Quote:
Originally posted by Jools
But it's not illegal to overtake on double whites, only to cross the double whites while you're doing it, so if there's a big enough gap it might be incredibly risky but...
The hill you're talking about could almost be the one leading into the town I live in. It's a steep hill that has buses and delivery vans labouring up there in second gear at about 10 mph and it has double whites all the way up it. Right at the top of the hill there is a 90 degree right hander...still has double whites, but the road widens at this point so that, if buses and trucks keep to the left, you can get a car past quite safely without crossing the double whites. There is enough room on the left hand side of the road to paint a white line down the middle of it and call the leftmost half a crawler lane, but they haven't painted that line so it remains a single carriageway.
But... I've overtaken there. A slow moving vehicle keeping left leaves about an 8 foot gap. On a bike it's just a question of a quick flick of the right wrist and two seconds later you're past - with 4 feet between you and the vehicle and 4 feet between you and the double whites.
Illegal? No. Committing any due care and attention/dangerous driving offence? No, perfectly safe in my view (and all but the most zealous observer of the law). Stupid? No. Risky? No more than getting on a bike in the first place.
So it's not always stupid/risky/illegal just depends like anything else on road layout and other road conditions at the time. |
Er .there are actually several situations where you CAN cross the white lines..................come on then get your highway codes out???