I often get inspiration for my blogs through recent claims we take on and stories I read in the press. On occasions, the inspiration comes from my own personal experience – and given I do a commute of more than 66 miles a day, I’m almost taken out on the motorways and on roundabouts on a regular basis.
It’s quite concerning sometimes – but as I’m a good driver (in my opinion) I can normally avoid the idiocy of others causing an accident. So let’s look at the changing lanes scenario.
The M1 between Junction 28 and 29a which is on my commuting route is a nightmare enough with the central reservation barrier replacement job slowing traffic down to 50mph and moving the lanes over to use of the hard shoulder. If anyone breaks down or has a crash, it’s a traffic nightmare!
But you’d think with everyone having to drive at a slow and steady pace of 50mph that accidents would be far less likely. But sometimes, people just don’t concentrate on what they’re doing – as per my experience this morning when a driver decided to try and change lanes in to my lane whist I was still driving in it!
The basic rules of the road are clear and rather easy to follow when it comes to changing lanes – you use your mirrors and signal, and only move over when it is completely safe to do so. You can’t just move over and expect other drivers to then have to dodge you – the right of way is with the driver already established in their lane.
Luckily I saw him moving over and I was able to slam the brakes on and blast my horn to avoid a collision – but the driver behind me almost slammed in to my rear end as a result of it. This kind of thing highlights that silly driving mistakes can result in significant accidents – especially on motorways where even 50mph is fairly fast and can lead to multiple car pileups.
So if you are the victim of someone changing lanes and causing an accident, you should have a solid claim for personal injury compensation against the other driver. As the established driver in the lane, you have the right of way and it’s the responsibility of the driver trying to move in to your lane to ensure they do so when it is entirely safe and appropriate.
Don’t hesitate to get in touch and get a claim started today – the process is dead easy and normally very straightforward to set up and initiate.