it's completely legal to filter?

[Yammi]

Thought this was interesting, filtering past stationary traffic is no longer a grey area - it's completely legal......read on



http://www.facebook.com/l.php?
u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.motorbikestoday.com%2Fnews%2FArticles%2Ffiltering_law.htm&h=uAQFE_JejAQGQuoZYvl_jVjFCOPtFE4H4IaA7-p2Hj8MJTA&s=1

[andybesy]

Interesting, thanks.


Non facebook link (for those who don't do that): 


http://www.motorbikestoday.com/news/Articles/filtering_law.htm

[Skippernick]

Brilliant, what i don't understand though is the case happened in 2006 and has only now become case law, why so long?

[Stooby2]

It's always been legal - the case law refers to deciding where the blame lies in a civil case for compensation. The 2006 ruling now means a rider can now be blameless and get full compensation - he/she is not automatically held to be partially at fault simply because they were filtering.

[Doddsie]

Says at the bottom of the page `copyright motorbikestoday.com 2007`!!

[AdieR]

Highway code, rule 88 IIRC.

[JZS 600]

It's in Roadcraft so it must be OK!

[VNA - BMW Wank]

It always has been completely legal.

I don't see that anything has changed.

What you need is, as usual, is witnesses.   

[Grahamm]

From the old Yuku forums...

http://fazerowners.yuku.com/topic/6327/Filtering-accidents-Powell-Vs-Moody-and-Davis-Vs-Schrogin

The main point about Davis vs Schrogin AIUI is that it establishes that drivers making a manoeuvre are responsible for making sure it's clear and safe to make their move, they should not expect others to watch out for them and take avoiding action.

However, by the same token, bikers filtering need to keep their eyes open in situations where others may manoeuvre in a position where the biker might not see them immediately.

[stevierst]

It always has been completely legal.

I don't see that anything has changed.

What you need is, as usual, is witnesses.

Quite a bit has changed. Now there's case law to support us in a court. Not sure how much you know about law, but quite a lot of the more complicated cases rely on this case law to finalise a decision. It's a good thing whereas before it was 50/50, now it's much better odds. Witnesses are not necessarily the be all and end all. I've seen so called good people as witnesses torn to pieces in a courtroom, these solicitors/barristers can be viscous sometimes!

Sent from my AT300 using Tapatalk 2

[JZS 600]

Funnily enough I'm close to settlement for a filtering SMIDSY that happened a in 2011

[Simon.Pieman]

However, by the same token, bikers filtering need to keep their eyes open in situations where others may manoeuvre in a position where the biker might not see them immediately.

 I don't know what that means but keeping your eyes open really does help.
 I was on the London despatch circuit for the best part of 10 years, 'went through three GT550 Kwackers and a GPX750. People have asked me for advice on filtering a few times but it's difficult to think of any one particular golden rule. I'll add one thing though which is probably becoming more relevent thesedays. Don't get so pre-occupied watching out for idiots that you forget to watch the road surface. Most crashes us despatchers had were because of diesel and potholes or wet white lines. Avoiding cars was the easy bit.
 

[dBfazer600]

Still need to be careful as some cagers just do not give a shit.
 
Daz

[Grahamm]

However, by the same token, bikers filtering need to keep their eyes open in situations where others may manoeuvre in a position where the biker might not see them immediately.

 I don't know what that means

Sorry, I probably could have been clearer there.

Imagine, for instance, you're filtering past traffic and you go past a lorry and a bus and then suddenly there's a car coming across in front of you because you'd not seen that there was a side turning on the left and the bus had stopped to let the car out.

If you'd noticed that there was a gap forming in front of the bus you should think "hang on, why isn't the bus moving on? Let's just slow down a minute and take things slowly..."

[shady]

Had a car pull out of a stationary queue of traffic years ago hoping to nip down the wrong side of the road and turn right just as l was filtering past. No indicator or use of mirror, well l collided with his front wing but managed to stay on the bike, bent foot rest,gear linkage, ripped trousers and a very sore knee. This case went on for ages, he claimed he looked and had his indicator on, he claimed l was speeding  but l was lucky l had a witness. Still it went on and his solicitor brought up the Powell and Moody case (look it up) in the end l refused to accept the 50/50 settlement and asked that the case go to court, long story short, he failed to respond, l won full damages. Point is each case is different, is part of the blame on you for travelling too fast, did you not see a guy stop to let out another car from that side street, many variations but use common sense and always try find a witness, its that what l felt was my ace in my case.

[VNA - BMW Wank]

Quite a bit has changed. Now there's case law to support us in a court. Not sure how much you know about law, but quite a lot of the more complicated cases rely on this case law to finalise a decision. It's a good thing whereas before it was 50/50, now it's much better odds. Witnesses are not necessarily the be all and end all. I've seen so called good people as witnesses torn to pieces in a courtroom, these solicitors/barristers can be viscous sometimes!

I think firstly you will have to fight your own insurance company, it's highly lightly that if you have a case they will still want to go 50 50.

Also how do we know that this is a land mark ruling - says who?

If you've got no witness, the best thing you can do is gather evidence before anything is moved, assuming you can move at this point.  But there's still a strong element of your word against theirs. 

When it happened to me, I was up and running about try to get witnesses.  It was in the middle of town, lots of folks saw it, lots of people stood to watch what happened next, a nice fella asked me if I was OK and helped me lift the bike, but everybody started disappearing when I asked for witness details.   I got the cops out as the driver of the car was denying any wrong doing etc.   The cops asked me - did you get any witness details - oh, oh well.   It went 50/50. 

But then again there were other complications.  If you ever take out a bike shop demo, make sure you are insured, it's your responsibility, not the bike shops.  I almost got stung badly!

[Grahamm]

Also how do we know that this is a land mark ruling - says who?

It's a ruling from the Court of Appeal. AIUI this sets a Precedent higher than ordinary Case Law.

[Hedgetrimmer]

I got taken out by a guy who made one of those spur of the moment decisions - "Oh, look, there's a place to park over there" - whilst filtering (carefully). My solicitor, provided by the insurance company, did indeed at first say settle at 50/50, but I wasn't happy with that. I had no witnesses (in fact the car driver claimed a witness after I had continued to challenge). My solicitor said, based on the road layout, that I shouldn't have been filtering but she used Google maps to check the road layout - which changed due to council road improvements before the "accident". I had to go to the council and get old and new road plans, works start & completion dates etc because the solicitors were too damn lazy to go check for themselves. Anyway, the upshot was, I ended up with 70/30 in my favour and a payout from his insurance company - as you can imagine, it took forever. His "witness" mysteriously evaporated early in the proceedings. The only reasons I accepted even that much blame is that the solicitor said that in court, it would probably turn out that way "because filtering is a potentially dangerous manoeuvre"., and I wouldn't have got much more of a payout even if I'd won outright. The car driver said he did check his mirrors carefully and signal. I said, in that case, how come he didn't see me - in other words he manoeuvred without due care.
Nick