The nearside pass

[7db]

My commute takes me through some of the busy roads of West London. Yesterday I had an interesting situation.

2-lane dual carriageway with heavy traffic moving at around 40mph. I'm in lane two making gentle progress past slower lane one traffic. Ahead at a following distance is a van which has come alongside another van in lane one. Both have good space ahead and behind is a golf which has been a little closer than I would like for the past mile, following me. Lane 1 is otherwise empty.

As I reach around 250m from my exit we have a slight incline, and the change in speeds make me decide that the van ahead isn't going to safely clear the other van, and leave room for me to do a sensible pass before exiting so I decide to slot in to lane one.

Mirrors confirm lane one clear and golf still rummaging through my boot, indicate, mirrors and the golf is moving quickly to the nearside. This is my blindspot but I suspect conflict, as I suspect a close into the gap I'm heading for. My exit is approaching.

What would you have done?

[driverpete]

Option 1. Keep left indicator on, hold position and see how the Golf reacts, using shoulder checks if he's in my blind spot. If he holds back then slot in, big "Thankyou" wave and exit.

Option 2. If no further traffic behind me I'd slow and aim to drop in behind the Golf (assuming he decides to pass on my nearside).

Option 3. If the Golf is making dogged progress up along my nearside and there is traffic behind me then bite the bullet and carry on to the next exit.

[TripleS]

My commute takes me through some of the busy roads of West London. Yesterday I had an interesting situation.

2-lane dual carriageway with heavy traffic moving at around 40mph. I'm in lane two making gentle progress past slower lane one traffic. Ahead at a following distance is a van which has come alongside another van in lane one. Both have good space ahead and behind is a golf which has been a little closer than I would like for the past mile, following me. Lane 1 is otherwise empty.

As I reach around 250m from my exit we have a slight incline, and the change in speeds make me decide that the van ahead isn't going to safely clear the other van, and leave room for me to do a sensible pass before exiting so I decide to slot in to lane one.

Mirrors confirm lane one clear and golf still rummaging through my boot, indicate, mirrors and the golf is moving quickly to the nearside. This is my blindspot but I suspect conflict, as I suspect a close into the gap I'm heading for. My exit is approaching.

What would you have done?

Immediately descended into a state of total panic, desperately anxious to get away from West London and back to North Yorkshire.

Actually I think driverpete has provided some good suggestions, so I'll leave it at that, but it does illustrate how even a very keen and highly accomplished driver (sincere comment, no fannel, David) can still find himself in slightly tricky situations occasionally.

[7db]

I think Option 2 is a very grown-up option -- seeking refuge in the safest place on the road: behind the idiot. It would have cost me all of one car length at 30 mph as well (1/3s).

In the event, I think I sought to continue my manoeuvre rather than reassess: I opted to seek cooperation before running for refuge. The aggressive version of Option 1 was leaving my left indicator and drifting slowly towards the nearside with a long blast of the horn (in the tunnel ). I think the closing gap was uncomfortable for her to accelerate into.

She cooperated.

Had she not, I would have abandoned my drift. Although it was all rather uncomfortable making that judgment in my nearside blindspot. On the whole I'd rather I chose differently.

That said, I'm a fan of the drift -- as a piece of chassis-language, it can really reinforce an indicator in persuading passing traffic (particularly with a low speed differential) that you are really serious about changing lane. Best started from wide of the crease.

[MGF]

I'd like to think I would be in lane 1 earlier having anticipated others might also want to abandon lane 2 for the exit. As such anticipation often escapes me I would be looking at moving in behind if she was that close

[Jack Russell]

In my experience of London driving these situations tend to be subtly different each time encountered so formulating a general driving plan to fit is extremely tricky.

My general driving plans of 'what I would do if's...' is constantly being updated, daily, from every driving experience. Therefore a specific answer is impossible.

I think your option 1 depending on their reaction is quite valid, with option 2 ready if it were looking dodgy.

However I do agree with MGT I'd like to think I had read ahead and was already in lane 1, which you said was 'otherwise empty' assuming that's how the situation was reading.

Pete

[WhoseGeneration]

Depending upon mood, let Golf get ahead and drop in behind or "assertive" acceleration and hit lane 1 before Golf.
As always, one would have had to have been there to truly decide the best approach.

[7db]

Earlier is nearly always better, although this was reasonably early - around 15s before the exit and around 10s after the previous one.

This is where I started to indicate:-
https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=hanger ... 7,,0,-2.43

It was only the decision that the final overtake, slot-in, establish and exit was unlikely to be comfortable that was clear to me at that stage. The conflict was resolved by the time we exited the tunnel.

I suspect my indicator / movement triggered the Golf to tuck in.

[Ancient]

It's possible the Golf driver saw your indicator and thought "I want that exit too", causing the move across at the same time.

London driving is always 'different', with people happy to drive much closer than most other places IME and a certain assertiveness being taken for granted (or you get squeezed out). OTOH I've always found more people give way in London when the traffic is truly crawling.

[Slink_Pink]

The tunnel may have given you a slight edge in this particular scenario as the general drop in light levels would have enhanced the relative brightness of your indicator, and nicely amplified the effect of the horn!

[zadocbrown]

Impossible to comment specificaly without being present. But I think these things are more straight forward than they sometimes feel.

Why? Well there are really only 2 things the driver in question can do - either they hang back, leaving you space in front of them; or they accelerate, leaving a juicy gap behind them....

Spotting the sheep from the goats is easy enough: the majority will not willingly go up the nearside of a vehicle which is clearly intending to move accross - the danger is obvious even to the average. It is therefore safe to move gently over, unless there are complicating factors such as traffic ahead anchoring up.

Those who do want to take that space rarely do it by halves, and so are easy to spot. The fact that they are accelerating makes it easy for you to ease off and slot into the space they have vacated. Roll of eyes optional. I don't mind too much when this happens - better to have them in front, out of the way.

[7db]

The tunnel may have given you a slight edge in this particular scenario as the general drop in light levels would have enhanced the relative brightness of your indicator, and nicely amplified the effect of the horn!

And possibly the blip of the downchange might have echoed a little as she approached my exhaust...