Right of way?

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#1215427 15-Jan-2015 12:20

Look at the very beginning of the video. The Toyota is visible in the windscreen of the OPs car. That was the moment the OP should have slowed to allow the merge.

mdooher

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#1215447 15-Jan-2015 12:39

JWR:
I don't think either car are turning i.e. neither have to cross a centre line.

Therefore, it is a merge.

It is hard to tell. But, it did seem that the other car was ahead. So, you probably should have slowed a little and let him go ahead.

Also, if it was me, I would have been in the left hand lane there. I can't see any reason to be in the right hand lane.

I know merging is mentioned in the road code however there is no such term in the Land Transport (Road User Rule) 2004 therefore you must rely on other rules to make a determination. If we consider the Toyota is on a slip lane (rather than coming off another road and therefore a turn) then the only bit of the rule I can find that applies is:

Section 2.6 (3) A driver must not, when passing another vehicle moving in the same direction, move into the line of passage of that vehicle until the manoeuvre can be made safely and without impeding the movement of that other vehicle.

This of course only applies once the two lanes become one and since the Toyota ended up in front I would say by definition it passed the other vehicle. and so contravened this section.

Matthew

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#1215449 15-Jan-2015 12:39

Only in NZ do you have traffic merge lanes on the fastlane / righthand lane of a motorway. Or even exit lanes from the righthand lane. Makes a mockery of the keep left rules.

MikeB4

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#1215454 15-Jan-2015 12:44

mdooher:
JWR:
I don't think either car are turning i.e. neither have to cross a centre line.

Therefore, it is a merge.

It is hard to tell. But, it did seem that the other car was ahead. So, you probably should have slowed a little and let him go ahead.

Also, if it was me, I would have been in the left hand lane there. I can't see any reason to be in the right hand lane.

I know merging is mentioned in the road code however there is no such term in the Land Transport (Road User Rule) 2004 therefore you must rely on other rules to make a determination. If we consider the Toyota is on a slip lane (rather than coming off another road and therefore a turn) then the only bit of the rule I can find that applies is:

Section 2.6 (3) A driver must not, when passing another vehicle moving in the same direction, move into the line of passage of that vehicle until the manoeuvre can be made safely and without impeding the movement of that other vehicle.

This of course only applies once the two lanes become one and since the Toyota ended up in front I would say by definition it passed the other vehicle. and so contravened this section.

I actually drove that road several times in the last few weeks and it is a definitely a merge and what is detailed here applies http://www.nzta.govt.nz/resources/roadcode/about-driving/merging.html

A slight reduction in speed would have allowed the Toyota to merge safely and only cost 1/1000th of a second in time

mdooher

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#1215457 15-Jan-2015 12:50

KiwiNZ:
mdooher:
JWR:
I don't think either car are turning i.e. neither have to cross a centre line.

Therefore, it is a merge.

It is hard to tell. But, it did seem that the other car was ahead. So, you probably should have slowed a little and let him go ahead.

Also, if it was me, I would have been in the left hand lane there. I can't see any reason to be in the right hand lane.

I know merging is mentioned in the road code however there is no such term in the Land Transport (Road User Rule) 2004 therefore you must rely on other rules to make a determination. If we consider the Toyota is on a slip lane (rather than coming off another road and therefore a turn) then the only bit of the rule I can find that applies is:

Section 2.6 (3) A driver must not, when passing another vehicle moving in the same direction, move into the line of passage of that vehicle until the manoeuvre can be made safely and without impeding the movement of that other vehicle.

This of course only applies once the two lanes become one and since the Toyota ended up in front I would say by definition it passed the other vehicle. and so contravened this section.

I actually drove that road several times in the last few weeks and it is a definitely a merge and what is detailed here applies http://www.nzta.govt.nz/resources/roadcode/about-driving/merging.html

What I am getting at is the road code is just a guide, it is not the law, you don't have to follow it if you don't want to (obviously it makes for a better world when we do)

You can't rely on some pretty picture in the road code when you end up in court.

Matthew

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#1215501 15-Jan-2015 13:52

Just rewatching it, I think the toyota was in the right. This is because the OP driver was easily able to see that the toyota was coming up on the right side for a reasoanble period of time, and there would have been a warning of a merge for the OP driver further up the road, so they knew they needed to pay attention, and to merge with traffic from the incoming right lane. So they needed to judge their speed with the car that was about to merge with the lane. The toyota must have also been in front of the other vehicle, as shown in the video, but was travelling slower so the cars nearly ended up in the same space at the same time. Whereas teh OP driver should have slowed down a little to match the toyotas speed. If the toyota instead had to slow down to merge behind the other vehicle, then it would have had to slow down, and it could have created a dangerous situation, as it would have then been too slow for the lane it was in, and could have caused a nose to tail. If I was in this situation, I would have slowed accordingly to allow the toyota to merge, as it was already ahead when I first saw it near to the merge area.

JWR

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#1215507 15-Jan-2015 14:19

mattwnz: Just rewatching it, I think the toyota was in the right. This is because the OP driver was easily able to see that the toyota was coming up on the right side for a reasoanble period of time, and there would have been a warning of a merge for the OP driver further up the road, so they knew they needed to pay attention, and to merge with traffic from the incoming right lane. So they needed to judge their speed with the car that was about to merge with the lane. The toyota must have also been in front of the other vehicle, as shown in the video, but was travelling slower so the cars nearly ended up in the same space at the same time. Whereas teh OP driver should have slowed down a little to match the toyotas speed. If the toyota instead had to slow down to merge behind the other vehicle, then it would have had to slow down, and it could have created a dangerous situation, as it would have then been too slow for the lane it was in, and could have caused a nose to tail. If I was in this situation, I would have slowed accordingly to allow the toyota to merge, as it was already ahead when I first saw it near to the merge area.

The OP actually sped up and tried to head off the other guy.

You can hear the exhaust note change and the GPS-based speed went from 25km/h to 44km/h.

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Jaxson

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#1215508 15-Jan-2015 14:21

jarledb:

This is the place...

I was driving on highway 2, following it. The other person had just gone through the roundabout from highway 50 and was going onto 2.

I know that roundabout, but even before you included the maps link I was going to say that in this case I think you'd look at who was merging.
In your case you on a straight bit of road that is two lanes wide, and they are on a single lane that joins with the main larger road that you are on, so the other lane is doing the merging here, not you.

So my take is that they are merging into your lane and they have to do that safely.
I'm sure there's a bit of guidance somewhere about how to join a motorway for example, which fundamentally applies here (despite this not being labelled a motorway, but you get the idea).

After that you're talking racing incident type rules, whereby if one car is clearly over half ahead then you're not legally allowed to cause an accident by driving into them to prove a point.

Jaxson

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#1215511 15-Jan-2015 14:25

JWR:

The OP actually sped up and tried to head off the other guy.

You can hear the exhaust note change and the GPS-based speed went from 25km/h to 44km/h.

I don't think the change in speed is based on cutting off the other guy. There is a corner for both of the two main lanes prior to this merging location.
Drivers in either of the two main lanes would be slowing for the corner and would be naturally speeding up coming out of it anyway.

MikeAqua

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#1215521 15-Jan-2015 15:16

From the road transport rule (road user) 2004: -

27 A driver must not pass or attempt to pass on the right of another vehicle moving in the same direction when ....

....(b) approaching or passing a flush median, unless the driver—
- (i) intends to turn right from the road marked with the flush median into another road or vehicle entrance; or
- (ii) has turned right onto the road marked with the flush median; or
- (iii) can make the entire movement without encroaching on the flush median

Technically I would argue: -
- If the Toyota encroached on the flush median at all, they are in the wrong.
- The Toyota is they are (via a short road from a side the roundabout) entering the road that runs along side the roundabout, and which the OP is already on the OP is on

From a pragmatic point of view, I think both parties could have driven better.

Both cars are accelerating toward the merge point. This makes it more difficult for either driver to judge the merge well, as it's difficult to predict the acceleration of another vehicle. If either vehicle had maintained constant speed rather than accelerating to reach the merge point first, the whole situation could have been avoided.

IMHO it's a shared fail.

Mike

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#1215523 15-Jan-2015 15:21

I don't think I am infallible. and I would have probably been better to move over to the left lane. BUT, there was no race here. I was coming through the turn and had to slow down before the turn to wait for the train crossing barrier that had just gone up.

I was driving on Highway 2 that was taking a left turn and I was accelerating to the speed limit in a normal way, was not in a race or trying to get before the Toyota.

My understanding of the situation was that the Toyota was coming out of the roundabout and entering into highway 2, and therfore had to yield to me. But I am starting to understand from the discussions here that its not that clear cut. Will be looking out extra carefully in these types of intersections in the future.

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MikeB4

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#1215525 15-Jan-2015 15:24

jarledb: I don't think I am infallible. and I would have probably been better to move over to the left lane. BUT, there was no race here. I was coming through the turn and had to slow down before the turn to wait for the train crossing barrier that had just gone up.

I was driving on Highway 2 that was taking a left turn and I was accelerating to the speed limit in a normal way, was not in a race or trying to get before the Toyota.

My understanding of the situation was that the Toyota was coming out of the roundabout and entering into highway 2, and therfore had to yield to me. But I am starting to understand from the discussions here that its not that clear cut. Will be looking out extra carefully in these types of intersections in the future.

I will say that the intersection in question is poorly designed and some what ambiguous

jarledb

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#1215527 15-Jan-2015 15:32

mattwnz:
... and there would have been a warning of a merge for the OP driver further up the road, so they knew they needed to pay attention

Knock yourself out looking for that sign. https://www.google.co.nz/maps/@-39.492134,176.892132,3a,75y,347.05h,96.78t/data=!3m4!1e1!3m2!1s4W3W87X9RFcTKM5vhYL_IA!2e0

dafman

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#1215536 15-Jan-2015 15:41

I err slightly in favour of the Corolla (as was on OP right and OP did speed up at point of merge), but agree it's a tough call and I might be wrong. Luckily for both drivers, insurers didn't have to view the dash cam to arrive at a definitive answer!

gzt

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#1215537 15-Jan-2015 15:45

The geekzone page composition finds Jarledb guilty of posting a long link without inlining and therefore messing up the page formatting. It finds Jaxson to be his unwitting accomplice quoting the same link. Where's Peter Reader when you need him? ; ).

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