Driving pet peeves

They can be confusing, or at least I got confused. We have one that the 2 straight lanes go from green to red but the left turn lane continues to blink the yellow arrow. I was approaching the left turn timing the turn looking up to the arrow and back to the traffic, but as I make the turn I look up and the light is already red. I probably looked up to see the final yellow then it turned to red as I look out to the last car that possibly ran his own red, now I'm running a red.

 

@Iamraiderpower

This just happened today...

I was at a 4-way intersection, and I wanted to make a left.

There was an older woman in a white late model Mercedes E350 wagon going straight, and she had gotten there first. Obviously, she had the right of way!

She pulled forward a bit, but she was was staring to her right and abruptly stopped with her front end just past the limit line.

I could have just made my left, but as many people know, I haven't had the best of luck with elderly Mercedes drivers when making left turns at intersections in Doylestown Borough...

Unlike the last elderly Mercedes driver who hit my truck, this woman was not only probably totally sober, but also had the right of way. I could have probably cut through the intersection, but if she abruptly decided to snap out of whatever trance she was in and continue through the intersection, I would have been at fault this time!

So, I finally got fed up and beeped at her.

She literally jolted out of her daze, looked around to see who had beeped at her, and then continues through the intersection.

So yeah, this driving pet peeve would be people you try to give a break and/or people who have the right of way (in this case both), but are too clueless to realize it!

 

Well at least you got her out of her trance for other drivers

 

People that use turn signals after they already start to change lanes.

 

People using blinkers after coming on over halfway into the other lane can suck my ass. Hitting the blinker stalk as your hand passes by it while already turning does
NOT count as using blinkers so just don't even bother. Blinkers don't mean "watch out here I come", they mean at some safe point I need to get over (while waiting until someone LETS you in or there are no others cars there). Forcing your way in just because you hit the blinker = fuck you.

 

LMAO we literally posted the same thing at the same time.

 

@Iamraiderpower
@Plain Jane Taco
@Jamesboy2233

This happened not longer after I got my driver's license, back in 2011. This tricky intersection is located within walking distance of my parents' old house. The red X marks where I'd been sitting while waiting to make a right turn. The light was red, and it was NO TURN ON RED, so I had to wait. I had my right signal on. The light turned green and I took my foot off the brake with the Tacoma's wheel turned slightly to the right. Out of nowhere, this lifted black GMC Sierra blows past on my right side, using the shoulder, and turned right with such aggression that I wouldn't have been shocked if he flipped his truck over. I angrily blasted my horn at him, but he was gone as quickly as he'd shown up. The blue line/arrow shows the black GMC's path, and again, the red X shows my Tacoma's location...


Upon arriving home, I immediately told my mom what happened, and explained exactly where I'd been. I wanted to be absolutely sure that the lane the black Sierra had used was in fact a shoulder. My mom confirmed my suspicions, and said that if the guy in the black Sierra had hit me, he would have been at fault. That incident was truly scary for me, at the time a new driver...

That Sierra was hauling ass!

If I'd been a few more inches to the right, he would have ripped the front bumper off my Tacoma, and probably would have done some damage to the right front fender. There's also a good chance the right headlight would have been ripped out. A few more inches and my shiny Tacoma, which was at the time only about a year and a half old and had barely 20K on the clock, probably would have been totaled!

I would like to point out that if somebody is going straight from where I was, it is perfectly acceptable to use the shoulder for right turns...

 

Driving 500+ miles a week and no one spots me

 

You got hit or you were just really close between two cars?

 

@Iamraiderpower
@Speedytech7
@Jamesboy2233

This happened way back in the summer of 2013. I have talked about the now-defunct cruise night at Shady Brook Farm (in Yardley, PA), held every Tuesday from May through August. Well, at the time, I would see my psychologist every other Tuesday (on a bi-weekly) basis. This did not keep me from going to the cruise night, as my therapist was ten or fifteen minutes away in Newtown. I would just have to leave the show a little earlier...

So one Tuesday, I was running a wee bit late, and a bunch of people decided to leave at the same time as me. I was in a rush to leave, and obviously I wasn't about to let anybody in front of me or otherwise do anything that would slow me down even more...

Up ahead on my left, there a blue late model 5-door sporty car (either a Subaru Impreza or a MazdaSpeed3, I forget) waiting to get into the exit line. There were four or five guys in this car, in their late teens or early twenties, and all I remember about them is that they did not look too friendly. They abruptly tried to cut in front of me and I gave them a hard no by pulling forward (I don't think I beeped at them or anything. I thought absolutely nothing of this. People refused to let me in all the time, and if I was either in a rush or afraid of getting rear-ended, I did the same...

So, I denied entry to the guys in the 5-door hatchback, thought nothing of it, and kept moving. I made it out of the parking lot and headed towards Newtown. The guys in the hatchback made it out as well and unfortunately weren't far behind me. I was coming up to a red light, my intention being to make a left turn onto the Newtown Bypass, when I looked in my rearview mirror and saw the same blue hatchback approaching fast on my right. If the guys had looked unfriendly before, they looked like they wanted to get out of the car and fight now. The left rear seat passenger stuck up his middle finger and pressed it to the window. I just ignored them and kept going...

The owner of that blue hatchback had obviously been showing his car at the cruise night, but I never ran into them at the show again after that encounter...

 

Eh, shit happens, the passenger has no real consequences either as he was probably in there joking with his buddies and didn't do that with the drivers approval anyway.

I was coming home from a pre season baseball game yesterday and a dude on the highway wanted in front of our car, none of us have an issue with that but he couldn't merge to save his life. Kept half going into the lane and going back like we were close or something, we we're a good two or three car lengths back. Eventually after he tries three or four times to merge into a wide open expanse we decide to just block him out cause he's getting nowhere and our exit is coming up anyway and we don't want him in the way. Dude gets in behind us like he actually knows how to merge and rides us with the brights for a mile. Like what the hell haha, some people man.

 

@Iamraiderpower
@Speedytech7
@Jamesboy2233

One of my biggest pet peeves is when I'm the left lane on a stretch of road where the lanes merge together to form one lane, and a whole bunch of vehicles start blowing past me and cutting me off! We're not talking one or two vehicles, but like five or more!

This particular example of such an occurrence happened sometime in 2017, probably in the summer...

I was on a stretch of Route 202 literally just outside Doylestown Borough, where the two lanes merge into one. It was rush hour, and inevitably people wanted to get to the front of the line. I had thought ahead, having traveled this stretch of road many times before, and got into the left lane. I was moving, albeit slowly, and this huge line of cars appeared. There had to be half a dozen vehicles, and one of them cut directly in front of me. I'd just about had enough and the right lane was just about gone, so I positioned my truck in such a way that nobody else could get past. Someone in a Honda CRV ended up directly behind me and they were not happy. They beeped their horn but I ignored them. The CRV reappeared on my right a short time later, and the driver started beeping their horn. I would like to point out that at this point, what the drive of the CRV was doing at this point was totally illegal. They were just butt-hurt that I'd given them a hard (but in my opinion totally legal) no! My light turned green, I went straight, and the twat in the CRV disappeared...

 

I've talked about the guy in the Jaguar on Route 611 in this specific thread before, but I don't think you've read it, so here it goes...

I don't remember if this happened in 2015 or 2016, but I was late and in a rush to get somewhere. This brings up another pet peeve of my mine, clueless drivers who go below the speed limit in the left lane! This, however, is not what this story is about. I was in the right lane, passing a long line of slow drivers in the left lane, and then I abruptly got into the left lane because there was another long line of slowpokes in the right lane. There was a late 1990s Jaguar XK8 convertible in front of me, quite a good distance ahead.

My best guess here is that the guy driving the Jaguar didn't like my driving, even though it did not in any way affect him, and decided to teach me a lesson...

I had absolutely no beef with the guy in the Jaguar and thought he was going plenty fast. All of a sudden, he started to slow down. I initially gave him the benefit of the doubt and assumed that he was making a left at some point in the near future, but didn't know if it was supposed to be at the upcoming intersection. The Jaguar slowed down a lot, but the intersection was a good distance ahead and he did not put on his signal. I didn't know if he was lost or distracted by something in car, but before long he was probably going 15-20 MPH below the speed limit. The traffic light ahead was green and there was not a single vehicle in front of the Jaguar. His left turn signal still hadn't come on, and there were vehicles to my right, so I finally lost my patience and beeped at the guy. He didn't move or go faster, and I believe at this point he flipped me off. I could see at this point that there was a passenger in the front seat as well.

Livid that this guy would hold up traffic just because he was seemingly distracted, and then flip me off for beeping at him to get him out of whatever trance he was in, I laid on the horn at this point. This act of frustration only seemed to make the guy go slower. Finally, the right lane cleared up, and I flipped on my right signal and roared around the Jaguar. I glared at the driver (who happened to be a man in his 50s or 60s) as I drove past, and he stretched his arm across the center console (and his front seat passenger) and flipped me off again. I just ignored his little obscene gesture and kept going. He didn't follow me, but I honestly don't remember if he was making a left or not.

Again, my theory is that he saw me coming in his rearview mirror, didn't like the way I was driving, and he decided to teach me a lesson...

 

Plenty of teachers out there unfortunately too haha. Had a few of those myself, some of them seem to have some weird ideas about physics too. Had a little Nissan Versa try to bring me and my well armored, lifted, and frankly quite loud Tacoma to a full stop on the open freeway once, went so far as to keep in front of me as I switched lanes. I was doing a healthy ~70 something in what was a stretch of open 70mph and this dick wanted to keep me behind him going like 65 again while the road was wide open and at night when there was zero regular traffic. I decided he probably wouldn't follow me into the kinda gravely shoulder while I got around him and I was right. I really don't get it, I hadn't passed him ever and he was well behind me when he decided to get in front and slow down I'd guess. I was driving back to school at night as I preferred to do, I didn't want to start shit haha

 

That's one thing I've noticed, with both tailgaters and teachers...

I drive a regular cab 5-lug Taco, which is among the smaller light trucks on the road. However, a lot of the twatwaffles who either tailgate me or think it is their duty to teach me a lesson, are driving vehicles that would lose badly in a collision with my Tacoma. I caused frame damage to a drunk driver's 2002 Mercedes without even trying. Can you imagine what would happen if I brake-checked a Nissan Versa at highway speeds and the driver didn't stop in time?!?!

 

I was in Washington state at the time too which is kinda interesting because there the person who rearends someone else is always at fault even if the dude in front is being aggressive and brake checking. :/

 

I've heard of dashcam footage working in the favor of the person who was brake-checked. I don't know what state it was in though...

The point I am trying to make is that a lot of the people who tailgate me or cut me off are driving little subcompact shitboxes that would be utterly destroyed in a collision with even my relatively small Taco...

 

You know what should be a lot easier than it is? Taking window tint off. I just spent a total of like 3 hours de tinting my Tacoma. Pain in the butt, but it looks really nice now at least.

 

I want to tint my Tacoma, because on the rare occasion I screw up while driving, I hate that other motorists can just stare into my truck as they drive past...

 

Tint can be nice looking but I've yet to see any non factory tint that doesn't either distort colors or distort clarity. The tint I just removed the previous owner had put on and it was pretty hazy. I like all the brightness for low light driving and being able to see clearly during the day. My taco is my adventure vehicle, gotta see the cool places I'm going haha.