Rant

AndyPix

This is a message to the people who, in rush hour traffic, on a chocca-bloc motorway -
In the 3rd lane, leave a massive 2 mile gap between them and the car in front ...


I hate you


I hate you with every fibre of my being


You do reaslise that it is people like you who actually cause the massive tail-backs ??
If you dont want to keep up - MOVE OVER


You make my blood boil and you should be stripped of your license and sent to jail


Rant over

JP08

As the late Manuel might say, "Que?"

Is this slow moving traffic - ie not creeping forward every time the car in front moves a couple of feet ? Or someone overtaking in the third lane - ie going faster than the car in lane 2 - but not going as fast as the car in front of them ?

AndyPix

This is in stationary/stop-start traffic


The rest of the motorway edges on, but the **** in the 3rd lane just sits there and doesnt move until a huge gap has formed - then decides to move up and close the gap.


This is how queues are formed in the first place.
If everyone moved at exactly the same time then there would be no queues
This is , of course, not possible - But why the massive gap ?? WHY


Edit : The ones you mention are just as bad
eg pull into 3rd lane, and then do exactly the same speed as the second lane are doing - hence blocking the motorway ..


They also, should be flogged and sent to jail

peter_the_piper

'Possibly has a stop/start engine and can't be doing with constant starting/stopping.

AndyPix

I never thought of that - but still - No excuse - should move to the first lane

JP08

Sorry then Andy, I'm probably guilty of being both types - though not to the degree you are talking about.

I will overtake someone in lane 2 doing {mph less than mine} but don't expect me to do {mph more than likely to attract a coppers interest if they happen to be in the area} when doing so. Even if you want to and are behind me !

And in stop/start traffic I don't close up every couple-of-inches movement of the car in front. Wouldn't leave more than a car length though. Anyhow, if the gap were more than a couple of car lengths, one of lane 2 would take the opportunity to nip over and gain a bit of road and the cars behind them could move forward. OK - you (as the car behind the "offender") would be slightly more held up, but the effect on the overall queue would be zero.

AndyPix

You dont understand the way in which queues work/form


BTW a cars length is fine - You escape flogging
And if you are actually going faster than the car you are overtaking, then you also avoid flogging

JP08

AndyPix wrote: »

You dont understand the way in which queues work/form

Generally on congested motorways by someone (probably the same guy who WAS doing {mph more than likely to attract a coppers interest if they happen to be in the area} when he hooled up behind my legit overtake) braking too hard for the situation in front of him and causing a ripple back effect travelling back up the motorway ...

... and in slow moving traffic, in my experience, if there's a big enough gap, someone will move into it ...

Joe_Horner

Assuming that, by "2 mile gap" you're exaggerating a little because that would hardly be a choc-a-block motorway:

When traffic is reduced to stop-start movement just because of the volume of traffic (so no traffic lights or lane restrictions etc involved), that stop-start is caused almost entirely by people driving too close, usually exacerbated by people playing lane-change games to try and get ahead.

Opening a proper gap and moving at a steady speed allows you - and those behind you if they do the same - to keep moving without continually stopping because, when the idiots ahead have to stop, you just keep going and close the gap. When they start again you don't speed up with them, you let the gap open ready for the inevitable next time they have to stop.

It's closing up too far that caused queues, not leaving good gaps.

AndyPix

Sigh .


No - Its not moving when the car in front of you moves that causes queues


When the car in fornt of you moves, and you take a couple of seconds to respond and move, this action is magnefied all the way back by each car that it "passes".


So if 1 idiot doesnt move for say 60 seconds instead of the 3 seconds when a normal person would have moved then you can see how this action its-self is the actual cause of a lot of the actual queue.


There is a little animation somewhere to demonstrate this affect - let me dig it out

AndyPix

Ok, cant find the animation but an explanation.


There is no obstruction blocking the traffic, and if ALL the traffic moved at once then everybody would be off on their merry way.
But of course this cant happen because i have to wait for the car in front of me to move, and when he does, it takes me a second to engage brain and move


Now the guy behind me , has to wait for me to move, and a second to engage brain etc
So you can see that the more cars are behind, the longer this "wait" becomes


So if one guy up front isnt moving when he could, he is making the problem a lot worse, magnifying the delay further back down the road.


Further reading : http://www.smartmotorist.com/traffic-and-safety-guideline/traffic-jams.html