Motorway driving standards ……

I look forward to the trip to Leeds tomorrow, then onto Whitby Thursday! All just to come back on Sunday. Fingers crossed everyone is just happy to chill and enjoy the aircon in the car like we will be!

I think the new 4 lane motorways don’t help matters – people are tending to use them as freeways rather than motorways. Lane discipline has gone out the window.

What do you lot know? You don’t even pay road tax.

I think the 4 lanes are better.

Left lane for people like me.

Next lane for the Citroen C3/Mazda drivers, truck drivers.

Next lane (would be called middle lane) exclusively for JLR and Passat drivers.

Right lane (overtaking lane) for the self entitled.

And me…. far far away from “that lot”

👍🥳

While a lot of drivers here are indeed crap, I was over in the US a couple of weeks ago and my GOD, you haven’t seen bad driving until you’ve been over there (I’ve been to wayyyy worse countries for driving, but the US should know better). It’s just an absolute free for all on the highways, be in any lane, overtake/undertake whenever, never use signals, go at any speed you can be bothered with. It really does make me appreciate driving in the UK more. It’s not great here, but it could be A LOT worse. The road rage over there too is incredible.

One thing that annoys me with motorway driving over here, is when you’re keeping in the left lane, see a lorry or bus fairly far ahead of you so begin to think about moving over into the middle lane, then a middle lane hogger comes up to overtake you but at about 0.5mph faster than what you’re going, and the lorry in front of you is quickly coming up, so because of the person in the middle lane, you have to slow down, get in behind them to overtake the lorry, then go back in the left lane. It’s incredibly annoying.

We have a new mini roundabout near us, and it’s caused chaos.Give way to the right? No, just do what you fancy, or sit there clueless as what to do.

The speed cameras obviously aren’t turned on when the variable speed limits aren’t in force.

How is that obvious?

It’s ptetty hectic on my twice weekly run down the M6. Chill out and carry on. Not much use complaining about traffic when your in a vehicle. I think I’m pretty sensible and polite on the road but then so do most other people probably. I told my employer though I’ll be late every day probably so fire me now or accept I run to my own clock and the job still gets done.

I find adaptive cruise control a good mechanism for restricting my motorway stress. With all the variable limits gone are the days where you can assume 80-85 on the motorway (note this speed is not acceptable in bad weather or busy conditions, but I think the french have it right with variable limits and modern, safe cars should be able to go that fast when conditions are suitable).

Also the standards are generally way worse in holiday periods as you get lots of people who hardly every go on them stopping at slip roads, sitting in lane 2 for miles on end etc

I have driven quite a lot for work over the years and also am doing some support work for a mate who holds advanced driving events for companies.

There is a lot of (quite appropriate) annoyance in the posts above – another’s poor driving could obviously have a massive impact on you or your family.

The problem (as I see it) is in 2 parts:

1, Mindset
2, Skill

Some people are dicks! Their mindset is to get what they want and any cost to others. They also have a shallow understanding of the wider topic and particularly the consequences and risks involved. No amount of training would really help these people as they don’t really want to change!

If we take the dicks out of the equation, then training can really help as good quality coaching can tease out an understanding of a situation and train appropriate defensive driving techniques to minimise risk.

One of the first posts said that driving is the most difficult thing most people do – its amazing that we have so little input for a task after our test.
For me practical training with qualified instructors who enjoy their role is the best way of improving the situation (CPC training for HGV is a joke – 7 modules to be present at – apparently you could pass by doing one module 7 times!)

There’s no silver bullet for this one – attitude changing is difficult!

this weekend i yelled at someone for reversing out of a parking space with out looking. Luckily I had seen that they had not seen me as they did not even look my way. They then proceeded to tell me i should be stopping for them as I could see they were reversing.

Bear in mind this is onto a main road which is dual carriage way. I would have moved to the right lane but there was faster moving traffic in that lane. They then dually reversed into that lane as well forcing a 7.5 ton lorry to a standstill. He was not as polite as me in explaining their error to them.

I think the greater speed difference between trucks and cars in mainland Europe helps. And forcing trucks to remain in lane 1 at certain places. The unrestricted German autobahn demands a higher skill level and alertness. I found it less tiring than a uk drive. Sweden feels a bit slow but really they are tanking it when no one is Looking.

One thing that annoys me with motorway driving over here, is when you’re keeping in the left lane, see a lorry or bus fairly far ahead of you so begin to think about moving over into the middle lane, then a middle lane hogger comes up to overtake you but at about 0.5mph faster than what you’re going, and the lorry in front of you is quickly coming up, so because of the person in the middle lane, you have to slow down, get in behind them to overtake the lorry, then go back in the left lane. It’s incredibly annoying

Why is it annoying ? Just slow down for 10s or speed up for 10s… you’ll get to your final destination within about a minute either way ? Did you have something planned with that extra minute in your life ?

Oh another thing that pisses me off is lorries that decide they absolutely MUST overtake the lorry in front of them, blocking up two lanes of traffic, taking a minute or more to actually overtake only to just sit in front of the one they just overtook. All the while traffic behind them getting backed up because they’re taking up two thirds of the whole motorway.

Why is it annoying ? Just slow down for 10s or speed up for 10s… you’ll get to your final destination within about a minute either way ? Did you have something planned with that extra minute in your life ?

Because it’s not about getting anywhere a minute quicker, I know I’m not. It’s the fact that if I’m (quite rightly) sitting in the left lane, it seems as though that’s a cue for someone to HAVE to overtake, even if they’re doing it at a snails pace, blocking me in as a result. I have regular non adaptive cruise control, so it’s just a minor annoyance to switch it off then on again. It happens quite a lot of the time so the minor annoyance of it becomes more noticable. Am I not allowed to vent here?

Am I not allowed to vent here?

Sure, but apart from making you more angry and enjoying driving less, what will you actually get from being annoyed ? That’s kinda my point… All this anger on the roads actually accomplishes nothing.

yesterday a truck pulled out, then in, then out, forcing my to emergency brake… Most people in here would be shouting, screaming, throwing the finger etc…. Annoyed..

I laughed, gave him a cheery wave and went on my way, he flashed his thanks. Everyone happy. He never meant to be like that, he was just confused… I still did what i needed to do and the world carried on.

If more people can just shrug and laugh …. we’ll be a nicer place to drive/live.

and then the truck that you were thinking of overtaking decides to overtake the truck in front of him at 0.00000000001 mph quicker so both of you get stuck at 55.9999mph for the next 20 minutes anyway.

I laughed, gave him a cheery wave and went on my way, he flashed his thanks. Everyone happy. He never meant to be like that, he was just confused… I still did what i needed to do and the world carried on.

Good for you! For the record I don’t shout or swear or get any kind of road rage, the most I do when I’m actually driving is a little head shake to myself. But it’s cathartic to be able to talk about it afterwards. What were you expecting in a thread like this?

Most drivers have no concept that their average speed is dictated by the volume of traffic, not their own actions. Once this simple fact is accepted, only then does driving becomes much more relaxing – there is no point in trying to “make progress” other than giving stress for little or no reward. I used to commute 600 miles a week for 10 years and kept a detailed log of speeds and conditions. Sad I know.

Just back from the US too, and the standard of driving is worse, although fewer people seemed to undertake. I am also always impressed by French drivers, seriously their standards appear much higher than ours, and it is a pleasure to drive there.

As for tailgating, love them, just ease off, then a bit more, then a bit more, then when they decide to undertake, ease up to the car on the left. Little pleasures, I know.

BTW slow moving vehicles are required by law to show a flashing amber light. Cycles and mopeds are excepted. THere is nothing wrong with driving slowly, but such vehicles should signal this to other road users.

Where I come off the M1 at junction 14 in the mornings, lane 1 is always queued up and most folk sit there nicely. Then you get the people who can’t wait, they have to get to the front of the line. So they cruise along in lane 2, looking for a gap. Then when there isn’t one they simply put their indicator on and stop in lane 2 until someone lets them in, merrily blocking an entire live lane of traffic. The lack of awareness of the consequences of their actions is staggering. Or maybe they know and just don’t care.

I know I’m not. It’s the fact that if I’m (quite rightly) sitting in the left lane, it seems as though that’s a cue for someone to HAVE to overtake, even if they’re doing it at a snails pace, blocking me in as a result.

Can’t you just indicate and pull out a few seconds earlier, so they don’t get the chance to block you in?

I hate being boxed in too, but accept that I usually could have avoided it if I’d planned a bit better.

Its not just the motorways.

Driving standards on any road are appalling.

I was the subject of road rage on a quiet single track country lane today at 07:45 in the morning!!

Fat bastard in a Range Rover Sport to impatient to wait a few seconds for me to pull over safely, honking his horn , no lights on in the mist and on his mobile phone.

The speed cameras obviously aren’t turned on when the variable speed limits aren’t in force.

Because the right hand lane is full of reps doing 95 down the whole stretch? Also, the Chief Constable made a sarcastic remark some months ago about threatening to switch the cameras on to enforce the 70mph limit…

Can’t you just indicate and pull out a few seconds earlier, so they don’t get the chance to block you in?

One of the things that cruise control demonstrates is how inconsistent people are with their speed. Sometimes they’ll start to pass you and then slow down to block you in against the lorry. Although a few drivers are good and will anticipate and move out into the empty lane 3 before you’ve even indicated.

Then you’ve got the people who sit in the middle lane and just go at a speed of “faster than lane 1”. So, if they’re passing a lorry they’ll be doing 65-ish. But when they get past it and the next vehicle ahead of them in lane 1 is a car doing 65-70, they’ll accelerate up to 80, get past that, and then slow down again when they reach the next lorry. I’ll sit there with cruise control on, constantly overtaking and being overtaken by the same car.

he speed cameras obviously aren’t turned on when the variable speed limits aren’t in force.

They are round Bristol – I had the joy of an awareness course as a result of getting flashed at 12.30 at night on an empty M5 a few months ago with no gantry limit showing

Motorway driving standards have declined in the 40odd years I’ve been driving. That didn’t quite come out right!

I’m with tetrode, being victim to that sort of behaviour only encourages middle-lane hogging!

I don’t know if it has changed in the last 17 years, but when I was doing my driving lessons learners weren’t allowed on the motorway. There is no way for people to learn motorway driving unless they opt for extra training after passing their test. I took the extra training because it lowered my insurance by about 300 quid a year.

I don’t know if it has changed in the last 17 years, but when I was doing my driving lessons learners weren’t allowed on the motorway

Changed last year apparently. Not sure how much use it is for many learners. When I learnt to drive nearest proper motorway was an hour or so away and doubt thats abnormal.

I’ll sit there with cruise control on, constantly overtaking and being overtaken by the same car

This one winds me up. It’s like some sort of groundhog day synchronised loop going on. Except my speed isn’t changing, there’s is going up and down by a couple of MPH and we keep passing each other.
Combined with tetrode’s point about getting trapped in by that same person slooowwwlly coming past.

To be fair, my early morning 150 mile motorway drive this week was lovely and quiet with everyone else off on holiday.

I don’t know if it has changed in the last 17 years, but when I was doing my driving lessons learners weren’t allowed on the motorway.

There is a consultation in place at present to stop young drivers* from driving at night. Whether that ever gets past or not is undoubtedly up for debate.

*don’t know at what age/how long they’ve been driving.

There are plenty of 4 and 6 lane dual carriageways to practice on, which are motorways in all but name in terms of speed, lane discipline, slip-roads etc.

I’ve come to the conclusion over many years that if everyone concentrated on improving their own driving and not criticising everyone elses, then the roads would be much safer. Better anticipation and observation would compensate for poor driving by others (after all, when was a mistake by someone else actually a surprise if you really thought about the warning signs?).

(This isn’t a rebuff to all the posts above, and yes I do get frustrated at inconsiderate or ignorant driving, and yes I do make mistakes (too many for my liking). I like to think of motorway driving a but like a game of chess: how many manoeuvres can you predict before they happen……I think it should be at around 6 or 7, but for most it will be around 1 to 3. It’s a sign of tiredness also when things start becoming a surprise.

I genuinely feel sorry for most of you who have posted on here..my typical commute from North West Northumberland down to Tyneside leaving at 6.30a.m each weekday for the first 25 miles has me seeing an average of less than 6 vehicles in front of me ..travelling at whatever speed takes my fancy ..things change when I join the A69 dual carriageway which gradually gets busier the closer you get to the A1 West of Newcastle ..but I only join this for approx half a mile before taking a minor road alongside the River Tyne ..and up through Gateshead to my destination ..
Setting off 30 mins later is a different kettle of fish though !

As mentioned earlier driving on French motorways is a delight, everyone indicating properly, pulling back into the lane once overtaking, not racing along at 110, so much for the UK driver to learn here. And the motorways are so well maintained but that’s a different story.

Yesterday I saw one driver come out the station car park and try to drive the wrong way round a one way system, then she looped round the street parked up and within a few minutes had reversed out of her parking space into a parked car – with the owner sat inside it. That’s 2 incidents from one driver in a matter of minutes

It’s hard to believe but the UK has extremely low casualty rates compared with most of the world. But that doesn’t stop the idiots on BMWs, Audis and Mercs driving right up to your boot in the hope of intimidating you to move over, rushing up to junctions in the hope of intimidating you to let them out, or undertaking on motorways and nipping in in front of you. Driving nowadays has become more like self-defence than ever before, while negotiating a real-life game of Grand Theft Auto.

If you drive regularly on French autoroutes at the rush hour near any conurbation, you’ll see exactly the same things that you regularly see on UK motorways. Yes, the bits in-between are far less congested than the UK so there’s more space between cars, but they’re just as likely not to bother signalling before changing lanes, or just sitting in the middle lane for 250kms.

As mentioned earlier driving on French motorways is a delight

1. wait till August.

2. TBF, France is twice the size of the UK, with roughly the same amount of folk in it, it’s not surprising that it’s m-ways are less fraught.

I’ve come to the conclusion over many years that if everyone concentrated on improving their own driving and not criticising everyone elses, then the roads would be much safer.

Not just driving though is it?

Tailgating gets on me nerves when I speed up to create a gap they speed up to reduce the gap.

You’re doing it wrong. You don’t speed up to increase the gap behind, you slow down to increase the gap (your braking distance) ahead. If they don’t get the message you keep slowing down.

I find imagining that I have the power to make people poo themselves helps in most stressful driving situations… middle lane hoggers soon pull over, tailgaiters slow down dramatically, queue jumpers and undertakers have something to take their minds off the oh so important act of getting ahead.. 😁