Kinley did not author the article, but did do a fairly good job of explaining it to me. West of the Cascades (MT chain) is rural, almost totally un populated, lumber production regions in WA. They have road signs that tell lumber trucks to pull over if there are 5 cars behind them. It may take more than 20 minutes for 5 cars to accumulate. I-5 is like I-95 on the East Coast but they drive I-5 much faster. I have seen doubles (two rigs behind one truck) but don't remember seeing triples. I have never been to OR, but assume it is similar to WA, perhaps less populated. I have driven I-5 mostly in CA, and a little in the Seattle area. Seattle has big city traffic problems. One can commute on large multi deck-ferries and go to the dining area and get an espresso depending on the commute in the Seattle area. The Pacific Northwest is some of the most scenic, unspoiled part of the country. Probably due in large part to it not being over populated, even by rural MId west standards.
Driving to fast for current road conditions - i.e. excessive speed - is a major cause of accidents. However, the statistics captured by officers investigating crashes all too often fail to distinguish between excessive speed and simply speeding. This is probably due to the zeal of the "Speed Kills" set: mainly government and law enforcement, propelled by the insurance industry and every vocal but unknowing victim of an accident. Whatever the cause of the faulty statistics, lumping together every crash in which one vehicle was exceeding the speed limit with those where excessive speed caused the crash just clouds the issue to the point where the statistics become meaningless.
Speed does not kill, crashes kill. Speed alone rarely causes an accident, but can greatly exacerbate the effects of one. If we really knew what was causing auto accidents - what specifically was at the root of most accidents - we could take steps to reduce them. But as long as we simply lump together statistics into meaningless lumps that fit someone's pre-determined agendas, we will never get at the causes.
Yesterday we saw reports of a woman in a Jeep GC who broadsided a home heating oil truck causing the tank to be ruptured releasing several thousand gallons of light oil into town sewers ansd a wetland. She was speeding and, according to witnesses, talking on a cell phone. The accident is shown as speed-related. Now does that really capture anything useful about the cauase of the accident?
The other common agenda-driven statistical lump is DUI: If anybody involved in the accident, whether or not they were in a vehicle, has a BAC >.08 the accident is listed as an alcohol-related accident. Doesn't matter if the drunk was a back seat passenger who was uninjured, it's an alcohol-related accident. I too would like to crack down on accidents caused by driving under the influence, but unless we find out how many there truly are, we will never accomplish the task.
I'd also like to cut down on accidents caused by inattentive or inept drivers, but we don't collect stats on them. Too bad - I think there are probably way more of them than DUI's!
I would add that speeding in excess of those with whom you share the road also causes accidents. If everyone is going 5-10 MPH above the limit, you have those that are attempting to go 25 MPh above the limit and weave through traffic. These are accidents waiting to happen.
Well they certainly can be, and often are. When traffic is uniformly heavy, it is best to drive with it and minimize moves. Often traffic is glommed up into packs with open road between them. By keeping to reasonable differential speeds, and making few predictable lane changes, prudent people can move through a pack and get in front safely, where they can open it up a bit until they reach the next pack.
It's mindless speeding through traffic that is dangerous, just like mindless anything else in traffic.
pat84: I realize that kinley did not author the article. Maybe I didn't make that clear in my rebuttal. When I referred to "he" or "him," I was referring to the Mr. Vitolo quoted in the article.
I didn't believe it's authenticity the first time I saw it because few American Marine officers would be so coarse as to write something like that for publication... much less repeat it in a public forum where we have international participants. You're a classy guy, kinley.
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A French (yeah, I know) deputee has submitted a law for approval which stipulates that any penalty for a driver is doubled if a teenager under 18 is on board with him! This applies to the amount of the fine AND the number of points removed from the driving license...
Not a bad measure
Also, and at a long last, police officers will cruise along the road in anonymous cars. Good, now all these suckers with improper lighting, dangerous passing maneuvers etc will be caught at last.
You mean that if you are driving the family sedan with your teenagers inside and are cought for a traffic violation your penalties are doubled? Surely that law applies to drivers under a certain age, right?
So, France has never had unmarked police cars, eh? Interesting. It isn't necessarily as effective as you might think. Wait until some car thief learns that he can pose as an officer in an unmarked car and pull over people driving the car he wants....
Nope, no limit of age. Whether the driver is 18 (minimum legal age) or 80+, the rule would apply (it has not been adopted yet). Also noteworthy is that new drivers will eventually get a "limited" number of points (4 or 6) on their license before they are granted the full quota (12 points - a violated stop sign or red light is worth 4 points for example).
Unmarked police cars have of course existed before, but they have never been used for traffic "regulation" before. And anyway they won't have the possibility to arrest people. They can witness the infraction, take photos or even films. Then they contact another team of police officers who will apply the fine.
"They can witness the infraction, take photos or even films. Then they contact another team of police officers who will apply the fine. It'll be interesting to see how that plays out. In many areas we have agressive driving teams working with several units, but I think all units can make traffic stops if warranted.
The other law - doubling fines if a minor is on board - sounds problematic to me. That suggests that the welfare of minor passengers is somehow more important than the value of adult passengers. The message it gives is that screwing around in traffic is less dangerous when the driver is alone.
When the 55 speed limit was in effect across the country, The Illinois State Police said they did not have quotas, but the Feds did. There were threats to reduce Illinois' federal highway dollars because there were not enough tickets written to show enforcement. (The Feds wouldn't believe those of us in Illinois were more law abiding than the rest of the nation.) To reach the Federal quotas, multiple troopers would stop all the cars on a section of road, and write them all tickets for over 55. I heard radio reports of more than a hundred cars in one stop!
In Pennsylvania, two police cruisers would travel I-81 at 55 mph - side-by-side - to slow down traffic. Within minutes, both lanes of traffic were backed up, bumper-to-bumper, with cars and trucks stuck behind the police cruisers. Yes, THAT certainly improved highway safety!
as usual. This past weekend we watched all the morons with 6" of snow left on top of their cars, back windows covered, fogged glass - they're all out again! How brainless can people be? If you can afford a large SUV surely you can manage to finance a broom to clean the snow off the top!
One thing that ticks me off is people who cant park their cars straight. How did they get their driving licenses? I hope they are not doing it on purpose to prevent other people from parking next to them. That's snobbish! If you park your car straight in, then you have room to move around w/o scratching the other's person's car.
I know what you mean. Unfortunately, I have a new car now. Before, if someone parked directly centered over the line (believe me, it happens often), I could park my old car within 2-3 inches of theirs, without caring whether or not my car got dinged.
State College, PA is centered around two one-way streets with two traffic lanes in each direction. On College Ave, which heads west, there is metered parking on both sides of the street. During the day you have to be alert for delivery vehicles that stop in the left traffic lane with flashers on to make their stops at downtown buisnesses. I'm USED to that. What I'm NOT used to is people evidently too cheap to park in an available spot and instead just put on their 4 way flashers and leave their car in the traffic lane while they "run in to get a few things". I'd never seen that around here before and I just had to deal with it TWICE on a single trip through town. Traffic backed up nicely because of these mental giants!!!
Location: Ski resort where parking is roadside, but straight in towards the snow bank. (Perpendicular to the road). Before the lifts opened two posers each driving their individual 911's with their respective snow bunnies pulled in and parked rather far apart from each other enabling both doors of each 911 to open without touching, but yet not far enough to allow another car to park between them. Around noon, the hangover crowd started to appear and it was a long walk to the lodge from where you could park down the road. One of the late arrivals was driving an imported station wagon of small stature, but with two couples in it. They stopped by the 911's, unloaded their gear, and waited for the driver to carefully inch the wagon in the parking spot so tight, you couldn't open the door. The driver then got out the rear wagon door. When the 911 posers showed up, they were less than happy while we all just grinned.
Years ago, I carried cards in my wallet for inconsiderate parkers. . . A bit off-color to repeat verbatim here. Something like "I hope you don't (blank) like you park, since you'd never, err, consummate due to poor aim (or something like that)"
I wonder if there might be a more fun way to "teach" cruddy parkers. The problem with putting something on the car that tells the driver he's a dork is that either he already knows that, or will simply tell himself that you're wrong, thus accomplishing nothing. But inconvenience them or embarrass them, and perhaps they will think twice about how they park in the future.
Ever see the notices they plaster on the windshield to warn the driver that they have installed a boot on the car? They are international orange and have the adhesive on the front. They put them face down on the windshield right in front of the driver so that he can't see anything but that notice, and they are impossible to peel off! Maybe we could have some printed that has the writing facing outward, and says something like "I'm a Parking Space Parasite!" It would serve them right to have to go find a razor-scraper to get the sign off before they could drive.
Or, wouldn't it be great if you could simply tie on one of those vinyl helium baloons that usually say something like "It's a Boy!", only now it says "I Can't Park!" Won't they be happy when they have to take it off while others walk by smirking....
Its not really something Im that proud of either. I was returning to school and if you were around University of MAryland Baltimore county the past few years you'd know how horrible the parking had been. As if that weren't bad enough, in the parking lot nearest my apartment plenty of idiots would completely ignore where the lines were when parking. This would of course screw up a whole row of cars by forcing everyone else to do the same thing, until at least 3-4 spots in each row of cars would be completely lost. One night I was really tired and frustrated and then I thought I had a spot but someone had parked their vehicle so it almost perfectly straddled the line even though the cars on either side had done a good parking job. I stopped to scrawl a very short letter basically asking the owner of the offending car why they thought they were special enough to deserve 2 spots when the rest of us struggled to find just one. Except I made sure to fit in pretty much all the expletives of the human language in those few sentences I wrote. This was a few years ago, and at the time I was really anal about my truck so I couldn't have nudged it into a tiny space even if they had left me enough space to do so.. I can understand if people dont worry about being between the lines when its an almost empty lot, but when parking it's scarce that just shows ignorance and a blatant disregard for others. Now the Ranger's a bit older and more scarred and nicked already, so if I have a few inches to spare on either side I'll cram it right in there and force the owner of the other car to have to spend some of their time inching their way out. I especially love to do this if it's a real nice, shiny new car
the line. A few of us successfully jacked the thing around so it was perpendicular causing the owner to wait until at least one of the neighboring vehicles moved - 5 hours later.
The sentiment is understandable, after all. Who hasn't been proud enough of a shiny new vehicle to want to protect it?
Granted, it's way more irritating in places where parking is limited or when close to a facility, but if someone is way out in the lot, leave them alone.
Me, I will usually just find a spot at the end and park as far away as possible from the car on one side.
If someone wants to protect their car, I agree that a good solution is to park further out in a parking lot. However, you are completely wrong that anyone else should be giving these people a break. If a person feels entitled to straddle a line, then that person (IMO) has just put a target sign on their vehicle.
When I had my old car, I would park right next to those vehicles.
Guess what? I bought a new car. I park it further out in the parking lot. I park it straight and between the lines, for 2 reasons. First, it is the correct way to park. Second, if I were to straddle a line, I would EXPECT that someone would park inches from me and/or break my wiper blades and/or do some other thing to my vehicle.
Can't park? You shouldn't be driving.
A little while back people were posting about stickers, etc. to leave with poorly parked vehicles. I am giving this some serious thought!
Waiting to make a left turn, and the bozo behind me decides I'm a little too conservative re: oncoming traffic and cuts around me to make the left before I do. Patience, people! (And I'm not generally known as a conservative driver!)
Once was a 'loopy righty', I had my right signal on (we were on a one-way street) and a cab went around me, through the sign and turned right (it was an unprotected intersection). I think I called his cab company on him when I returned home.
the lead car is usually a low powered vehicle and the following is usually a high performance car. The 911 driver has decided he's not going to have your decision to wait slow him down. Now, I don't approve of this, but an F 16 pilot in a 911 is not about to wait for me in my Towncar.
People are so desperate for parking spaces at the mall this time of year.
If there's a line of car waiting at the light to get into the mall's parking lot, I will see someone's wife or husband leap out of the car, run across the green and STAND in an empty parking space to hold that spot for their spouse/family. That should be a violation worth ticketing.
Many years ago, I lived in an apartment. One of the guests made a habit of straddling two parking places in the parking lot. It was a 2-3 year old cammero and not especially new looking. I had to park significantly farther away from my apartment and walk by that cammero with my arms full of groceries. I went back out with a valve stem insert remover and flattened two tires opposite each other. I put the valve stem inserts under the tires so the flat would cover them up. About 2-3 weeks later I hear an argument out in the parking lot. My neighbor who lived above was out letting the air out of one of the same car's tires and got caught. I went out and sided with my neighbor. I told the guy with the cammero that next time I saw him taking two places I'd have the resident manager tow it away. On the way back, I told my neighbor why he got caught. We had a good laugh.
There is a line of boaters waiting to launch with few available spaces to park afterwards. That's when one or two of the far behind and late arrivals decide to "help" the process by saving a space with their bodies. I saw one driver back his trailer in as though he didn't see the lady standing there. She moved.
In Boston, if you aknowledge that you see another car's driver, you lose the right of way to that car. I would never ever consider saving a parking place with my body in Boston. No one would see you. Much like the young lady.
I thought it was illegal to drive wearing headphones (i.e. tape player, CD, etc.).
So how is it that someone can drive with a hands free phone? I realize some of these devices work via microphone and radio. However, some of them are essentially headphones with an attached microphone.
Waiting for the green arrow to take a left hand turn. Of course, those who are on-coming never fail to clog up the intersection because of lack of vision to look ahead 100 yards at a stoplight. Anyway, there is of course a vehicle blocking the intersection. However, there is also enough room to go behind his vehicle. Finally, we get the green arrow, and the idiot driver behind this guy decides that she better get her car up there. So she guns it forward and almost completely blocks the intersection. At least I was able to roll down the window to yell.
I was making a left turn, and was sitting in the intersection, waiting for the traffic to clear. (That is how I learned to drive). Light turns yellow, then red. No one is comming, so I start going. A Caddy driver (out of my view and passing other stopped cars) tries to make it through doing about 60 in a 35 mph zone. I effectively (but painfully) blocked the other car with my B-piller.
$50,000 dollars of ins money later, and I have a new car, and his car was fixed.
...that it was the b-pillar on your passenger side, and that nobody was riding shotgun!!
Last night, after Christmas Eve at our aunt's, my brother and I tried to follow my mom from Elwood, Illinois to Noblesville, Indiana. We got about as far as Momence, IL when we decided to turn around and head back to Chicago. Big snow storm. Turns out it took about seven hours for my mom to get home (this would normally be a three hour trip).
Anywho, on the way home, I was amazed how badly people drive in snow. I was driving (my brother's Blazer, in 4Hi) and had lots of people tailgating (!) me on the interstate in this snowstorm, of course a few people in the ditch (one, the obligatory cocky Jeep Grand Cherokee), and one guy who turned left *right* in front of me to get into a gas station (nobody was behind me, naturally). I was in no hurry, but also wasn't driving too slow (blowing snow, no sign of plows or salt trucks).
Going to the inlaws for Christmas dinner and found myself behind a Cherokee in the left lane going 60 (speed limit was 65). I figured - okay, he's just moved over to allow us to merge on. Such a nice gesture. I move over to the left to pass the traffic in front and this person goes up to right at 65 and apparently locks the cruise control on. It takes him over a minute to pass a vehicle in the right lane. He passes - but does not move over. I am not riding is backside...just patiently waiting for him to move over. But no joy. So I move over to the right lane, intending to pass. My speedometer shows 70. The jeep is beside me. My speedometer shows 80...the jeep is still beside me. Traffic is in front of me and I slow back down. So does the jeep. I move back over to the left lane (behind the Cherokee) and ever so slowly pass the traffic in the right lane (once again, we are traveling about 60 in the left lane with the jeep "enforcer" taking over a minute to pass a slower vehicle. Finally, the right lane opens up again, and I see my opening. Since my car has much better acceleration than the jeep, I hit the gas hard. The idiot tries to speed up, but to no avail...I am able to get past him before approaching more right lane traffic. I settle in at about 75 with the jeep about 3 feet off my rear bumper. He's shown no indication of ever using the right lane, so I take the opportunity to pass another person and get the jeep off my back. It worked. The freeway merged into a wider freeway and the jeep drivers first move...move all the way over to the left lane and lock the cruise control in on about 65 mph.
Have you seen the Saturn add where a woman is driving her Saturn and various other motorists say things to her while driving near her. The add starts with a woman who says, "My husband is going to cut you off when the light turns green. " Later a guy in another car says, "I am driving with my knees. " He is eating something with both hands. Another guy in a 3rd car says, "I am really tired. " That add makes me think of this topic.
I just got back from a lunchtime run to the bank where I got to put my 300M's handling in an evasive manuever to the test. Coming back up a 4 lane road, with a "fifth" left turn lane for the median, going the posted speed limit of 40 mph when an Explorer in the rightmost lane decides to make an immediate left turn. He turns, I stomp my brakes (thank you ABS) and make a hard left myself, missing his front end by no more than one foot, then having to rapidly make a hard right to keep from going over the curb and into a light pole. Fortunatly, the driver coming the opposite direction was aware of their surroundings (unlike the person in the "safe" SUV) and hit their brakes, lest my avoidance manuever result in a head-on with him. I think the person in the Explorer was checking their shorts in the median...when I looked back, I could see that they had a couple of elderly folks in the back seat. Had I hit that vehicle, I have no doubt that there would have been a fatality in the Explorer.
Comments
West of the Cascades (MT chain) is rural, almost totally un populated, lumber production regions in WA. They have road signs that tell lumber trucks to pull over if there are 5 cars behind them. It may take more than 20 minutes for 5 cars to accumulate. I-5 is like I-95 on the East Coast but they drive I-5 much faster. I have seen doubles (two rigs behind one truck) but don't remember seeing triples. I have never been to OR, but assume it is similar to WA, perhaps less populated. I have driven I-5 mostly in CA, and a little in the Seattle area. Seattle has big city traffic problems. One can commute on large multi deck-ferries and go to the dining area and get an espresso depending on the commute in the Seattle area. The Pacific Northwest is some of the most scenic, unspoiled part of the country. Probably due in large part to it not being over populated, even by rural MId west standards.
Speed does not kill, crashes kill. Speed alone rarely causes an accident, but can greatly exacerbate the effects of one. If we really knew what was causing auto accidents - what specifically was at the root of most accidents - we could take steps to reduce them. But as long as we simply lump together statistics into meaningless lumps that fit someone's pre-determined agendas, we will never get at the causes.
Yesterday we saw reports of a woman in a Jeep GC who broadsided a home heating oil truck causing the tank to be ruptured releasing several thousand gallons of light oil into town sewers ansd a wetland. She was speeding and, according to witnesses, talking on a cell phone. The accident is shown as speed-related. Now does that really capture anything useful about the cauase of the accident?
The other common agenda-driven statistical lump is DUI: If anybody involved in the accident, whether or not they were in a vehicle, has a BAC >.08 the accident is listed as an alcohol-related accident. Doesn't matter if the drunk was a back seat passenger who was uninjured, it's an alcohol-related accident. I too would like to crack down on accidents caused by driving under the influence, but unless we find out how many there truly are, we will never accomplish the task.
I'd also like to cut down on accidents caused by inattentive or inept drivers, but we don't collect stats on them. Too bad - I think there are probably way more of them than DUI's!
It's mindless speeding through traffic that is dangerous, just like mindless anything else in traffic.
- yesterday, yet another moron hit two children of age 5-6 as they were getting out from a school bus
I'm no proud of being French sometimes.
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Not a bad measure
Also, and at a long last, police officers will cruise along the road in anonymous cars. Good, now all these suckers with improper lighting, dangerous passing maneuvers etc will be caught at last.
So, France has never had unmarked police cars, eh? Interesting. It isn't necessarily as effective as you might think. Wait until some car thief learns that he can pose as an officer in an unmarked car and pull over people driving the car he wants....
Unmarked police cars have of course existed before, but they have never been used for traffic "regulation" before. And anyway they won't have the possibility to arrest people. They can witness the infraction, take photos or even films. Then they contact another team of police officers who will apply the fine.
The other law - doubling fines if a minor is on board - sounds problematic to me. That suggests that the welfare of minor passengers is somehow more important than the value of adult passengers. The message it gives is that screwing around in traffic is less dangerous when the driver is alone.
Harry
ARGGGHHHHH... primal scream therapy works!
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tboner1965 Mar 30, 2002 7:42am
TB
Ever see the notices they plaster on the windshield to warn the driver that they have installed a boot on the car? They are international orange and have the adhesive on the front. They put them face down on the windshield right in front of the driver so that he can't see anything but that notice, and they are impossible to peel off! Maybe we could have some printed that has the writing facing outward, and says something like "I'm a Parking Space Parasite!" It would serve them right to have to go find a razor-scraper to get the sign off before they could drive.
Or, wouldn't it be great if you could simply tie on one of those vinyl helium baloons that usually say something like "It's a Boy!", only now it says "I Can't Park!" Won't they be happy when they have to take it off while others walk by smirking....
Granted, it's way more irritating in places where parking is limited or when close to a facility, but if someone is way out in the lot, leave them alone.
Me, I will usually just find a spot at the end and park as far away as possible from the car on one side.
When I had my old car, I would park right next to those vehicles.
Guess what? I bought a new car. I park it further out in the parking lot. I park it straight and between the lines, for 2 reasons. First, it is the correct way to park. Second, if I were to straddle a line, I would EXPECT that someone would park inches from me and/or break my wiper blades and/or do some other thing to my vehicle.
Can't park? You shouldn't be driving.
A little while back people were posting about stickers, etc. to leave with poorly parked vehicles. I am giving this some serious thought!
The 911 driver has decided he's not going to have your decision to wait slow him down. Now, I don't approve of this, but an F 16 pilot in a 911 is not about to wait for me in my Towncar.
If there's a line of car waiting at the light to get into the mall's parking lot, I will see someone's wife or husband leap out of the car, run across the green and STAND in an empty parking space to hold that spot for their spouse/family. That should be a violation worth ticketing.
I went back out with a valve stem insert remover and flattened two tires opposite each other. I put the valve stem inserts under the tires so the flat would cover them up.
About 2-3 weeks later I hear an argument out in the parking lot. My neighbor who lived above was out letting the air out of one of the same car's tires and got caught. I went out and sided with my neighbor. I told the guy with the cammero that next time I saw him taking two places I'd have the resident manager tow it away.
On the way back, I told my neighbor why he got caught. We had a good laugh.
So how is it that someone can drive with a hands free phone? I realize some of these devices work via microphone and radio. However, some of them are essentially headphones with an attached microphone.
$50,000 dollars of ins money later, and I have a new car, and his car was fixed.
Last night, after Christmas Eve at our aunt's, my brother and I tried to follow my mom from Elwood, Illinois to Noblesville, Indiana. We got about as far as Momence, IL when we decided to turn around and head back to Chicago. Big snow storm. Turns out it took about seven hours for my mom to get home (this would normally be a three hour trip).
Anywho, on the way home, I was amazed how badly people drive in snow. I was driving (my brother's Blazer, in 4Hi) and had lots of people tailgating (!) me on the interstate in this snowstorm, of course a few people in the ditch (one, the obligatory cocky Jeep Grand Cherokee), and one guy who turned left *right* in front of me to get into a gas station (nobody was behind me, naturally). I was in no hurry, but also wasn't driving too slow (blowing snow, no sign of plows or salt trucks).
;^)
The add starts with a woman who says, "My husband is going to cut you off when the light turns green. "
Later a guy in another car says, "I am driving with my knees. " He is eating something with both hands.
Another guy in a 3rd car says, "I am really tired. "
That add makes me think of this topic.