Motorway Middle Lane Hogs!!!

[sunnybunny]

Why do idots object to using the nearside lane on an empty motorway? We were driving on the M25 at 4am this morning (family airport run) and there was this plonker mini cab doing 60mph in the middle lane with nothing in any lane in front of it. All the traffic behind including me had to queue and pass on the outside lane. How can we educate them?

Colin-Orpington.

 

[Lord Braykewynde]

It wasn't an empty motorway when I encountered a problem, it was busy. Traffic was braking in all lanes due to trying to get into the outside lane. After what seemed forever I also got into the outside lane and when I got closer to the obstruction I was amazed to see the lanes clear and flowing ahead.

I got alongside the car and couldn't believe my eyes. The female driver, who I can only think had managed to velcro her mobile to the centre of her steering wheel was holding the wheel with one hand while texting with the other. She was totally oblivious to the mayhem she was causing behind and no, she wasn't blonde. This happened on the M5 just south of Birmingham.

 

[Gumbo]

I fail to understand how people can get upset enough to post about real trivia. LBs is not trivia I accept it's down right dangerous. But for overtaking just pull out and overtake like you would on a dual carriage way !!!!! The nearside lanes on Motorways can be quite nerve racking if you happen to slip into the ruts made by Heavy HGVs

 

[Dustydog]

Hi Gumbo,

Must be those ruts that stop my outfit from snaking! Ha HA.

Chers

Alan

 

[Gumbo]

Or your off road vehicle that weighs a lot !!! along with your TA caravan lol

 

[g_374369443]

"TRIVIA" !!!!! Really?

Not sure that you comprehend the dangers involved to other road users.

It is nothing like applying the rules of a dual carriageway,as vehicles using the motorway properly will actually also be travelling in the inside lane,and will need to move over two lanes not one.

At any time other than light traffic, this is as hazardous,as forming a bottleneck!

Course the pratt sitting in the middle lane is oblivious to this,as its happening behind him,and if he was driving with due care in the first place he would not be hogging the middle lane in the first place!!

Trivial! Tell you what trivial is, is using the small amount of badly pitted parts of the inside lane,as an excuse for not using it...Now that's being trivial.... and dam right dangerous too....

 

[Gumbo]

well g Please read the post The Road was empty. It was no problem to overtake the guy/ girl driving who was quite happy to be travelling at 60. If the inside lanes are full of HGVs sometimes people feel comfortable at 60 in the middle lane. I get fed up with plonkers trying to push me along at 70/80 when I don't want to. If you want to do 70 fine overtake me and pull back in. The road ahead is clear as per the posters comments. Trivia is trivia minor problems are trivia.

 

[mark_374368910]

I agree with the OP. It really really bugs me people who sit for miles in the middle lane - especially when the rest of the road is almost empty. It often causes delays and bottlenecks on busier roads, not to mention making my high, now very high,no - extremly high blood pressure get worse!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ooooh, I feel a sit down session coming on!;-)

woody

 

[Angus1]

Totally 100% with g on this one.

It doesn`t make a blind bit of difference if the road is busy or deserted. Maybe if we had a decent and active police presence on the roads we coild either educate or prosecute these fools off the highway.

Danger? I`d rather take my chances with someone doing 85 rather than a middle-lane-moron anytime, at least he/she is likely to be aware of whats going on around them, and possibly even awake as well.

 

[g_374369443]

Gumbo, you missed the point.If the cab driver can hog the middle lane when there is nothing on the roads anyway,then he really doesn't give a dam about other users,he is a pratt.

As for using the inside lane "full of hgv,s", as some sort of defence for not using the inside lane! May i remind you that these vehicles do indeed take over one another,and then pull back in again[in the end]

So if these very large vehicles seem to find the space to pull in,I am baffled as to why, you cannot.....

 

[Dustydog]

Hi Mark

Hope your BPs down now. Look, does it really matter to you or me that some moron behaves the way Colin described?? You'll never change them and why should you? Who's going to pay you and with what qualification would you tutor them?

The best thing is ignore them, stay out of their way, and relax, even pull over somewhere so you don't have to see them anymore. Better to live another day and fight tomorrw etc.

Cheers

Alan

 

[Gumbo]

It really really bugs me people who sit for miles in the middle lane - especially when the rest of the road is almost empty

How would you know they hog the middle lane for miles are you following them?? Why do you not just overtake ?? You want to go faster then go faster. I remind you 70 mph is the maximum so if your happy at 60 go at 60.

My point was why get upset over trivia and I haven't yet seen anything to convince me otherwise, that is what this post was about. For goodness sake overtake and get on with it, or undertake as most other nations would do.

 

[PaulHull]

We're all caravanners so we should have fairly heavy vehicles. I say instead of passing them, shunt them hard up the bottom, pull over behind the wreck, drag the driver out, force feed them used engine oil, then torch them. Eventually there will be no middle lane hoggers left.

Then we can start on people that don't indicate and then people who tailgate.

 

[DeliDave]

Whatever else you do don't undertake,thats more of a licence loser and very dangerous,they probably wont check their mirror or blindspot before they pull in.Just overtake and go and pull back into inside lane to show them how it should be done

 

[Angus1]

Thats O.K if you`re not towing, Deli Dave.

I will admit to being guilty of undertaking whilst on the M1 a couple of weeks ago with the van on, it was either that, use the third lane (also illegal) or sit behind Richard Cranium in his maroon Focus doing 50 until he either woke up or died.

Might have been naughty, and he might have got a shock if he`d seen me, but he was still in the middle lane oblivious to the world around him when I disappeared over the horizon. Impatient? Probably. But I only had a fortnights holiday and I didn`t want to spend it following some imbecile who was probably concentrating so hard on `The Archers` he was unaware that he was actually in a car, let alone on a motorway.

 

[DeliDave]

must admit its a tricky decision,would probably give him a generous portion of lights and horn to get him to move over but agree some people are cretins who shouldnt be walking let alone driving.I think before we know it there will be cameras everywhere and we'll be getting regular taxes,I mean fines,and points in almost every post.

 

[Gumbo]

I don't understand the reluctance to undertake, I lived in the US and it is normal practice.( don't often see big pile ups )

I do appreciate it is against the law here but so is speeding and most of us do that!!!!!!!!!!

 

[DeliDave]

have driven in florida and as you say its normal but people also pick a lane and stick to it which is not the practice as written in Highway Code.The traffic definately seems to move better but that wont help if you get pulled over.

 

[colincheshire]

Travelled back from Fance via the Tunnel with a trailer in tow last weekend. Going up M6 at around 1am, I came across one of these charming middle lane hoggers doing 50mph in a Nissan. Undertaking is illegal. I have a trailer so use of the outside lane is ilegal. So you end up stuck there. Tried flashing the lights and eventually after about 15 minutes he pulled over to the inside lane so I could pass him. The police would not see him hogging the lane or me and others trying to go past him, but would almost certainly see me either overtaking or undertaking and proceed to write a ticket. Middle lane hogging rarely seems to give the police an excuse to write tickets.

 

[Gumbo]

Just undertake and get on with it for goodness sake. I stand by original trivia comment !!!!!!!

 

[PaulHull]

I dont get why the police are so hard on people who undertake. You should never be able to undertake unless somebody else is in the wrong. If you are able to undertake someone then they are incorrectly positioned and therefore breaking the law - yet I have never heard of anyone being given a slap on the wrist for it.

 

[DeliDave]

http://uk.wrs.yahoo.com/_ylt=A1f4cfWV_rZIy0cAaspLBQx.;_ylu=X3oDMTByNGxmazk4BHNlYwNzcgRwb3MDMQRjb2xvA2lyZAR2dGlkAw--/SIG=12d45iin9/EXP=1220038677/**http://blogs.warwick.ac.uk/cdoidge/entry/richard_branson/
Third post down i think.My neighbors daughter did 15 months lost licence for 5 years.The police really dont like it at all.

 

[Gumbo]

Read the link "This was not a case of straight forward undertaking" It was an agressive piece of Driving. I love the comment the Police don't like it, they don't like arresting criminals neither.Still that's another issue

 

[Colinn]

I have long maintained that if the law was changed to allow drivers to use all lanes on motorways for overtaking, then the problem would be solved at a stroke. No-one should change lane without looking first, so what does it matter whether it's to the left or right. As someone else, has said, it works in the US, no problem.

It makes more sense in my view than the ludicrous proposal to use the hard shoulder to beat congestion. If ever there was a recipe for sheer terror, then it's surely that one...

 

[Angus1]

Actually Colinn, you`ve hit on something there.

If we have a three lane motorway, and the hard shoulder is in use as an extra lane, what will Mr/Mrs Middle-lane-moron do then???????

"Hmmmmm, do I go in lane two, or three, or should I staddle two AND three as I will be in the middle then?"

Hopefully the confusion will be enough to keep these liabilities off the road.