What kind of driver are you?

[Cheezdoodles]

I have come to terms with that i am a very aggressive asshole on the road.

Just earlier today, i had a very bad morning, and when some moron lady decided to cross the street at exact same time when the cars got their green lights, instead of stopping, i will accelerate towards the crossing and press down the horn, forcing her to run as fast as she can. She seemed really scared. I will somewhat bad now, since she was in her 50-60ties, but frankly the insane arrogance of just walking onto incoming trafic because you know cars will stop for you pisses me of.

Imo, if you dont understand what red "walking guy" means, its your own stupidity. Of course i make sure that i have no chance of actually hitting her, but i really try to make my best to scare the living crap out of people who do this. (If they are right infront of you, put into neutral and rev up, that usually scares the shit out of people).

I know its a bad trait, but it pisses me off when pedestrians think they can do whatever they want.Why is their time worth more than mine?

Around other cars, if i see somebody trying to sneak when there is a heavy trafic i will never let them in. (Like, 100 cars in the lane to go straight, nobody in the lane to go right, people will take the right lane, and suddenly want to switch to the "go straight" lane". I will ALLWAYS block their entry, give them the finger, and they can decide on their own if they want to crash into an expensive german car or not).

What kind of driver are you?

 

[DuckThor Evil]

Since I bought my VW Golf 1.2 TSI, I've been taking it easy. On a highway if I'm not blocking anyone, I might drive under the speedlimit to save fuel. most of my friends ridicule me for that

On heavy traffic situations I do get crankier and I also don't like people trying to change lanes at the last moment, but in general I do take things easier nowadays.

 

[nightshade]

I have come to terms with that i am a very aggressive asshole on the road.

Just earlier today, i had a very bad morning, and when some moron lady decided to cross the street at exact same time when the cars got their green lights, instead of stopping, i will accelerate towards the crossing and press down the horn, forcing her to run as fast as she can. She seemed really scared. I will somewhat bad now, since she was in her 50-60ties, but frankly the insane arrogance of just walking onto incoming trafic because you know cars will stop for you pisses me of.

Imo, if you dont understand what red "walking guy" means, its your own stupidity. Of course i make sure that i have no chance of actually hitting her, but i really try to make my best to scare the living crap out of people who do this. (If they are right infront of you, put into neutral and rev up, that usually scares the shit out of people).

I know its a bad trait, but it pisses me off when pedestrians think they can do whatever they want.Why is their time worth more than mine?

I am EXACTLY like this
However I even get pissed at people who drive/ride on road thinking that their car/bike is the only vehicle on road, blocking others ignoring anyone behind them, these are the ones I hate the most.

 

[Cheezdoodles]

I am EXACTLY like this
However I even get pissed at people who drive/ride on road thinking that their car/bike is the only vehicle on road, blocking others ignoring anyone behind them, these are the ones I hate the most.

What hate the most on the road, outside of people trying to sneak in heavy trafic, is people staying in the left lane (high speed lane), and going slow.

If you are in the fast lane, and a car behind you is coming at a higher pace, you should let him pass. A lot of people just dont give a **** and keep driving at their own pace.

My solution to that problem is flashing them until they move

 

[Blazkowicz]

I did scare a pedestrian on green light, big rev up but I hit the brake and clutch so the car only moved on its pitch axis.

your car is dangerous weapon with a lot of kinetic energy.
I used to drive (for a few years but don't anymore, I would do too fast on roads and rather gentle in town, letting people cross sometimes, letting a bus make its turn even though I just got the green light but I did my share of reckless stuff.

later, I did not feel the need to use up the tremendous amount of power available to you (tens of kilowatts is a lot). slow accelerations, low rev, driving under the limit etc., not running up as fast as I can to the next red light then brake as hell.
I had fun in not slowing down in roundabouts instead .

now I live in town and use a 30 or 40 year old racing bike, I get some greenlight accelerating fun without endangering anyone. I'm aggressive in letting cars, trucks, pedestrians know where I belong i.e. a bicycle does belong on the left lane sometimes.

 

[Tahir2]

I'm a very bad driver but always respect pedestrians.. other drivers though I am very aggressive with.

Pedestrians do seem to think that a car will always stop for them but this is just so dangerous on so many levels - if the driver is not watching the road ahead for example it will only end in tears.

I drive fastish but try to conserve fuel by not breaking too heavily allowing the car to roll slower when approaching big roundabouts usually making it so that don't need to stop altogether by timing it with an empty "slot" on the roundabout and it mostly works. Braking is for wimps...

 

[Xenus]

Yeah I like to accelerate aggressively but coast whenever I need to stop. My biggest annoyance is those people that go 50 whether it's 40 or 60 and those people that refuse to pass a slower moving vehicle so by the time you get there there are 4 cars stacked up behind them or more and you can't pass all that on a 1 lane road.

 

[John Reynolds]

I have come to terms with that i am a very aggressive asshole on the road.

Just earlier today, i had a very bad morning, and when some moron lady decided to cross the street at exact same time when the cars got their green lights, instead of stopping, i will accelerate towards the crossing and press down the horn, forcing her to run as fast as she can. She seemed really scared. I will somewhat bad now, since she was in her 50-60ties, but frankly the insane arrogance of just walking onto incoming trafic because you know cars will stop for you pisses me of.

Elderly can have a pretty bad sense of entitlement, but to be honest you should feel bad about what you did. That was most likely someone's mother or even grandmother, and despite her rudeness she was probably only going to delay you by a few seconds. Were those seconds worth acting out in such a way?

Sidebar, but I have several houses around me where the parents let their kids play in the street, and we live at its start. One neighbor who lives on the far end hates turning onto our street and having all these kids in the way, and she loves to gun it. I've seen her do a good 45 mph in a 25 speed zone, and 45 is too fast to stop if a 8-9yo runs out in front of you. I've gone down and talked to her (her college age son is actually worse), and last night after he did about 50 down the street I called the police. Of course they refused to answer the door, which they do when parents go down to talk to them about their excessive speeding down our street. F'n idiots.

What kind of driver are you?

I used to be very aggressive in terms of I just wanted to get to where I was going as quickly as I could, usually speeding a bit (only 2 tickets in 30 years of driving though). Since having kids, though, I'm much slower and far more defensive. It's just not worth it to be in a rush and make bad decisions while behind the wheel, and I've learned it's more relaxing anyways compared to how I use to drive. Not to mention a good bit safer.

 

[digitalwanderer]

I'm not an aggressive driver, I'm a rolling vigilante of street justice. I like to hassle rude drivers and intimidate them, and I really dislike people passing me unless they're going 50% of the speed limit. Lost my license more than a couple of times and counting how many infractions/tickets I've gotten is difficult.

Currently I'm insanely legal with too many cars tempting me into trouble again.

 

[Cheezdoodles]

I'm not an aggressive driver, I'm a rolling vigilante of street justice. I like to hassle rude drivers and intimidate them, and I really dislike people passing me unless they're going 50% of the speed limit. Lost my license more than a couple of times and counting how many infractions/tickets I've gotten is difficult.

Currently I'm insanely legal with too many cars tempting me into trouble again.

Do you mean 150% of the speed limit? Or are you on average driving at less than 50% of the speed limit so its possible to pass you by going 50%?

 

[digitalwanderer]

Ok, 150%. DAMN I've been acting blonde lately. (I have a friend who nicknamed me "Blondie" recently. )

I'm not as bad when my kids are in the car I'll admit, or when I'm driving a vehicle that isn't built for maneuvering/speed. I had my Mom's suburban last week for moving and I drove that pretty much like a grandpa, the damned thing was more like boating than driving and our family had 3 growing up so I'm used to them...it's just been so long since I drove anything like that.

Felt like heaven to get my car back, I gotta get my summer rubber on this week.

 

[Mize]

What you describe in your first post qualifies as vehicular assault. No kidding.

I like to drive fast, but I alway respect pedestrians and I always let other drivers merge or whatever so long as they use turn signals and/or are polite.

I hate tailgaters and will punish them in all manner of driving slowly, etc. if necessary. By the same token I just let slow drivers be and don't let them get the best of me...watch for my opportunity and pass them by.

 

[Mintmaster]

I know its a bad trait, but it pisses me off when pedestrians think they can do whatever they want.Why is their time worth more than mine?

That's kind of douchey, but I suppose I can understand that perspective. If there's a group of people (back when I was at University of Toronto, which is downtown in a major city, we'd often have 100's of people crossing at once), then saving you time would cost 100's of people theirs.

I'm definitely biased towards pedestrians. First of all, as a society we don't walk/bike as much as we should. I used to rollerblade a lot (I've heard too many stories about stolen bikes, whereas skates can taken with you), 6km to highschool and 2.5 to my current university. It was actually more reliable and faster than the bus in highschool, and a car is only a couple minutes faster now. Unfortunately, I had my leg broken when I was crossing the road and a driver turned right on a red, obviously looking to the left at oncoming traffic rather than at me. Robbed me of my last available childhood summer, when I was finally one of the older kids in my soccer division and was owning people in the first few games...

So even though I always jaywalk in a way that doesn't interfere with traffic, and now use a car myself more often than not, drivers can kiss my ass when I'm crossing the road

Yeah I like to accelerate aggressively but coast whenever I need to stop.

Heh, I do the same thing. It's fun, safe (create separation from the guy behind you until the next stop sign), and good for fuel economy. Most BSFC graphs that I've seen show engines are actually more efficient outputting, say, 100hp for 3 seconds instead of 30 for 10 seconds.

 

[Sxotty]

Mint I don't think a hard acceleration is really going to be best. But that doesn't mean you have to drive like a granny necessarily.

I believe in not giving up when you face an endless line of cars to pass Even if at the end you only pass a few I have noticed more often then I thought likely I actually end up getting through the line of 10+ cars and actually get to go the pace I want again.

 

[Grall]

What hate the most on the road, outside of people trying to sneak in heavy trafic

People "sneaking" in heavy traffic typically means they need to change lanes to get to the exit/turnoff to reach where they're going. You should facilitate this by stepping off the gas and letting them in. Showing consideration in traffic means you're statistically more likely to receive consideration in the future, because you'll be inspiring others to act the same way you do. So even from a pure selfishness perspective you'll be helping yourself by helping others.

So by acting like a prick behind the wheel you'll be inspiring others too of course, and that'll come back at you eventually.

Also...what if the woman you describe in your first post had tripped and fallen as you were coming at her? You don't think squishing her flat would have been worth the inconvenience of her crossing the street on your green light, do you?

Cars are very dangerous objects, thousands of people die on the roads every day. Drive safely, you'll get where you're going anyway, pushing and shoving will only save you seconds, while those same seconds WILL save a life in a critical situation if you show consideration. Remember, you're protected by a cage of steel and glass. A pedestrian typically doesn't even wear a helmet, imagine what happens to a brittle human body when the two smash together.

Consider this: hitting a pedestrian at 50km/h on a city street is ~80% fatal.

Hitting same pedestrian at 30km/h is ~80% survivable.

The time difference for you in getting from A to B at the slower 30kph is basically negligible.

If you are in the fast lane, and a car behind you is coming at a higher pace, you should let him pass. A lot of people just dont give a **** and keep driving at their own pace.

My solution to that problem is flashing them until they move

If I'm in the fast lane and driving at the speed limit (or, more likely, slightly above) and I see you approaching in the rear view mirror...tell me why should I facilitate your breaking of the law, driving recklessly and needlessly endangering other people on the road? I'll stay right where I am, and if you start flashing me, I'll turn on the rear foglights/start pumping the break pedal. Simple as that.

Chill out, god dammit.

Most BSFC graphs that I've seen show engines are actually more efficient outputting, say, 100hp for 3 seconds instead of 30 for 10 seconds.

Hard acceleration typically is anything but fuel efficient, but moreso, it will stress your engine and drivetrain significantly more meaning greater risk of premature failures and component wear (more expensive maintenance), plus wear your tires harder too (and the street, if you care about such things...)

 

[AlphaWolf]

The time difference for you in getting from A to B at the slower 30kph is basically negligible.

How does that math out? Spending 67% more time on the road is probably going to be noticeable to most people

 

[Mize]

Grall: the far left lane is for passing only. Stay out of it if you're not.

Alpha: Average speed of someone who wants to go 120 vs. 90 is probably at best 10 kph once you count traffic and piss stops.

 

[3dcgi]

If I'm in the fast lane and driving at the speed limit (or, more likely, slightly above) and I see you approaching in the rear view mirror...tell me why should I facilitate your breaking of the law, driving recklessly and needlessly endangering other people on the road? I'll stay right where I am, and if you start flashing me, I'll turn on the rear foglights/start pumping the break pedal. Simple as that.

Chill out, god dammit.


Hard acceleration typically is anything but fuel efficient, but moreso, it will stress your engine and drivetrain significantly more meaning greater risk of premature failures and component wear (more expensive maintenance), plus wear your tires harder too (and the street, if you care about such things...)

Rear foglights? What do you drive?

I agree with some of what you wrote, but I hate when drivers think it's their job to enforce the law. Especially when they might be breaking another law (or at least a rule of the road) by not switching out of the left lane.

Also, it doesn't sound like Mintmaster was describing hard acceleration. At least 100hp isn't hard acceleration for either of my cars.

This doesn't happen often, but one thing I hate is idiots that tail gate me in the right lane even though I'm exceeding the speed limit and the left lane is wide open. Apparently some people just like to tailgate.

 

[AlphaWolf]

Alpha: Average speed of someone who wants to go 120 vs. 90 is probably at best 10 kph once you count traffic and piss stops.

Actually in my experience the opposite is true. Moving slower incurs more time penalties.

 

[Grall]

How does that math out? Spending 67% more time on the road is probably going to be noticeable to most people

You generally don't travel distances long enough inside a city for the speed difference to make any significant difference. Typically a few minutes, at most...

Grall: the far left lane is for passing only. Stay out of it if you're not.

What gives you the idea I wouldn't be passing? Doesn't mean I'd voluntarily yield way to a blatant lawbreaking speeder.