It’s strange, my coworker said the roads were really crazy last night. First light i tunred at, left turn by the way, with green arow, dude ran the red and almost hit me. Is it something in the water?
I think it’s a barometer for the overall mental health climate. We’re any combination of overworked, broke, tired, we got news organizations trying to keep us mad at each other all the time…and then we get on the road where it’s easy to pretend those other metal boxes aren’t filled with human beings.
I’m not above it. I’ve participated in my fair share of road rage parties. And I don’t have any solutions, just observations and memes. That’s all I got.
It’s deeper than that.
People have been doing this since cars became fast. There’s something in our brains that automatically turns driving into a battle.
I mean, you roll up on anyone in an aggressive/adversarial manner, regardless of the situation, you’re more likely to encourage pushback than agreement/compliance. Even if it’s just the perception of aggression, our primate brains are wired to stand our ground. Doesn’t matter who’s wrong or right, it’s about locking horns. It’s why online arguments are the way they are.
So… Aggressivity always escalates if people interact at random without a cooling period?
That’s quite a hypothesis. Seems realistic. I wonder if anybody tested it.
Has it started getting hot out where you are recently? There is always a spike in bad driving when the weather gets nice.
“in these hot days is the mad blood stirring” -Romeo and Juliet
An important game maybe? Being Brazilian, I’ve always refrained from driving before big soccer games started, like World Cup or championship finals. People were crazy trying to get home.
This is every day where I live. It’s madness. Otherwise, the place is paradise. Beautiful area. People are great here. Until you get them into a car. Then they are inattentive, pushy, and unsafe. People die every single year. Kids on bikes get plowed over. It’s insane.
At a 4-way intersection, if I stop around the same time as a car to my right I always yield to them according to the “right hand rule” of right-of-way. But everyone else wants to go only by “who reached the line first” and they want to time it down to the millisecond. And guess what: they always, always determine that they arrived first.
Funny how that works. They’ve changed the rule from “right of way goes to whoever arrived first, defer to car on your right when in doubt” to “it’s always my turn.”
Literally the first 2 posts as I opened the app
These ‘zipper merge’ vs ‘early merge’ arguments are really the worst. At the same time, the lack of consensus fully explains why merge zones like that are such a mess.
I remember driving through OK, and the state law is “early merge.” I thought it was all bullshit, buuut they have studies 1 year after they implemented it that it actually cut down on traffic somehow. I still believe the late zipper merge is better. Use the whole road until you can’t!
What discussion? Zipper merge is a well defined technique.
More like half the people know how to zipper merge and the other half try to justify merging a mile early and getting angry when people pass them and zipper merge properly.
Let pedestrians and cyclists go first. Scramble walk is okay and sjould be encouraged
I hate scramble walks that act like you can’t still walk while traffic is going. The light is green just turn the walk sign on.
50/50 about it. My premise was for stop signs and or yield signs in general. But for traffic lights I’d rather it red light all around and pedestrians go where the heck they need. Like in Chicago there is busy intersections in a densely populated neighborhood that has foot traffic of bars/restaurants etc. but pedestrians have to abide by traffic’s patterns?? Like that one-five driver decides to make a right turn and bam either you hit someone or someone rear ends or block the bus or just make long queue for the cars who go past the cross walk…
I support this wholeheartedly. Cars should be banned.
God damnit , now I gotta go watch police academy 1-765 now
Who holds back the electric car?
Who makes Steve Guttenberg a star?
Hot tip: if your bumper to bumper during congestion or construction periods. You need to have at least 2-3 (minimum 1) car spaces between you and the car/truck in front of you. This way you’ll maintain a steady speed (maybe btwn 2-9 mph) rather than coming to complete halt every stretch.
Yep. Tailgating causes fullstops.
That just invites people to keep pulling in front of you, and now you’re driving slowly while the lane in front of you is moving faster, and you’ve become the traffic jam.
Just like like my comment - you got hooked for no reason. The congestion is already there why are you gonna pile up… on a queue…
You try to keep 3 car spaces in front of you. Someone pulls in front of you, so now there’s only 2 spaces. So when traffic starts moving again, you stay still and wait for there to be 3 spaces. Then somebody pulls in front of you, so there’s only 2 spaces in front of you, so you stop and wait for there to be 3 spaces in front of you…
Everybody behind you is going slower now because you won’t match the speed of traffic.
(Depends are you in stretches of congestion or are is it all clear?) Okay what’s the point if there traffic ahead. You’re gonna speed up to get up to that car who jumped in the lane to come to complete stop? I see various types of stop gaps in 30 mi stretches and seen phantom stops for reason (or ppl on their cell phones¿) My friend, no disrespect but I’d like to keep steady speed (albeit it’s 2 or 5mph) than come up to a cars rear bumper and sniff their exhaust pipe.
It’s not about making sure I’m close. It’s about not increasing the traffic issues.
If you’re working so hard to keep multiple car-lengths of distance in congested traffic, you’re required to travel slower than traffic. The lane you’re in travels more slowly for anyone behind you.
Yeah, people in the next lane over can pull in front of you and relieve traffic in that lane, but that just results in more lane switching in front of and behind you, leading to more fender benders.
Be. The. Sunshine.
Be the honest dark cloud fogging up the narrative.
Just here checking in on the narrative.
It’s dark and foggy. But you’ll have to bear with it.
Some people think that if there’s a hwy lane closure in 30 miles, you’re the asshole of you don’t immediately merge over
I don’t mind personally, but don’t assume that your blinker means I HAVE to let you in
Definitely. I personally merge earlier, knowing it’s less efficient and will put me back relative to zipper merging - just to avoid the stress of trying to get in between potentially uncooperative mergees. But I also don’t get too mad at the mergers - maybe they’re in a legit hurry
You do, though, depending on where you live. It’s the law in plenty of countries, and for good reason. Lanes are meant to be used until they end, and the best strategy with traffic is a zipper merge. Every-other car should be from the ending lane, assuming there are cars in the ending lane. If you aren’t letting the next person in to the continuing lane, you are an asshole, and a dangerous driver.
Some people eat up rage bait like a fine meal
Something something milk before cereal something…
And some people think inflating numbers proves their point.
Plus, If you have 30 miles of signs telling you to get over and you wait until you are forced by the actual lane closure, yes you are the asshole.
I will not be taking questions.
If you have 30 miles of ending lane warnings, you should still ride it until the actual end. It’s best for congestion. Leaving a whole lane unused is pointless. It’s better for everyone if you wait to merge.
I didnt open that post cause I knew immediately that it would devolve into the age old fight of when to merge. This confirms I made the right choice, to always merge instantaneously when a sign that lane is ending is first seen in the distance.
I thought everyone would just get along and be happy
why?
Hot take:
No matter how good or crap you think the traffic laws are in your place are, the best bet is to follow them because if you don’t you will likely have to pay a lot of money that you probably don’t have to just throw away. Speed limits are limits, meaning maximums, merging should go like a zipper, yielding to traffic already up to speed is safest, driving without substances impairing your body is safest.
Its quite simple but a lot of people think they should be allowed to rebel against the laws and get away with doing whatever they want because the rules shouldn’t apply to them specifically.Hee hee hee ho ho ho ha ha ha 😉
