A recent incident involving a car coming towards me on a country road has prompted this question…. You are riding/driving on a country road, one lane in each direction, speed limit is not material, the lanes are separated by double white lines. The white line nearest to you is solid and for traffic in the opposite direction broken. There is no footpath and there is a pedestrian walking in the side of the road towards you. What should you do?
Presuming the car isn't in your lane: slow down almost to a crawl. Unless the car is far enough away you can cross the white line. Personally I'd cross the line - assuming safe to do so - even if there was a copper watching; but the priority is the pedestrian (who is, I'm glad to see, on the correct side of the road).
The law is very clear: You must not cross a solid white line You must give pedestrians 2m You should pass pedestrians at low speed (20 or less?) If in any doubt give way.
Rule 129 Double white lines where the line nearer to you is solid. This means you MUST NOT cross or straddle it unless it is safe and you need to enter adjoining premises or a side road. You may cross the line if necessary, provided the road is clear, to pass a stationary vehicle, or overtake a pedal cycle, horse or road maintenance vehicle, if they are travelling at 10 mph (16 km/h) or less.
Good to see pedestrian is walking the right way. if I was the the pedestrian I would tuck into hedge to let car pass. As the car driver I would slow down and wait until it was safe to pass pedestrian and nothing is coming the other way
I would have done all the above prior to looking at the rules. If they were riding a bike or on a horse coming towards you at under 10 mph then you can cross the white line provided you give 1.5m or 2.0m respectively. There is no exemption to cross the solid white line if they are a pedestrian. Since 29/1/2022 the pedestrian has the hierarchy when it comes to using the road. The only solution in the scenario I have come up with is to stop, allow the pedestrian to walk past and then continue your journey. It gets worse if in the scenario the pedestrian is walking in the same direction as you are travelling. The only solution there is to follow at their walking pace at 2m distance.
wrong And furthermore horses and cycles should be on the correct side of the road for the direction they are travelling If there is an obstruction on your side of the road and it is not safe to cross the white line then you slow or stop until it us safe to cross to pass the obstruction. Highway code is advice not law but iits advice can be used to demonstrate a person's manner of driving is careless or dangerous.
If it’s not on my side, I don’t have to worry about the white lines: oncoming do. But…. I would assume a very defensive road position (closest to kerbside as possible) and slow to watch out for ignorant oncoming traffic.
Check mirrors for police cars (marked or unmarked) and if all clear, pull a wheelie?* *In my version of the scenario, the pedestrian is an 11 year old boy and he was egging me on.
Come on, real world? Safely pass the pedestrian, not at the same time as you have oncoming traffic. Next. To add. Context is everything. How wide is the lane, what is at the side of the road, how fast is oncoming traffic. Etc etc Country road here in France a few weeks back, similar choice, tractor doing around 10mph. Solid white line, but I can see for 4-500metres in front the road is clear. No police, no cameras, so I overtake carefully. Car behind sticks to the law. Get around the corner, solid white line finishes, car behind overtakes towards oncoming traffic and I can hear people blasting the horn at them. Who was safe? Another scenario. Out with an ‘advanced rider’. Look in my mirrors, cant see where he has gone, look over my shoulder, he is nearly in the gutter on the wrong side of the road, to achieve ‘forward visibility’. Fine, but the road was nearly three lanes wide and nearly straight. Common sense should always be applied.
To avoid an accident is a legitimate reason to cross a solid white line. Not indicating any relevance in this case but a mate was up for it and claimed it was to avoid an accident based on the presence of a large amount of slurry on the road around a sharpish corner. He took photos, stated that he had slowed down massively (about 25mph iirc) which was confirmed by the police footage and that to have ridden through the slurry would have meant a significant chance of him having an accident. His solicitor also questioned why the farmer involved had not even been spoken to let alone charged. The police offered no evidence beyond their own dashcam footage and it was thrown out by the judge who stated that he felt the police should never have brought it to court.
Copper on one I think, my mate is a pretty chilled out guy so doubt he was arsey with them but you never know. It was just bad luck that they were coming the other way as he went around the corner just over the line. It was about 15 years ago and I think the copper involved was fairly young. Just a complete waste of everyone’s time.
It's far More likely a rookie cop being chased by stripes (monthly performance) Mind you if there are 2 in a car with a camera then it will just be traffic cops. 90% of traffic offences are whats called absolute offences., in other words that's the offence and you did it not a lot of thinking involved
