When Did I Lose the Right of Way?
Seriously now! (I type like I speak). When did I lose the right of way when making a right hand turn on a street to somebody making a left in front of me? Has there been a change to the driving rules in the last few years? Do I need to upgrade my skills? Somebody please let me know!
In the last few years driving in my neck of the woods has gotten extremely bad. I have almost seen it all and it doesn’t look like it is going to get better.
I will sum up a few things here.
Stop signs are not optional. And this includes red lights! You must stop. At all times. Especially when there are other people around. I will however forgive those rolling stops when nobody is around. Even though it is against the law I will let that slide.
Don’t pass the school bus when the lights are flashing. This is one of those situations that once you see it the first thing you say is ‘where is a cop when you need one?’. It doesn’t matter if you are making a right or left just wait until the lights stop flashing.
Be patient when making that left turn. For some reason people love to make that left turn in front of me at the very last minute making me slam on my brake and horn. It has happened numerous times. The part that pisses me off the most about this is that 90% of the time there is nobody behind me. IF they just waited for me to pass the road would have been clear for them. But I guess that isn’t as fun.
Continuing on that note. Stop pulling out in front of me at extremely slow speeds when I am coming down the road. Why must I suffer because you don’t know how to drive. Just wait until the road is clear and then cruise at your own leisure. This is extremely dangerous especially on a road where the speed limit is 70 km/h.
Stop trying to squeeze in that left turn when the light is red. This one is really getting ridiculous. These days my advance green is finished before I can even turn left because I am stuck waiting on all the people turning left on the red light ahead of me. You are only creating a hassle.
Now I don’t know what can be done to improve the situation. Maybe the police should get a little more strict with their tickets. If I get one and I truly was doing something wrong I will pay for it. But of course we are always innocent.
I could recommend that everyone should be retested every 5-10 years but I do not feel this would help. Whoever these people payed to get their license from in the past they will pay again.
I think we need to go to the root of the cause and examine the people that are giving out these driving licenses. They need to get harder on the tests. I can honestly say that a lot of drivers in my area do not look comfortable behind the wheel. This makes me nervous. Its amazing how easy it was for me to get my motorcycle license.
The only positive thing in all of this is that I am now a very good defensive driver.
Thanks for putting up with my rant.
April 9th, 2010 at 5:10 am
There aren’t stop signs in England just yields and dotted lines! The roundabouts are awesome here. if only we could adapt there in Canada…but the ones we r installing around KW are piddly little accident friendly hairpin turns!!!
Oh we like your blog can u make ours look like that if it doesn’t take long? Email us. We r in South Wales