This ticks me off very much. Ignorant and rude behaviour by people who should know better.
I have a similar place where this happens on the way to work where the right hand lane is solid queue for a mile or so .
Its usually obvious if someone genuinely does not know the area but I regularly prevent the local queue jumpers pulling in front, particularly the ones who you know are taking the mickey , ie the local taxis , local white van men ( and any BMW owners.)
Maybe its inconsiderate behaviour by me but it makes me feel better....
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Not that I tend to do this, but to me it's just good use of road space. The road planners could presumably have made the first stop 'right turn only' if thay wanted, but didn't. If everyone treated the 2-lane as being valid for 'straight on' or 'right at next junction' , (i.e. they queued in each lane in turn , more or less equally) , then a simple 'merge in turn' before the next junction would see less of a tailback at the 1st junction - win, win I'd say! Trouble is, people in the UK have great difficulty with the 'merge in turn' concept - it's usually perceived as someone trying to 'get one over' on you.
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I'd agree with woodbines - a good use of road space. He's doing nothing wrong, IMO.
I probably wouldn't let him in - but I wouldn't close a gap to stop him moving across either.
I couldn't care less if he thinks I'm a mug.
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At least they make an attempt to move over to the straight ahead lane. Round here it's right hand lane, floor it and go straight on anyway.
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This sort of situation is for BMW drivers. We are slightly more bright than your average driver so are not dim enough to simply sit in a queue half a mile before the junction, so instead will use the perfectly legal, perfectly open lane to drive along, and then merge in at the point where the lane becomes right turn only.
The British are the only nation with this sort of obsession for queuing. Use all available, legal road space, and merge in turn. That way we can turn half mile long tailbacks into quarter mile long tailbacks.
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i've been known to jump the odd queue but I don't think 'mug', I think ' oh look at that empty stretch of road, I'll just use that...'
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in this situation its just plain rude and arrogant. It does nothing to help the traffic flow and is nothing to do with merging in turn.
If you have a 2 lane road going down to one lane, say for road works, then it makes sense for both lanes to be used as much as possible with cars merging at the appropriate point.
Jumping the queue is rude and annoys other drivers causing them to sometimes drive dangerously. How do I know its rude and inconsiderate? Well, I admit that I know becuase on occasions I have done it myself.
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Forgot to say in the earlier post - Im British and I have no obsession with queuing. Im all for doing what we can to get the traffic moving and make effective use of the road. However, i despise people who jump the queue. It doesnt make the traffic go any faster, it only delays me even further.
You make it sound like Brits enjoy queuing - I certainly dont!
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I too have this problem, dual carriageway leading to a major crossroads.
In a morning traffic to go straight on or turn left can be queing for half a mile or so.
The right lane is clear, so those who are too important to queue head down the right lane until the lights and then take their chance at getting into the left lane.
Unfortunately, if they can't, they then sit there with their indicator on blocking the
RH lane. This causes those behind them often to miss the green light on the RH turn and on this particular juntion it is quite a while till the next. Just what you don't need in the morning.
The thing is, that I can almost certainly tell who is going to pull this stunt before they do, due to a sixth sense based upon a combination of driving style and vehicle being driven.
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Its me again.
I agree with you Telco and it happens to me frequently getting stuck behind some idiot stopped signalling left and I miss the green light to turn right.
They have no right to delay my journey in a selfish attempt to reduce their delays. 'Making good use of road space' is a euphemism for 'trying to justify my bad driving'.
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So how far BEFORE a lane restriction should you get in the correct lane? 50m, 500m or 3 miles?
We have a stretch of dual carriageway on one of the approaches/exits to our town - it's punctuated every 200m or so by roundabouts - some drivers round here who want to turn right at the 7th roundabout get into the right lane as soon as the dual carriageways starts, that's 2 miles before they actually want to turn right.
The 2007 Highway Code now includes "merge in turn", rules 134 and 288, but most drivers will only obey rules in the out-dated version of Highway Code from when they passed a test - or not obey rules!
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Use both lanes - that's what they are there for.
Merge in turn - you know it makes sense.
Later today I will be driving along the A329 in Bracknell Berkshire. Near the fire station the two lanes narrows into one lane. There is even a sign which says 'merge in turn'.
So - what's the problem?
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the problem is thus:
if you use the o/s lane because it is more free (which i often do), but can't get in at the end as there's no space to merge left.......then you should follow the lane you're in and re-calculate your route
if you don't want to risk having to go the wrong way for a bit, because of the above, then you'd need to ensure you got into the left lane when you can, even if this is some distance back.
What is completely 'pig ignorant' is to sit there blocking a lane, because your 'cunning plan' hasn't come to fruition......or turn left and 'drive at' the most vulnerable looking driver you can find (which I have seen more than once).
Twice recently i've been caught out driving in unfamiliar places (Brighton seafront in road works and Gravesend town centre in rush hour) and got myself in the wrong lane. Fortunately other drivers helped me out, but sometimes the signage is dreadful as you cannot always see the signs on the ground. Why not have overhead ones?
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Should always be merge-in-turn so both lanes are used avoiding congestion further back.
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These 'sour grapes' posts about supposed queue jumping are pathetic. If everyone formed two equal-length queues and merged in turn the delay would be the same for everyone. If there's empty road space I'll use it - and I expect/want other drivers to do the same.
If there are three slow-moving queues on a congested M-way, how many of you keep pace with the slowest one, so as not to 'unfairly' get ahead of the others?
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So - what's the problem?
Problems arise when there isn't a clear instruction e.g. 'use both lanes/merge in turn'. When drivers are left to make their own decisions, what seems rational and efficient to some seems like pushy selfish Beemerista behaviour to others. There is enormously wide variation in people's attitudes to 'making progress', with some fairly wide awake and others apparently in a coma. It is the co-presence on the road of these varieties of ability and intelligence that causes unnecessary eddies and resonances in the traffic flow, slowing it down.
The mood of traffic can be very important and make a 50% difference in ease of flow.
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At the bottom end of Castelnau there's a traffic light next to a dealer in American cars. The n/s lane bears left towards Barnes Common, the r/h lane is a right turn lane.
Someone tried to push in front of me from this lane once and bear left in front of me, but I didn't let him (I think it was probably a man). He carried on down the middle of what is quite a narrow bit of road hoping I would drop back, but I didn't. I scraped him off against the bollard just before Barnes Common, as did a couple of cars behind me. That'll learn him!
I am blushing today as I write this over twenty years later. I hardly ever do that sort of stuff now. I let the pushers push and the mimsers mimse, and try to swim through the soup without getting an apoplexy. Life is hard O! (as they say in Lagos).
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the r/h lane is a right turn lane.
Which if I understand the OP correctly is an entirely different situation.
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The problem is that people dont merge in turn.
The second problem is that two lanes merging into one is a different situation to that described here.
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At the deep, deep heart of this I'm sure it's that's little weevil in all of us, to some degree, that doesn't like being overtaken, full stop. As someone pointed out - if you ever change lane to turn left or right, & it involves moving past another vehicle, then that is effectively a 'merge in turn' - the question debated is about the efficiency (or lack of) of where that happens.
On the 'pro' side, it can mean using available road space & merging only when physcially necessary, to the 'antis' it means never apparently being seen to have gained an advantage of any kind - even it that meant queueing for 2 miles in one lane & causing a much longer queue. I agree, road markings could encourage correct merging more pro-actively, with nice big arrows, signs & chevrons - but even then I've seen people bumper-hugging the car in front in their attempts to stop someone merging.
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As woodbines points out, some people can't bring themselves to merge in turn even when it's the obvious thing to do and everyone else is doing it. There is no solution to louts and fools who are always with us.
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I'd agree with woodbines - a good use of road space. He's doing nothing wrong IMO.
Not necessarily. If he has to stop and wait for someone to let him in, he is blocking a lane, and inconveniencing those in that lane.
Depends on the roas markings and signs though.
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Its usually obvious if someone genuinely does not know the area but I regularly prevent the local queue jumpers pulling in front particularly the ones who you know are taking the mickey ie the local taxis local white van men ( and any BMW owners.)
Crikey! I'm glad I went over to Audi !
Edited by Dynamic Dave on 28/11/2007 at 19:08
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Just so long as they don't damage my car in the process I'm not really bothered. One of the nice things about being retired is that you're rarely in a hurry. If someone wants to jump in front of me I just look on it as adding variety to my life. Bring it on, you queue jumpers!
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L\'escargot.
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I'll look out for you next time Im in the supermarket - all these years I've been queueing up behind the 'oldies' when I could just be jumping the queue.
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I'll look out for you next time Im in the supermarket - .......
Be my guest, moonshine. A poor life this if full of care we have no time to stand and stare!
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L\'escargot.
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