Give way when joining dualled/motorways

[Lord-WYBMAnE220]

I trust you both learnt something. I certainly did (but not related to joining motorways...)

I'm pretty sure one of us did, but I'm not saying who.

 

[flango]

I had an interesting experience yesterday and thought of this thread. On joining the M621 at Elland the slip road is steeply up hill with a high bank on your right hand side, this means you can't actually see whats' on the carriageway until you are bang on the point of entry, so in this instance I was looking for my gap when the kind driver in lane 1 flashed me in, we were all happy no hinderence to other motorists and common sense rules

 

[219]

With the greatest respect, I hold ADV motorcycle and car licences.

You may well hold some sort of advanced driving certificates ( for which I congratulate you ) , as do many of us on here , but your driving LICENCE , issued by DVLA , is just the same as everyone else's .

 

[219]

Why are KnightErrant and BruceMillar so hung up on people merging in front of them ?
Makes them seem somewhat hostile, angry and bitter.
Merging is like the Tango - it takes two.
In Germany, drivers are very ordered about merging and it's a seamless, non-competitive, non-confrontational process.
Those who think it's just about right of way are a danger to themselves and everyone else.
They need to drop notions of who has 'right' of way and see it for the co-operative process it is. If each carriageway-driver accommodates one joiner, the merge will be safe, efficient and seamless .... no screaming and shouting necessary.
If those who stand on their rights exercised a little more courtesy and a little less hostility to their fellow road-users, the roads would be a lot safer.
My advice to them ?
Imagine every joiner is a member of your immediate family.
Are you so keen to deny them some basic courtesy and consideration now ?
Those who put their 'rights' before other people's safety have some serious hostility issues to address.
A man is defined by a propensity to give and provide - and in this particular instance, giving someone a little room is not only the courteous thing to do - but might also save a life one day.

No one on here ( I hope ) is advocating deliberately blocking those trying to join by closing a gap which may already exist .

What the other posters seem to be trying to say is that it is wrong for joiners to try to force their way into a stream of traffic already on a busy carriageway where no safe gap already exists .

We have already covered that , where safe and convenient to do so it is all very nice to extend courtesy to joiners by easing off , speeding up or moving over to create or expand a gap in front , behind or alongside as appropriate , but at the end of the day traffic already on the main carriageway has PRIORITY ( please note this is not the same as 'right of way' which both drivers have ) .

 

[219]

Forgive me for doing so, but I'm going to answer your question with a question.
Would you rather have motorways with side-roads or slip-roads ?

What that means is 'evasive action' or unanticipated action to avoid a near-miss or collision.
What it doesn't mean is action that someone who has passed a driving test would expect to take (such as reducing throttle for 0.5 to 2 seconds) to permit safe and orderly merging from the sliproad.
The HC is intended to provide guidelines, not basic driving instruction.

Motorways are just a special form of dual carriageway .

DC's do sometimes have side roads and crossroads without acceleration/deceleration lanes .

What the latter statement means is that you should not cause another driver to have to alter course or speed .

 

[219]

If I'm on the inside lane of the carriageway and see someone joining, I'll move to the middle lane.
If I can't because that lane is occupied, I'll try to accommodate him before he runs out of sliproad.
What I won't do is ignore his presence and leave it to the decency of the driver behind me to accommodate him at the very last second.

What you seem to be missing here is that it is incumbent on the person attempting to join yo use his powers of observation and adjust his speed so that his merging does not inconvenience those already on the carriageway ; ultimately stopping if there is no safe gap into which to join . If he 'runs out of sliproad' that is a failure on his part - no one else's .

 

[Clkrichard]

27 posts 25 of which are in this thread ! Welcome to the forum.
I am not sure why you are accusing me of pouting and being a bad sport when I am advocating give and take and common sense. I admit to finding the undertaking on a slip road minority can be annoying but do accept they are out there and have no wish to tangle with them.

 

[Deleted member 65149]

What you seem to be missing here is that it is incumbent on the person attempting to join yo use his powers of observation and adjust his speed so that his merging does not inconvenience those already on the carriageway ; ultimately stopping if there is no safe gap into which to join . If he 'runs out of sliproad' that is a failure on his part - no one else's .

Thank you. That's exactly what I've been trying to tell his lordship but he has failed (or refuses) to understand. It's not just the person in the inside lane who slows down or moves out who may be being inconvenienced, it's other road users who are nearby who may have to make adjustments because of the "courteous" driver's actions. Those "adjustments" could have a significant ripple effect. That's what I want the "courteous" drivers to consider. One good deed MAY inconvenience a great many others if not carried out with significant forethought.

 

[flango]

What you seem to be missing here is that it is incumbent on the person attempting to join yo use his powers of observation and adjust his speed so that his merging does not inconvenience those already on the carriageway ; ultimately stopping if there is no safe gap into which to join . If he 'runs out of sliproad' that is a failure on his part - no one else's .

This is one of those areas I have a problem with what you are saying is technically correct, If I can see the carriage way flowing then I'll aim to get to the end of the slip at or slightly faster than the flowing traffic. If I can't see the carriage way then I'll aim to get there at around 50 mph taking the cautious approach. Either way I would not be stopping on the slip road on entry to a motorway that is far too dangerous, for one you risk yours and your occupants safety by being rear ended as people don't expect stationary traffic on slip roads and also trying to join a motorway when you have been stationary is also far too dangerous. If you can't see the carriage way it's easy to run out of slip road but I definitely would not stop.

 

[Deleted member 65149]

I'm sure Pontoneer wasn't advocating stopping but instead suggesting that failing to merge into motorway traffic doesn't give one the right to just plough on in. Stopping in a slip road is clearly dangerous, but preferable to attempting to enter an occupied lane.

 

[flango]

I'm sure Pontoneer wasn't advocating stopping but instead suggesting that failing to merge into motorway traffic doesn't give one the right to just plough on in. Stopping in a slip road is clearly dangerous, but preferable to attempting to enter an occupied lane.

I know he was not advocating stopping but I'm not sure stopping would the correct solution if lane one were occupied. I know you don't have the right to plough on regardless and this should only really ever happen in a very limited number of circumstances where the carriageway is not visible, the inner city motorways around Glasgow and Leeds spring to mind. I personally think the risks involved in stopping on an entry slip road are greater than any other course of action.

 

[Deleted member 65149]

I personally think the risks involved in stopping on an entry slip road are greater than any other course of action.

If the other course of action is to slow sufficiently to ensure safe entry to the motorway then I agree, but if it's to continue on blindly in the hope that someone will let you in then I have to disagree.

 

[flango]

If the other course of action is to slow sufficiently to ensure safe entry to the motorway then I agree, but if it's to continue on blindly in the hope that someone will let you in then I have to disagree.

I'd never continue blindly and the first course of action would be to slow and try and find a gap for safe entry, but there are circumstances where this is not possible. Take junction 41 on the M1 it's entry slip is less than 1 mile from junction 42 interchange with the M62, consequently lane one on entry is always full speed varies from a crawl to around 50 mph. You have to rely on the goodwill of other drivers to let you in, at a crawl this is not an issue and danger is reduced but when lane one is moving at 50 mph and you have those drivers that just won't let you join it makes life a little more difficult so you have to adopt defensive positioning that clearly indicates your intention to join that motorway in the hope they will ease off and let you in.

 

[219]

I'm sure Pontoneer wasn't advocating stopping but instead suggesting that failing to merge into motorway traffic doesn't give one the right to just plough on in. Stopping in a slip road is clearly dangerous, but preferable to attempting to enter an occupied lane.

Indeed : the only time I have stopped on a slip road is when the motorway is nose to tail with traffic which is starting and stopping , and the slip road itself is queued with traffic waiting to join .

However , I was trying to make the point that , if there is absolutely no gap , you do by rights have to give way to traffic already on the carriageway , and if this does mean stopping , undesirable as it might be , it should not be at the end of the slip road with no distance in which to accelerate .

I certainly would not barge onto a motorway , forcing others to take evasive action .

 

[219]

Actually , there are probably a few places in the UK where stopping is not unusual , or easily avoided .

Only this morning , I came out of Paisley to join the M8 Westbound at junction 27 , leading onto the White Cart viaduct .

The approach road is a tightly radiussed bend , affording no visibility of the carriageway at all , the mouth of the slip road is only about 50m long , and there is no hard shoulder as you are going onto a bridge ! Moreover , while this section used to have a 50mph limit , it was increased to 60 a while back and , of course , quite a few drivers go faster than that .

Most of the time , traffic flow on the main carriageway is moderate and it is possible to merge and join safely , but other times there may either be someone already stopped waiting to join , or a stream of fast moving traffic that even a 5 litre V8 is not going to gun its way into without risk ( although approaching at around 40 mph in second gear usually gives me some leeway to either speed up or slow down as required ) .

Doubtless , there are many other equally awkward entries around the UK motorway network .

Here's a link to the location in question

https://maps.google.co.uk/?ll=55.861319,-4.415807&spn=0.001484,0.00387&t=k&z=19

 

[peter49]

I don't think there can ever be hard and fast rules on this issue.
There are so many possible scenarios, witnessed by the above posts, that we just need to use our driving experience and skills in order to join the flow of traffic without incident.

 

[Dieselman]

Doubtless , there are many other equally awkward entries around the UK motorway network .

There shouldn't be, the lead in and off are a set standard and what can differentiate a motorway from a dual carriageway.

Counting the lines makes that at least 100 meters and it doesn't look abnormally tight.

 

[219]

I'll admit that it looks a lot more open in the aerial view than it does when you are on the ground ; taking that bend at anything more than 30 or so is enough to get complaints from passengers , and the 'mouth' of the opening is akin to the normal distance between lamp posts on most roads ( usually of the order of 50m or thereabouts ) .

I've been round it twice today and there really isn't a lot of time or distance to make adjustments in if the road is busy . I think it is just one of the exceptional places where there just wasn't room to do anything else .

I think the main differences between motorways and other dual carriageways are the limited classes of vehicles which may use motorways , and the presence of a hard shoulder most of the time .

 

[flango]

I know that one well its the one off the Renfrew road isn't it, One I use a lot when coming from our plant in Paisley, it is a lot tighter and poorer visibility than the ariel suggests I usually am at around 50 mph until I get my sights on the traffic and choose my gap not an easy entry though I agree.

 

[219]

Yes , that's the one .