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Cracking little car - having personally worked in this area I think it's a scandal that many vehicles sold with leather seats actually have very little animal hide - usually only the sections in contact with the user, the rest, eg side and rear panels, are actually textured PVC made to look and smell like leather. This happens even on luxury/upmarket vehicles.
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Achieving Autonomy - I think the correspondent may have the wrong impression of the driver assistance systems fitted to their BMW. I see that the report from Thatcham published recently stated the marketing of the systems is at fault.
I have no experience of BMW systems, but have driven a number of Infiniti Q30s fitted with the Mercedes forward collision mitigation system, which has a red warning light that illuminates if the system calculates you are following too closely. It waits about 5 seconds before it illuminates. I have never been in a situation where the forward collision warning or the autonomous braking has activated .
I own a Honda Civic with the Honda sensing systems fitted, and like all these systems everything is a driver aid - for example with the lane keeping assist system you have to keep your hands on the steering wheel, and I find it a useful aid on a long motorway journey. You still have to keep your hands on the steering wheel, and it is an aid to keeping you in the lane.
For the forward collision mitigation system the key is always whether the system judges there is a risk of a collision. If you are going the same speed as the car in front there is no risk of a collision. If the car in front slows and the speed differential is sufficient the Honda system first flashes a yellow warning light, then beeps and finally if you do nothing it will brake. I have had the warning light come up on a few occasions when a car in front has suddenly slowed, and on one occasion the warning beep when a car slowed almost to a halt approaching a speed hump and I was a bit slow to react. Again the risk of a collision comes from the sudden speed differential.
Simply approaching a zebra crossing at a low speed with pedestrians around does not necessarily mean there is a risk of collision. It depends upon
The key thing is 'risk of collision'
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Re: Misdirected
Even if the road markings are obviously incorrect (and should be reported to the authorities), its blindingly obvious that the RH lane is for turn right 99 times out of a hundred, as in this case the straight on road only has two lanes, thus those in the RH lane nearest to the inside of the roundabout will have nowhere to go - anyone turning right should be filtering across to the middle lane as they are passing the exit before.
Some roundabouts have the road lane markings on the roundabouts that automatically do this (e.g. the inner ring road/Newmarket Rd roundabout in Cambridge near me as per the below link), but they can be confusing to people 'used' to the 'standard' markings and many people stay in the 'area' they get on the roundabout in, often cuasing just as many near misses as the OP did in this letter's incident.
www.google.co.uk/maps/@52.2082085,0.1374067,3a,75y...n
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Re Misdirected
I think it's fair to say that most large roundabouts I have encountered have 'ambiguous' road markings, though of course I am aware of the problems on local junctions. Basically, you get in a lane marked for your destination, then after an exit that land changes. I can think of one local roundabout where the correct lane 'appears' half way around the circuit.
As the correspondent notes, the problem is compounded by HGVs often needing a wide berth, quite possibly a vehicle longer than usual when the junction was created.
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I drove over this junction today and do so often. The problem is that the arrow is straight on but the road markings say A428 COV. In short, they conflict and defy common sense as A428 COV is a right turn at the roundabout, so the straight on arrow is misleading and lulls the unwary into an error. Highways Agency is wrong and ideally if arrow pointed right, it would cut problems.
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Most roundabouts could be better laid out by a 5 year old. In Telford, the highways authorities have spent millions of ££ recently 'upgrading' a significant number of major roundabouts in the town; some traffic light controlled and others as standard roundabouts. Without exception, the white lining indicator lanes and markings are confusing at best and downright misleading at worst, leading to any number of near misses. On one, located at J.4 of the M54, Highways have been back to change the laneage twice since completion, and on each occasion have left it even more confusing and ill thought out than the original.
It would almost make more sense to abandon all the markings altogether and impose a shared safety zone and let everyone make their own minds up !
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Re: walk through vehicles
I don't know why people like cars with massive centre consoles.
1) It prevents the driver exiting through the passenger door (see "Survive" advice about stopping on hard shoulders ref: www.survivegroup.org/pages/safety-information/stop...r )
2) If you have to lower the seat (to get headroom and sight lines) the "armrest" on the centre console does not drop with the seat so you end up like Quasimodo with you left shoulder hoisted up in the air.
Centre Consoles rule out many (most?) cars except:
C4 Picasso
Astra in Design trim only
Octavia in S trim only
others?
Presumably marketeers think it makes their cars look luxurious; it just makes them impractical / uncomfortable for many potential customers.
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