How do you drive courteous ( ideas welcome ! )

[Rishar]

Originally Posted by Fat Charlie

Tell me what I, as a random member of society that you've never met, owe you as another driver. Now tell me why you do not also owe that same consideration to me and the other people in the area. If we're all in it together, which we are, we can work together and have smooth flowing traffic. No muss, no fuss, and everybody gets where they're going with no problems. But I refuse to reward bad behavior by cooperating with it.

I was going faster than the cars in the right lane this morning . A car that wanted to go even faster came up behind me and sat awfully close. I could have juggled speeds, popped into a gap in the right lane and forced them to adjust everything so that the faster car could proceed unimpeded, but why? How many of us should be disrupted for the enjoyment of one guy... who tailgates? I know the road's kind of full, but this guy really wants to go faster. We should all work together to let him go. We all owed it to him.

Or...orrrrr...slow down to match speed of the vehicle to your right saving both you and the speedster behind you gas and money! It's a win for everyone. Unless of course...he has a dying person or pregnant wife about to give birth in the vehicle...then maybe not so much.

It's something I often have to remind myself before I make a revenge maneuver, why might this person be driving like a complete (insert obscenity here)? Sure, it could be for jollies, or he might be heading to the hospital. I don't know. On that note, this is what hazard lights are for, if someone has them on and is speeding, I definitely choose get out of the way.

[Fat Charlie]

I had to pick a speed that would get me where I was going by a certain time. It was below the PSL on that stretch, but higher than the crowd.

Yes, lighting is a great communication tool. So is not tailgating. Believe it or not, there is a lot of room on many roads that has nothing to do with the number of lanes the paint crews decided to mark and he could have blown by me without missing a beat. But he didn't show any indication of needing to go fast and was in fact happy to ride my bumper until a gap appeared on the right for me to move into.

I waited for a gap that was big enough to let him pass me sluggishly without interrupting my speed. Good thing, too, because it's exactly what he did. He was more focused on passing me than with going somewhere, so the moment I moved over his day was made: he was a fast guy and people were falling over themselves to get out of his way.

[freebeard]

I treat vehicles as 'black boxes', evaluating them on position, velocity and signal lights. Hands waving over the top of the a steering wheel I ignore.

I think that's equitable.

[user removed]

When courteous is necessary as long as it does NOT interfere with defensive. At Interstate cloverleafs a lot of the left laners will speed up to block you from moving left to let someone in the right-merge lane. I generally stay right unless it is less dangerous to move left.

If it works I will move to the left lane to let a mass of mergers enter the road without undue interference by me, which sometimes ticks off the left laners going 75 to 80 instead of 65-70. I pulse over the crest of the overpass then go back right with a coast and let them by.

I will speed up to make things smoother but I would do that anyway if traffic was light.
I try to avoid riding in the lanes that are used by entry-exit vehicles and I get into the lane I need to be in to turn early. My objective is for other drivers to consider my actions predictable.

I watch the vehicles around me for low tires, not tracking straight, wheels hopping or any other indication of poor operation or maintenance. Few slow down as gradually as I do but sometimes I will try to NOT let them blast around me, when I KNOW they will have to slam on brakes the instant they swerve in front of me because I have the light perfectly timed, but if the light will not be green when I get there they can go ahead and I just coast further.

I also try make make left&right turns with the least change in inertia, sometimes I hear a gasp from the wife when I coast off a cloverleaf and enter the turn at 50+ MPH. Not may will tail gate me through an exit cloverleaf, goodway to get the SUV off my arse that's been 2 car lengths behind me for.5 mile while I coast down to exit ramp speed without touching the brakes.

regards
mech

[Arragonis]

It gives Karma - I stopped to let a jogger cross the other morning, and in return he didn't trigger the (very long) red crossing light.

We both waved thanks.

[War_Wagon]

I was taught that the left lane is for passing, the right lane is for driving. I try to abide by that as much as possible. As well, if I am in the right lane and want to pass someone, and see a faster moving vehicle coming up in the distance in the left lane, I slow down and wait for them to pass us both before I overtake the driver in front of me. I am sure the person in the left lane never notices my attempt to be a safe and courteous driver, but I do it anyway.

As for city driving, forget it. I live in an area where 70% of the population has immigrated from a country where less than 10% of their homeland population has had a drivers license for more than 3 years. I drive safely not to be courteous, but because I don't want to get killed by someone that decides to turn left, from the right hand turn lane, across 2 lanes of traffic. I wish I was making that up. But it's something I see at least once every few weeks. I actually saw someone miss their turn, stop, backup, and make the turn they missed. On a busy two lane road. That was an hour ago.

And people wonder why I keep Miss Silvia around at the shop. Every once in a while I just need to drive home and enforce a little bit of safe driving in the people around me. Strangely, I don't seem to get nearly as many close calls, people changing lanes right beside me, or stopping randomly in the left lane, when she has all her lights on. The 454 with really loud 2 chamber Flowmaster exhaust probably helps. Sadly it costs $10 to drive the 8 kms to my house haha.

[Fat Charlie]

Originally Posted by Old Mechanic

At Interstate cloverleafs a lot of the left laners will speed up to block you from moving left to let someone in the right-merge lane. I generally stay right unless it is less dangerous to move left.

If it works I will move to the left lane to let a mass of mergers enter the road without undue interference by me, which sometimes ticks off the left laners going 75 to 80 instead of 65-70.

What the "fast people" don't understand is that in the ramp neighborhood, the lane that was the rightmost available lane isn't available for through travel anymore. It's a mess of entering and exiting cars, and depending on traffic volume that mess may bleed over into the next lane as well. Traffic is being obstructed. Deal with it. Traffic that had been keeping right is going to divert around the obstruction, and that's going to cut into the higher speed lanes. Sorry, but there are fewer travel lanes here and I'm not diving into the scrum of merging traffic to avoid inconveniencing the folks who want to set & forget their cruise. I try to move left into a big gap, but if traffic is heavy I just move left sooner.

If it's possible to pass me on the right after I move left, shut up, do it and move on with your life: I apparently didn't obstruct you. If there isn't a chance to pass me on the right, it just proves my point- that the road is too congested in that area for unobstructed high speed runs. I'd prefer it to not be the case, but I'm not the guy who designed the ramp area. Write your congressman and ask for the road to be widened there so we can have another lane farther left.

[dirtydave]

How about leaving an opening for cars turning onto the road from a side street or parking lot? I will leave a gap so someone can get out.

Or in the city where it is a light and another light just a few car lengths ahead people will block the entire road and be in the middle of the intersection stopped at the red light. I wont move if I cant fit on the other side of it.

[ninetynineSC2]

Originally Posted by dirtydave

How about leaving an opening for cars turning onto the road from a side street or parking lot? I will leave a gap so someone can get out.

I try to do this but here it's kind of hard on any road that has more than one lane going the same direction. Whenever there's one or more going the same way someone in the other lane either shoves into the gap or blocks it in the other lane so no one can get through anyway.

[Grant-53]

As they said in the car magazine years ago "Accidents waste time." I prefer a 3 second gap between vehicles. Life is much better with a live and let live policy. Lights and horns are communicating tools. Unless there are flashing lights I will take my time to use the left lane properly for passing. No one is under obligation to exceed the speed limit. For someone following too close I put on the hazard flashers until they back off to an acceptable distance.