Pie Man's Flaura and Fauna of the Roads #2

Look, continuation, how amazing.

#2 The Middle Lain drivers.

Pootling is a made up word, by me. It describes the motorist you often see on an empty motorway, tootling along the middle lane at 50mph or less. A close relative of the outer lane moral guardian.

I often use the term pootler because its more generous, it suggest a gentle incompetence, perhaps a little of the grumpy old "this isn't a race you know" mentality. However it only describes one of the two sub-species of the middle lane driver.

Pootlers are usually in the middle lane because they genuinely don't really understand motorways, they may still be believing the myth that the lanes have different speeds assigned, and that the middle is 50-60, they may just be completely clueless and so stick to the middle as it seems like a compromise. Pootlers are pretty hard to identify, they drive a variety of cars and are a variety of ages.

Hogs are the other breed, they know fine well they shouldn't be in the middle lane, but they somehow believe that the inside lane is for slow moving pensioners and girls, and not for them. Yes they can only cope doing 50, or sometimes they are doing 70, but there is still an vast stretch of unused tarmac to their left. Of course they won't admit pride as to their poor lane management, no, they'll make excuses, like they were preparing to overtake a slower car over the horizon, they know that in 30 miles the road becomes 2 lanes, and this is their correct one. Either way it isn't, its just because they can't quite stomach going to the inside unless its for slip road purposes. These hogs quite often become outside lane menaces on dual carriageways. usually identified as male, aged anywhere from 17-55 and will be driving a small hatchback with all the trimmings (Cooling tower exhaust, stereo, extra lights like a mobile disco, picnic table spoiler and mandatory fog lights regardless of visibility) older versions will be driving some sort of repmobiel, Vectra or Mondeo through to BMW and even some of the smaller Mercs.

So, why is this a problem, there's an outside lane, you cans till overtake. This is true, however, say there is someone doing 50 in the middle lane, no traffic to their left. Someone approaches at 60 and needs to overtake on the outside, causing someone travelling at 70 to slow down. Ideally with three lanes, and everyone playing by the rules, the outside lane should only be 70+ (not counting heavy traffic) instead this starts to give us the odd situation where the outside lane is full and the inside almost empty, as everyone tries to overtake the one person sitting in the middle.

So, how do you deal. Well, first thing, Never Undertake. Its dangerous, and you remove an opportunity for them to realise the error of their ways and pull in. Don't tailgate either, again dangerous and calling them a middle lane hog won't help the insurance claim. No, what I do, where possible, is overtake on the outside, then pull right back into the inside, maintaining the higher speed. This often works on the confused pootler, who realises that it is Ok to do 50 in the inside lane if someone is doing 70 in it. The hog, well shouldn't be on the road really, and no amount of instruction or guilt will move that bullish head.