My thoughts on the new Highway Code...

It's been two months now since the "new" rules in the Highway Code were released and things are starting to settle down a bit.

Initially, fuelled by a bit of misrepresentation in the press, some vulnerable road users went a little bit crazy and people who'd usually just a car turning into a side road ahead of them whilst their dog sniffed around the base of a post box, now going to huge effort to exercise what they saw as their "new right of way" over the car. In one case, we were waiting to emerge from a busy junction and one guy, who was initially 100mtrs away to our right and not a problem, actually sprinted to the car and chose to walk in front of it rather than behind it to CREATE A PROBLEM!

The rules weren't changed to create that kind of drama and conflict.

I'm not totally sure they were changed much at all if I'm honest!

WE WERE ALWAYS OBLIGED to slow down and let people finish crossing a road they'd already started to cross.

WE WERE ALWAYS OBLIGED to check our mirrors before turning left and only turn if it was safe to do so (for example, you wouldn't turn if you saw a cyclist alongside you if you were anything like a decent driver).

WE WERE ALWAYS OBLIGED to leave 2mtrs of space when passing cyclists (and yes, that does mean putting yourself onto the other side of the road in many cases - whether the cyclist is in the gutter or the middle of the lane, whether he's insured, whether he's paid road tax and whether it's even called road tax are all just ridiculous arguments that detract from the fact that it's quite easy for a car pass a cyclist safely when driven by a competent driver).

WE WERE ALWAYS OBLIGED to give way to cyclists as we would any other road user on the carriageway when we were emerging from junctions.

PEDESTRIANS AND CYCLISTS WERE ALWAYS OBLIGED and still are obliged to act sensibly and safely on the road. Perhaps contrary to the way it's been worded in the press coverage, this includes crossing the road only where and when it is safe to do so (but maybe expect approaching traffic to make it safe for you more often than in the past) and cyclists avoiding moving up the inside of vehicles that are signalling or slowing in preparation for a left turn of their own (that's rule number 74 for those who wish to look it up)

FOR A LONG TIME Driving Instructors have been training their drivers to give way to pedestrians approaching a Zebra Crossing "showing an intention to cross the road" unless they were going to arrive at the stop line significantly ahead of the pedestrian and we've also asked our drivers to consider whether it's appropriate to stop and allow pedestrians to cross the mouth of a junction where they are waiting and traffic conditions allow.

I'm nearly 20yrs into this job now and there are many people who have either failed their driving tests or been faulted for not acting with courtesy and responsibility in these situations... the main reason they haven't done so? It's just my opinion, but I think it's because they weren't seeing the other drivers acting in the same way and society tends to criticise those who stand out from the crowd whether it's for good or bad reasons.

For example, how many experienced drivers do you meet that talk with pride about how good they are at driving and talk with pride about they passed their driving test without sufficient training and then went through a process of either crashing or nearly crashing which they call "learning to drive after passing a test"?

I'm a driver that you'll hear talking like that, but I don't reflect with pride. There's nothing to brag about. If anything, I just think it was just lucky that nobody got hurt. The test I passed obviously wasn't fit for purpose. We do it better now.

So what's changed really is that in many ways, the Highway Code has simply been bought up to date with the driving standards already being applied to the driving test. Having it written down in the national "best practice manual" like this also allows courts to act more appropriately when cases are presented to them and hopefully experienced drivers will start driving well as a result rather than holding on to the rules of times gone by.

The new Highway Code is released in physical format on April 16th - why not pre-order it now?

Update from Nick Heath Driver Training

It's been over a year since I last updated this blog.

What a crazy year it's been too!

We still haven't actually been back at work for a year yet after being locked down three times during 2020 and 2021 (yes, I know some people think there were only two lockdowns but there were three - March / July 2020, November 2020 and January / April 2021) but it does finally feel as though they're behind us now although we're still cleaning and airing the cars through, we are teaching without masks and even DVSA has conceded that it's safe for their examiners now to conduct full length driving tests again.

Although the restrictions seem to be over now, I think the financial effects of Covid are going to be with us for a long time to come with something of a tax tidal wave coming for next year along with several other major challenges for the driver training industry such as fuel supply etc.

My plans to switch to electric cars in January 2021 had to be scrapped as I need some electrical work doing on the house so that the charger could be installed and couldn't get it done in time (or afford to pay for it) as we were all stopped from working.

Furthermore, the contract for the Fiesta (the worst car I've ever owned) had to be extended as a result of payments missed during lockdowns and when that finally expired, new cars weren't available to buy!

I've now taken delivery of a new tuition car to take me through the next two years and that is one aspect of this whole mess that finally feels back under control... I'm hoping that the work can be carried out for the switch to electric in 2024 now!

Another mess that is coming under control is the waiting list - I'm basically closed to new customers for 2022 now and have a long waiting list for 2023 already! That could all change if DVSA suddenly made loads of tests available and reduced the pressure on the learners sitting those tests, but being as that's not likely to happen any time soon, the current waiting list for lessons is as realistic as I can forecast it.

Now I'm restarting the blog, I'm hoping to be back more regularly again, writing about all different aspects of driving including car ownership, different types of road users, driving best practice, driving test waiting times and anything I can think of as I use the roads all day.

I hope you're all well after the pandemic and that you've come through it with your livelihoods secure. I wish you the best for the future.

Nick

Government considering changes to breath testing procedures

I was encouraged this week to see news in the press that the Government is looking to modify existing legislation relating to the procedures for breath testing drivers in the UK.

At the moment, the Police can only conduct a breath test on a driver either at the scene of a crash, or after seeing some behaviour that gives them grounds to suspect that you've been drinking.

That requirement to justify their decision to conduct a breath test on you MUST cause arguments sometimes when drivers, the vast majority of whom would be okay with assisting the Police in random testing, feel criticised unfairly and are told they look like they're drunk when they're actually stone cold sober!!

The proposal from Government is to modify the procedures so that the Police may pull you over and breath test you without needing to give a valid reason.

In addition to a more amicable process when dealing with the innocent, these changes are also expected to lead to a greater chance of the guilty being caught "by chance" and therefore it is hoped that publicity surrounding the changes will act as a deterrent to reduce offending rates overall.

I think that most law abiding drivers would be in agreement with these changes and I think that most would want them bringing in sooner rather than later.

Nick Heath Driver Training is located in Rode Heath on the Staffordshire / Cheshire border and provides driving training services to those looking to either improve their driving or learn from scratch. In addition to media work, we conduct Taxi Driver Assessments for local authorities and offer Advanced Driver Training and Testing, Motorway Training and Fuel Efficient Driver Training alongside refresher courses and learner driving lessons. We are ORDIT registered to provide Driving Instructor Training and are listed on the DVSA's register of Fleet Trainers so we can help you with your business needs

More details are available on our website www.nickheathdrivertraining.org.uk

Or call 0800 820 20 38

How many driving lessons do I need?

When I first started working as a Driving Instructor in 2005, this question was THE most regularly asked question when customers range to book some lessons.

I started to drive in 1991 and at the time, learning to drive typically involved 1 hour long driving lessons of which I remember having about 18 before passing my driving test. Those around me had similar numbers of lessons with the exception of 1 of my friends, who had about 5 go's at his test before passing it and took lessons every week in between his test attempts - he must have had about 40 hours of lessons in total, something like that.

In line with the times, we set about "learning to drive after passing our test"...

• 'B' hit a opening car door as he drove past it - nobody had mentioned that risk on our lessons
• I couldn't turn right at crossroads with people coming the other way who also wanted to turn right and had many near misses and received much abuse from others as I worked it out for myself - it hadn't been mentioned on lessons
• I also nearly killed a few of us when passing parked cars when there was on-coming traffic present that I now know has priority in such situations - that hadn't been mentioned either (and neither had the risk of rear seat passengers being thrown forward in the event of a crash - I had passengers in the back without seat belts on that day and one ended up sitting on the handbrake!)
• Myself, 'D' and 'I' all needed work doing on our gearboxes within a year... guess what - vehicle empathy hadn't been mentioned on lessons to any of us
• 'I' and 'A' were both rear ended at various junctions - that HAD been mentioned, but in the context that as it wasn't our fault, it didn't really matter
• 'M' had several bumps and crashes, hitting a hedge when avoiding an oncoming car on a narrow country lane and reversing into things when leaving car parking spaces
• 'B' skidded on gravel at a junction and came off the road, hitting a sign
• The first time it snowed, I skidded into a busy main road with thankfully nothing coming, after driving slower, but not slow enough for the conditions. I was also driving too fast in heavy fog, and nobody had ever mentioned the words "always drive at a speed that allows you to stop easily within the distance you can see to be clear"

So could we drive and should we have passed our tests?

Definitely not!

Were we lucky not to get seriously hurt or to hurt anyone else?

Definitely!

So did our Driving Instructors do a good, thorough job of teaching us to drive?

I think they did their best in the times and culture they were operating in. The culture was very much about getting everything as cheaply and as quickly as you could and there wasn't such a focus on safety then - almost as though a certain number of people getting seriously hurt or killed in crashes was an unavoidable fact of learning to drive.

The facts of the time were that an average driver had 30 hours of driving lessons before passing a test - as we'd all generally had little more than half of that, we WERE very much a risk on the roads, not only a risk to ourselves, but a risk to everyone else too whether they were walking, riding or driving. That lad that had 5 go's at his test and more than twice the number of lessons the rest of us had has never, to my knowledge, had any incidents.

Today, Driving Instructors are trained more towards being being Road Safety Professionals. Even if turning right at cross roads isn't likely to feature on your test routes, a good Driving Instructor will still teach you to do that and the focus is very much on learning to drive, rather than learning to pass a test - putting nerves aside for a moment, if you can drive properly, then passing a driving test IS easy even if you've never driven on the roads you find yourself being tested on.

The current figures from the DVSA tell us that the total number of driving lessons needed to pass a driving test has remained reasonably steady now for many years... you should expect to have between 45 and 50 hours of professional training and around 30 hours of private practice in your own car. If private practice isn't an option for you, then you're looking at around 60 hours of professional lessons and as you get older, particularly if you get into your late 20's before learning to drive, your number of hours increases a lot - a 40 year old will take around twice as many lessons as a 17 year old, with much of that being down to the "I want to get it absolutely right before taking a test" attitude rather than any kind of inability (40 year olds will very likely have lost a few people they know to crashes and other incidents on the roads of course, so the safety messages are very real to them).

There may be a conflict of interests, but I genuinely have a lot of respect for the quality of learner drivers passing a test these days and definitely don't agree that the old saying of "you learn to drive after passing your test" still applies.

Amongst many other skills, today's learner drivers who pass their tests demonstrate that they:

• Can interact with other drivers when turning right at cross roads, adapting their driving in response to the other vehicle being a car, bus or motorbike and using a mixture of 'offside to offside' and 'nearside to nearside' techniques depending on the situation
• Leave enough room for doors to open as they pass parked vehicles, but don't move into the path of oncoming traffic to do so (they wait until it's safe instead)
• Understand priority at meeting situations and when it's appropriate to give way
• Adjust their speed to suit the limits of their visibility, being ready to stop within the distance of clear road they can see ahead of them and adapting to different weather and road surface conditions
• Drive in a manner that reduces wear and tear on the vehicle, reducing the need for repairs
• Know their responsibility for the safety of those in and around their cars as they drive

Those skills mean that they won't have the problems me and my friends had when we learnt and they are required to demonstrate these skills repeatedly over a 35-40 minute drive in mixed road settings, so it is unlikely that they will pass by fluke. I genuinely believe that today's new drivers drive at a standard that is higher than that of many of the drivers around them on the day that they pass their test.

So, bearing all that in mind with all that practice, discussion and money spent... it remains a statistical fact that 1 in 6 drivers passing a test go on to crash within 6 months so why don't they drive to the standard they've been trained at all times after passing?

Food for thought!

Nick Heath Driver Training is located in Rode Heath on the Staffordshire / Cheshire border and provides driving training services to those looking to either improve their driving or learn from scratch. In addition to media work, we conduct Taxi Driver Assessments for local authorities and offer Advanced Driver Training and Testing, Motorway Training and Fuel Efficient Driver Training alongside refresher courses and learner driving lessons. We are ORDIT registered to provide Driving Instructor Training and are listed on the DVSA's register of Fleet Trainers so we can help you with your business needs

More details are available on our website www.nickheathdrivertraining.org.uk

Or call 0800 820 20 38

Handling Emergency Vehicles

I remember once being on a bus in central London when 5 Police cars came up from behind at speed and with their lights and sirens on. The bus was stuck in traffic within some roadworks and there was no room for the Police to get past.

The bus driver remained perfectly calm.

In spite of what I've been told in my own training, the lights and sirens on all of the Police cars stayed on as they waited in the traffic and the first two positioned themselves behind us in the line of sight for the bus driver in a very "Get out of the way! Get out of the way!" manner with the other's further back in the queue separated from those first ones by other queuing cars.

But still my driver remained calm.

It was almost as though he didn't know that the Police were there. We were held by Red traffic lights and coned into lanes that were only a few inches clear of the bus on each side with London rush hour traffic ahead of us - probably about 8 or 10 other vehicles in front before we got to the lights.

We were stuck, but it was obvious the Police were in a hurry at the worst possible time in the day for London's traffic.

The lights changed, the traffic moved and as we came out of the roadworks, the road expanded to 4 lanes. The driver signaled his intention to move to the left as he approached the exit of the roadworks and the Police responded by positioning to the right of the lane, inches from the cones, absolutely itching to get past.

And that's exactly what happened when exited the bottle neck and got back out into some space. The bus moved left (and accelerated normally), the Police moved right and easily out paced us on the open road and because our driver left the scene rather than stopping to let the Police past, the flow of traffic followed behind us and the other Police cars were "released" one by one to follow their colleauges.

That bus driver remains one of the best examples of how you deal with emergency services that I've ever seen on the road.

When you are approached by a vehicle responding to an emergency on the road:

• Remain calm
• Do what you can do to help them through (but don't stress if you can't do anything)
• Use signals to communicate your plans to the emergency driver
• It helps everyone if you offer SAFE opportunities to them to get past
• It helps everyone if you consider yourself to be part of a team assisting the Police
• Don't break any rules in the Highway Code - you must drive legally at all times and face prosecution if you don't!

It's worth bearing in mind that that emergency drivers:

• Have formal exemptions to break three rules in the Highway Code
• Speed limits
• Red lights and stop signs
• Keep left or right bollards
• Have widespread public support in breaking other rules in the Highway Code
• Are trained to deal with traffic - in a nutshell, they have two questions in mind at all times:
• Is there space?
• Are all other road users aware of my presence?
• Are well trained in car control skills
• Are well trained in the driving skills of observation and anticipation
• DON'T have to use blue lights and sirens in emergency response if they feel it's better not to
• SHOULD turn off their lights at sirens when in queues at Red traffic lights (to avoid provoking a dangerous reaction from other road users) and restart them when lights turn to Green
• MUST drive SAFELY at all times, regardless of the circumstances surrounding their journey

So it's a question of teamwork! We can help emergency vehicles by being aware of our surroundings, creating space and trying to be as predictable as possible.

Examples of people failing driving tests for poor response to Emergency response vehicles include:

• Drivers entering bus lanes
• Mounting the pavement
• Drivers stopping in dangerous places expecting the ER vehicle to over take
• Drivers stopping in other inappropriate places and causing a blockage

That bus driver WOULD NOT have failed his driving test because there was nothing he could do.

Stay safe!

Nick Heath Driver Training is located in Rode Heath on the Staffordshire / Cheshire border and provides driving training services to those looking to either improve their driving or learn from scratch. In addition to media work, we conduct Taxi Driver Assessments for local authorities and offer Advanced Driver Training and Testing, Motorway Training and Fuel Efficient Driver Training alongside refresher courses and learner driving lessons. We are ORDIT registered to provide Driving Instructor Training and are listed on the DVSA's register of Fleet Trainers so we can help you with your business needs.

More details are available on our website www.nickheathdrivertraining.org.uk

Advanced Driving... Reading White Lines

A few weeks ago, I did a series of articles looking at commentary driving and if you gave that a go, then you'll know that it's all about making your thoughts conscious and actively looking to read the situation around you.

In today's notes, I want to look at the subject of white lines, and specifically, the white lines down the middle of the road that define overtaking conditions.

Advanced drivers who are giving a commentary will often comment on the white lines that they can see in the road up ahead, particularly as they navigate their way around bends and over the crest of hills etc.

They'll often plan for overtaking manoeuvres based on this information and as a result they'll say something like this "the overtaking restrictions lift just around this bend, so we might get the chance to overtake this tractor here" and go on to select gears and move into overtaking positions before or as they take the bend.

I was doing this myself recently, when it occurred to me just how often the information presented by the white lines is wrong - it's got to be more than half the time!

For those who aren't sure:

• Double white lines down the middle of the road mean overtaking is disallowed in at least one direction - if the white line on your side is solid, then you can't overtake. You ARE allowed to overtake bikes, works vehicles travelling less than 10mph (road sweepers etc) and parked cars but these lines are used where overtaking is considered to be dangerous

• Single white lines mean that overtaking is allowed in both directions and there are two versions - longer lines and smaller gaps mean that it is "hazardous", smaller lines and longer gaps mean "non-hazardous"

• Arrows telling people to move back to the left hand side of the road are a sign that a change in the road markings is coming ahead (sometimes you can see that if you look far enough, but other times it may be around a slight bend etc) - this would usually mean that they are becoming more restrictive / hazardous

Examples of inaccurate placement of the lines include:

• A road near me where you come around a right hand bend with a 1/3 mile straight bit of road ahead of you, but double white lines are present for around 250 meters before the line on your side is broken and you are allowed to overtake

• The road I was on last weekend was quite bendy but road markings were often "overtaking is non-hazardous" in places where there was less than 100 meters clear visibility of the road ahead due to upcoming bends or hill crests

• Very bendy sections of road where clear visibility is down to less than 50 meters with "hazardous" overtaking road markings

• "Non-hazardous" road markings past entrances to businesses, side roads or fields

I've always thought it was a bit strange that road markings attempt to define "hazardous" or "non-hazardous" overtaking conditions when so much depends on visibility in different road, traffic and weather conditions as well as what it is that you're actually overtaking.

I wonder how many crashes or near misses are caused every day by drivers taking these road markings at face value and overtaking when they can't see sufficiently far enough ahead? A driver suddenly confronted by an oncoming vehicle on their side of the road as they come over the crest of a hill will not be left thinking afterwards that that driver is a highly skilled, advanced driver will they - they'll more than likely think they're stupid!

There's nothing wrong with planning ahead of course, and I think it's worth mentioning that overtaking doesn't just mean that we're overtaking other large vehicles - overtaking things like slow moving bikes requires a shorter stretch of road, particularly if you're driving a high powered car but I find the road markings alone to be a very inaccurate indicator of the safety of an overtaking manoeuvre.

Nick Heath Driver Training is located in Rode Heath on the Staffordshire / Cheshire border and provides driving training services to those looking to either improve their driving or learn from scratch. In addition to media work, we conduct Taxi Driver Assessments for local authorities and offer Advanced Driver Training and Testing, Motorway Training and Fuel Efficient Driver Training alongside refresher courses and learner driving lessons. We are ORDIT registered to provide Driving Instructor Training and are listed on the DVSA's register of Fleet Trainers so we can help you with your business needs.

More details are available on our website www.nickheathdrivertraining.org.uk

The first week back after lock-down & a new style of blog

This is the first of a new set of blog posts that I intend to read like a diary piece. The intention is to do them weekly and see what lessons can be drawn from each week.

I'm starting them at the end of the first full week of work that we've been able to do as an industry since the government lifted lock-down restrictions on us.

This week, everyone has worn a mask, everyone has avoided paying cash, everyone has agreed to have their temperature taken, nobody has cancelled their training session and nobody has displayed any concerns about the virus.

The only problem with those masks is that, although they're not tight, they wear grooves into the tops of your ears after about 8 to 10 hours of wearing them, leaving your ears feeling bruised and looking dented - it's certainly a relief to take them off at the end of the day and I feel the pain of all those people in care work and at the NHS etc who've been wearing them for ages!

But of course, the masks are necessary.

As ADI's, we are sitting 18 inches away from somebody else in a well ventilated, yet otherwise enclosed space and either of us may have the virus and not know it.

In everything I've read up about the virus in the last few months, the one question that remained unanswered related to the number of people who contract it without displaying symptoms but more and more reports and studies are now concluding that the answer to that question is that it is around 80%. In other words, if you deliberately infected a group of 100 people, then 80 of them would be expected to display no symptoms. If it's true, that's a horrendous figure because we all rely on people displaying symptoms in order to recognise that they have the virus, stay in and protect the rest of us!

So the masks are essential PPE for anyone working in close proximity to others and it's disappointing when you see an ADI not wearing them, or hear them saying that "I've told the clients that I'll wear one if they want me to" (which is an incredibly unfair position to put a teenager in - can you imagine ANY teenager insisting that you wear a mask??)

If people like us, in high risk situations don't wear them, then what happened in Leicester WILL happen again. Local lock-downs are a reality where there are local outbreaks and no matter how self conscious or uncool people feel about wearing masks, we ALL lose out if that happens.

It's worth saying that the majority of ADI's I've seen this week ARE wearing PPE though, and that's a good thing.

It's also worth considering if you're learning to drive without masks that they are mandatory for both people in the car when you take your driving test. DVSA have already released that information to say that the examiners will be wearing them and expect that the clients also wear them - if you're not used to it when you take your test, you're going to be at a disadvantage in the same way that you would be if you were driving a new car on test day.

Other things I've been doing in the car this week is cleaning it before and after every driver!

That's interesting when the client comes and stands in the middle of the road waiting for you to get out of the car whilst you're trying to wipe it down - you start power cleaning!! 

In order to be effective, the cleaning must cover all contact surfaces with soap, as the virus has a fatty coating that is destroyed in soap leaving it fatally wounded so not only does every surface need to be touched by a wipe, that surface needs to be coated with a fresh, soapy wipe and left wet to the touch for a couple of minutes whilst the soap does it's job.

This is again something that examiners will be doing before they enter the car for a driving test.

If you are doing it yourself, then anti-bacterial wipes from the supermarket are fine and don't damage the interior, but you must be careful not to buy ones that contain bleach - because that WILL harm the interior!

The windows have also been open this week and the Heko Wind Deflectors I purchased to allow the windows to be open in all weathers have been put to their test with all the rain we've had.

In spite of it getting pretty heavy from time to time this week, I've been pleased to see that very little rain has entered the car (any that has, has come in through the very back of the rear windows where the deflectors don't cover). Ventilation in the cabin, particularly on fast roads, has been fantastic and it hasn't been too noisey. These wind deflectors are available easily by searching on line (I got mine through EBay) - mine cost around £40 for the set and look great on the car.

So that's it for this week. Driving instruction requires an ADI to do a lot of things in their head when they're working. They watch the road, plan how they'd drive along it themselves if they were driving, plan escape routes in case anything goes wrong AND watch the client to see if their actions match what the ADI would do or are otherwise appropriate for the road conditions IN ADDITION to actually talking to the client about their driving! Mentally, a driving lesson is a busy time for an ADI and you develop a kind of fitness if you do it regularly, so you can cope. It's obvious that after 14 weeks off, I've lost some of that mental fitness and it's been a tiring week... the day off is very welcome and there are more days off next week to enjoy!

Whatever you're doing this weekend, enjoy it!

Nick Heath Driver Training is located in Rode Heath on the Staffordshire / Cheshire border and provides driving training services to those looking to either improve their driving or learn from scratch. In addition to media work, we conduct Taxi Driver Assessments for local authorities and offer Advanced Driver Training and Testing, Motorway Training and Fuel Efficient Driver Training alongside refresher courses and learner driving lessons. We are ORDIT registered to provide Driving Instructor Training and are listed on the DVSA's register of Fleet Trainers so we can help you with your business needs.

More details are available on our website www.nickheathdrivertraining.org.uk