to 146BPM after the close pass, increasing from the 129BPM when he was cycling, despite a pause in the physical effort.
Amidst all this, the business to whom the lorry belonged has got caught up. After CycleGaz posted the video on social media, eagle-eyed viewers were quick to point that the van belonged to a certain Carpet Supplies, and thus began the exercise of review bombing, despite CycleGaz requesting people not to do it.
This post is intended to highlight the poor actions of the Met Police and to flag the dangerous junction.
Please do not contact or review the company in question.
— CycleGaz™ (@cyclegaz) April 12, 2023[4]
> Near Miss of the Day 859: Driver cuts across cyclist at speed, narrowly misses front wheel[5]
However, the business, instead took a quite interesting approach, threatening the reviewers with a defamation case. Under one one-star review, it said: “We kindly request you remove this false review in relation to the flooring business, you have not purchased or received any service from the company.
“Your comment is in regards to a closed civil matter and not to the services that carpet supplies limited have offered. Should the review not be removed the review and your details will be included in the defamation case being raised against the individual who posted the video should he not remove it from all online platforms as requested.”
However, CycleGaz has denied that he had received any information of a defamation case against him from the business owner.
> Near Miss of the Day turns 100 – Why do we do the feature and what have we learnt from it?[6]
Over the years road.cc has reported on literally hundreds of close passes and near misses involving badly driven vehicles from every corner of the country – so many, in fact, that we’ve decided to turn the phenomenon into a regular feature on the site. One day hopefully we will run out of close passes and near misses to report on, but until that happy day arrives, Near Miss of the Day will keep rolling on.
If you’ve caught on camera a close encounter of the uncomfortable kind with another road user that you’d like to share with the wider cycling community please send it to us at info [at] road.cc or send us a message via the road.cc Facebook[7] page.
If the video is on YouTube, please send us a link, if not we can add any footage you supply to our YouTube channel as an unlisted video (so it won’t show up on searches).
Please also let us know whether you contacted the police and if so what their reaction was, as well as the reaction of the vehicle operator if it was a bus, lorry or van with company markings etc.
> What to do if you capture a near miss or close pass (or worse) on camera while cycling[8]
References
- ^ April 12, 2023 (twitter.com)
- ^ April 12, 2023 (twitter.com)
- ^ April 12, 2023 (twitter.com)
- ^ April 12, 2023 (twitter.com)
- ^ > Near Miss of the Day 859: Driver cuts across cyclist at speed, narrowly misses front wheel (road.cc)
- ^ > Near Miss of the Day turns 100 – Why do we do the feature and what have we learnt from it? (road.cc)
- ^ road.cc Facebook (www.facebook.com)
- ^ > What to do if you capture a near miss or close pass (or worse) on camera while cycling (road.cc)