This PSA brought to you by several would-be assassins who tried to wave me in front of speeding cars in the last month and who will have to try harder next time.
I don’t think I’ve ever had someone in a turning lane wave me through like that. Regardless, I’m not going anywhere if I can’t see the oncoming traffic.
This is how I got hit on my bike, except I wasn’t waved at. I was in the bike lane and a truck ahead of me waved to a car to drive across. I would be close to were the car going 45mph is in the picture. Car pulled across and by the time i could see the car it was too late. I mashed into the side of the car right as it was crossing the bikelane and was bounced backwards by the force, smacking hard backwards onto the asphalt.
Driving is about predictability. You don’t do that bullshit in the first place. Same way with “slowing down for people getting on the highway.” It’s their responsibility to speed up to highway speeds. If they aren’t going fast enough by the time they need to enter, they yield, not you.
If they aren’t going fast enough by the time they need to enter, they yield, not you cut across the stripes, nearly hit the impact attenuator, and run the car behind you into the next lane.
For what it’s worth, I agree with you. Safe driving is about being predictable. But defensive driving is about predicting what others are likely to do. And oftentimes, the answer to “what is this driver near me about to do” is “attempt negligent vehicular manslaughter.”
technically the right of way is something that MUST be yielded to you. a traffic light cannot grant you ROW if someone is barreling through it. the light only guides who should yield it.
the issue with the waver in this comic is that, while they are yielding ROW for their own lane, there’s four other fucking lanes that they cannot control
I don’t have a driver’s license, so I’m not knowledgeable in the topic, but aren’t there situations where the decision is deferred to the drivers? For example when 4 drivers of the same class arrive at an intersection without signage at the same time, with each having one of the other drivers to their right, with all of them wanting to go straight ahead, with none of them being a tiebreaker.
Certain circumstances, yes. The comic depicted is not a four way stop. The person turning onto the road does not have right of way over someone turning left onto their street.
Can confirm, US small towns with the mega giant superhighway going through it will have these exact intersection designs. A turn lane in a divided, but no accel space. Best bet is to yield / stop in the halfway point to check traffic before going for it.
Some absolute imbicile waved a child across straight into the path of a car outside a school just the other week. Thankfully only broken bones. A few months before that a resident on the same street drove straight into the back of my parked van. Their reasoning was that the windscreen was all fogged up. Drivers scare the shit out of me.
And i haven’t seen a crash from someone launching themselves straight over the center in months.
I never heard of that sort of case short from DUI, which shouldn’t be include in any accident statistic other than DUI. They’re really magical people that will make all sort of edge case happen.
But yes, love roundabout, it’s a really good way to make traffic flow smoother on a lot of junction, though the downside is you can’t have a traffic light near it. Traffic light is always the bottleneck of every jam in my city
I lived within view of one so every time I heard a mildly distant crashing sound, it was almost always someone fucking up at the roundabout. Quite a few Dukes of Hazzard wannabes were completely sober, but “didn’t know the area and were speeding”. In case you’re wondering, it’s well lit, you have ample warning with both reduced speed and the big circling arrow signs, and it’s even at the end of long straight hits so you have a clear view of what’s coming. So as far as I’m concerned, there’s no excuse.
I’ve never heard more bitching and moaning about communism than when the city first started considering putting “those damn communist euro things instead of a proper stop sign”
Like damn Bro I didn’t realize people could hate efficient traffic flow so much.
This is America. The only valid traffic control structure is one that is predicated on mutually assured destruction. Anything less is namby-pamby socialist propaganda.
In almost every case, it’s because the entity that owns it doesn’t actually have to use it daily, because then you know they’d fight to get whatever safety measures they can cram into it.
Last city I lived in had a new intersection put in with a 2 way stop (only one of the roads stops, and you have to yield to main road traffic)
After tons of minor accidents and altercations arising from disgruntled people having to swerve or slam on brakes, the city out out a statement saying basically they’ve done studies and it’s safer than other intersections so nothing will be done to it.
Two or three years go by and one of the city council people moved and now has to use that intersection.
Within a month it had stoplights installed without a word.
Could be a coincidence. Maybe they even had been planning that for the entire two or three years.
But I personally believe nobody gave a shit until an “important” person (you know, that high-stake, much coveted small town council seat) had to use the intersection.
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