A careless driver who close passed a cyclist is to either pay a fixed-penalty notice fine or attend a driving training education course — after the rider submitted the footage of the incident to the police, who forwarded it for prosecution.
The incident occurred on 4 January 2024 on Grosvenor Road in Belfast, the road.cc reader moving into the right-hand lane to keep travelling straight on when a driver indicating left cut across them at speed, at an unsafe distance.
When they were then stopped at a red light moments later, the cyclist told the driver the footage would be reported and said it had been a "ridiculously close pass".
The Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) agreed and, having heard the rider's witness statement and seen the footage, put the case to the Public Prosecution Service for Northern Ireland, recommending that the driver be prosecuted for careless driving and required to either pay a Fixed Penalty Notice fine or undertake a driving training education course.
> Near Miss of the Day turns 100 - Why do we do the feature and what have we learnt from it?
Over the years road.cc has reported on literally hundreds of close passes and near misses involving badly driven vehicles from every corner of the country – so many, in fact, that we’ve decided to turn the phenomenon into a regular feature on the site. One day hopefully we will run out of close passes and near misses to report on, but until that happy day arrives, Near Miss of the Day will keep rolling on.
If you’ve caught on camera a close encounter of the uncomfortable kind with another road user that you’d like to share with the wider cycling community please send it to us at info [at] road.cc or send us a message via the road.cc Facebook page.
If the video is on YouTube, please send us a link, if not we can add any footage you supply to our YouTube channel as an unlisted video (so it won't show up on searches).
Please also let us know whether you contacted the police and if so what their reaction was, as well as the reaction of the vehicle operator if it was a bus, lorry or van with company markings etc.
> What to do if you capture a near miss or close pass (or worse) on camera while cycling