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I know that you are talking about. I think the more empty ones bounce around worse than the full ones. Some seem to be much worse than others at least. I've seen the full size triple trailers in Nevada and I think in CA, too, but am not certain of it.
Sometimes there are crackdowns when there have been a spate of truck accidents in our area of I70/I75. I believe Indiana recently raised their truck speed limit to 65 from 60. The truckers' behavior might have been related to the change. I believe there were problems with truckers driving in roadblocks in protest of the dual speed limits as the legislation was being considered. That might have been a related factor.
The worst I've seen in being tailgated was in Kentucky I65 between Bowling Green and Nashville (TN). A dual FedEx Ground truck tailgated me at 75 approx. I couldn't go any faster because there were a couple of other semis ahead of me going...75. I called in his info to FedEx. Never heard a word from them. That's a part of the problem with having a 65 or 70 speed limit for trucks just like cars have. They intend to go 5-10 over. AND they become dangerous tailgaters to get their way.
Being tailgated by 50K pounds is a lot different than a 5K lb SUV.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
a. are the pedals set up the same way as on U.S. cars (gas right, clutch left), or is it reversed?
b. is the shift pattern the same as on U.S. cars, or is that also in the reverse?
Any shared knowledge on either question would be greatly appreciated!
Be careful on the highways, called motorways, where lane discipline is observed. Also, read up on drving through roundabouts, (our traffic rotaries) which are everywhere, including little ones and huge ones.
I constantly encounter this phenomenon and it absolutely boggles my mind. On your average three lane highway there will be a slow moving pack of vehicles taking up the left and middle lanes and a nearly empty right lane. So those who want to actually pass must do so in the right lane, except every now and again you will encounter one of the few people who tried to do the right thing and stay in the far right lane since they wanted to go no faster than the speed limit. So now you have to change into the middle lane to pass, then get back into the right lane to continue passing slower vehicles. OF course, at this point the drivers of the slow moving vehicles in the far left and and middle lanes who are creating the situation that forces you to drive this way see what you're doing and label you as some insane maniac weaving in and out like he owns the road, rather than stopping to think "Hmmm, why is it he was forced to pass slower traffic using what is supposed to be the cruising lane? Could it have anything to do with me?".
Goodness gracious, I am glad there are relatively few of these scofflaws !!
After we passed each other about five times, I began to try to lose him. I still don't know whether he was intentionally following me, but for WHATEVER reason, I could not lose this guy. No matter what, something always happened and he always ended up behind me or next to me. I would put some distance between us, only to get stuck behind two cars, and then he'd catch up. I'd slow down, he'd pass me, but either slow down or get stuck behind someone else.
It was annoying me so much that I actually was hoping to run into a Left Lane Camper that I could use to block him. But it never happened. It was as if there was this invisible rope tying us together, and in the moderate traffic, no one would cut in between us.
At one point, I got pretty far ahead of him, but then ran into a huge mess of cars being lead by a cop! (actually considering there was a cop in the group, it was moving very quickly - about 10 over the limit).
When the cop finally left the freeway, I brought up to about 80 and finally "escaped" the camry. It's never taken me 40 miles to "lose" a car on the freeway before.
I learned to drive in So.Cal in 90-91, when shooting was the current trend to deal with inconsiderate drivers.
I had a guy get all nasty and violent towards me. He imagined that I cut him off. I pulled into traffic from an offramp, at a light. He wasn't even at the other side when this occurred. And he wasn't coming on fast, which is why I came out. Then he hammers it, and roars past in the turn only center lane, and proceeds to jam on his brakes to avoid the stopped traffic ahead. He gets out of his car all yelling and veins bulging. By then traffic is moving again, so I zip around him, and go on about my way.
By the time he gets into his car, traffic is such that he can't persue me. I just ignored him the whole time. When he was next to me, I cranked up the 500 watts feeding 2 10 inch woofers in the hatch of my car. But I had a hand on my equalizer just in case, a Maglite, the kind that takes the 4 D cells. What an idiot. I coulda had a gun, or been a cop, or worse, followed him home and took it out on his whole family. You never know what you're gonna get.
Many years ago, I was on the PA TP coming west. I was going through the 476 interchange area. There was some sort of rolling interference in the left lane. Brake lights every where. By the time I got there, 10 miles had rolled by. It was a little old lady, scared to death in a gold Cavalier(newer model.)she was hunched over the wheel, knuckles white, sweat running down her face. She was doing 50 mph! I have no idea how far she had been driving like this, or how she managed to make into the left lane with out incident. This is about the only time I ever felt sorry for a fellow driver, who was technically in the wrong. Poor girl, after that, I wondered how far she made it.
Another time, I was on an interstate, 95, or one of the beltways, and I actually did the off and back on thing, to lose another car that was "attached with invisible string".
So the only purpose these red lights seem to accomplish is to take people who are already horrible mergers, who cannot even accelarate from 45-65 in time to enter traffic safely, and make it even harder for them to merge safely by forcing them to accelarate into complete traffic from a standstill. Unless I'm missing something it seems like fairly poor traffic engineering.
I've seen them placed for two reasons. Bad design on the ramp affecting visibility for gauging when to "go" for the car on the ramp and for high traffic areas to limit the number of cars merging because that backs up the traffic already on the expressway.
The friction of the cars merging causes backups even where the additional number of cars shouldn't have an effect. I played the game of lane changes where off ramps lighten the right lane and it speeds up drastically and then slows down where the new cars are merging in.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
We have some in NJ that meter traffic into traffic circles (the ones that are left). It at least gives the traffic from the side streets a chance to get through.
I agree that having them at the bottom of the ramp makes little sense, but not much about the raod system in the DC area does.
2020 Acura RDX tech SH-AWD, 2023 Maverick hybrid Lariat luxury package.
I lived in NJ for a few years as a young kid when my Dad was stationed at Camden IIRC. I remember vividly the traffic circles--I always thought they were neat--until I started driving! Best traffic circle "event" I ever witnessed was when one driver missed the exit, and instead of going around the circle and getting the exit that time, the driver stopped, and backed up in the middle of the circle. My dad, already patience-challenged behind the wheel, really let some choice words fly! The look on the other driver's face was priceless--still kept backing up, even though by that time other drivers were also doing their best to verbally "assist" the circle-challenged driver!
I always expected LA to have good roads, since cars are so important there. But boy do they suck. And I was there during the big rains, which the roads were obviously not designed for. No drainage... huge plumes of water behind every car and truck on the outside lanes, and the drivers were (understandably) not ready for the rain either.
The MOST annoying thing I saw was big traffic jams in LA that were due to nothing more than rubberneckers. At the end of one jam, we saw police and rescue vehicles along a canal, and right after that traffic was clear again. It's the butterfly effect applied to traffic.
This post is not intended to inflame women, but I do have a question that I think only a woman can answer.
What is the deal with putting on makeup or doing your hair while you drive on the freeway? I realize that people get up late sometimes or have car problems and that translate into having to push their morning routine, but what I saw this morning scared me down to my socks.
I’m on the freeway this morning about 6:30am, traffic in all four lanes is moving from full speed 65mph down to 15mph, which is pretty normal. I look up in my rear-view mirror and see something that I can’t quite figure out. I see the driver behind me illuminated (it’s still dark outside) and I can’t see this person head, just the neck down.
Then it hits me what’s going on this driver has the sun visor pulled down, the vanity mirror open (thus the illumination) and is in the process of doing some kind of morning beautification. At this point I decide this is the last place I want to be is in front of this person, so I switch lanes and ease up on the accelerator so I can keep this driver out in front of me. I look over as the car (bmw 325i) glides by me and I see that the driver (she) is looking in the vanity mirror brushing her hair.
Oh, well I got to work, I didn’t hear of any freeway crashes on the radio, so I’m assuming she made it too and life goes on. I’m done with my ranting, just needed to expresses my concerns.
Safe driving to all,
Philip
And speaking of women drivers, I overheard a couple talking here in the driveway, whining about driving in the snow and fishtailing. Can you make an FWD minivan fishtail?! I know you can still make an FWD car lose control, and when it does I think it's way scarier than when you do it with a RWD, but I thought fishtailing was more of an RWD "asset"?
There's another one, who recently gave up her aging 200K+ mile Explorer for a used Infiniti Maxima. I'm sure it'll do just fine, but once they give up that 4wd, I guess they just feel naked!
Cheers,
Dan
The other driver panics and goes into a skid. I forget what it was advertising, but it was pretty funny! I bet if you got ahold of an old mail delivery vehicle, you could have some fun with it...
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
Anyway, nothing exciting to report. People more or less drove sanely, nobody was tailgating, etc. Nobody off in the ditch, upside down, etc.
Of course, now that it's after dark, and the road is starting to re-freeze, people are driving faster/more stupidly. I can hear them, occasionally zipping past my house. I'm pretty sure that, over the course of the night, somebody's going to end up off the road at the S-curve. It's a holiday tradition around here!
I just headed south out Philly on 95 from the parents' house, taking care to keep it to 50-55 for most of the trip. Surprisingly, everybody was whipping past me with an urgency I could only wish people would drive with when it's clear out. Plenty of people doing 70 or above, tailgating, and making sudden lane changes. Lots of VERY impatient drivers. I couldn't help thinking, why is it these people are in such a rush right now? On the other hand if it were 70 degrees out with bone-dry roads and perfect conditions, the situation would be me stuck in the left lane behind some goof doing 54, who would be matching speeds almost perfectly with another goof in the middle lane, and one more car rocketing by those two in the right lane at a whopping 58. But throw a couple of inches of snow on the ground and all of a sudden people have places to go, things to do. Is maybe it some macho thing about suddenly feeling the need to show that you have the skill to drive at high speeds in poor conditions?
Kyle
Doug
I work in Greenbelt. One of my co-workers lives NW of Baltimore, normally less than an hour's commute. He said it took him FOUR hours to get home last night!
The 7-11 must be on Tuxedo Road which kinda of runs parallel to Rt 50 for a bit. Even though I've been commuting this route for over 17 years I rarely take Rt 50. - too congested during the morning/evening commute. My normal route takes me up the hosptial hill past the Pepsi plant and right by the hospital to Landover Rd. Then I get on the infamous beltway.
How ONE issue, can affect sooooo many.
There was some snow here Wednesday afternoon and evening, and I had to drive in it during the evening. A trip that normally takes anywhere from 50-70 minutes took me 165 (yes, 2 hours and 45 minutes).
The funny thing (no, the really DAMN annoying thing, but I'm trying to be nice) is that where I was the conditions were hardly bad at all. There was no snow accumulation- between the temperatures and the road salt, the roads were just wet. The snow was also not heavy enough to impair visibility. But for miles at a time, major highways were creeping along at 5-15 mph. Absolutely infuriating, actually.
And just a couple months or so ago I was headed south on 95 to meet a friend in Maryland when I got caught up in what appreared to be an EXTREMELY severe rain/thunder/hail storm that only lasted for a minute or two. I wonder if anybody else was caught in this one. The sky turned from clear to black and visibility was cut severely as I was driving, it stayed that way for 5 minutes, then as I drove through it there was another clear distinct border in the sky between pure black a clear, and then the storm ended. But right after, traffic slowed to a crawl. I thought, No big deal. Must have been a minor accident. Then a few minuts became an hour. An hour became two. Two became three. And then I started seeing medivac helicopters flying in and out over the highway and I knew I was screwed. Turned out there was a huge 11 car pileup that closed 95 that day. I was stuck there for over 4 hours, and this was just to inch and crawl my way 2 miles to the next available exit.
I ended up calling my friend and telling him Id be needing a raincheck, got off at the next exit to have dinner at a good restaraunt, then turned around and high-tailed it back home. OF course this all happened AFTER I made it through Delaware, which meant after driving all that way for nothing I owed 7$ in tolls to get back home.
Is I95 a toll road somewhere?
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
During the same time period, I commuted from the Willow Grove base in Horsham, to Lancaster County daily for 2 years. During one crash related jam, after sitting for nearly an hour. Some brainiac decided to cut the fence. I watched over a hundred(I counted!
If I really wanted to put fourth the effort I could use 695 to get around the Baltimore toll and pick up 95 further up in Northern Maryland, and then route 1 to circumvent the Delaware tolls. I have done so a few times when I was in the mood for a slow cruise. But when I count the gas money and extra time, it's unfortunately not worth it. I do it mainly to spite the toll authority, not to save cash.
If it's night time and there's no traffic I can make the trip on the alternate routes almost as fast as I can do it on 95. But it doesn't quite work like that during the day when there's more cars on the road.
And yes Andre I think it was in October if I recall correctly. The pileup it caused on 95 made the news big time.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
Even tho hands free still is distracting, it allows for both hands on the wheel, which helps, a little. I am guilty of using my cell, while driving. However it's like once a month or less.
I even correct my wife when she does it, cuz she usually has our little one along when she calls.
One of my sisters in law punched a red light, cuz she was reaching for the cell. The light was red long before she approached it. My other sister in law was with her. She was hollerin about the light. Anyway, brother found out, few weeks later, when oldest daughter(4 at the time) spilled the beans. He cut her off at the knees. She went 6 months w/o cell phone. Hopefully she learned her lesson. Fortunetly there was a lull in cross traffic when she bombed the intersection.
That afternoon I went out to Ikea with my uncle, in his truck. I saw 2 or 3 cars where the driver's didn't bother to clear off the rear window at all! So they were relying solely on their door mirrors for any visibility, and in one case, one car even had ice on the mirrors!
Isn't it illegal to drive with your rear window completely obscured like that?
At one point, there was this early 90's Corolla in front of us, with the back window completely covered. There was a county cop behind us. We were in my uncle's truck, so the cop couldn't see the car.
Finally, we got to a point where the cop passed us in another lane, and here I'm thinking that if he has any sense about him, he'll pull that Corolla over.
No such luck. And to add insult to injury, the cop's rear window was completely obstructed, too! And the police wonder why we civilians often have so little respect for them! :-/