Those that ride on the road - a Q?

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Nic

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Does anyone else feel that riding on the road is becoming more dangerous?

We have no choice but to hack on single track country lanes. Lanes that I've been riding on for about 20 years. In the last few months I have been run off the road by a Mitsubushi Lancer, & verbally abused (and now stalked) by a woman in a BMW X3 who told me horses have no right to be on the roads. Recently we have more near misses & today the vet told us that she had to attend an RTA last week to destroy a pony that had been hit by a car.

It doesn't seem to just be bad drivers, some of them genuinely have no idea what hand signals mean or the correct manner in which to pass a horse. Have these people never read a Highway code?

We never ride without Hi viz, are always courteous & allow cars to pass easily.

So is it just me?
 
I'd have a word with the police, just take their car reg and report them for dangerous driving as for the lady stalking you, why haven't you been to the police already, she could be dangerous
 
definitely not just you! my youngster used to be okay on the roads, but since a landrover speeded past about 3 inches away from us completely ignoring my signal to slow down - she kicks out at all passing cars.
it only takes one bad experience and thats it! lots of people just dont understand/are to ignorant to understand that horses are unpredictable
 
No, it's not just you.

There was an RTA last year in the village we have to ride though and a horse was killed. There was a campaign started and a few of us have since been in discussion with the local Council. We were advised to take the registration numbers of any vehicle that was driving inconsiderately or dangerously or if the driver gave us any verbal abuse, and report any incident to both the Council and to the Police.

I have to say that since the accident, and subsequent awareness walk through the village, things have been a LOT better, but we still get the occasional arse, like the bloke on his Harley who insisted on revving it up despite my requests for him to stop, while my pony did a spin dryer impression.
 
No its not just you. I always hack and have to go down a country lane. This day in particular a car came speeding round the corner, i heard it but had no where to go to get out of the way. They screeched to a halt just in front of me. The driver works at the racing yard opposite my yard, so should know better. I just shook my head. I then carried on down the lane when i saw a 4x4 towing a horse trailer. It was doing about 30. Again i just had to sit there and hope it could stop. Good job they had no horse in the trailer. Neither of them said sorry, they would not even look me in the eye. But i love hacking and will carry on.
 
Black_Horse_White said:
No its not just you. I always hack and have to go down a country lane. This day in particular a car came speeding round the corner, i heard it but had no where to go to get out of the way. They screeched to a halt just in front of me. The driver works at the racing yard opposite my yard, so should know better. I just shook my head. I then carried on down the lane when i saw a 4x4 towing a horse trailer. It was doing about 30. Again i just had to sit there and hope it could stop. Good job they had no horse in the trailer. Neither of them said sorry, they would not even look me in the eye. But i love hacking and will carry on.
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I think the phrase is 'familiarity breeds contempt.

My OH thought she was a goner while riding down a steep slope as she heard a van coming down behind her way too fast. She got as far off the road as possible (which is not far at the point she had reached) and heard the screeching of brakes and tyres. The van missed her by millimetres and the driver jumped out (a woman) and burst into tears, confessing that she was going much too fast. You would have thought the driver would have known better, as she is a local rider and her van is a mobile tack shop!
 
i had a woman in a flash convertible sports car whizz past my (then 9 year old son on his 13hh pony) down a single track lane at high speed, thank goodness the pony was totally bombproof and didn't bat an eyelid but her wingmirror hit my sons stirrup as she went by, luckily it was a dead end lane and boy oh boy did she get a bollo*king when I caught up with her at the end of the lane, I was furious and shaking, I passed her several times after that incident and she always then slowed down and waved us through.
 
no it's not just you!

i don't mind the single track roads so much coz people have to stop to get past you. (I know they don't always want to) But I have to ride on a 2 lane country road that has buses, lorries, tractors etc, and that concerns me more. most people are fine but i have had many over the years that have ignored my polite requests for them to slow down or stop, and even ignored me as my horse leapt around in the road.Because they can see that it's wide enough for 2 cars they think that means slowing down from 50 to 40 is fine and ignoring the silly woman begging them to stop is fine too! obviously the leaping horse won't cross the white line in the middle of the road onto their side cos it read the highway code before it came out on its hack, so they are safe to continue!!!

i also had a very scary incident with a herd of bullocks which involved me being trampled by my own terrified horse who then galloped off down the road, ripping off a shoe as she went. that was on a narrow lane.

that was a real crunch point for me. I realized that no matter what i did to control or manage my youngster, i ultimately had no control over the other road users!! took me a while to realize i was delaying leaving to go out for a hack. made the decision to only hack at weekends for a while until i got my confidence back, which is a real shame. A year later i still prefer to ride on sundays as traffic far less, far smaller and far slower!

i've been riding for more years than i care to mention and the volume and size of the traffic has grown beyond belief.
I can envisage a time when it will just be too dangerous for anyone to ride on the road, not sure what we do then.

:0(
 
i hate road hacking, but iv only got 2 bridlepaths and 1 permissive route, and they can only be used May-Sept so over winter i HAVE to use the roads (and would have to use the road to reach the bridlepaths anyway)........i detest every second of it, people have no clue and no manners.

only last weekend a combine came up behind me and my 5yo started rodeo broncing and spinning, instead of stopping it followed me thus effectively chasing us until i could pull in to a housing estate and let him past. really shook us both up and has no doubt made his slight nervousness in traffic a million times worse.grrrrrr. if the tw@t had given me 10 seconds i could have crossed the road in to a drive and let him past straight away.
 
I ride alot on country lanes. Providing I'm not on a blind corner, I find that riding in the middle of the road is safer. This makes it impossible for cars to try to speed past as they can't get past me and therefore have to slow down. I then thank them and move into the side of the road.
 
Yes I often move further into the road to enable drivers to see me, and I am hi-vizzed up to the eyeballs! I believe that this is what motorcyclists are trained to do also.
Thankfully my horse is excellent in traffic. We are approaching tourist season, we've been lucky to have a quiet winter but the traffic is picking up now.
 
We have found that the roads are definitely getting worse. We moved here about 5 years ago and the difference from then till now is very worrying. We find the aggression from drivers when asked to slow down is quite unnerving and people just speed past on the narrowest of roads and don't get me started on white van man and tractor drivers - we have had lorries hooting and trying to overtake on single track roads because horse is upset and spooking because of said lorry. I am getting quite despairing about hacking out now as even the weekends are full of idiots racing along narrow lanes either on bicycles or cars or motorbikes, a lot of whom seem to find great pleasure in upsetting our horses. The filthy looks we get when we politely ask people to slow down is quite incredible. I think we have become a very unpleasant and aggressive society and I do worry about the future of hacking out.
 
I think drivers seem to be getting worse!! They're going so fast often and just don't bother to slow down.. It's not just when i'm riding either... i often cycle up to the yard... and several times ive been nearly hit buy speeding drivers!! :(
 
monkeymad said:
I ride alot on country lanes. Providing I'm not on a blind corner, I find that riding in the middle of the road is safer. This makes it impossible for cars to try to speed past as they can't get past me and therefore have to slow down. I then thank them and move into the side of the road.
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Yes that's what I do also. If there are 2 of us we ride 2 abreast so they have to slow down. Once they have slowed we go in single file. Still scary with the huge lorries that go past a rattling and shaking, supposed to be 30 mph but more like 50. My 18 yo used to be fine but just 1 bad incident of speeding rattling lorry frightened him and even now I will hide in any gateway or trot in middle of road til I find safety with him....he never forgot:(
 
johnrobert said:
I'd have a word with the police, just take their car reg and report them for dangerous driving as for the lady stalking you, why haven't you been to the police already, she could be dangerous
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I have been to the police about both incidents. The woman isn't stalking me as in following me, she has taken to watching me in a field we can ride in since the Police showed up at her door. Shame as she went AWOL for a while, kinda hoped she'd fallen off the edge of the planet. Don't worry, the second she starts following me I'll dial 999!

The Police were most amused at her attitude when they paid her a visit. She demanded to know how dare they turn up at her house & why weren't they out catching criminals?!
 
I should also add that most lorry/van/tractor drivers round here are very considerate. It seems to be the smaller the vehichle, the worse the driving!
 
I have to say 99% of drivers around me are great, but there is 1 seriously horrid woman who always speeds up when she sees me, just because i asked her to slow down one day when i was riding a young horse on the road for the 2nd time, when i did ask her to slow down she started mouthing at me and shaking her head and waving her fist.
would love to meet her in person when iam on foot one day and see how brave she is then
 
Must admit that the majority of road users near me usually slow down and give plenty of room. However, there is always the minority - one in particular who should know better - she has horse of her own and regularly revs the engine of the horsebox she drives as she passes other riders (idiot!).

It's not just those drivers that go too fast near us but also the condition of the lanes - surfaces are so slippery that it's got to the stage that I try not to ride on them now. Usually end up boxing horse up and travelling to a local disused railway track that is now a public bridleway and surrounding fields/lanes which are much safer and thankfully only 20 minutes away.
 
I never hack out without my 'road whip' which is a red lunge whip with the lash cut off. If I hear a speeding car behind, I stick it right out in the road so the car has to give me a very wide berth or risk getting hit! I would not feel safe without it now.
 
QR

I really think a lot of drivers have no idea what hand signals mean. I ride on a country road which is big enough for two sides of traffic but has no white lines in the middle so its not the appropriate width. A taxi came speeding past us at what was probably 50 and made no attempt to slow down. About 5-10mins later he was coming back towards us so I put my arm out, waved it up and down to tell him to slow down. He just put his hand up to thank us and must have assumed I was thanking him!!

I think its something that should be in driving theory tests. I did my theory little over 4 yrs ago and dont remember anything in the book about what signals mean from riders.

The only down side to the yard i'm on at the mo is lack of good offroad hacking. The country roads are busy on one side of the yard and on the other there is the Fosse Way which I would never want to ride on.
 
My advice is to always wear a long sleeved Hi-Viz jacket when hacking out as other road users can see your hand signals more clearly. When I want other road users to stop I point at them for 3 seconds and then put the palm of my hand up towards them. That normally does the trick. I would also suggest that you take the BHS Road Safety Course as this will provide you with some useful tools to control traffic when riding on the roads.
 
I do think they are getting worse. A lot of people do not seem to know or care what hand signals mean. We were on our way through a narrow passing place between two high walls the other day and a couple of cars came up behind us. I asked the first to wait for us the get through and she came barging on past anyway. Well, i normally sing my abuse to stop me upsetting the horse but this time i shouted 'i said wait, you ignorant woman!' and found to great satisfaction that her window was open. I hope she got the message, especially since it clearly upset the horse i was on. Same ride, a very noisy clattery flatbed full of scaffolding stopped just after a passing place to let us through when i asked because it was spooking the daft arab. I was thanking him profusely, and then an estate comes barging between him and us, further upsetting the horse. The guy in the van actually shook his head and guestured at them for me! :D

A lot of the big traffic is fantastic though. We found ourselves in the middle of a building site with lots of huge wagons the other day and poor osc just freaked out at finding himself surrounded. They all stopped/ slowed right down and waited until we were out of sight, deespite it being an obviously busy site. Then another big lorry stopped on the main road to let us cross as both horses were still freaking out from the bad experience. Just wish more car drivers would react the same.

The best ever was some sort of rattly construction vehicle on a narrow country lane, who actually stopped and turned it off as soon as he saw us (high viz saves the day!) without me even asking, and waited about 5 mins whilst we reached him, went past and got far enough away. There are lots of nice people out there too :D They should get the credit they deserve, it's not all bad news!

And i find that i do have less problems since buying hi vis gloves, which i never hack out without. At least then there is no excuse to say they haven't seen.
 
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I think im lucky as its a very horsey area and people kind of expect a horse to be round the corner. I actually find women driver the worst. I once asked a lady in a convertable to stop as I was going to turn right ( as was she) but Winston had spotted a really scary sheep that was loose on the same side as us. She ignored my hand signal revved her car and passed me with no distance. Thankfully Winston is pretty chilled but she went so close to him that when he did jump at approaching sheep he took off her wingmirror. She said nothing to me I just got a dirty look. Just peeved me if she stayed where she was she would have kept her wingmirror.

Another thing that peeves me is when im driving Winston some people try and cut me up when turning . I swear to god one day one of my shafts is gonna go into some ones car.
 
A few weeks ago, I was driving down the single track lane to get to my yard and I found I was following another driver who lived on that very lane, complete with its horse & rider road signs. Unbelievably, he thought the safest way to navigate the lane was to zoom about at normal speed but on every blind corner he would lean on the car horn!!!! I deliberately closed up the gap between us and made frantic signs through my windscreen for him NOT to hoot as he zoomed round corners. I mean, what possible good did he think that would do if there was a child, ramblers, another vehicle with the radio on, cattle, sheep, goats (don't ask), pony and traps, horse riders, child riders etc etc etc. Where are they supposed to throw themselves when they hear the toot? What an absolute pratt. But, me being me and never one to let dangerous behaviour go unchallenged, I stopped behind him when he pulled up outside his house and told him that it was only a matter of time til his actions caused a nasty injury or a death. Have a guess which of the following replies he gave: a) oh no! I hadn't thought it through! Thank you for bringing it to my attention, or b) you hideous old cow, don't you go telling me how to drive and get your bloody car away from outside MY house before I call the police. If you answered (a) you clearly don't have as jaundiced a view of non-riders as I do!
 
I have only ever ridden on the roads once and it was quite a nervous experience but the horse was good as gold even though there were caravans and lorries hurtling past at silly speeds down a narrow lane.

But when I'm first in queue of traffic down a narrow lane and there's a horse, I slow right down to pass making sure everyone behind me goes as slow (I have a big 4x4 so they can't pass :D ). Though once a guy beeped his horn at my slow speed and the horse who was riding next to us freaked out. It was only a young girl on top. So I stopped my car, opened the door and stood there so as he couldn't pass and waited until the horse had gone round the corner before getting back in and driving away calmly. He wasn't so brave once I had got out lol.

I think it's ridiculous though how people drive. I am only 21 and make sure to drive as safely as possible because I know of the dangers of bad driving from others' experiences. So age or inexperience is no excuse.
 
I was always happy to ride on the road, and found the majority of drivers kind and courtious. But 5 weeks ago we were hit by a car and my horse was killed. |The other horse with us will be pts this week because of brain trauma. There is so much in the horse mags about riders riding safely, i. hi-vis, single file etc etc (which is no bad thing) but this accident had no reflect on e. The car was just going too fast. I do think the advice given to riders is good, but maybe it should also be put into driving mmagazines, and something brought into the driving test as to how to pass a horse on the road.
 
No, it's not just you, some people seem to have little respect for horses on the roads these days. :(
Some guy shouted at me to "get off the road and on to a bridleway" as he pays his road tax! I replied that I pay road tax too I am just as entitled to use the roads with my horse! I also said that I was on my way to a bridleway, and if he could suggest another way of getting there I'd gladly use it. Idiot. :mad:
It does however annoy me when you see riders without hi-vis on, and also those who don't say thank you when cars do slow down.
Rant over. xxx
 
Nope, not seen any real difference in my lifetime, however I am only 20.

I do think our off road riding is getting worse though :S Stupid families with brain dead kids, out of control dogs, people who refuse to move, and dirt bikes. Riding on the road is often less stressful around here!
 
Box_Of_Frogs said:
A few weeks ago, I was driving down the single track lane to get to my yard and I found I was following another driver who lived on that very lane, complete with its horse & rider road signs. Unbelievably, he thought the safest way to navigate the lane was to zoom about at normal speed but on every blind corner he would lean on the car horn!!!! I deliberately closed up the gap between us and made frantic signs through my windscreen for him NOT to hoot as he zoomed round corners. I mean, what possible good did he think that would do if there was a child, ramblers, another vehicle with the radio on, cattle, sheep, goats (don't ask), pony and traps, horse riders, child riders etc etc etc. Where are they supposed to throw themselves when they hear the toot? !
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I live on a sharp bend on a 2 lane country road that is used as a rat run quite a lot. Lots of riders go past my house (noisy clattery things ;) ) and there is one guy that always toots his horn approaching the corner.

One day I will be prepared enough to be there waiting for him to as him exactly why he does it. If there are horses on the road - they can't go anywhere anyway to move out of the way, and if there was a tractor just around the corner....... well I think I know who would win the fight there! I just don't know what he's trying to acheieve - just drive slower you fool :mad:
 
The drivers around me are generally good, but at rush hour they manage to pass wide, but not slow!

A few months ago I was hacking out with a friend and as we were coming out of a junction a driver was indicating to turn in, but went straight on, at us, and slammed her brakes on when she saw us. This in itself was not a big issue, we all make mistakes, but she then proceeded to let my friend turn out of the junction, but when me and Murphy tried to follow she cut us up, leaving us behind round the corner. Fortunately Murphy is very chilled, but I know for many horses their friend disappearing round the corner without them and a car about 3 inches away from their side, but be enough to blow their brains. I did go a bit mental at the driver, who then stopped and apologised for leaving her indicator on, but I had to explain that her cutting me up was more of an issue.

A friend once taught me a good way to make drivers slow down if they're coming up behind you a bit fast - turn round repeatedly, look anxious at them, gather up your reins etc - it often makes them think about their speed. My pony is so ploddy and calm that I think sometimes drivers don't feel the need to move over/slow down.
 
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