Driving complaints

by on May.04, 2004, under Rant

Ok, your driving along on a quite road, some good music on the sterio, minding you own business, just enjoying the drive when suddenly all of the most annoying things about driving seem to happen at once!
Heres just a few and what I think of them

Tractors
The mechanicised workhorse of the modern farm worker. These beastes may be strong and able to pull or push things much heavier than themselves and are especially useful in a field, they have big wheels and big engines geared for maximum torque. This however means that they travel at really low speeds, which again in a field isn’t really a problem. On a road the mile long tailback kind of suggests that maybe theres something wrong?
Granted farmers need to get their tractors between fields, but do they have to use the main roads for it? They are slow, they tend to take up most the road so its hard to pass them safely and they only ever seem to be there when you need to get somewhere fast.

Horse and cart things
These to me are as bad if not worse than tractors. Again they slow the traffic and to make it worse you have to be even more careful passing incase you scare the horse! like tractors they should stick to country roads where country things are expected to be found, not the main busy roads.

Tailgaters
Why are you driving 10cm away from the back of my car? Can’t you see I’m going as fast as the car infront of me?
Why do drivers do this? They drive up as close as they can in the hope you’ll drive faster or get out the way, on a single lane road with a queue caused by a tractor, I’m not likely to go any faster or move to the outer lane now am I?

Lorries
Ok I have nothing against goods being carried by lorry, what I do have a complaint about is their maximum speed seems to be 60 and the drivers seem to think they own the road.
Single lane road, stuck behind a lorry, I know its going to get up to speed eventually, so that doesnt bother me too much.
What is really annoying is when they insist on overtaking each other on a dual carriageway! This wouldnt be a problem if they didn’t drive at almost the same speed! It takes atleast a mile for a lorry to overtake another lorry where as it takes a car about 300 yards (maybe less) to overtake a lorry. Again this slows the traffic causing nice long tailbacks.
I’ve also had a lorry driver try to crush me while I was passing him, I’m abouthalfway along the length of the trailer and he indicates right and starts to pull accross! Well I didn’t quite fancy being squashed between the trailer and crash barrier, and luckily I didnt have a tailgater as I slammed on the brakes and got out the way. Then just to make that drive even better another one tried the same trick later only I had more room to move and just changed lane out the way.

People that dont know the speed limit
Ok we all hate beign stuck behind the car thats driving too slow, and everyone hates the guy that zooms past at 110mph, this isnt about them.
This is about the people that drive at the speed limit untill they reach a speed camera where they decide to slam on the brakes and drop their speed by 20mph! Why do they do it? You don’t get fined for driving at 70mph in a 70 zone. anyoe that drives like that instantly becomes a hazard to anyone following as there wasn’t any reason to slow down except your too dumb to know what speed you shuold be driving at. Learn the speed limit or get the bus!
This brings me onto…

Speed cameras
Whats the point in them? The goverment and police say they help control speed, which yes they do across the 20 yards or so they cover! Speed cameras bring in money nothing more, they don’t stop people driving fast, they just slow them down while they pass then their foots back down hard.

Random Speed Merchants
These are the people that come up behind you, and then overtake at almost the same speed your traveling, then pull inforont of you and slow down, forcing you to slow down or overtake them. Why do they do it, if your going to drive slower than the car your about to overtake why not slow down and stay behind them?
Another breed of these people are the I’m not going to let you overtake me type. They’re driving along slower than you are so you pull out to over take, then suddenly its hard to close the gap your going 10mph faster than when you originally cought up to them and still not passing, you put your foot down more and still dont get closer! In some cases they let you start passing and then match your speed so you’re traveling neck a neck at what now would be considerd dangerous speeds. There are 3 (4 if you include being cought speeding) possable outcomes of this kind of driving, 1) you manage to pull ahead and become the previous breed as you slow down to safer speeds, 2) you give in and slow down and drop bacl to safe speeds and back behind the offending driver, or 3) neither side gives in, your traveling as fast as possable and lose control, the final result being crushed and torn metal and bones severed limbs, lots of blood and most likely both parties finding out if there really is an afterlife.

“Middle lane cruisers”
This is how the lanes are organised, left lane normal driving, middle lane overtaking slower vehicles that are in the left lane, right hand lane for over taking everyone – if I remember right lorries and busses aren’t allowed in this lane, the same applies for dual carriage ways only the right lane isnt there just the left and middle. So the question is, why if theres nothing to overtake(and no queues) is the car I’m catching upto in the lane to my right, not the same lane as me? Once you’ve finished overtaking get back into the left lane! It’s where your supposed to be. As its illegal to pass on the left(unless the car your passing is turning or the traffics queing) I cant really pass you without pulling into the right lane wich involves passing through your lane and I beleive this is considered dangerous driving too! Get in lane and learn to drive!


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