To flash at middle lane huggers?

[WhatMummyMakesSheEats]

it really angers me how many people don’t know how to drive on the motorway. Especially the M25.

Why are there so many people who just sit in the middle lane and don’t move over? I don’t want to undertake people. So if I’m being made to slow down by a middle lane hogger I’ll flash at them to move over. More often than not they will move to the outside lane, so they obviously know where they should be?!

I do want to add that I also hate people who weave and undertake but I think they are just aggressive drivers and also if no one hogged the middle lane they wouldn’t be able to!

Middle lane hoggers driving at less than 60mph are a pain in the backside if you are towing a trailer. You can’t use the outer lane to get round them.

I'm sorry @Bikergran but this is just not as helpful as you think it is.

When you have a car which is going at 60mph in lane 3, why should I "stay behind them" at 57 mph? That is what I would have to do, unless you want me to crash into the back of them?

And then when you say "so you can overtake them"... it's not that easy.

Because how can it be that easy, when you have lane 4 full of people who are at 70mph or much faster, trying to overtake this one rolling roadblock of a driver?

Sure, I take my turn to come out. I drive professionally, I have IAM qualification, I know how to drive.

But I have to then take time at 55mph to wait for a gap, then overtake, all because someone has decided for EVERYONE that

• the national speed limit for today is 60mph
• that lane 1 and 2 are "for lorries" , thereby striking out the use of them for anyone who doesn't want to undertake

Effectively they have turned the motorway into a dual carriageway as a result of their actions.

Can anyone defend the above sentence in bold? Or are we just going to read dozens of posts about "flashing nervous drivers" again and again?

The reason it’s enraging is it’s so selfish. It forces the rest of us to take more frequent and dangerous manoeuvres because you cba/ are too frightened to drive properly yourself.

Perhaps not actively dangerous, but it’s forcing people into a manoeuvre in which they have to cross two lanes to overtake and then cross two lanes again back to the left hand lane, which increases their risks unnecessarily and which they wouldn’t have to do if the idiot person in the middle lane just stuck to the Highway Code.

Exactly. Everytime I am driven into the fast lane to overtake some numpty who is tootling along in the middle lane I curse them! It’s not hard. If you can be in the left lane be in it.

It doesn’t matter what speed they are going at. What matters is if they are overtaking someone or not. And if not, they shouldn’t be there. And you cannot always overtake them that’s the point. Because lane 3 (or 4) is also full of people TRYING to overtake them but are being held up by someone going 1mph faster than those in the middle lane. So you’ve got lane 2 going at 55mph and lane 3 at 56mph. With lane 1 totally empty. And the even better thing that happens in that scenario is when the middle lane hoggers inexplicably speed up!! So the car doing 56mph ever so slowly overtaking them almost gets past, then the hogger speeds up and now we’ve got two cars doing 56mph complete next to each other and no one can get past them! Seriously I must drive on different roads to some people. I see this all the time yet other than the OP and a few others no one else sees it! I think it’s them doing the hogging that’s why.

This is spot on @SoubbG finally I'm reading someone who is describing the world as it is.

It is incredibly annoying and I agree with posters who say that most of the middle lane hoggers just don't know the highway code, which in itself is crazy. I don't buy the excuse of nervous drivers, as if you are too nervous and need to sit in the middle lane, please get off the motorway!!

You need to chill out. Yes it's annoying but nothing to get worked up about.

And if it’s nerves or fear then wow you really should not be on the motorway in the first place.

I kind of feel that flashing lights at ppl is a little bit more polite than tailgating. I would rather someone flash at me than tailgate

It's not selfish to flash?

Ok then.

It's perfectly ok to drive just under 60mph in the middle lane if overtaking. Especially in bad weather.

The 70mph limit, is just that, a limit. It is NOT the default speed you should be travelling at nor a target speed.

It is a problem if you are driving too slowly on the motorway - doing 40mph for example as that is dangerous. But 50 - 60mph in the middle lane overtaking, is allowed.

It's the numpties that fail to understand that no, driving up to someone's bumper at 80mph isn't the driver in front driving badly...

But why aren’t you just staying in lane one? Who are you overtaking? Someone in lane one?

Because she’s not meant to undertake? By staying in lane 1 she’d been undertaking.

No, that's the point, someone in lane 2 who I either have to cross two lanes out and two lanes back to overtake or to undertake them because lane 1 is clear.

They’re overtaking the middle lane hogger in lane two, but in order to do that they have to move from lane one right over to lane three and then back to lane one. It’s pretty clear…

You know that you shouldn’t be undertaking right?

If you are overtaking, you are not a middle lane hogger. I have no issue with people overtaking. However, if you aren't overtaking, keep left. Speed and conditions are irrelevant.

I wonder if middle (or outer) lane hogging falls under the Highways Act

"If a person, without lawful authority or excuse, in any way wilfully obstructs the free passage along a highway he is guilty of an offence and liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 51 weeks or a fine or both."

Maybe it only applies to men.

Exactly @RedToothBrush- so bloody arrogant and danger!

Nobody on this thread has said otherwise though. Of course it’s fine to overtake, using the overtaking lanes, at whatever speed is necessary to do so. This thread, though, is about middle lane hoggers who sit there without overtaking.

It's the numpties that fail to understand that no, driving up to someone's bumper at 80mph isn't the driver in front driving badly...

Perhaps not badly, but still above the maximum speed limit on UK motorways

It's the OVERTAKING lanes, NOT the fast lanes which the flashers fail to grasp. If you are screeching up the back end of someone and flashing you aren't reading the road well.

People are agreeing that you shouldn’t be driving up someone’s arse- of course you shouldn’t. But that still doesn’t change that people should not hog the middle lane- which is what this thread is about!

But nobody on this thread is describing this behaviour, I don’t know where this narrative has come from. Flashing has been described in situations where people get stuck behind a hogger (not an overtaker) but “screeching up their back end” is something that’s been added, probably by someone who’s guilty of sitting in the middle lane trying to deflect.