What driving problems irritate you the most?

tailgating

I’m completely anti-death penalty, but would support it for just this one offense. No lengthy trial needed.

Some people corners very seriously, they take ages, I mean ages, I think I could land a commercial aircraft in the time that it takes them to turn that corner. Other than that, I live in a high density traffic city, I am very patient and forgiving.

In this order:

Tailgating

Not using turn signals

Unsafe passing ( this happens to me all the time on my rural 2 lane highway in the hills/mountains. Big rigs pull over as best they can but people still pass on blind curves and I have had some narrow misses.)

The tailgating really pisses me off up here too with hundreds of deer on these roads. If I am leading the fucking parade and have to brake for a leaping deer we’re all fucked, especially me since I will hit the deer, be rear ended and possibly even knocked into the oncoming lane. Just the way I want to die, thanks!

Pretty much all of them. In addition to tailgating, I loathe those folks who “frontgate.” You’re driving down the road, at or over the speed limit, and the frontgater pulls out from a driveway, slowly, slowly, slowly—you have to slam on the brakes to avoid ramming his tardy ass.

And when you’re driving—please just drive. Focus your attention on that important activity. Leave the chicken leg, the mascara, the cell phone, the newspaper, and any other activity to your pre- or post-driving time.

^^ @picante: “And when you’re driving—please just drive.”

This! Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. If you are driving, why do you need to constantly look at your passenger while you are driving? Eye contact has no business while you’re driving. If you’re not driving at 100% attention, you’re announcing to me that you are willing to kill me and my kids. Not cool.

With tailgating I love to then make sure I am driving right on the speed limit because when I look in my mirror I can see the steam coming out of their ears.

I do also tend to get annoyed when I’m on a road and cars are parked on the other side, but my side is clear so I have the right of way, then someone will barge their way through since they believe that I drive the Batmobile and can magically levitate out of the way. If your side is blocked and mine is clear, then I have the ball so play to my rules.

Preach it, Brother Tom! When I am a passenger, and my driver starts looking over at me, I purposely keep staring straight ahead hoping s/he will follow my lead. Keep your eyes on the road and your attention on all the crazy drivers who surround you. Driving is serious business!

@TheProfoundPorcupine You described the two that bother me the most. I always get stuck behind the person driving under the speed limit on the county highway, but as soon as they get to town where the speed limit is reduced to 30mph they continue at the same speed. I don’t get it either.

I also get very irritated when someone passes me in a no-passing zone. I’ve seen many close calls that made my heart skip a beat. They are endangering the lives of others. I get extremely upset when this happens when I have my daughter in the car with me.

GET OFF THE GODDAMN MOTHERFRAKKING PHONE!

There is nothing in the WORLD on Facebook, Angry Birds, Youtube, or Google Maps that is so friggin’ important it’s worth side-swiping your tiny fiberglass vehicle into my Crown Victoria. Hang it up, turn it off, and just DRIVE.

Everything @Coloma mentioned, and pretty much in that order, with a couple of additions:

I live on a curve in a residential neighborhood with a posted speed limit of 25 mph. However, from school buses to cops, everyone normally drives around 40 mph through that curve, making my morning exit from my own driveway kind of harrowing. Since I can’t see around the curve at either end, I have to inch out into the road, look as far both ways as I can, then hope for the best. And I frequently set myself up to be T-boned on my side, or I end up with some moron attempting to drive up my tailpipe. I don’t like that.

I also get irked by people who don’t get that obstructions in their lane are their problem. Instead, they seem to think that if they get to the obstruction before I’m actually in the opposite lane and in the space they need, then they have free rein to pull into my lane and make me watch out for them. It shouldn’t be that way.

And the phone. Oh, yeah, those idiots who have to be on the phone.

I seethe at cars and motorcycles that weave in and out of lanes on a highway with a 65 mph speed limit. Most of the traffic goes along at 70 and these morons want to go 15 miles faster and do! Where’s a traffic cop wen you want one?

People who slow down and stop at the end of an on ramp on the highway. People, if you don’t speed up, you can’t merge safely with the traffic.

Overtaking just before the junction they want to turn off.

You know how you’ll be inching along for 15 minutes in that “exit only” lane (the lane you got into a mile back because the sign told you that’s the lane you had to be in), and then as you get to the last few yards before the exit the dudes who just zoomed right past that long line of cars try to nose their way into the exit lane? That.

@wundayatta : Totally agreed.

Parking indefinitely in a store’s fire lane with the flashers on, as if it were okay to park there for hours simply because one remembered to turn on their hazard lights.

People who don’t slow down for school zones or construction zones. Any driving too fast for the conditions.

Slow fuckers.

Besides following too close and making unsafe lane changes I wish the more drivers would learn how to turn left at a signal.

Here’s how we make left turns in L.A.: From the left hand turn lane (when the light turns green) you start a very slow roll out into the intersection (you don’t just sit there like a dumb toad!) while watching for an opening. If there is no openings through the green and yellow lights, then when the oncoming cars have finally stopped, you proceed to make your left hand turn on the red light (usually taking a couple other left turning cars with you).

^^^ L.A. driving stresses me out to no end, I don’t know how you guys get from point “A” to point “B” in one piece! haha Then again, city friends freak out up here in NorCal with the winding little roads, deer everywhere, hairpin curves. I’m a great mountain driver but the 405 gives me panic attacks. lol

The first thing I noticed when I moved to Utah 30 years ago was the way people come to a DEAD STOP before making a right-hand turn onto a side street or business entrance. Still can’t figure out why they do this. I have come close to rear-ending them many times.

People who drive slow in the fast lane.

Tailgating is unnecessary and not to mention, TERRIBLY DANGEROUS! Not using turn signals, those who cruise in the passing lane. People who are distracted by texting or talking on the phone, or changing the music. Oh. And NOT USING HIGH BEAMS!!!! At night! On a mountain or country road! No guard rails! Cmon.

I don’t mind if someone cuts me off if they get moving and get out of the way, but if someone cuts me off and then just toodles along, it can make sweet little @Judi cuss.

Oh, yeah. California freeways. This illustrates several of the problems to be encountered there.

Driving in L.A. is like being inside a pinball machine. lol

Here in Seattle, people do not pay attention! I have had people in the lane next to me with their front tires about even with my drivers seat not see me and try to merge. They also tend to not travel at an appropriate speed for the lane they are in. As the signs on the side of the road state, the law is Slower Traffic Keep Right. Just because your foot is physically on the gas pedal, that does not mean you qualify to be in the left lane!

Then there are the jackwads who travel 53 in a 60, you go to pass them on the right, as they refuse to leave the left lane and they suddenly speed up to 70. Conversely are the ones who pass you at 70 then slow down to <55.

Oh, and for those of you who mention tailgating, in Seattle, many consider it tailgating if you cannot parallel park an F-350 longbed between you and the person in front of you at a red light, yet they travel closer on I-5 than on streets with speed limits of 30 MPH?!

Kind of a dramatic shift from the Boston area where 70 in a 45 is slow enough to get rear-ended….

Seriously trying to kill me and my passengers if any ranks up there pretty high for me. That’s really happened twice to me this year. I know what it feels like to know you are going to die. It isn’t a nice feeling.

Slow people and people on the phone. It’s worse in combination: one car blocking everyone in the left lane, only to finally pass them and see them on the phone in their own world as if they don’t know everyone behind them is livid. I hope those people die.

People who smoke in the cars up ahead.
And those who want to look at a wreck causing a bottleneck.

Oh and when they let their little shit dogs drive.

Many things. Many, many things.

People who don’t use their turn signals (as I’ve said somewhere else, we’re not mind-readers, and that switch on the side of your steering column isn’t there for ornamental decoration).

People that zig-zag across more than two lanes (and then back again), at high speeds, without using their turn signals.

People on the freeway who use the shoulder or a lane that is ending/merging to try to speed ahead of everyone else, and then cut in. Hello: YOU are part of the reason why that particular lane isn’t moving at all, you selfish prick.

People who intentionally run red lights.

People who are on the phone/texting.

Like many of you, I am not a fan of tailgaters, especially the more aggressive ones.

People who make illegal u-turns in the unsafest of places (curvy streets with blind spots; just beyond major intersections, across all lanes, during rush hour).

People who speed down the opposite left-turn lane, crossing the double yellow lines, trying to be “first” in the left-turn lane up ahead. These folks are just begging for a head-on accident, or a very expensive ticket.

People who are doing anything but driving (I have seen people eating with both hands while steering with their knees, women applying makeup/mascara, men shaving, people reading books (!!), people flossing, and parents looking back behind them while driving at full speed, lecturing their kids or, in one case, helping with homework (no, I’m not kidding).