Ten Good Natured Driving Irritations

Acme said:
One that annoys me, and particularly annoyed me this morning. People on the motorway who you are following at say, 65MPH, they gradually reduce their speed to 60MPH so you go to overtake them, then they increase their speed to 70MPH so you pull in behind them again, then they slow down to 55MPH so you go past them and pull in, then a few minutes later they go past at 80MPH... :mad:

WHYY?!?! Pick a bloody speed and stick to it!!!
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So much this. Only other one that bugs me is people that change lanes on slip roads without indicating. One of the roads I drive down on my commute has a two-lane slip road. People in the inside lane gliding across to the lane I want when there are clear road markings of them being two separate lanes.

They then give me funny looks as if I've done something wrong :confused:
 
Merging lanes, and the desperate rush for everyone to get into the one lane when they first see the 800 yard sign...

And even more annoying, the special little pumpkins who do this, but then decide that nobody should be able to use the other, empty lane, so straddle the two preventing other people from skipping the queue of fools. I remember this used to happen EVERY day on the drive home when there was roadworks on the motorway.
 
Yes yes! Also merge in turn is a concept seemingly 85% of people seem to not understand.

Three things I feel that should be focused on specifically during driving lessons. motorway etiquette, indicating and merge in turn.

Failing at any of those should result in being struck with a long stick to the fingers while stationary.
 
DereksDontRun said:
It's not just other cars tho... When you're a passenger with your other half driving - do you ever spot a pot hole in the distance and think "it's ok, she's move over to avoid it..." only to later feel like she's purposely aiming for them...
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Mine is soooooo guilty of that! But then it's her car so she can do whatever she wants with it. However once I/we get a new car it will have to stop.
 
mrk said:
Yes yes! Also merge in turn is a concept seemingly 85% of people seem to not understand.

Three things I feel that should be focused on specifically during driving lessons. motorway etiquette, indicating and merge in turn.

Failing at any of those should result in being struck with a long stick to the fingers while stationary.
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I join the queue as i cant be bothered to deal with the angry looks/people that might take offence:(.
 
theone8181 said:
I join the queue as i cant be bothered to deal with the angry looks/people that might take offence:(.
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God forbid you offend people!

The current etiquette of joining the long queue is crazy. Would people join the longest queue in a supermarket for fear of upsetting someone who didn't see the open lane?
 
kefkef said:
And when all the lanes are active people don't use the hard shoulder. I commute on the M62 from Leeds to Huddersfield and back, every day the motorways are 'managed' and I'm lucky if I see 2 vehicles using the hard shoulder lane except when it's to queue to come off at Bradford (even worse are the people who merge into lane 1 from the on ramp when they could just carry on down the hard shoulder!).
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I do try to make sure I use the hard shoulder when appropriate, but far too often I find within a couple hundred yards it becomes a "next junction only" lane, so after pulling in & out of it, I eventually just give up, and use the leftmost lane that isn't the hard shoulder.
 
theone8181 said:
I join the queue as i cant be bothered to deal with the angry looks/people that might take offence:(.
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If I don't see someone raging in my mirror as I pop into the lane ahead of them then I feel I failed.

This is made slightly easier by the fact some people just have irrational rage for bikers in general.
 
Another one:

Councils etc who "improve" roundabouts by adding traffic lights. I don't think I've yet seen a roundabout that's been converted to have traffic lights that works better now the lights are in place. The whole point of a roundabout is to naturally govern traffic flow between multiple roads, and they work really well (in the vast majority of cases). Traffic lights may slightly speed up traffic flow from some of the minor roads (30s-1m wait, rather than 1-2m wait), but hugely impact the major roads (20+ min queue rather than 5 mins)
 
kefkef said:
And when all the lanes are active people don't use the hard shoulder. I commute on the M62 from Leeds to Huddersfield and back, every day the motorways are 'managed' and I'm lucky if I see 2 vehicles using the hard shoulder lane except when it's to queue to come off at Bradford (even worse are the people who merge into lane 1 from the on ramp when they could just carry on down the hard shoulder!).
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I don't use the hard shoulder unless I *have* to, because its usually covered in crap and stones and muck and debris and I worry I'll end up with a puncture or something.

Perhaps its different on the M62.
 
Left lane is by far the best option on the 4 lane sections, nobody uses it so you're guaranteed to make better progress there, quite often moving faster than lane 4.
 
Agreed, I always use the inside lane in slower traffic. Everyone else seems to clamber for the outside lane as though they genuinely believe that it is a "fast lane" :D
 
R.C.Anderson said:
Another one:

Councils etc who "improve" roundabouts by adding traffic lights. I don't think I've yet seen a roundabout that's been converted to have traffic lights that works better now the lights are in place. The whole point of a roundabout is to naturally govern traffic flow between multiple roads, and they work really well (in the vast majority of cases). Traffic lights may slightly speed up traffic flow from some of the minor roads (30s-1m wait, rather than 1-2m wait), but hugely impact the major roads (20+ min queue rather than 5 mins)
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Yea they did this at the Black Cat roundabout at St Neots. They made it much bigger with more lanes, but also added traffic lights :/

It didn't improve the traffic problem AT ALL. You still can't go within about 3 miles of it without hitting gridlock.
 
Nasher said:
Yea they did this at the Black Cat roundabout at St Neots. They made it much bigger with more lanes, but also added traffic lights :/

It didn't improve the traffic problem AT ALL. You still can't go within about 3 miles of it without hitting gridlock.
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I don't mind them so much but.....

Why are they switched on at night ?
 
How about councils that decide to delete roundabouts entirely and replace them with 4-way traffic lights and more lanes. Looks good on paper and junction visibility is better but the traffic now gets even worse.

Of course there's also always some idiot who suddenly realises they want to turn right, yet are in the left-hand filter lane and causes chaos shifting across.
 
Borealis said:
How about councils that decide to delete roundabouts entirely and replace them with 4-way traffic lights and more lanes. Looks good on paper and junction visibility is better but the traffic now gets even worse.

Of course there's also always some idiot who suddenly realises they want to turn right, yet are in the left-hand filter lane and causes chaos shifting across.
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How does one go about "deleting" a roundabout? Is it the same as when someone "deletes" their DPF?
 
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