Mad Drivers

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Unbelievable - I hope the police follow up and actually do something about it.

Not nearly as bad but still incredible, there was a Riding & Road Safety Test at our stables at the weekend. A young girl was taking it (guessing about 12/13) on her own bombproof pony. Stewards were dotted about, there were signs up saying "exam in progress" and everyone was hi-vized to their eyeballs. The girl signalled left at a junction and stopped to check for traffic - the car behind her pulled out, overtook and turned left in front of her! Her pony was obviously upset and swung its bum round so she had to turn it and halt again. She failed as a result and was in floods of tears
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What an idiot driver.

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Why did she fail as a result? Provided her reaction to her pony's behaviour was appropriate, she should have been ok?
 
There really is no excuse and he should most certainly have stopped.
However, the car was stopped 'as if parked' what do most people do when they see a parked car? He should however, if he thought the car was parked, have ovetaken, seen the ponies ahead and stayed out long enough to pass safely.
 
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I am surprised at a motorcyclist not seeing you, they are usually the most considerate of road users round horses (I was told by an old biker that this is because they do not want half a ton of horse landing on them and the bike!
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I would also have thought that as a fellow vulnerable road user, looking out for HI-Viz would be second nature for him
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I was more than a bit suprised myself -
 
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Car passes what seems to be a parked car and speeds up,hits pony because he cant see it.Yes ,it is irresponsible to ride or lead on modern roads without fluorescent high vis clothing of some sort.

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Contributory negligence to a small degree at best in a civil claim. In a criminal case as this is likely to be, unlikely to be a valid defence. The duty of care is still on the driver to avoid hitting other road users and a road user is not rendered invisible in the eyes of the law merely by the failure to wear reflective clothing.
 
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Car passes what seems to be a parked car and speeds up,hits pony because he cant see it.Yes ,it is irresponsible to ride or lead on modern roads without fluorescent high vis clothing of some sort.

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Contributory negligence to a small degree at best in a civil claim. In a criminal case as this is likely to be, unlikely to be a valid defence. The duty of care is still on the driver to avoid hitting other road users and a road user is not rendered invisible in the eyes of the law merely by the failure to wear reflective clothing.

[/ QUOTE ]We have already established that the horses?people had hi viz items.The point I have been trying to make is that the roads are so dangerous nowdays that it is irresponsible to ride without Hi viz .Personally I am more interested in living than the result of some posthumous criminal case.
 
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Car passes what seems to be a parked car and speeds up,hits pony because he cant see it.Yes ,it is irresponsible to ride or lead on modern roads without fluorescent high vis clothing of some sort.

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Contributory negligence to a small degree at best in a civil claim. In a criminal case as this is likely to be, unlikely to be a valid defence. The duty of care is still on the driver to avoid hitting other road users and a road user is not rendered invisible in the eyes of the law merely by the failure to wear reflective clothing.

[/ QUOTE ]We have already established that the horses?people had hi viz items.The point I have been trying to make is that the roads are so dangerous nowdays that it is irresponsible to ride without Hi viz .Personally I am more interested in living than the result of some posthumous criminal case.

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I don't disagree in full, but as a high milage driver, and motorcyclist with over 30 years on the road, I feel that people don't see other road users for a number of reasons, not least of which is because they are not paying attention to the road.

The classic 'sorry mate I did not see you' has long been translated in the motorcycle world as 'sorry mate I was not looking'.

In this case I would speculate that the driver was in a hurry (aren't they always) and decided he could get through regardless. The riders, handlers and ponies could have been clad top to toe in hi-viz and the driver would still have barged through.

It does beg the question, why do people think they can cut so close to horses? Something they would never do if it were a 42 tonne truck!
 
I was having this discussion with a cyclist that I ment on my Saturday morning hack last week and we decided that one of the reasons so many drivers show little respect or commen sense to vunerable road users is because they have never walked, cycled or ridden a horse on public roads.

Children these days are containerised in vehicles and taken to and from school in them and then taught to drive. They have never walked, cycled or riden a horse on the roads.

I wear a long sleeved Hi-Viz jacket and a hat band and my horse wears Hi-Viz reign covers, nose band. The long sleeved jacket ensures motorists can see my arm signals and many of them mistake me for a mounted police officer.
 
Hi viz or not, I am sorry, the car will have had to slow down momentarily to then decide to overtake the 'stationary' car so should be able to bloody well see two ponies and people leading. I don't wear hi viz when walking my dogs. What if it had been a tractor/hedgecutter etc in front and he hadn't seen?!

For the sake of a few seconds that irresponsible driver could have killed a pony AND a child just thank god this didn't happen but I DO hope he his charged with driving (a) without due care and attention and (b) for leaving the scene of an accident.

Reminds me of a horrific insurance claim we dealt with where a horse rider was turing right off (I assume) a more main road. car behind waiting for her to turn. Another car approaching from behind decided he wasn't going to wait behind this car and overtook - he obviously did not see the horse and rider (god knows how) and killed the horse outright and the rider was left with severe spine and leg injuries. Stories like that make my blood run cold. These drivers ruin people's lives and for what? The sake of a few seconds.
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We have already established that the horses?people had hi viz items.The point I have been trying to make is that the roads are so dangerous nowdays that it is irresponsible to ride without Hi viz .Personally I am more interested in living than the result of some posthumous criminal case.

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Living is the most important thing, of course it is BUT in the case of a hit and run (that is what it was) the driver should be prosecuted and maybe he will learn his lesson, be it that he is fined, get a driving ban or spends a few nights in jail (As you can probably tell I have no idea what the penalty is for a hit and run.) For all the driver knew he could have killed a 3 year old child and he didn't give it a second thought - just drove off. That to me means he needs to learn some sort of a lesson, well actually to me he shouldn't even be driving.

Why is it that most road users don't seem to get that horses have the same rights to be on the road as cyclists or motorbikes??

I'm so glad it isn't really like this where I live - you get some idiot drivers but most of them will slow down to pass the horses or stop to let you turn into a road. Saying that I do live in a small village that probably has around 10 stable yards so most people are used to seeing horses on the roads.
 
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