|
That is not an unusual sight, I often see this near our industrial estates and some side roads, some drivers just do not take any notice and on one occasion I stopped to let an artic turn but drivers overtook me and prevented the artic from turning.
I do wonder if drivers really understand how much room large motors need to make turns that they do, or if they really care as long as they get past?
|
I do wonder if drivers really understand how much room large motors need to make turns that they do, or if they really care as long as they get past?
Judging by the number of car drivers who "straight-line" roundabouts from the left lane, despite cars in the right lane and no HGVs around - I sometimes question whether the human race will survive much longer!
|
|
I could write 20 pages on this and still only cover half of it.
As RT, not sure how much more dumbing down we can endure before we revert to galloping about on all fours again.
|
I could write 20 pages on this and still only cover half of it.
As RT, not sure how much more dumbing down we can endure before we revert to galloping about on all fours again.
I sometimes wonder whether all drivers should be made to drive an HGV for an hour during their lessons to pass the car test?
Apart from yard repositioning I've never driven an HGV but I do tow a caravan which is nearly as wide, needs an exaggerated swing on turnings and just as likely to be hit on a roundabout so I soon learnt some of the pitfalls of larger vehicles.
|
|
Oh i think they know they are cutting it fine when they can't manage to stay in lane and encroach on possible contact with lorries, its the i'm safe with several airbags and my no win no fee lawyer will see me in a new car whatever happens.
The irony of it being, if they asked any traffic officer who see the results daily what the score is with a nasty prang with a big lorry, he would tell them there is only one winner end of, being maimed or dead isn't the best way to enjoy the compo Mr no win no fee got them.
I think we've seen the good days of motoring (the good days of this country and others too) and its all downhill from here.
|
|
|
|
Nearest I got was a long wheelbase renault master, and often used to get drivers cut you up, or drive through n/s as you take a right swing to get into a tight left drive
sometimes having to wait ages to get a clear drive across the road, because no one would give way.
No one these days likes to be held up for anything,least of all some women
|
I sat my PCV test a couple of years back in the centre of Glasgow and it amazed me the insane manoeuvres car drivers pulled to try and get past the bus.
You'd indicate to turn left, pull out a little to the centre of the road to give yourself room and suddenly out of nowhere an idiot would be trying to squeeze up under your nearside wheels. People glued to their mobile phones wondered out infront of you and numpties again glued to phones stood right on the corner you're turning at with their feet right at the edge of the kerb almost daring you to clip it.
Would be a good lesson for every driver to have a shot of a large vehicle before being able to hit the road solo.
Edited by SLO76 on 10/12/2016 at 20:19
|
|
Would be a good lesson for every driver to have a shot of a large vehicle before being able to hit the road solo
If you drive past schools you would see some cannot drive a small car let alone a large motor....I wonder how they pass the test (probably just luck on the day)
|
|
|
|
Nearest I got was a long wheelbase renault master, and often used to get drivers cut you up, or drive through n/s as you take a right swing to get into a tight left drive
sometimes having to wait ages to get a clear drive across the road, because no one would give way.
No one these days likes to be held up for anything,least of all some women
There were always impatient drivers, I don't think it's any worse now.
|
Nearest I got was a long wheelbase renault master, and often used to get drivers cut you up, or drive through n/s as you take a right swing to get into a tight left drive
sometimes having to wait ages to get a clear drive across the road, because no one would give way.
No one these days likes to be held up for anything,least of all some women
There were always impatient drivers, I don't think it's any worse now.
Depends were you are and time of day, imo, its getting worse. Artics and large lorry drivers must have the patience of saints the way car drivers push through/past them....
|
Depends were you are and time of day, imo, its getting worse. Artics and large lorry drivers must have the patience of saints the way car drivers push through/past them....
If you don't have the patience and frame of mind for the job then you won't last, its a simple as that, you can't do 40 years, as i have so far, stressed out of your mind, when you get in the lorry seat you should (though increasingly that is no longer the case) put your metaphorical vocational hat on.
The recent fashion for not signalling their intentions backfires on those who don't, do they think themselves clever i wonder or is plain ignorance, but if one is hooning round a blind (foliage or other reason) roundabout without an indicator to be seen they shouldn't be surprised when they find their route filled with a lorry already committed to going.
On that note, what's the reason for making roundabouts themselves and the approaches to them blind?, eg putting up a fence on the central reserve on the approach to one to make it impossible to see and judge the approach, then plant a small forest on the island itself so you can't see people until its too late?
This is all so counter productive, the modern lorry (way underpowered despite the quoted or badged BHP figures, try driving your one ton car with 10bhp) takes an age to get rolling, so if we could see over the roundabout as we approach...especially if others had the self preservation nous to indicate their intentions...we could maintain progress be out of their way and we'd all live happily everafter.
Why is it against the rules for those who plan our roads to use a bit of common sense, or, Heaven forbid, actually ask full time road users of all classes of vehicles for some suggestions how to help traffic flow?
Edited by gordonbennet on 11/12/2016 at 10:21
|
On that note, what's the reason for making roundabouts themselves and the approaches to them blind?, eg putting up a fence on the central reserve on the approach
They did this on the A22 Caterham bypass /M25 junction to reduce rear end shunts, as people 3 or 4 cars back were looking across and assuming it was good to go and driving into the back of the cars infront that were slowing. Fortunately it's the right height so restricts car drivers but, allows HGV drivers to see.
Why is it against the rules for those who plan our roads to use a bit of common sense, or, Heaven forbid, actually ask full time road users of all classes of vehicles for some suggestions how to help traffic flow?
Reminds me of Clapham common west side when they stuck the traffic lights in the middle of the junction making it impossible to turn right towards south side with a 40' trailer. After the junction got mangled a few times they eventually sorted it out. but, in that time we had to turn left and go into wandsworth around the one way system then head back out again to avoid it.
|
|
|
I sometimes wonder whether all drivers should be made to drive an HGV for an hour during their lessons to pass the car test?
Perhaps not drive it, but certainly travel in one. I regularly used to hitch hike and learned loads from observing.
I think all car drivers should also be made to ride ten hours on a moped - it would teach them to observe the road surfaces, to look properly, and to give bikers more space - especially when it is raining.
A few years ago, my PA was ranting because an artic 'had nearly driven her off the road'. No amount of explaining that, on a small roundabout his trailer had to take a shorter line cutting into lane 2, got through to her. She completely failed to understand that she was the one who put herself into the dangerous position.
I think every driver should do some compulsory top-up training [not necessarily a test] every 3-5 years. It is rediculous that someone can pass a test at 19 and not have any further training, ever. Someone driving today, might have passed his/her test 70 years ago - before the first motorway was built
Edited by Marlot on 11/12/2016 at 06:23
|
|
There is no way I would be willing to travel on the public highway on any two wheeled vehicle - a few years ago whilst on holiday in Italy I hired a golf buggy and drove it around town on the public highway, whilst I stuck to mostly minor roads it was a nerve wracking experience - max speed was about 20 kph, (12mph), I was switching between potholes in the kerb and getting out of the way of overtaking cars, vans etc. Being a golf buggy it was open to the elements (mid summer, nice time of the year!) - in my view it was enough to get a good understanding of many of the challanges faced by pedal cyclists, and I do apply this understanding when near them.
|
|
|
|
|
|
I do wonder if drivers really understand how much room large motors need to make turns that they do, or if they really care as long as they get past?
Judging by the number of car drivers who "straight-line" roundabouts from the left lane, despite cars in the right lane and no HGVs around - I sometimes question whether the human race will survive much longer!
Darwin will sort them out...
|
|
Maybe it's time to introduce a new type of indicator for large vehicles, say a double speed flash with alternating colours which would mean "this vehicle really is turning left even though it doesn't look like it". Possibly even legislation forbidding undertaking in these circumstances. I vaguely remember a driving test question somewhere along the lines of "A large HGV is signalling left but moves over to the right. Why?"
Edited by kiss (keep it simple) on 11/12/2016 at 18:01
|
Maybe it's time to introduce a new type of indicator for large vehicles, say a double speed flash with alternating colours which would mean "this vehicle really is turning left even though it doesn't look like it". Possibly even legislation forbidding undertaking in these circumstances. I vaguely remember a driving test question somewhere along the lines of "A large HGV is signalling left but moves over to the right. Why?"
Some artics are lit up like christmas trees anyway, so another light on one will only confuse matters
Maybe a large sign showing the path they take doing a left would be better ?
|
|
Agreed, some lorries have too many lights anyway, and the idiot continental idea of replacing all the side marker red/white lenses with amber lenses has detracted from the indivduality of indicator lights.
Some people cannot be helped, they are victims in waiting, you cannot train the terminally stupid (nor the superfast urban heroes clad in lycra crushing their undercarriage) that getting tangled up with steel, whether it weighs 1 or 44 tons, is only going to have one outcome, some people have to learn the hard way, maybe the removal of self preservation common sense is nature's answer to overpopulation.
Edited by gordonbennet on 11/12/2016 at 22:06
|
|
This old quote springs to mind... quite apt for some cyclists....This is the grave of Mike O’Day, who died maintaining his right of way. His right was clear, his will was strong, but he’s just as dead as if he’d been wrong. -Old English Epitaph
|
|
|
the idiot continental idea of replacing all the side marker red/white lenses with amber lenses
I've been confused by those things. If you get a brief glance of them that's obscured by something else and then exposed again, It's easily assumed they may be flashing indicators.
|
the idiot continental idea of replacing all the side marker red/white lenses with amber lenses
I've been confused by those things. If you get a brief glance of them that's obscured by something else and then exposed again, It's easily assumed they may be flashing indicators.
Exactly BT, an amber indicator light in the usual places they are found is no longer noticed because modern lorries are festooned in the things, never mind an expert has been consulted, now where's that face palm smiley?
|
|
Yesterday swmbo and myself drove out mid afternoon and going down a B road between Colchester and Maldon and there in the gloom running/jogging towards us on "our" side of the road a youngish couple.
WHY? there was a perfectly good footpath wide enough for them on the opposite side of the road!
|
|
If you asked them ORB it would probably be the same answer you get from cyclists who won't use perfectly good cycles lanes "we don't have to".
|
|
|
|
|
|
