Double dose of almost being taken off my bike in the rain by SMIDSY this morning. I was in bright blue Gore jacket with reflective piping front and rear and had front and 2 rear lights to announce my presence.
First attempt was by car trying to turn right out of Yeaman Place onto Dundee Street eastbound. I was going westbound on Dundee. 2 cars pull out ahead of me as I approach Dundee Street to make the left turn, all fair and good. Third car follows them out to make the right turn without stopping at the give way line and - quite obviously - looking. Caused me to swerve wildly around his nose and almost into the oncoming traffic. My very loud profanity elicited the usual sheepish smidsy wave of the hand on the steering wheel.
Second attempt was less than 50m from the entrance to the office car park - here's me thinking I was nearly home and (not literally) dry. Roundabout at intersection of South Gyle Broadway and South Gyle Crescent. I was coming round roundabout on inside lane to make a left onto SG Crescent. Car waiting on SG Broadway to make same maneouvre. Driver quite obviously clocks me and decides there's time and room to make his turn. Which there isn't. Would have stopped at giving him the finger if it wasn't for the fact he fails to accelerate once he has made his move and keeps it under 10mph - me doing roughly double his speed and despite having the brakes down full comes within a whisker of running into the back of him. In fact got further forward than his projecting tow-bar and was worried that as he drifted across me it was going to hit my wheel side-on and tip me off the bike. Somehow narrowly squeezed past the bar and - still deccellerating in the wet - again uttered the loudest profanity I could muster as I cruised past on the inside - again starting with the 6th letter of the alphabet. And once again got that stupid, sheepish, guilty wave off the top of the steering wheel. I was itching for them to pull in to my office car park so I could give them a lecture about stopping distances in the rain and if they were that desperate and in a rusgh to make the turn, they should have been desperate and in a rush enough to find the accelerator.
In both cases, there was no excuse for either driver not to see me - both had clear lines of sight and I was a clearly visible object. The first driver obviously just didn't look and did what all too many drivers do when they get to a T junction and there's a give way line - they just put their nose over it and then think about stopping, checking if their exit is clear and then making a move. The second driver quite obviously saw me but decided that cyclist = gap (even though it was an empty roundabout apart from me)
If I had been in a car, I wouldn't have been able to stop or maneouver in time and would have run into either vehicle. And in both cases, if I'd been a car, would they have pulled out? I doubt it.
I'm still raging 5 hours later.
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