The best argument for lanesplitting?

[revnort]

There was a 100% chance of getting rear ended. Even a 50% chance of getting sideswiped is better than a 100% chance of getting rear ended. And honestly, the chances of getting sideswiped there are probably a lot lower, around 1-10%.

That is a good point. I am just trying to put myself in his shoes, and thinking of what my reaction would be. I am not sure I would have gone to the right and that is something for me to think about.

This is one of my fears of riding a bike and this situation happens pretty frequently. Car you are following suddenly slams on brakes as they weren't paying attention.

It is the main reason why I try to get around trucks, SUV's, and any vehicle I can't see over. Still I can't help but think that car wasn't stopping even if he was on the brakes much earlier and not skidding. The rider was following at a safe distance even if guilty of not paying attention. The driver who hit him was also not tailgating and should have had time to stop, but clearly wasn't going to. He had good sight lines around that bike.

Also notice the SUV two cars back who also was not going to brake in time and swerves into the other lane. Even had the rider gotten right there were still many chances for an accident.

So I am hearing the proper reaction should have been to lane share? Or the proper reaction would have been slow earlier and move to the right lane? The only out I see, is throttling in front of the white truck on the right and then braking hard in front of him...which is questionable as well.

I wish I could see what was farther down the road. This looks like a tough situation all around to me. I think this is a really good situation to analyze. What would you have done?

 

[auntiebling]

That is a situation where you should already be riding near the marker, sharing a lane (even if a car isn't there). The rider should have already been established on the marker. This is EXACTLY why I crowd the marker in traffic at all times. If you are set up already, it isn't but a gentle 12" lateral move either way to get into the other lane. Even when there is no vehicle on either side of me, I "share" the lane with the imaginary car to keep myself in that mode.

I think this could have been avoided. Staying close to other vehicles laterally actually saves you.

i agree the bike was in a bad lane position for the situation. being in the right side position would have given the option of ducking between the cars, and that extra space might have let the car miss the bike completely; it's just not a place i'd actively be sharing lanes as the thread title implies.

 

[revnort]

i agree the bike was in a bad lane position for the situation. being in the right side position would have given the option of ducking between the cars, and that extra space might have let the car miss the bike completely; it's just not a place i'd actively be sharing lanes as the thread title implies.

I agree I wouldn't be sharing then. I do usually ride close to the right of the lane, BUT that also puts you in danger should something like this happen in the lane to the right...

 

[Z3n]

In my experience, when you have a situation like that where you're slowing, and the car behind you isn't slowing, you stop braking and laneshare past the car in front of you.

Why? You're passing through the cars around you so you have a solid wall of car between you and the idiots behind you. If they're slowing for a toll booth, the chances of them being able to lane jump at any reasonable speed is pretty low, 15mph is 22 feet per second, so you'll blow by any car near you in a bit under a second, which means that even if the car behind you asspacks the car you just passed, you should be out of the danger zone before things get too crazy.

The other factor is that getting sideswiped still gives you some outs, you can swerve with the car. There isn't the same out when you get asspacked.

I don't really give a shit about legality or courtesy at that point though. I'll hash the problems of my evasive maneuvers out with the courts when my date is up in the next 9 months.

 

[GAJ]

There appears to have been plenty of room between the car in front and the concrete divider as an escape route.

 

[JakesKTM]

In my experience, when you have a situation like that where you're slowing, and the car behind you isn't slowing, you stop braking and laneshare past the car in front of you.

+1

I would even advocate lane sharing when you aren't lane sharing. Yes, there are those cars who creep into the space next to you, but you have the advantage of filtering forward if you don't like it. But at least you are already established and in position. I'm perfectly okay sharing alongside a vehicle at the same pace because you inherit its visibility and buffer. In the video: had the rider been proactively sharing he probably would have been using that white truck as a buffer and avoided asspack scenario.

The "mentality" of proactive lane sharing at all times is something that is still incomprehensible to a majority of riders IMO

 

[revnort]

+1

I would even advocate lane sharing when you aren't lane sharing. Yes, there are those cars who creep into the space next to you, but you have the advantage of filtering forward if you don't like it. But at least you are already established and in position. I'm perfectly okay sharing alongside a vehicle at the same pace because you inherit its visibility and buffer. In the video: had the rider been proactively sharing he probably would have been using that white truck as a buffer and avoided asspack scenario.

The "mentality" of proactive lane sharing at all times is something that is still incomprehensible to a majority of riders IMO

So I tend to do this, and be in the right of the lane. However, in a recent thread (I think Iron Butt's thread in moto photos) some were saying this as a bad practice. I suppose it depends on the situation though. In the above video I would have been in the right of the lane. So it is possible I would have dipped between.

Also the vehicle buffer thing is not necessarily safe. I have been riding right next to cars who come over into my lane. No I wasn't in the blind spot either...I was at their window.

 

[Karbon]

I think its really important to view each situation as it presents itself, and approach the system as dynamically as possible and not to be tied down to some set of hard and fast rules a bout lane positioning. Heck I don't know if I can make a more broad, shotgun blast statement as that.

Sure there are dogmatic ideas such as "give your self more space and time", and "pick the most favorable outcome", but its always the means that gets people all in knots about it.

 

[rumpofsteelskin]

This video best supports an argument in favor of FastTrak, defensive riding, and well-adjusted mirrors, not necessarily in that order.

 

[Z3n]

So I tend to do this, and be in the right of the lane. However, in a recent thread (I think Iron Butt's thread in moto photos) some were saying this as a bad practice. I suppose it depends on the situation though. In the above video I would have been in the right of the lane. So it is possible I would have dipped between.

Also the vehicle buffer thing is not necessarily safe. I have been riding right next to cars who come over into my lane. No I wasn't in the blind spot either...I was at their window.

It's a situational bad practice. Ironbutt got grief for it because he was hugging the right side of the fast lane at high speed while traffic was stopped/slow in the lane to his right, which robs him of time to react to cars moving into his lane at a high delta (him moving at ~80mph, and them moving over from the right at ~0-45mph).

In this situation, you're coming up to a stop (the toll booth), so the chances of a car diving to the side as you progress get lower the closer to the booth you get and they get more "locked in" to one booth.

The thing with motorcycles is that speed isn't dangerous on it's own, high deltas are dangerous. Getting rear ended here is a result of a high delta between the cars in front and the car behind. Low deltas mean more time to react, to stop, to swerve, to accelerate away. Learning to minimize deltas is, IMO, one of the most important skills to develop as a new rider.

 

[rritterson]

even after all that has been said, above, something like that is a worst nightmare type situation. The frame rate on the traffic camera sucks, but, as far as I can tell, the car behind the moto didn't even brake until after it had collided with the rider, which means that the time the rider had to react was extremely small (a braking car would have taken longer to hit, a screeching-brake car gives a loud warning). If the rider hadn't already prepped an escape route in his head and been staring at the car in his rearview, it was going to be lights out because there just wasn't enough time to react.

I try to maintain excellent situational awareness at all times when on my moto, but I have to admit I'd have probably tunnel-visioned into the rapidly stopping cars ahead of me and been focusing on determining whether I could stop (without the locked rear wheel) and become momentarily oblivious to the car behind me.

Huge kudos to the SUV for A) swerving to prevent packing the car into the moto again and B) swerving hard enough to avoid the rider on the ground with out losing control.

And note how the jeep behind comes to a stop easily and without incident, so it's not like this was one of those crazy 70-0 for no reason situations I've been in on the 405.

 

[tuxumino]

the car that hit the rider doesn't appear to try to stop at all, bet the driver had a cel phone in hand.
the best the rider could have done was have an eye on his six and pulled some evasive maneuver, going into a splittin' mode may have given him a better chance, if he could have dodged that rear-ender that car would have run full speed into the car in front of the rider.
I don't think lane sharing is legal in Tx so riders there have little practice with it.

 

[Z3n]

even after all that has been said, above, something like that is a worst nightmare type situation. The frame rate on the traffic camera sucks, but, as far as I can tell, the car behind the moto didn't even brake until after it had collided with the rider, which means that the time the rider had to react was extremely small (a braking car would have taken longer to hit, a screeching-brake car gives a loud warning). If the rider hadn't already prepped an escape route in his head and been staring at the car in his rearview, it was going to be lights out because there just wasn't enough time to react.

I try to maintain excellent situational awareness at all times when on my moto, but I have to admit I'd have probably tunnel-visioned into the rapidly stopping cars ahead of me and been focusing on determining whether I could stop (without the locked rear wheel) and become momentarily oblivious to the car behind me.

Huge kudos to the SUV for A) swerving to prevent packing the car into the moto again and B) swerving hard enough to avoid the rider on the ground with out losing control.

And note how the jeep behind comes to a stop easily and without incident, so it's not like this was one of those crazy 70-0 for no reason situations I've been in on the 405.

Nightmare situation or no, there are many lessons to learn here. To stack up a couple that have already been addressed:

1. Always, ALWAYS, have an escape route planned.
2. Defensive lane sharing.
3. Always check your mirrors when braking.

I'd add to this: Accidents like this are why a generous following distance is good. Slowly braking rather than super aggressive braking gives the cars behind you time to notice that you are on the brakes. It also helps you avoid tunnel vision because you need to brake aggressively. If he'd been braking for 2-3 seconds, or gently applied the brake to light his rear brake light, then the driver behind him may have noticed before it was too late.


More following distances is even more important on a motorcycle than it is in a car. You can mash the ABS on a car and it will stop regardless of conditions, most motorcyclists don't have the luxury of ABS.

 

[revnort]

It's a situational bad practice. Ironbutt got grief for it because he was hugging the right side of the fast lane at high speed while traffic was stopped/slow in the lane to his right, which robs him of time to react to cars moving into his lane at a high delta (him moving at ~80mph, and them moving over from the right at ~0-45mph).

In this situation, you're coming up to a stop (the toll booth), so the chances of a car diving to the side as you progress get lower the closer to the booth you get and they get more "locked in" to one booth.

The thing with motorcycles is that speed isn't dangerous on it's own, high deltas are dangerous. Getting rear ended here is a result of a high delta between the cars in front and the car behind. Low deltas mean more time to react, to stop, to swerve, to accelerate away. Learning to minimize deltas is, IMO, one of the most important skills to develop as a new rider.

I am not so sure that this IS near a toll booth. The only indication you have is the road is a 'tollway' That doesn't mean the booth isn't 10 or 20 miles down the road. Too hard to tell why people are stopping, other lanes are moving normally.

I agree with the situational aspect of the lane position. Also I would not have been in the right in Ironbutts video. However, I got the impression some were advocating this is a bad practice all around, but that is too broad a stroke. Still I have had people come into my lane when they should have seen me. This is with no delta.

even after all that has been said, above, something like that is a worst nightmare type situation. The frame rate on the traffic camera sucks, but, as far as I can tell, the car behind the moto didn't even brake until after it had collided with the rider, which means that the time the rider had to react was extremely small (a braking car would have taken longer to hit, a screeching-brake car gives a loud warning). If the rider hadn't already prepped an escape route in his head and been staring at the car in his rearview, it was going to be lights out because there just wasn't enough time to react.

I try to maintain excellent situational awareness at all times when on my moto, but I have to admit I'd have probably tunnel-visioned into the rapidly stopping cars ahead of me and been focusing on determining whether I could stop (without the locked rear wheel) and become momentarily oblivious to the car behind me.

Huge kudos to the SUV for A) swerving to prevent packing the car into the moto again and B) swerving hard enough to avoid the rider on the ground with out losing control.

And note how the jeep behind comes to a stop easily and without incident, so it's not like this was one of those crazy 70-0 for no reason situations I've been in on the 405.

I agree this situation is giving me some food for thought and is a bad one all around. It is easy to armchair but the rider probably would had so little warning about the rear end. I am trying to be realistic about what I would have done. I do look in my mirror though when braking hard but I am not sure I would have not gotten hit here though. Hindsight is easy.

The SUV swerving does deserve some serious kudos. I am glad there were not cars in lane 3 preventing him from missing the rider.

 

[flying_hun]

1. Always, ALWAYS, have an escape route planned.
2. Defensive lane sharing.
3. Always check your mirrors when braking.

QFT.

BTW, the tollways in TX do have something like FasTrak. It's called EZTag or some such thing. Just like here, not everyone has the transponders.

 

[Z3n]

I am not so sure that this IS near a toll booth. The only indication you have is the road is a 'tollway' That doesn't mean the booth isn't 10 or 20 miles down the road. Too hard to tell why people are stopping, other lanes are moving normally.

I agree with the situational aspect of the lane position. Also I would not have been in the right in Ironbutts video. However, I got the impression some were advocating this is a bad practice all around, but that is too broad a stroke. Still I have had people come into my lane when they should have seen me. This is with no delta.

That is a fair point. However, in that situation, it makes even more sense to drop into the laneshare, again, in an attempt to minimize the delta of you and the cars around you. 70mph traffic behind you to stopped traffic in front of you, dangerous. 10-15mph through stopped traffic isn't very dangerous at all.

I agree this situation is giving me some food for thought and is a bad one all around. It is easy to armchair but the rider probably would had so little warning about the rear end. I am trying to be realistic about what I would have done. I do look in my mirror though when braking hard but I am not sure I would have not gotten hit here though. Hindsight is easy.

The SUV swerving does deserve some serious kudos. I am glad there were not cars in lane 3 preventing him from missing the rider.

The thing about having little warning is it really highlights why it's so important to have these plans already mapped out in your mind. A famous racer once said that the key to being a good racer is already knowing what you're going to do before the situation hits. When you start sliding the rear wheel, you don't have time to think "Oh, It's spinning...now, because it's spinning, I need to hold the throttle steady!", by the time that passes through your brain, you're already on the ground. You need to have that plan already in place so you don't have a "stop, think, react", it's a simple "cause/effect".

You need to be ready in a situation like this where when you're slamming on the brakes to make your decisions immediately, and drop into the split. If he doesn't stop, then you've performed a mild traffic violation (or not, if you're in CA), and you're safe. If he does stop, you've performed a mild traffic violation and you're safe. More following distance would have given him more time to react, and would have been easy and safe to establish. Over the years I've been riding, it seems like the majority of accidents I see that take place could have been avoided by either more following distance or better management of speed deltas. As such, these are 2 things that I try to be VERY aware of, and do my best to manage properly at all times.

Hindsight is easy, but what people don't think about is how they can apply that hindsight to future situations so that future situations get easy too. Everyone gets tired, everyone makes mistakes, everyone gets caught out sometimes, but having these escape routes pre-planned, having gone through these situations in your head before, can be the difference between "oh fuck, he's not stopping!" and "time to lanesplit to safety!".

 

[Gnarly Cranium]

Having that white pickup right next to him going nearly the same speed means he didn't really have a chance to switch lanes. HOWEVER... I would much, MUCH rather have that pickup right there in that position, than have it approaching from behind at an unknown speed. Having the pickup right there at hand means that he could've used his peripheral vision to measure the distance between himself and the vehicle in the next lane, to be certain that you have a good chance to dive between the lanes in an attempt to go around the guys in front of you, without having to take the time for a shoulder check. Thing is, that's only the type of maneuver I'd try in a bad emergency, not just as a precaution. Diving for the shoulder probably would have been a better bet, more room that way, but again not a casual option. If the white truck wasn't there I'd just move over casually, but since it was...

Trouble is, he probably felt like he was braking hard enough to stop in time, and that was his primary concern. Whether he locked the rear or not, he was successfully stopping.

To really gauge the speed of the car behind him and realize that it wasn't stopping fast enough would take studying the mirrors for some actual time-- it's HARD to really tell just how fast somebody is approaching you from behind, especially if they're already in the process of decelerating. They look like they're slowing down, but are they slowing down ENOUGH? Judging their speed with that detail is really difficult to do at a glance. Sometimes, at red lights, where I have nothing to do but sit still and stare at my mirrors, I watch the cars behind me and try to guess how fast they are going, and if they're slowing down enough... and frankly even when I'm staring at them for a few seconds I still wouldn't really be able to say I could recognize it in time if one wasn't going to stop.

Shit like this makes me really paranoid about even thinking about touching my brakes, especially on the freeway. Escape routes first.

 

[R3DS!X]

He wasn't braking properly. He calould have been way harder on the front brakes and stopped sooner. (Which wouldn't have helped him not get hit)
I almost never use my rear brake my rear tire squeals a bit but that from engine braking and being hard on the ffront brakes.

 

[louemc]

In my experience, when you have a situation like that where you're slowing, and the car behind you isn't slowing, you stop braking and laneshare past the car in front of you.

Why? You're passing through the cars around you so you have a solid wall of car between you and the idiots behind you. If they're slowing for a toll booth, the chances of them being able to lane jump at any reasonable speed is pretty low, 15mph is 22 feet per second, so you'll blow by any car near you in a bit under a second, which means that even if the car behind you asspacks the car you just passed, you should be out of the danger zone before things get too crazy.

The other factor is that getting sideswiped still gives you some outs, you can swerve with the car. There isn't the same out when you get asspacked.

I don't really give a shit about legality or courtesy at that point though. I'll hash the problems of my evasive maneuvers out with the courts when my date is up in the next 9 months.

Exactly (or damn close to it) there is 0 chance of sideswiping ahead of me.

And to add to your post (cause I don't feel up to posting on the offending post about this)

There is no reacting. Reacting is too late. Look what is around you. Access what has to be done, and do it. You have to be in command of your situation, period.

In this video, there was space to dive into, the biker that couldn't brake right, got so busy braking wrong, the biker target fixed on the car in front, and totally ignored the open space to dive into.

The space between lanes is lovely...You fit in...cars don't...what more could Ya ask for?

(I know, 3Zn already said this, I just couldn't control myself, and shut up ).

 

[Gnarly Cranium]

I have tried to develop the habit of always glancing at my mirrors BEFORE I ever touch the brakes. I need to keep enough following distance ahead of myself that even if something catastrophic happens to the car in front of me, I have enough time to check my mirrors before I go for the brakes. If I have a clear path behind me, great. If somebody's too close, it's time to swerve instead. That decision has to be made before losing speed, as soon as I brake I lose my chance to change lanes.

You know, the way he curls up and starts rolling around at the end of that video looks exactly like that baby squirrel the cop pepper sprayed in that video in the sink the other day. That's sticking in my head for some reason.