Says the same thing to people in the US (and elsewhere??) that drive in the freeway's fast lane holding everyone up for MILES. That is one of the most annoying things I face regularly on the road.
Then why the f*ck are they in the left lane?!
Most of them go back to the right/slow lane when they're done passing any trucks and other slow traffic. Even on the I-5 it's not like the right/slow lane is an unbroken line of trucks from Mexico to Canada, you know.
But one thing I have learned by driving 50k miles these past few years is that you never actually get there meaningfully faster. So really, everyone is better off if they just slow down and hit that cruise control.
Depends what you're driving on. If it's a freeway where you're going to hit stretches of traffic anyway or roads where there's stop signs and lights, sure. When I'm on the 5 going from SF to SD, though, yeah, the clown who's doing 60 in the left lane for miles while holding me up is very much increasing the amount of time I have to spend on the road.
Not to mention, waiting behind a needlessly slow driver is just annoying. Mental costs are real, especially when operating heavy machinery.
When I was making that drive every other week I hated the slow pokes. There are only some many times you can look forward to a stop in Tomah, WI
What's the deal with a truck going 54 in the right lane being overtaken by another truck going 55 in the left lane? Does he not see him? Slow down, let him in, and the rest of us can get on with our day.
As well, 20%, or say a difference between going 10km over vs 10km under on a 5hr trip, is an hour and that's not nothing :-/
Or worse, people don't see turn signals enough to know what they mean, and just adds to the confusion.
Also, people seem to really bunch up in some regions. Having a gap that is several car lengths in front of you actually helps traffic flow smoother (and thus faster.) I feel like aggressive/impatient drivers who cut people off create this culture where I live and then ultimately end up slowing everyone (including themselves) down.
Better yet, since my car is old and I don’t maintain it, I will drive 50 on the highway in the middle lane so everyone has to drive around me.
Who gives a shit about other people anyways. Them driving faster than me is a problem but not the other way around.
Deliberately driving at a faster or slower speed than traffic for no good reason is the definition of unsafe driving. Please surrender your driver's license before you kill someone with that attitude.
My sentiment remains nonetheless: Anyone who deliberately breaks the flow of traffic for no good reason is a danger to other drivers.
For example, when you’re driving more than 6 hours in a day, which is not uncommon for Americans, especially ones living west of Mississippi, extra 10 mph of average speed means you’re getting to your destination 1+ hour faster, which most definitely is a significant difference.
This, for sure.
Those of us who live in the midwest are often hours of boring highway driving aware from anything, so a long weekend trip does require getting where we're going as quickly as reasonably possible.
Being stuck behind some nitwit who insists on pacing the semi truck next to them at 60 MPH rather than doing the 80+ everyone else on the highway wants to go is incredibly annoying.
Absolutely not. The legal limit should mean it is objectively unsafe to go faster in clear conditions no matter what you're driving. It is not supposed to be the speed you expect most traffic to go. If the average speed of traffic on a road is 85 MPH and people aren't constantly screwing that up, the limit (if there is one at all) should be meaningfully higher than that.
And of course if people are regularly screwing up at whatever the natural speed of the road may be, the correct answer is ALWAYS to change the road and reduce the speed people feel comfortable driving at. Lowering the limit below the natural speed doesn't actually reduce the speed of traffic unless there's active enforcement forcing people to comply. Redesigning the road makes people actually want to go the desired speed. A fast road is a fast road, no matter what number someone puts on a sign next to it.
> Stopping distance is not linear with speed, damage in a crash is not linear with speed (hello deer), gas usage is not linear with speed.
That's why I'm talking specifically about long, flat, straight stretches of road with effectively infinite visibility during the daytime. These are common in the American midwest, there are plenty of stretches where you can literally see the road disappear off over the horizon in a perfectly straight line. The same sorts of situations where the Germans go to unlimited, and it works just fine for them.
> No one who drives over 80 has grounds to complain about gas price, especially in large suvs or pickups.
No argument here. My car gets better MPG at 100 MPH than a lot of SUVs get at 65 MPH so I could not possibly care less, but you also won't ever hear me whining about gas prices.
It's a heck of a lot easier to make up half an hour by making quicker stops than it is to make it up on the road IMHO.
You: "Averaging 10-20mph faster is very difficult on anything but the least congested roads."
Either you're blatantly ignoring what the parent said ("west of the Mississippi"), which does not exactly amount to polite discourse, or you're commenting authoritatively on a set of roads which you clearly know nothing about.
I'd be surprised though if those roads didn't have roadworks, slower vehicles overtaking one another, accidents, bends, reduced speed sections etc. Certainly the roads I've driven in 10 or so other countries had these things in common.
Most Americans do less than 5000 miles per year. You totter to the shops and back over distances that people in other countries would just walk.
You can spot American tourists in Scotland, because they can't cope with everything being 200 miles apart when they drive at a maximum of 15mph.
The FHWA (Federal Highway Administration) states that the average person drives around 13,500 miles per year.
Most people barely drive further than the end of their street.
You're pulling "facts" out your ass.
No need to get defensive.
It's okay. You can look all these things up on the Internet.
People here are commenting how it's wrong for long drives, so I'll chip in with how it's wrong for a short drive too.
South bay to Sacramento in a Chevy bolt. I can drive 55mph and do the round trip on one full battery charge. Or I can drive 75mph and save so much time that it more than makes up for the necessary mid trip charge up in Davis on the return.
If it's the fastlane, then there are other lanes.
I suspect the person is doing the speed limit, maybe a bit over, in the fast lane -- and you're just and ASSHOLE.
In these scenarios it's usually two lanes in each direction, and the slow lane is filled with a line of semi trucks that have hard limiters set somewhere in the 65 MPH range and can not go faster no matter what, even if the highway limit is 70 or higher. Those truck drivers will do anything they can to maintain their max speed.
Some utter jackass then decides they don't want to be behind the trucks, but they also don't want to go faster than the trucks, and we end up with a line of annoyed traffic led by one dipshit.
> I suspect the person is doing the speed limit, maybe a bit over, in the fast lane -- and you're just and ASSHOLE.
Your position assumes the posted speed limit is set reasonably. Here's a hint: It's usually not on highways. I mean ffs there are eight lane divided highways with 55 MPH posted limits. You can't possibly defend that nonsense.
Most controlled-access highways the speed limits should start at 75 and as proven by the Germans beyond any doubt ∞ is a perfectly reasonable limit for rural stretches with good visibility and quality pavement.
Beyond all that, you are not the cops. It is not your job to enforce posted speed limits. If you are intentionally choosing to get in the way of a line of traffic when you have a reasonable option to not do that, YOU are the asshole.
I just can't even contemplate the level of selfishness it would take to be in the passing lane, looking at a line of annoyed drivers behind you and open road in front, thinking "man all those people are assholes for wanting to get past ME".
I refuse to drive more than 5mph above the speed limit after a particular incident a few years back. I drive quite a bit on a 3 lane 75mph highway. Consistently, I'll end up behind someone who doesn't know what speed they want to go in the middle lane, something between 65mph and 75mph. They're mostly 18 wheelers. I'll usually move over to the passing lane and go between 75mph and 80mph until I pass them.
Inevitably, there's some asshole that wants to go 90mph that appears out of the ether as soon as I start passing. They always want to be less than a second behind me, and never seem to understand that I want to keep at least 3s between me and the car in front. I always imagine they're saying the same thing you're saying in their heads.
(For record and clarification I do not condone that approach :)
> 147 (1) Any vehicle travelling upon a roadway at less than the normal speed of traffic at that time and place shall, where practicable, be driven in the right-hand lane then available for traffic or as close as practicable to the right hand curb or edge of the roadway. R.S.O. 1990, c. H.8, s. 147 (1).
* https://www.ontario.ca/laws/statute/90h08#BK251
unless you're passing or making a left turn, and which has a fine of:
> (3) Every person who, while driving a motor vehicle, contravenes this section is guilty of an offence and on conviction is liable to a fine of not less than $150 and not more than $1,000. 2019, c. 8, Sched. 1, s. 27.
I believe normal people call that “empathy”, and people who lack it are called “sociopaths”. Or, sometimes, “Americans”.
Your own safety is concern #1 when driving. For a very simple reason: if you're not safe yourself, you cannot make it safer for others.
Others will have different ideas on what is safe. They may feel comfortable breaking traffic rules or pushing you(r vehicle) past your/its safety limits. Some have new cars and new tires and can go much faster than others in slippery conditions.
Spoiler: none of that is ever an excuse. Not with traffic police, not with accident investigators, not with emergency services. I don't know what condition your vehicle is in. I don't know how worn out your brakes are, how much grip your tires have. I don't know what happens in your car above that certain speed. I don't need to know; I need to be able to rely on you to operate your vehicle sufficiently safely. That is: such that it doesn't make the roads less safe for me.
I can't speak about your (w|l)ife, but in my (w|l)ife, people who say this are the people who personally enjoy taking advantage of my nature, and my "overly considerate behavior" is only pointed out when someone else seems to be getting benefit at the expense of my (w|l)ife; i.e it's a statement of selfishness.
In other words, both fsckboy's wife and misc. people in their life tend to only point out that fsckboy is being "overly considerate" when it appears that fsckboy is letting someone benefit from their considerate nature. The implication is that fsckboy considers the behavior as being kind and/or safe, while their wife/companions think of it as being taken advantage of.
The broad concept of this exchange concerns where the line is between being considerate and being taken advantage of, and how others might be incentivized to view that one way or the other.
>I can't speak about your (wife), but in my (wife), people who say this are the people who personally enjoy taking advantage of my nature, and my "overly considerate behavior" is only pointed out when someone else seems to be getting benefit at the expense of my (wife); i.e it's a statement of selfishness.
Being excessively considerate of others on the road is safer from my experience.
There isn't always advance signage, so you often see them at the last second and don't have time to check the quality of the approach, check if the person behind you has enough warning, etc.
They're always far poorer quality than the road itself, so you're aggressively decelerating a heavy vehicle in usually mountainous conditions, approaching a 4"+ drop into ragged pavement or gravel. I've hit some of those spots at speed and it's felt like the vehicle was going to fall apart.
And yes, often you're going slowly because you've just let a few cars past and reentered the road, just for another person to drive up behind you and start the whole game again.
It's very very rare to find signed turnouts that are good and long enough that it's trivial to pull off the road at a reasonable speed, let people through, and then continue on without just creating more problems.
I remember turnouts in NW Idaho or closer to Spokane maybe where the signage suggested you were meant to use the shoulders to let cars pass, but they were really narrow and I wasn't sure how exactly they were meant to be used? Anyone familiar with that area? If it's not wide enough to get fully out of the lane, wouldn't the passing car just overtake using the opposite lane anyway?
It takes far less oncoming traffic distance to pass someone going 20 in the shoulder than 50 in the regular lane.
You could achieve the same effect going 20 in the lane if you could clearly signal you intended to stay slow so the other person could pass.
Here in Australia, the road trains will often signal when it's safe for you to overtake them - they're seated higher with better visibility, have far better lights for night driving, etc. But I always hear that their employers/industry discourage them from doing this, I assume out of fear of liability.
I've driven x0k miles in the US and tried signalling like this when I can tell someone desperately wants to overtake me ("go now, it's clear ahead"), but almost no one understands the intention.
IMO, most RV/truck/etc drivers dislike holding up traffic as much as the traffic dislikes being held up!
That is achieved very easily by driving a 31,000 lbs vehicle.
But a pull out is just that. It’s a pull out. They are typically very short such that one has to pull in and fully stop. They are often found are on narrow roads in windy coastal, mountain or river canyons where putting in a passing lane is not feasible.
Yeah why would people expect anyone to do that?
I guess I expect people to be reasonable, but comments in HN should have taught me better by now.
> coming to a complete stop
You're not meant to come to a stop. That absolutely kills what momentum you do have. It's exceptionally difficult to start a heavy vehicle from a stop. You're meant to pull out, maybe slow down a little, then pull back in, cars be damned. Some cars will pass, maybe not all. The new lead set of cars will get by at the next pullout, and so on in incremental fashion.
But what happens in practice is that the first or 2nd idiot behind you does not prepare in advance and then does not race like mad when you go into the pullout, thereby allowing as many following cars as possible to also make the pass. Even if that first car did execute it correctly, the 2nd car likely does not. Then the 2nd or maybe 3rd car is "in the breach" when the pullout lane ends, blocking your (RV) re-entry and forcing you to stop. Then you're doubly fooked. You have to start from a complete stop and you're at the very end of the pullout lane, with no speedup zone at all.
... this is why we can't have nice things ...
My daily commute involves a 2 lane highway (ie, 1 lane each direction) with a pullout for slow moving vehicles. Semi trucks and other heavy construction type vehicles use this road a lot, as it's the only viable route. They do almost always use the pullout, but they pull back in at the end without regard for anyone in the traffic lane. They have to -- they are even worse than any RV on getting started from a stop again. So I see this crap driving from the auto drivers almost every day. If I happen to be the first car waiting behind a truck, I race on past and then it's always the case that only 1 other car in a long line also make it past, when 6-7 should be making it. I also frequently witness the slow passing fool have to slam his brakes as the truck re-enters the lane.
I don't fault any RV for not using the pullout lanes.
The "cars be damned" part would be a collision, with the RV at fault. No thanks.
And the pullouts are not long enough to keep rolling, you have to come to a stop to have a chance to pick up speed again when there's a gap, otherwise you've just rolled to the end of the pullout and now you're sitting still with no room to accelerate before pulling into traffic.
The turnouts designed for slow moving vehicles to let others pass, at least to my experience these are almost always signed far enough in advance (I'm sure there's a vehicle code mandating distance of signage) and they are at least ten or tens of car lengths long.
I think you are asking too much for any vehicle to pull out into one of those tinier kind of little turnouts for the sake of normal kind of driving/passing activity.
> The "cars be damned" part would be a collision, with the RV at fault. No thanks.
Agreed and this is why i would never use them were I driving an RV, and I don't blame others for not doing it. I'm just noting that I see the big trucks do this all the time. I'd estimate once a month I end up behind slow car panic stopping when he realizes the truck isn't having it.
Ignoring those clearly-marked, friendly, and predictable pullouts, practically everything else is a total crapshoot you really don't know what it's going to be like until you've already driven past it. With a 38-foot 31,000 lbs class A, we made it the passenger's job to call out whether a pullout was safe or not, because the driver just didn't have enough time to notice it. Often we did manage to pull out of traffic for a moment and let 3-10 cars pass, but sometimes it just wasn't feasible.
First is the visibility of these pull-outs is often very poor. You'll be driving through long winding roads and then all of the sudden the pull-out appears. In an RV, you can't just slam on the breaks and swerve into the pullout, ESPECIALLY if you're going downhill.
Second, often times (in the USA at least), these pull-outs have rough terrain going in an and out of them. There will be a little bump or uneven ground that most vehicles wouldn't mind hitting every now and then, but in my rig, that causes the whole thing to sway back and forth (Class-C built on a Mercedes Sprinter). I REALLY need to upgrade the suspension.
Third is time. Since I'm slower than everyone else, people tend to pile up behind me pretty quickly. Pulling into the pull-out, coming to a complete stop, waiting for everyone to pass, then getting back up to speed takes a long time. If I did this every time there was a car behind me, it would take forever. So, I tend to wait until there's more than a few cars behind me before pulling off.
Fourth is my wife. She says I have "overly-considerate disorder" and I need to make our safety #1 and stop caring about other people so damn much.