Forcourt's pendulum
I had an interesting miss-a-beat moment today, when turning across to join a petrol station forecourt. I moved into the median strip while indicating right, an oncoming ute indicated left and gave a further signal by pulling to the left -- all of which I interpreted as a move to take the side road immediately before the servo.
It wasn't. Just as I engaged to turn in I realised he wasn't slowing sufficiently and was in fact pulling in for fuel also. All panned out OK, we both saw each other and took the appropriate action, but I thought I'd share it for discussion.
I have always believed and practised that a turn signal should be given at the appropriate time, and that is not necessarily three seconds or any other number of seconds prior to the manoeuvre. First and foremost an indication is a signal to other road users, it is not an act of faith or deed of rote. I get the feeling our road code teaches this quite the wrong way. Any kind of rule which fixes a certain speed or certain duration is highly likely to allow shallow thinking folk to miss the whole point of the exercise and to completely misconstrue the safety or danger in any particular situation. Even the two and four second 'rule' which I always use to recalibrate myself is misleading if you stop thinking about it.
In this case, especially as the ute had no following vehicles (else I would not have engaged...) the driver should have indicated after his possible entry point to the side road but before his turn onto the forecourt, in practice for about one second! In reality, he followed at least one part of the road code which says indicate for at least three seconds or at least three seconds before your manoeuvre.
Sometimes the absence of indication leaves us in the safety position, other times it leaves us in the danger position.
Same with the presence of an indication. In this case the presence of the indication tempted me to put myself in a danger position. So at all times it pays to remember that firstly an indication only means the bulb works and secondly, use all cues/signals and don't count on anything until the other guy is actually making his manoeuvre and you are safe.
Thinking through other possible outcomes... Given that I was still rolling, my right signal could have been misread by the ute driver to mean that I was turning into the side road and not the petrol station. In which case if the oncoming ute driver was in fact turning into the side road as I had originally thought, he would / should have slowed to give way to me. In the case that he did have someone following, that following vehicle would likely have swerved right to go around and then come into direct conflict with me, waiting patiently and cautiously in the median strip to see for sure that the ute driver would turn left and for the oncoming vehicle to clear ... oh fuck he's heading for me...we see this all the time eh.
If I was stopped waiting to turn, then I may not have time to evade the oncoming driver swerving into my path.
If I was still rolling, but wishing to turn for fuel, then whilst I may have been able to evade the oncoming swerver, if someone following me mistook my turn and position signals to mean I was taking the side road, and misjudged my speed or deceleration (as I am slowing for the petrol forecourt entrance, which is before where he wants to go) he might easily rear end me.
All of which leads me to wonder, if in this particular scenario I would be safer taking the Exit as my Entrance?
You see, I always treat petrol station forecourts as roundabouts. Not in the parroted three seconds or 100 k kind of way, but in the 'always drive on the left' and 'go round a roundabout clockwise' kind of way. It almost always seems so much neater and safer, not to mention polite. To enter the forecourt the wrong way into the path of drivers who are still fiddling with their wallets, ice creams or hot coffees, whilst also belting up and getting their bearings again does not seem inviting. If I had taken the Exit as my Entrance I would have had another 15 to 20 metres between me and the junction and the ute driver would not have been an issue... until we faced each other in the fuel lane...
It seems the best option would have been to take the side road, turn around, and join the forecourt with a left turn, thereby sticking to my clockwise rule, albeit making a meal of it.
What would you do and do you treat forecourts like roundabouts, or fire on in any which way?
And what would you do if you were the ute driver? Would you indicate three seconds before, or would you wait until you passed the side road on your left?
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Originally Posted by skidmark
, Steam, but I really wanted to know whether other bikers circulate the forecourt in the same direction as a roundabout or if they go ad hoc.
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