A driving AIBU: three point turns

[BeanAround]

This morning I was parked up next to the curb on a long straight 30mph urban road which is moderately busy. I needed to drive off in the opposite direction. The road is wide, but wide enough to U-turn meaning I had to do a three point turn in the road.

I waited until I had a reasonable amount of space clear of traffic in both directions - nothing visible behind me, and a car approaching about 300m away in front of me.

I completed two points of the three point turn and was ready to execute the third point as the approaching car reached me.

At this point, who should give way?

I fully expected the approaching car to adjust their speed so I could drive off ahead, but the car continued without slowing and went ahead of me, which gave me a bit of start.

YABU - the car turning in the road should give way to the approaching car, letting them pass before completing the 3 point turn

YANBU - the approaching car should slow to allow the car turning to complete the manoeuvre.

You live in London. People drive like selfish bastards there. Over there for several years). Come North people are much nicer. 😁

Oooooo 😀 Reeeeported

You rellyrelly went there !!!

Five point turn in the mouth of the junction outside a secondary school, going up and down the kerb, just after a blind bend ,with kids (primary and secondary) going to school all around seems to be perfectly reasonable to some drivers round ex's house.

It's not about being rude as being dangerous. Whatever anyone thinks about whether I was right to make a three point turn, driving at 30mph past a school at drop-off time, through parked cars on either side of the road, doors opening, people crossing the road...technically yes she appeared to be driving within the speed limit and had priority but most drivers are anticipating what's happening around them and adjusting their speed.

The driver anticipated you would stop.

That you would know you had to stop.

Now your argument is your driving was such that the other driver should have classed you as a dangerous driver

Mostly it's about the fact the road is full of school kids at that time but let's ignore that for a moment.

What you're talking about isn't anticipation it's assumption. She assumed I'd stop (which I did). I assumed she'd stop if I hadn't completed my manoeuvre (as my experience on that road is that people typically do), but I anticipated the possibility that she wouldn't. If we had both assumed, then we'd have crashed into each other.

Maybe it's stupid of me to be doing a 3 point turn there, OK. But if you can see someone doing something stupid in the road ahead, barrelling though without slowing down is even more stupid.

Lets not do think of the chliden and you wildly careening across lanes.

The other driver has the right to drive on
So anticipation (decision based fact) and then made assumptions (decision not based on fact) about your driving skills, you law abindingness, your observation skill etc.

You had no right to drive into her path but knew the driver had the right of way so correctly anticipated that she would not stop

Ah.... barrelling through, the speed, the lack of control.

Matched by ploughing on regardless of conditions

The fact it’s busy with school children is yet another reason it’s down right stupid to be doing a 3 point turn.

I know you’re not listening op, but you are being unreasonable. There’s a bastarding car that does a 3 point turn every morning outside my eldest school, holding up the flow of traffic and people trying to safely cross with their children. The school is on a triangulated road, all they have to do is come around the other way and no one would be bothered by their shit, selfish decision but no. Their time is obviously more important than others.

I know "everyone else does it" isn't a justification, but everyone at this school does a 3-point-turn because there's no good alternative.

It's not ideal. If I can I'll sit in the car and check my emails for a few minutes until the road has cleared down a bit but as I'm typically only using the car because I need to be somewhere else immediately afterwards I can't always do that.

Why can’t you leave earlier, take the slightly longer route to the school so you’re facing the correct direction to head off. That also frees space for the next parent to pull up instead of faffing with your phone for a few minutes. As my previous posts said, it’s all ‘my time and need to be places is most important’. Everyone on that road needs to be somewhere.

I can execute a 3-point turn without wildly careening anywhere.

I'll accept that the majority think the 3-point turn is unreasonable.

But I'm not accepting that the other car was reasonable to carry on without slowing down. Even if they assert their priority and go ahead, they should slow down to do so. Their route involved squeezing through a gap that was inches from my bonnet and inches from the parked car opposite (so at risk of clipping an opening car door). In that situation at the very least you slow down.

If I could routinely get my children out of the house 15 minutes earlier that would solve a lot of problems, three point turns being the least of them!

To be honest I hadn't really thought that much about the 3 point turn itself being a problem before as it's simply what everyone does but it is making me think a bit - my ideal is not to use the car at all which we manage most of the time but some days the time for the school run gets squeezed and the car is the only option.

Of course. If someone jumps out in the road in front of you, you don't just run them over because they were in the wrong.
If someone is driving dangerously slow then you don't exert your right to go faster and tail gate them.

I agree that the other person should have slowed down, for the simple reason that it sounds (from what you describe in later post about the tightness of the gap she squeezed through) like it was not actually safe to pass. I’d pause to let someone ahead of me finish a manoeuvre, even if I was a bit disgruntled about them having started the manoeuvre in the first place.

As an aside I’m surprised that there is a street in London with a 30mph limit and a school on it. Our borough and the neighbouring one are all 20mph everywhere. I think that doing what you did on a 20mph street might have been less controversial as traffic is moving more slowly anyway.
I agree with you generally about “assertive” London driving by the way, and the two-step right turns. I am often beeped by someone impatient behind me if I decide to wait until both lanes of traffic are free before turning right.

You created the hazard. You think the speed before the hazard was fine, you have no idea of how good or poor the drivers depth perception is compaired to yours.

The driver could slowed or stopped and kept blowing their horn.

I agree with you generally about “assertive” London driving by the way, and the two-step right turns. I am often beeped by someone impatient behind me if I decide to wait until both lanes of traffic are free before turning right.

Yeah two-step right turns are one of those things I always have think about - I don't like to do them if they're not necessary but equally sometimes it's the only option. I always wait a bit to see if a suitable gap is likely to emerge before resorting to the two-step version.

One of my peeves is people who launch straight out of a junction blocking a lane of traffic to make a right turn when they could have just waited a couple of seconds and completed the manoeuvre without blocking anyone. I often flash people and let them pull out in front of me when I can see they're stuck trying to turn right but when people force you to slam on the brakes because they can't wait a couple of seconds for a gap they'll get beeped!

Yes. They are always men too!

Live in london
You drive off in the direction you are facing and then find a street or car park on your right without anyone waiting to turn out into the road or anyone coming from the opposite direction who is turning into the road. You start to do a U turn coming to a stop almost parallel to the road but off the main road, check for traffic and then when safe pull out into the road

I think that doing what you did on a 20mph street might have been less controversial as traffic is moving more slowly anyway.

It's a limit, not a target though. I think part of why this caught me out is that I assumed when I started the turn I'd get out ahead of the other car because people aren't typically doing 30 right past the school.

Also as I've said almost every other car on that road is doing a 3 point turn so probably the most unusual thing is that the 30mph car had a clear run of it as normally there'd be half a dozen other cars blocking the road turning round before she got as far as me.

You mean like a u-turn but you're using the entrance to a junction to give yourself extra road width so you don't have to do a 3 point turn?

I hate it when people pull that manoeuvre. It only works at a really limited range of junctions that are wide enough to execute it (otherwise they end up having to do a mini 3 point turn in the mouth of the junction) and you need there to be no traffic approaching and good visibility in all directions. Other cars don't recognise what you're doing (assume you're doing a regular right turn but then you stop in the middle of the road) so risk hitting you before they realise what you are up to.

I thought of you this evening OP! I was driving along and a car pulled out from
the other side of the road into a three-point turn. I was definitely less than 300m away when she started her manoeuvre and I duly slowed right down and let her finish. (I actually had to stop). She did not make eye contact at with me and when she drove off she didn’t even do that thing where you flash your hazards to say thank you. That’s when I realised- I’m fine with all this stuff if people at least have the grace to say thank you. I hope you say thank you?

Later in the same journey a car wanted to change lanes so I flashed him to let him in. No thanks from him either. I must have had doormat written all over me tonight!

it’s doing a U turn but allowing you to stop off the main road to check that traffic isn’t coming before pulling out into the road

Not sure why you would hate someone doing that if there are no cars coming out of the side road and no cars going into the side road
Who is around to hate that manoeuvre

This happened to me once and I was the driver who didn't slow down as I was going quite fast and the other driver suddenly thought they could do a three point turn. As I went past she then caught up with me at a traffic light and called Me an idiot. I proceeded to tell her it was my right of way not hers. She actually made Me very cross.

I thought most london roads were 20 mile an hour limit, unless it's on the outskirts?