Incompetent Moron Drivers

[SA Friday]

All these people with road rage and guns....

[revchuck]

What really frosts me is when I see someone coming up fast behind me in the passing lane, I move over and at the same time they decide to pass me on the right (ignoring both that blinking red thingy on the right rear corner of my pickup and the fact that I'm moving into the right lane), they move halfway onto the shoulder and then realize they don't have enough room so they whip over to the left, yelling and screaming and flipping me off like I'm the one being stupid.

Well, you're not supposed to be driving in the "passing" (left) lane if the driving (right) lane is open anyway. It's courtesy and laws in most states.

True, and I don't. This happens when I'm passing other vehicles with some distance between them - otherwise I'd be bobbing and weaving from one lane to the other. If I see someone obviously going faster than I am, I pull over and let them go by...if they don't try to pass me on the right first.

[kurtm]

WOW most folks where I live now, do real good on 4 ways as that is almost all there is every mile on the mile. They also tend to move over when you are going faster than they are. I came from Denver and I swear that a turn signal ment speed up to the guy behind you in the lane you were triing to turn into! 4 way stops were just a matter of who was on the gas first and pleanty of "traffic finger" waving. Now life is much better driving wise. KURTM

[nmipsc]

I HATE people driving below the speed limit in the Left Lane. In Texas it is against the law to drive Continously in the Left Lane. I want to put a Sign in the back Window. that reads THATS WHY THEY CALL THE LEFT LANE A PASSING LANE. MOVE OVER!

Edited July 10, 2007 by nmipsc

[Carlos]

I HATE people driving below the speed limit in the Left Lane. In Texas it is against the law to drive Continously in the Left Lane. I want to put a Sign in the back Window. that reads THATS WHY THEY CALL THE LEFT LANE A PASSING LANE. MOVE OVER!

Really does not matter WHAT the speed limit is; its still the driver's duty to get out of the passing lane if faster traffic approaches. It really pisses me off when I hear somebody complain:

"Well I was going the posted speed limit so I had a RIGHT to be in the left lane and the person flashing their lights at me has no right to speed and its unsafe!"

Really? Who gave YOU police powers over speeders? And what makes you think your speedometer is correct? Or that there is not a 10 MPH buffer ABOVE the speed limit granted by police? And speeding (if they even are speeding) always unsafe? I am married to a German & we've been on the Autobahn many times; speed alone is not unsafe.

Edited July 11, 2007 by Carlos

[Paul B]

Really does not matter WHAT the speed limit is; its still the driver's duty to get out of the passing lane if faster traffic approaches. It really pisses me off when I hear somebody complain:

"Well I was going to speed limit so I had a right to be in the left lane and the person flashing their lights at me has no right to speed!"

Really? Who gave YOU police powers over speeders? And what makes you think your speedometer is correct? Or that there is not a 10 MPH buffer ABOVE the speed limit granted by police? And speeding is always unsafe? I am married to a German & we've been on the Autobahn many times; speed alone is not unsafe.

I am the first to agree that speed is not what causes accidents by itself and I'm usually at least 10MPH over the limit. Here in the midwest though we have the phenomenon of truck convoys either planned or otherwise. Often one of the trucks decides to pass the others because they are going about 1 MPH faster. This is a major pain as you have to run behind that truck for sometimes miles. I'd like to see you flash your lights and make these jerks pull over. When I am passing a row of these trucks I'm usually going about 10 over but there always seems to be someone who comes up behind me and wants me to pull over in between the trucks so they can go 15 over. I'll happily pull over after the pass, but until then they can pound sand, flash lights yell and scream, etc. If they are right on my bumper I still don't move as I want them to pass me on the inside as I don't know what they are going to do and my changing lanes is the most dangerous thing I can do till they speed past.

[kurtm]

We all have seen the cutesy bumper sticker that says...if you can read this you are to close.

Well years ago I made a FRONT bumper sticker drafted it out backwards so it would read correctly in a rear view mirror....kind of like ambulance. It was a rebutal to the insipid bumper sticker mentioned above. For quite a while Blue Streak Hot-Shot service ran it on their bug deflectorson their 1 ton trucks.

It meerly stated..,..IF YOU CAN READ THIS YOU ARE IN MY WAY

[chuckbradley]

We all have seen the cutesy bumper sticker that says...if you can read this you are to close.

Well years ago I made a FRONT bumper sticker drafted it out backwards so it would read correctly in a rear view mirror....kind of like ambulance. It was a rebutal to the insipid bumper sticker mentioned above. For quite a while Blue Streak Hot-Shot service ran it on their bug deflectorson their 1 ton trucks.

It meerly stated..,..IF YOU CAN READ THIS YOU ARE IN MY WAY

I like that!

[benos]

Petition to have a roundabout ("traffic circle") put in place of the 4-way stops for the 'traffic calming' effects. Bring a lawn chair and watch the carnage as people's cell-phone addled brains suddenly overload on something everybody in the 3rd world can drive at full speed across 3 lanes of traffic and six of interleaved mopeds chasing a taxi in the pouring rain... I swear they have to tone down the traffic in some of those places to film action movies.

Yea, I often wonder why we never started out with roundabouts instead of 4-way stops. Maybe the early road pioneers just didn't want to bring that piece of English history into their new world. Or maybe they just didn't think about it.

I realy hate to say it but I think the best thing we could do is adopt the German driving laws.

No cell phones, no drinking (anything), no eating, when you drive you drive.

There ya go. Now that I think about it I have 3 German vehicles: BMW 650 Dakar, VW Westfalia, and an Audi Avant. Maybe I should just move to Germany. On second thought, I like where I live.

be

[ima45dv8]

I'm sick of being called an aggressive drive. I'm just. . . . . . .competitive.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

I absolutely loathe lazy drivers, and by that I mean the ones too lazy to pay attention to what I heard best described as a "full-time job". That's not just a description of truckers. Anyone behind the wheel of any vehicle has to embrace it as a full-time job. If someone can't keep their mind in the middle of the task, then by all means leave the car at home and walk.

A few miles west of where I live is a small town named Whitesburg, GA. In a rare fit of forward-thinking a few years back they changed the major intersection in that little town into a round-about. I haven't been through there lately, but for at least the first two years the locals treated it as a 4-way stop (!).

[kimel]

I am not so sure the average American driver is intelligent enough to understand round-abouts.

[G-ManBart]

I'm sick of being called an aggressive drive. I'm just. . . . . . .competitive.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

I absolutely loathe lazy drivers, and by that I mean the ones too lazy to pay attention to what I heard best described as a "full-time job". That's not just a description of truckers. Anyone behind the wheel of any vehicle has to embrace it as a full-time job. If someone can't keep their mind in the middle of the task, then by all means leave the car at home and walk.

A few miles west of where I live is a small town named Whitesburg, GA. In a rare fit of forward-thinking a few years back they changed the major intersection in that little town into a round-about. I haven't been through there lately, but for at least the first two years the locals treated it as a 4-way stop (!).

Yeah, I'm one of those "competitive" drivers too:)

Most places that have put in round-abouts have removed them. They work fine up to a certain traffic flow and then they don't work well at all. NJ was one of the first places in this country to have a lot of them and they worked for years...now most have been replaced with traffic lights. I think one of the problems is that they require an even higher level of attention from the drivers....they can't just sit there and wait for a green light. We have a few here in residential areas and they seem to work fine.

[George]

Yeah, I'm one of those "competitive" drivers too:)

Me 3.

Once you have raced anything, you can never be tolerant of nimrods on the road. I drive fast, but safe and am constantly on the alert. My feeling is that if you are not pulling away from others, you are too close to them.

I like to be the fastest thing on the road in normal traffic. Just zoning along on someone elses bumper until your exit is about the worst thing you can do on a freewa IMHO. I like to move through traffic at 5-8mph faster than the flow and then grab a handful whenever I clear a pack big open spaces are the best place to be in on a road at speed.

Intersections are best treated as dragrace starts after assessing the crosstraffic while the light is processing through yellow.

Remember the three rules of the road I stated earlier

[Scooter]

Just dealt with one of those idiot drivers I mentioned earlier where they NEED to be in the inside lane the second they merge onto the freeway. I was stopped on the metering light on an on-ramp. Two cars go by me in the carpool lane, but they got held up by a semi merging. I get the green, I always merge at no less than the speed limit since my car can do that. Seeing the 2 out of 3 lanes will be blocked by the semi and those two cars, I go for the inside lane at 70+ mph since it was clear. Then the idiot in the first car starts for the middle lane, even though there's no cars there, he keeps going and ends up right in front of me at 45 mph. I'm hard on the brakes and the a-hole then brake checks me. Oh how I wish we can ban stupid drivers.

[benos]

Yea that's another good thing to hate about American drivers - everybody has to have an attitide. You make an aggressive (for an American) move based on your skill and awareness, and you get some a-hole break-checking you or intentionally trying to run you off the road. Most everywhere else in the world but here, everyone drives with a level of aggressiveness that people here can't even comprehend - without any attitude whatsoever. I remember riding with Massimo (Tanfoglio) as he was cutting through traffic in Brescia, jamming his Mercedes into literally any spot it would fit, all while laughing, as he said, "He he he - it's whoever has the muscle." All around everyone was beeping and cramming in front of each other - all without any attitude or anger at all. It was awesome.

be

[JFD]

The biggest problem is most US drivers are simply steering their vehicles. I very little actual driving. Waaay more attention is placed on non-driving tasks.

Personally I give my cell phone maybe 3% of my attention when answering it, talking on it, or dialing. There's little anyone has to say on the phone that is important enough to take a risk over. Yet I typically see folks slow down 15MPH in the process or answering or dialing, usually combined with swerving to some degree. One of the reasons I drive fairly fast to stay out of these "packs" of idiots.

I don't tailgate, although I'm a master at it. It's counterproductive too often. I'm also a master at freaking out tailgaters, but only if driving alone and traffic conditions permit.

I hate asshats who tailgate you, then when you move over they change lanes with you. Nothing aggressive, they just want to follow you. I hate that with a passion. If you are too cowardly to drive fast on your own, then at least get off my bumper while I'm doing it.

I was running 95 MPH through Atlanta many years ago at 3 AM when I had something like this this happen. I was driving a supercharged Camaro so I just punched it up to 140 until he was history and settled back to 95. The idiot reappeared to follow me once again. Was driving well over 100 just to catch up to me when he did. Repeated this 3 times before I decided he was up to no good and suckered him into the concrete divider.

I use to be a very aggressive driver, but it was simply too tiring. It did develop a large "bag of tricks" that I have at my disposal.

At 4-way stops, it's unusual that I'm not playing traffic director, pointing to each doofus as its their time to go.

[shred]

Saw a quote from a trucker not too long ago "When did 'keep left except to pass' become 'stay left until your hear gunfire or your exit is under 50 yards away'??"

[RobMoore]

.....too many rules. Everything to do with driving in this country is massively over-regulated.

I believe this is the case with every aspect of American life. Our governments work thier way deeper into our pockets and deeper into our business every year.

On the line of 4 way intersections. I hate when I'm approaching one with another vehicle coming through it, and I keep coasting through at 2mph rather than zoom up and make a complete stop, and the 3rd car (next to go after me) decides that since I never made a complete stop, he has the right of way and tries to jump out in front of me.....Now I realize that LEGALLY he does have the right of way, but I like to go with the intent of the law, not the letter of the law. I was up at the line before him, I shouldn't have to make my wheels stop completely to solidify my claim as next in line.

I'm intrigued by the correlation I'm seeing in this post between competitive shooters and competitive drivers. With few exceptions, we seem to be a real "on the ball" bunch when it comes to driving, with little tolerance for those that aren't.

My wife calls me an elitist when it comes to driving because, like a previous poster, I'm an "aggressive" driver with a large bag of tricks.

I too have dealt with coat-tailers (my name for the folks who want to speed, but only behind someone else speeding) by leaving them in my V8 wake.

I could eat up every ounce of bandwidth complaining about Maryland drivers, so one more and I'll stop.

I hate when people think that because there is a HOV lane to their left, that they aren't in the "left lane" so they can go whatever speed they want, and to hell with everyone behind them.....damn, one more: I hate when people USE the HOV lane simply because its there, during non-peak hours when they could easily be in the regular lanes. NOOOOO, they have to act like a gas a spread out to fill the available space.

[Merlin Orr]

.........I hate asshats who tailgate you, then when you move over they change lanes with you. Nothing aggressive, they just want to follow you. I hate that with a passion. If you are too cowardly to drive fast on your own, then at least get off my bumper while I'm doing it.

..............

At 4-way stops, it's unusual that I'm not playing traffic director, pointing to each doofus as its their time to go.

Two of my personal favorites listed here........

[shred]

.........I hate asshats who tailgate you, then when you move over they change lanes with you. Nothing aggressive, they just want to follow you. I hate that with a passion. If you are too cowardly to drive fast on your own, then at least get off my bumper while I'm doing it.

..............

My favorite routine for those folks back when I did a lot of long-haul driving in the middle of nowhere was to very sloowly reduce my speed until we were going well under the speed limit and wait to see how long it took them to figure it out. Some of those folks get so fixated that you can get 'em way slow before they wake up.