AIBU to think lots of motorbike drivers are dangerous arseholes?

[wheresthebunman]

still feeling shakey & fuming after an 'incident' with a motorbike on the road this morning as i was driving my 2 young DS home. usual story of bike creating his own lane in queue in attempt to cut up & race cars at lights. he then proceeded to bob & weave around, causing me to slam breaks a few times and when i didnt make space for him to overtake me in busy traffic, drove his bike parallel to car shouting abuse & flicking finger.
ive got a 'kids on board' sign & am not a dodgy driver! just getting from a to b. i live in a city & this happens alot & im sick of these agressive, bullying fuckers. they are very different to cyclists who tend to look after themselves on the roads without disrupting flow of other traffic.
'THINK BIKE' my arse

YABU for all the reasons stated before.

And, as previously noted, it's filtering, NOT overtaking.

FullyExpectsThisToBeAButButThreadTiggaxx

You do realise that these Baby on Board / Child on Board stickers were introduced to alert emergency services to the possibility of a smaller person being trapped in the wreckage in the event of a crash?

I know this is a de-rail, but that isn't true. The emergency services pay no heed to them and examine a car in the same order 1. Driver's side (because there's always a driver) 2. Rear passanger seat. 3. Front passenger seat. They are and always have been the preserve of twats keen to boast of their fully functional reproductive organs.

That said, I don't know why I bothered spending all those months getting expensive driving lessons and passing a test, when all i needed to do was whack up a gaudy 'little princess on board' sticker to prove my driving prowess. If you look carefully you'll find that copetition rules state that all World Rally Championship Cars have to have one them (plus a cuddly garfield) stuck on the back window.

AIBU to think lots of motorbike drivers are dangerous arseholes?

Yes, you are.

Had you said 'AIBU to think that THIS motorbike driver is an Arsehole I may have agreed with you to a certain degree.

Years ago I was forced off my bike and catapulted over the side of a bridge into a river by a car driver coming at me on my side of the road.

Due to that, would IBU to say that 'lots of car drivers are dangerous arseholes'? No, of course not.

Don't generalise, and don't over dramatise, op.

I'm a biker, I've got an 800cc

I am always more on edge in situations where there are a higher concentration of bikers. Many do take excessive risks and ride far faster than I'd deem fit. They can accelerate faster than any car on the road and break more effectively.

I'm more concerned about other bikers than I am about any other road user group (I personally am a pedestrian, jogger, cyclist, horse rider, biker and car driver).

I know many bikers who have had accidents and the majority are because they've been riding like an arsehole rather than it being another at fault and taking them out.

'no of course not'....obviously I meant 'yes, of course I would'.

As you were.

Not sure I am picturing this the same way as other people.

If there's a slow moving queue of traffic practically nose to tail and a bike zooms up the middle it isn't filtering it's queue-jumping, isn't it? If there isn't a space between vehicles because the traffic is almost stationary then the bike should wait in the queue like everyone else, shouldn't it?

Every bike that forces its way in pushes everyone else back down the queue, it seems to me. Or am I seeing this wrong?

Joysmum I have a 650cc... My husband has 3 bikes including a Hayabusa..

The OP is talking about filtering through some traffic not opening up the throttle on the open road.

I, of course, understand that bikers generally do go faster than cars - but as a biker I understand that manoeuvres such as overtaking are actually safer to a degree due to what our machines can do - as you say, increased acceleration and braking capabilities.. I'd expect car drivers to not understand this..

Yes Morgause you're seeing it wrong.. The bike is going between two lanes of traffic - that's filtering and allowed.

Thanks, I'm a non driver so couldn't picture what was going on.

So it won't be trying to force its way back in and just continues in its own lane?

filtering has to be distinguished from slalom-racing in traffic which also occurs and causes a lot of ill-feeling

It is fairly safe to filter cautiously between lines of stationery traffic, for example at lights or a jam; you are looking for the small risk of someone opening a door or flicking out a cigarete end. Filtering between moving traffic, you have to be alert for people swerving round a pothole or cyclist, or especially changing lane. They may have observed the position of the cars and trucks around them, moving at similar speed, but often not a smaller vehicle, coming from an unexpected direction, especially if at significantly greater speed.

I have lots of bikers in the family and in the main they are very safe drivers if a little prone to speeding.

I was driving alongside a bike the other day at 30MPH and he was texting! He then proceeded to weave all over the road and speed up/slow down without warning. I slowed right down and stayed well back from him but he was on his phone for ages!

I wouldn't say they are all arseholes, but a couple of hours ago one definitely was.

I was travelling along a single carriageway road doing 60 mph, there was a layby on the left with a motorcyclist sitting there on his bike, not indicating or anything. He waited until I was almost there and THEN decided the time was right to pull out in front of me. I had to slam my brakes on and all the things on my seats flew onto the floor. He's bloody lucky I didn't kill him, idiot.

drove his bike parallel to car shouting abuse & flicking finger

Wow, impressed he could do that with one hand on the accelerator and the other on the clutch.

Filtering is perfectly legal, what I think upsets the four wheeled fraternity is the fact that I am going past you your perception is that I'm speeding but most bikes don't admittedly you do get the odd biker whose dream is to end up a greasy spot on the Tarmac but that is not the majority of us please think bike we break very easily

I understand that bikes can filter and would never move to deliberately block them (in fact, if I'm aware of one approaching while in slow moving traffic I will often look to see if I can create space in front in case they need to pull in).

However, it does annoy me when they come past/through at a much greater speed, (ie riding at 30 mph when traffic is creeping at 5mph) they often make me jump due to the suddenness of their engine noise as they zoom by. And I have witnessed a few near misses where somebody in a queue of traffic wishes to turn right, they check their mirrors, signal, start to manoeuvre, but suddenly a bike is there who either has to slam on their brakes or causes the car driver to abort partway through.

There's one spot in particular on my journey to work that is bad for this. There is always a queue of traffic, and the road bends gradually to the left. This means the bike can be hidden from the car until a few car lengths back, and the car's signals are hidden from the biker until a few car lengths back. Of course, depending how fast the bike is going those few car lengths can be covered in less than a second. Whereas the bike should really be going slower to ensure that everyone has time to react to their presence (and so that they have time to observe that the car is indicating so they shouldn't be overtaking it).

OP-
"when i didnt make space for him to overtake me in busy traffic"

YABU
Bikers ARE ALLOWED to filter through traffic. Don't be an idiot, leave them room.

maybe the op should read the highway code and/or take some refresher driving lessons?

But if motorbikes are filtering and cars are supposed to let them in - they are also queue jumping, aren't they? Or am I still getting the wrong picture?

@Morgause

Filtering presents its own hazards, not least because some drivers wrongly believe that it is illegal and may react in a hostile way when they see a bike or scooter wending its way through a line of traffic. However the Highway Code acknowledges that motorcyclists can and do filter in traffic and advises that this should be carried out safely and slowly.
Link MCN

Thanks for that link - but I'm seeing from the advice that a motorcyclist should not force his way into a line of traffic?

This is interesting as well

"There is a civil court case which describes filtering as “an activity fraught with danger”. That sets the atmosphere in which you are operating – accept that and ride appropriately."

So it's something that should be done with care.

It's drivers like you OP that make me fear for my DP's life every day he rides his motorbike

It's an activity fraught with danger because car drivers get so bloomin' aggressive when bikers do filter.

All drivers should be put through a motorbike and cycling awareness course, to make them really aware of the both the law and dangers.
Only when you have cycled and rode a motorbike are you aware of how incredibly vulnerable you are around motorised vehicles.

Oh yes forgot horse riders on the road. The way some car drivers cut up horse riders is horrific.

But there's a big difference between bikers filtering safely and forcing their way through slower-moving traffic.

Some bikers are driving aggressively. If they wish to pass slower moving traffic (which is entirely reasonable when you are on a bike, that's why they ride one I imagine) they should ensure that there is room to do so, especially when the road has bollards, central islands or narrow lanes.

They shouldn't automatically expect other vehicles to move across the lane to allow them to pass especially where doing so puts others at risk.

watch this:

;)

SOME bikers are dangerous. I used to live out in rural Yorkshire near a massive biker café which was also out in quite a rural area on winding country roads with national speed limit. Particularly in nice weather, it was normal for literally hundreds of bikes to descend on the café and there were always lots of people who drove far too fast because they saw the country roads as being a nice drive. Consequently, it was common to get a lot of accidents as many of the bends are sharper than they look and a couple of deaths every year.

BUT when you look at the number of incidents caused by bikes, or involving only a bike, it's a tiny fraction of riders. Far more often, I pull over in my lane to let a bike filter through and watch the car in front swerve across to block them.

And "PFB on Board" signs are reason alone for you to be required to sit advance driving, they're almost as bad as the whole "Powered by Pixie Dust" signs...