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Bad Manners and Brimstone
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#Post#: 35650--------------------------------------------------
Re: Rules of the Road - or what happened to common courtesy?
Any Bad Driver Stories?
DIR By: vintagegal
Date: July 31, 2019, 6:40 am
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I am usually pretty mellow behind the wheel, but the last time I
got LIVID was in the strip mall shopping district of my area,
where there are about 7-8 sets of lights in a row, with signs
"Do Not Block Intersection". I was waiting to make a left turn
from the store parking lot onto the main road, the light there
has several parts of the cycle, not just N-S go and E-W go. Of
course a person on the main road HAD to drive right into my path
to "make it" through the light before it turned red, even though
she could see that she would be blocking the intersection as
traffic ahead of her was stopped. Her response to my honking was
a stupid grin and shrug. I had to wait through a whole nother
cycle to get out.
Whew, I need to calm down more. ;)
#Post#: 35651--------------------------------------------------
Re: Rules of the Road - or what happened to common courtesy?
Any Bad Driver Stories?
DIR By: Aleko
Date: July 31, 2019, 6:43 am
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--- Quote ---
> [quote]Quote from: sandisadie on July 30, 2019, 01:40:26 pm
> Everybody knows this one I think. People believe that if they
use their turn signals either their battery will go dead or
they'll have to use some of their gas to accomplish this - so
they don't use them! Anyway, those are the only explanations I
can come up with.
--- End Quote ---
Is that true??? I see a lot of people not using their turn
signals and it drives me nutso. if they really believe that
nonsense, then I can understand it somewhat. I just find it
hard to believe so many people are blissfully ignorant about
turn signals.[/quote]
I learned to drive in London, where by and large people do use
their indicators. Not always in advance - many people will swing
out to cut you up at the same moment as they flip them on - but
they use them. I found it very noticeable that in the area where
I now live, loads of people don't. You can sit interminably at
the entrance to a roundabout, missing umpteen opportunities to
enter it because the people already on it don't give you any
clue what they are going to do. This used to be a heavily
militarised area, and I've often wondered whether many local
drivers learned to drive in the army, where they never learned
to use their indicators because when they drove on public roads
they were normally in convoy!
#Post#: 35668--------------------------------------------------
Re: Rules of the Road - or what happened to common courtesy?
Any Bad Driver Stories?
DIR By: syfygeek
Date: July 31, 2019, 9:10 am
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My son was a horrible driver. In the course of about 4 years he-
totaled 2 cars, had 2 wrecks and about 3 speeding tickets. He
tailgated, he brake checked, he switched lanes on a whim. When
he went to defensive driving school at the ripe old age of 27
(in order to get points knocked down so his insurance wouldn't
be canceled) he had an epiphany! All these years, he had been
the bad driver. He had no idea that his driving wasn't
"defensive driving" it was "offensive driving".
Not only is he a better driver now, he's also a much better
passenger.
#Post#: 35672--------------------------------------------------
Re: Rules of the Road - or what happened to common courtesy?
Any Bad Driver Stories?
DIR By: RubyCat
Date: July 31, 2019, 9:35 am
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I live in an area that has a huge influx of tourists for the
summer. It's so nice to see them out and about, enjoying
themselves. Until I have to drive on the same roads as them. I
can cut a lot of slack to the people who are a little bit lost.
The locals tend not to drive aggressively but some of visitors
do. The latest example was yesterday when I was nearly
sideswiped at a rotary by somebody who thought she could cross
from the left lane to take a right turn and then, at the last
minute (and inches away) realized that she couldn't get there
through my car and she swerved away and exited at the next road
off the rotary. I was going that way too so I kept my eye on
her (and my distance) as she cut in and out of traffic.
Access to my area requires crossing one of two bridges and
during the tourist season, I avoid them during heavy travel
times because people drive crazy. I don't know why the police
do not enforce the traffic rules. We have people cutting each
other off at the merges, people causing gridlock at the traffic
lights, people forming extra (illegal) lanes to take turns at
the lights, and on and on. It's a nightmare.
#Post#: 35673--------------------------------------------------
Re: Rules of the Road - or what happened to common courtesy?
Any Bad Driver Stories?
DIR By: TootsNYC
Date: July 31, 2019, 10:05 am
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--- Quote from: syfygeek link ---
>
> My son was a horrible driver. In the course of about 4 years
he- totaled 2 cars, had 2 wrecks and about 3 speeding tickets.
He tailgated, he brake checked, he switched lanes on a whim.
When he went to defensive driving school at the ripe old age of
27 (in order to get points knocked down so his insurance
wouldn't be canceled) he had an epiphany! All these years, he
had been the bad driver. He had no idea that his driving wasn't
"defensive driving" it was "offensive driving".
>
> Not only is he a better driver now, he's also a much better
passenger.
>
--- End Quote ---
Was he thinking of "defensive" as though this was warfare, and
he needed to "defeat" the other driver?
I'm glad he had that epiphany!
#Post#: 35693--------------------------------------------------
Re: Rules of the Road - or what happened to common courtesy?
Any Bad Driver Stories?
DIR By: DaDancingPsych
Date: July 31, 2019, 1:58 pm
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I live in a city where the drivers are polite... too polite.
They will often break the rules to do something "nice" for
another driver. The thing is that the laws are supposed to take
the guess work out of driving as you don't need to guess who has
the right away; the law tells you. It drives me bananas the
number of times someone deflects the right away to me in the
name of being "nice". My favorite was when I lived in an
apartment that sat along a road with four lanes (two going in
each direction.) I often had to make the legal left hand turn
into the apartment complex and during rush hour, you might sit
for a bit waiting for traffic to clear. The one day this huge
SUV heading in the opposite direction stops in the left lane and
waves me to cross in front of it. There was no traffic light or
reason to stop; they were just trying to be "nice" by allowing
me to cross. Had the vehicle kept going, I would have been able
to turn in behind it. Now, I couldn't see if a smaller car had
entered into the right lane that I had to cross, because I
couldn't see around the SUV. The driver waved me to cross. I
shook my head no (I couldn't see.) The driver waved again. More
no from me. I finally realized that the driver was not going to
move, clearing my vision to see, so I turned off my signal and
continued down the road to turn around further down so that I
could get home. I watched in the rear view mirror as the SUV
continued down the road... they really did just stop in the
middle of a road to wave me on.
#Post#: 35703--------------------------------------------------
Re: Rules of the Road - or what happened to common courtesy?
Any Bad Driver Stories?
DIR By: malfoyfan13
Date: July 31, 2019, 3:52 pm
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I also have too many bad driver stories to list them all, but
two of my biggest pet peeves around my area are:
When I am making a left turn (either by green arrow or by green
light/once the other side is clear), a driver on the opposite
side of the street invariably decides that's the time to make
their right turn on a red light, which means that car is now
turning into the lane I'm trying to turn left into. They can
see me coming....but they go ahead and make that right turn
anyway. Now, supposedly they should be turning into the lane
closest to the sidewalk, while I'm turning into the lane closest
to the center of the road, so if all goes well we should
hypothetically both be able to turn safely. But
NOOOOOOO....they always have to turn into the lane closest to
the center, which means it's quite possible we'll collide. So I
(and my DH) seem to do a lot of honking and yelling at people
who just can't wait.
My other one is people who come up on the right side of the car
and pass, usually unsafely and too quickly, so that we often
don't see them until they're speeding up to get in front of us.
I also recently saw a woman driving in the middle of the road,
in that lane used for left turns, for several blocks, then cut
in front of someone to get back in the lane she was originally
in.
I live in California so there are few "no right on red" signs
but as someone else noted, usually there are some idiots behind
the first car who start honking when we actually obey that sign.
There is a weird intersection near a freeway entrance we often
take and there's always someone who just has to get past that
red light. I haven't seen anyone pulled over yet, but I won't
be surprised when I do.
It is no wonder to me that we keep hearing of hit and run
accidents around here. People just drive like there are no
rules and they don't care.
#Post#: 35713--------------------------------------------------
Re: Rules of the Road - or what happened to common courtesy?
Any Bad Driver Stories?
DIR By: GardenGal
Date: July 31, 2019, 6:12 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
I might have posted this incident before, but here goes. I was
coming to a railroad crossing for our local trolley, and the no
crossing lights were flashing and the safety barrier was coming
down. As I stopped, the gal in the car behind me blasted her
horn and gave me the finger. It seemed she wanted me to dash
across the tracks in front of her so she could also dash across
the tracks right behind me. No, idiot, I am not risking my life
so you can risk yours.
#Post#: 35718--------------------------------------------------
Re: Rules of the Road - or what happened to common courtesy?
Any Bad Driver Stories?
DIR By: silversurfer
Date: July 31, 2019, 7:19 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
--- Quote ---
>
> Posted by: DaDancingPsych
> « on: Today at 01:58:29 pm »
> Insert Quote
>
>
>
> I live in a city where the drivers are polite... too polite.
They will often break the rules to do something "nice" for
another driver. The thing is that the laws are supposed to take
the guess work out of driving as you don't need to guess who has
the right away; the law tells you. It drives me bananas the
number of times someone deflects the right away to me in the
name of being "nice". My favorite was when I lived in an
apartment that sat along a road with four lanes (two going in
each direction.) I often had to make the legal left hand turn
into the apartment complex and during rush hour, you might sit
for a bit waiting for traffic to clear. The one day this huge
SUV heading in the opposite direction stops in the left lane and
waves me to cross in front of it. There was no traffic light or
reason to stop; they were just trying to be "nice" by allowing
me to cross. Had the vehicle kept going, I would have been able
to turn in behind it. Now, I couldn't see if a smaller car had
entered into the right lane that I had to cross, because I
couldn't see around the SUV. The driver waved me to cross. I
shook my head no (I couldn't see.) The driver waved again. More
no from me. I finally realized that the driver was not going to
move, clearing my vision to see, so I turned off my signal and
continued down the road to turn around further down so that I
could get home. I watched in the rear view mirror as the SUV
continued down the road... they really did just stop in the
middle of a road to wave me on.
--- End Quote ---
I totally agree!! I think I read on this forum somewhere (may
have been about cars stopping in the middle of the road to let
pedestrians cross, when the cars had right of way):
I don't need you to be nice, I need you to be predictable
#Post#: 35724--------------------------------------------------
Re: Rules of the Road - or what happened to common courtesy?
Any Bad Driver Stories?
DIR By: VorFemme
Date: July 31, 2019, 11:46 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
I have been in an accident where there were two turn lanes, as
long as you follow the lane markings, there will be no problems.
Well, the other vehicle changed lanes into my front passenger
wheel and blamed me for not moving into the far left lane
instead of the first straight lane, since their lane was showing
as going into either a merge left lane or, just past the merge
portion, a right turn lane into a shopping center parking lot.
They clearly wanted to go straight...and changed lanes instead
of going into the merge lane (based on where on the road they
hit my right front wheel).
I printed off a map of the intersection from the internet and
drew MY path and their path and copied both insurance companies.
My company paid everything (we had rental car coverage) and the
repairs, then went against her company to subrogate the costs.
Her company maintained that they thought, like her, that I
should have yielded to her and changed lanes. Why they thought
this was never explained - but she was adamant at the site that
she had NOT changed lanes into me, I had changed lanes into her
because of course nobody would go from the right turn lane south
into the right turn lane west...huh???
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