Bad driving habits and lane discipline, tailgating etc.
There are number of things that other drivers do that I find extremely irritating. Bad Tailgating, poor lane discipline, not indicating and undertaking are just a few of the bad habits that I see frequently and find very annoying. Aside from the inconvenience to myself and other road users, this kind of inconsiderate driving is also very dangerous.
Poor lane discipline – Some drivers are all over the place and they don’t seem to realise that they are supposed to stay in between those white dashed lines. One example of this that I find particularly scary is the old two-lane roundabout scenario. When you move on to the roundabout to turn right, you have a car to your left that is going straight over. Instead of following their lane round the outside of the roundabout, they take the shortest path straight across through your lane causing you to hold back in case they hit you. Absolute madness, you really have to be on your guard against this kind of thing. It’s fair enough if you are a long wheelbase vehicle such as a lorry, but there is no excuse for a car doing this kind of thing.
Tailgating – This is probably the greatest offence as far as I am concerned. Some drivers are extremely impatient and whilst I am clearly overtaking traffic in the inside lane, I guess I am just not going quick enough for that car following six inches from my bumper am I? I understand that some people do it without thinking, just following traffic they get a bit close, but then they back off as you accelerate way.
Some drivers tailgate deliberately though and these are the ones that are the most dangerous. They sit behind you flashing their headlights in an effort to move you, but of course there is nowhere to go as you are in the process of overtaking and there is no room to pull in on the left. To this kind of driver, the two second rule means that they can just about cope with another vehicle in front of them before they decide to intimidate them by driving inches away.
Undertaking – Tailgaters that don’t get their way will often resort to undertaking if they can. Yes, I know that there are also those selfish individuals out there that hog the middle and the outside lane. They have no idea that there is a queue of traffic waiting to get past them, probably because they are in their own little world thinking about what to have for dinner. This causes some individuals to loose patience and undertake. Some drivers don’t even bother with overtaking and just carry on up the inside as if it was the most natural thing in the world to do, but it is a very dangerous manoeuvre for all concerned.
Indicators – Some people have no idea what these pretty orange flashing lights are actually for! They move here and there and go wherever they please without any thought of letting the rest of us know what their intentions are. You’ve got to be psychic to have any hope of sharing the road with these individuals. I wouldn’t like to second-guess the number of accidents that occur each year because people fail to indicate properly.
These are just a few of the things that I find particularly irritating about other drivers and their habits. Below are some other annoyances that I can think of.
- Cutting corners, particularly at junctions
- No headlights in conditions that require them
- Throwing cigarettes out the window
- Leaving main beam on, or dipping only at the last minute
- Inappropriate use of the horn, impatient people
- Pushing in ahead of a queue of traffic
Other road safety web sites
Safe Speed road safety campaign
Safe Speed is a serious road safety campaign, an excellent resource web site full of lots of useful information about safe driving and issues faced by road users.
Driving habits that drive me crazy
Some excellent and actually quite funny observations of other drivers. Which category would best describe you?
Brake, the road safety charity
Campaigns for safer roads. Lots of information and research.
Comments from visitors
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Man with 7 Years no claims who you all monsterized. - 21-Dec-11 21:01
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Outside of Hemel Hempstead, this bum boy of a motorist goes into the M1 South lane to cheat the M1 North queue exercising impatience and then suddenly cuts into the M1 North lane. It is not as if there was enough space for it to be done without motorists already in the M1 North lane having to break to avoid him.
What is wrong with the mentality of impatient barging idiots like him?
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greybeardloon - 1-Jan-11 00:24
Might I humbly suggest that the only people who do have these problems are people who are driving inappropriately, by dawdling and lane hogging. If the guy on your left is doing 68mph and you're doing 70mph, you're not overtaking you're holding everybody up.
As for queue jumping, if you want to be an idiot and queue in single file, that's not my fault. You use all of the road (both lanes) until you come to the lane closure, and then you merge in turn. Just like in the Highway Code.
My pet hate is passive-aggressive muppets, who refuse to get out the way in the overtaking lane, and who refuse to let you merge into queues because you've violated their self-imposed rules. Try reading the Highway Code again, you divots, better still, stay off the freakin road.
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Vigilauntie .... oooooooohhh was doing more than 30 miles an hour .....so what, are you fed up with your dinner for one and your 7 cats.... ? so you have to bore us senceless with some incident that really is of no interest to man nor beast.... have a moan by all means, but really who cares about a single incident ! ......
I shot JR.... it was probably a northern monkey nicking another car.... at 3pm he would be in a rush to pick up his 6 kids from the local pikey school, after collecting his benefits an hour earlier, after laying in bed all day.....
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About 15.00 on 8th October 2010
Black Renault Fat A*se
Between Knutsford and Sandbach Services southbound on a busy stretch of the M6 this driver undertook a white van that was in the nearside lane by undertaking on the hard shoulder.
There were exchanges between them as I saw them pass me and many other motorists saw.
The black fat a*se was the one who was in the wrong for two reasons
1. undertaking;
2. using the hard shoulder
Well done White Van Man - you showed them they were idiots and they tried to outdo you but failed.
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I am not a perfect car driver but I feel am a reasonable car driver.
I have peolpe cut me up on roundabouts, when they have decide that a roundabout should be renamed a Squareabout and literally go in a straight line in the left hand lane..what about the poor driver in the right hand lane going Right ?
I have poor abilty drivers that think that because you are doing 28mph in a 30, that the last speed sign they last clocked stated that was a Minimum of 30 mph as they are so close to the rear of your car, you can read their rear number plate.
I have seen some right naff driving ability over the last 10 years. Nobody seems to want to do anything about it. Just claim off your insurance !
The only vechicle these idiots should be allowed to gain entry is a Bus..as a passenger!
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264
You should always drive in the left-hand lane when the road ahead is clear. If you are overtaking a number of slower-moving vehicles, you should return to the left-hand lane as soon as you are safely past.
268
Do not overtake on the left or move to a lane on your left to overtake. In congested conditions, where adjacent lanes of traffic are moving at similar speeds, traffic in left-hand lanes may sometimes be moving faster than traffic to the right. In these conditions you may keep up with the traffic in your lane even if this means passing traffic in the lane to your right. Do not weave in and out of lanes to overtake.
I now undertake people that are too lazy to keep to rule 264 and give them a beep as I pass warning them of my presence.
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P588GWM
Green XJ6 Sport Auto Jaguar
This driver was exceeding the speed limit (30 mph) out of Chorley on the A6 towards Adlington.
Impatience was observed with this driver and at the first set of lights went into the right turn lane to dodge the queue while the lights were on red and went straight ahead.
In doing so this driver had to cut in front of the first vehicle forcing him to break hard as there wasn't enough space for two vehicles to pass past the junction where the island was.
They say that vehicles in the fast lane have priority but this shouldn't apply when they are in the wrong lane and do it for selfishness and disrespect to cheat on other motorists.
NB
Far too many bad driven luxury cars and 4x4s appear not to be properly registered so unless they have false number plates or a privilege not to be on some databases there is something fishy.
Eventually there will be video footage of such vehicles driven badly put on the net if there is no registration of the vehicle concerned to prove it is going on if the police don't get this problem sorted out.
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Black Audi A3 T Quattro Sport
Irresponsible undertaker on M6 - doesn't seem to know the Highway Code or how to respect the rights of other motorists.
BF56AAV
Blue Vauxhall SXI Twinport
Black Country route.
Knows when he is speeding - speeds up between speed cameras and shows a lack of trust as a 'do it and get away with it' mentality. I don't know how 50 mph means 70 mph when speed cameras aren't around.
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The Observer - 11-Jul-09 00:23
The police will almost certainly do nothing if you go to them as firstly there is no evidence that this happened (unless they go to CCTV records) and secondly they'll try to avoid the work it would entail to follow up. That said, I'd go to the police anyway just to show that this type of behaviour is unacceptable.
You can check on the MIB database to see if the vehicle is insured (http://www.askmid.com) and you will get the make and description but nothing else. It's illegal for you to do this unless you're the owner of the vehicle so I'm sure you wouldn't actually do so!
There are ways of getting the details of the owner but they are either illegal or outside the public domain.
I feel very strongly that this type of driving should not go unpunished, and I hope you will follow it up and not ignore it. However the advice that the previous poster gave you is very sound - it just doesn't happen to fit my philosophy.
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His reaction sounds typical of the sort of aggressive driver who finds themselves impeded because of their lack of skill, foresight and/or attention and then over reacts by attempting to bully another road user.
Try to forget the incident, I'm sure his blood pressure went up during the encounter as well and maybe next time he will pay more attention to the road ahead..
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Today, 24th June 2009 at about 9 am I was travelling on M6 southbound approaching J2 which is my exit. I was in the right-hand lane needing to move over for the exit. I ensured there was enough space after the vehicle to my left and I indicated and moved over to the middle lane. However, the driver of the white van EN57HXW was suddenly right on my back which surprised me as there was enough space and I gave him enough warning of my move. Then immediately he moved to the left-hand lane next to me and as soon as he got in front of me he moved to the middle lane without indicating and squeezing into a very small gap. I moved to the left-hand lane and the van moved in front of me again immediately and again with no indicators. He then went on to brake and speed up alternately until we reached the exit and he went onto M69 while I continued towards Coventry. It really shook me and made me upset.
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