people driving sooooo slow cos they dont know the speed limit!

Bob_the_Saver

Lum wrote: »

It was also a much slower moving age, where customers didn't expect/demand same day response to service calls (despite the fact that they went for the cheapest supplier, who are 300 miles away), where employers sometimes actually gave a damn about their staff, where it was actually practical to use the railways for business travel, where more people could reasonably expect to find a job near to where they live, and where it was more common for only one half of a couple to work, meaning that it was easier to relocate closer to work, and where jobs were more likely to last for long enough to make relocating closer to work something worth considering.

It's not purely down to selfishness, it's people doing what is necessary in order to survive in today's world. The boss doesn't care that there was some muppet doing 60 in the outside lane of the M4 this morning, all they care about is that you arrived at 9:02 so you get a mark against you in your HR file.

If you care more about a mark on your HR file than the safety and rights of other drivers (as it seems you do,) I think the roads would be better off without you. The roads belong to us all NOT JUST YOU.
Your comments are some of the most selfish and childish I have seen in a long time, I just hope you live long enough to grow up.
(Bob the Saver, No points in 30 years, no accidents in 30 years and I drive A LOT
in the UK and abroad)

Lum

Actually my boss doesn't care about my timekeeping so long as the work gets done. I was just describing what is a reality for many people these days. Nice personal attack though.

Two years ago I actually resigned from my last job because of the increasingly impossible timescales I was being given for on-site work, timescales that would have required me to compromise on safety and drive as I describe above in order to meet targets. This wasn't even sales this was service and support. I was the only person in the company doing the work as they couldn't be bothered to take on more staff despite doubling their customer base. Some weeks I could spend every day on site, not get off site until after 6PM and then have a drive that, at legal speeds, would take 5 hours to get to the hotel, get some sleep and repeat it all over again the next day.

I was lucky, I had another job to go to, I'm slightly worse off financially for it but nothing major. Someone who is in that position today, right now, probably doesn't have another job to go to, so they'll just stick it out and do what they need to to survive and to feed their family.

Mrs_Arcanum

Trebor16 wrote: »

Just out of interest, but how many of you have been "victims" of obstructive driving? How many have had vehicles accelerate as they have gone to over take them, or swerved across in front of you, or postioned themselves in such a way as to onstruct your vision?

Personally I haven't witnessed such behaviour in a long long time. No one has speeded up on me when I have overtaken them, no-one has swerved in my way and I don't recall anyone blocking my view. In fact, if your view is blocked could it be because you are driving too close to the vehicle in front?

Some 4X4 drivers do the obstructive driving. Simple things like pulling unnecessarily too far forward to turn right that anyone turning left cannot see if it is OK to go as this hulking great 4X4 is blocking their view. :mad:

Lum

Trebor16 wrote: »

Just out of interest, but how many of you have been "victims" of obstructive driving? How many have had vehicles accelerate as they have gone to over take them, or swerved across in front of you, or postioned themselves in such a way as to onstruct your vision?

Yes to all of these except the last one, mostly from back when I lived in England.

If you include 4x4s and vans parking too close to a corner so you can't see if it's safe to come out, then yes to the last one too.

Strider590

Trebor16 wrote: »

Just out of interest, but how many of you have been "victims" of obstructive driving? How many have had vehicles accelerate as they have gone to over take them, or swerved across in front of you, or postioned themselves in such a way as to onstruct your vision?

Personally I haven't witnessed such behaviour in a long long time. No one has speeded up on me when I have overtaken them, no-one has swerved in my way and I don't recall anyone blocking my view. In fact, if your view is blocked could it be because you are driving too close to the vehicle in front?

Just yesterday, my route took me along a dual carriageway. I pulled into the RH lane and started overtaking some slower moving cars (35-40mph), I had my eye on the gap behind a white van and for once nobody was racing up to close the gap. The van driver however decided he was going to straddle both lanes EVEN THOUGH I wasn't even intending to overtake him!!!

Road closes to one lane, then opens up again, I pull out and start to accelerate, but he moves into his lane straddling position and holds it until the lanes close to one again (about 1/4 mile). The next time the road opens up, there are broken lined chevrons, so I boot it into these chevrons and get past him before he has chance to block the road, he then sits straddling the lanes to block the guy who was behind me.

There's no excuse at all for blocking a dual carriageway like that, I have no idea what he thought he was doing!!

Knackered

Video or it didn't happen.

vax2002

I once drove to Devon in our car with friends with in their car and a trailer, i was away lets say booting it a bit and they sauntered down at 60mph.
We arrived at 10.30 in the morning, they arrived at just after quarter to 10;48 ish.
So all that stress, overtaking fuel guzzling and we saved 18 mins on the slow coaches.
I often wondered what I would do with 18 mins that could not wait.
My fuel light was on, they had the same car and they had over quarter of a tank left.

lindopski_2

Obstructive driving is as much of a nuisance as tailgaters are to me.
If I want to drive at 60mph on a dual carriageway then fine but I certainly wouldnt block you from passing at 70 or whatever you want to drive at. In the long run it means that I dont have someone in a rush behind me when I come off the road and into a 40 or 30 limit.
I would rather let the person by earlier and then enjoy a relaxing drive at the right speed rather than being encouraged to add another 10mph on top by mr tailgate.
I have been driven to madness in the past by tailgaters and have even broken my golden rule wildly once just to see what the tailgaters accept and 'nothing' is the answer.
I drive a long straight open 30 limit every day and every day I am tailgated along it, so one morning after about 3 years of this I saw my bum and floored it up to 50 with mr tailgate still right up my !!!! the whole stretch, nothing is enough for the speeder it is obvious. I signalled left and let him go and dropped back to normal speed, he was off the radar before i reached the next straight.
I dont suggest you repeat my foolish trial but it did prove to me one thing, enough is never enough for the speeder/tailgater.

Strider590

lindopski wrote: »

Obstructive driving is as much of a nuisance as tailgaters are to me.
If I want to drive at 60mph on a dual carriageway then fine but I certainly wouldnt block you from passing at 70 or whatever you want to drive at. In the long run it means that I dont have someone in a rush behind me when I come off the road and into a 40 or 30 limit.
I would rather let the person by earlier and then enjoy a relaxing drive at the right speed rather than being encouraged to add another 10mph on top by mr tailgate.
I have been driven to madness in the past by tailgaters and have even broken my golden rule wildly once just to see what the tailgaters accept and 'nothing' is the answer.
I drive a long straight open 30 limit every day and every day I am tailgated along it, so one morning after about 3 years of this I saw my bum and floored it up to 50 with mr tailgate still right up my !!!! the whole stretch, nothing is enough for the speeder it is obvious. I signalled left and let him go and dropped back to normal speed, he was off the radar before i reached the next straight.
I dont suggest you repeat my foolish trial but it did prove to me one thing, enough is never enough for the speeder/tailgater.

I can count on one hand how many times i've been tailgated in the last 6 months.

What tends to annoy drivers isn't so much the slow driving, it's when someone is overly hesitant or seems to not have a clue what they're doing.

For example, not going through a gap when there's enough room for a tank.
Braking for oncoming cars or every minor corner.
When they're so extremely slow off the mark, that the traffic lights change and leave you stuck there.
Or when they're generally just completely oblivious to the inconvenience they're causing to everyone else.

3 days ago I followed a guy on my way home, he was doing the speed limit (50mph) and I was quite happy with that, BUT I soon realised that for every single corner he'd brake down to 30mph.
After he'd done this 3 or 4 times, I was starting to get a little wound up and thinking "i've got to get past this guy".

I finally lost my patience when (despite it being an adequately wide road and him driving a Fiesta) he practically did an emergency stop for an oncoming bus.....
I waited for the next corner, looked through it for traffic, waited for him to brake and then just sailed past him.

It's not just slow driving which can induce impatience and cause tailgating...... Over hesitation can raise just as many problems.

NBLondon

Strider590 wrote: »

There's no excuse at all for blocking a dual carriageway like that, I have no idea what he thought he was doing!!

Do you drive something sporty/boy racer looking? In my younger hot hatch days there was a small subset of idiots who assumed that an Astra GTE with spotlights on was a challenge to their masculinity.

Or given that we're talking about a white van - he was possibly on the phone with one hand, eating a pasty with the other and steering with his knees.