Matt Cooper - Driving in Hard Shoulder

I.S.T.

GreeBo wrote: »

The clue is in the word you used. Quotes. I was quoting Zulu's other posts.
"If you were to read a book or two you would see it a lot"; GreeBo said, shaking his head sadly.

"Quotes are also used to indicate words used ironically, with reservations, or in some unusual way."
There, I did it again. Now if you are a good little minion you can run along and google that quote to see where I got it from.


"Fail" from Zulu et al (c) 2008

Is your boss paying you to post all this hot air? 25 posts on one subject in one day????

Alun

AudiChris wrote: »

I think it's fair at this point to say that I think you should mind your tone GreeBo, you seem to be making a lot of personal comments/attacks in your posts.

+1 And that from someone who admonished me for "attacking the poster" about 2 gazillion posts ago as well :rolleyes:

GreeBo

IrishSpeedTraps wrote: »

Is your boss paying you to post all this hot air? 25 posts on one subject in one day????

Yes I am paying myself for today.
Would you like fries with that?

P.C.

GreeBo wrote: »

There are supposed to be two sides to a debate, otherwise it gets very silent.

There aren't always two sides to a debate. Sometimes one side is just plain wrong. I oppose child pornography, for example. care to deabte that one?

GreeBo

P.C. wrote: »

There aren't always two sides to a debate. Sometimes one side is just plain wrong. I oppose child pornography, for example. care to deabte that one?

If you dont have more than one side then its not a debate. In this scenario we do have two sides so its a debate. Personally Im not willing to debate for child pornography so you wont get a debate from me.

FYI its perfectly normal for people to take opposing sides of a debate whether or not they happen to believe in their side. Thats how you learn how to debate.

Esel

GreeBo wrote: »

The point I was making was that if you are checking your mirror prior to overtaking 1) you are not going to have the same reaction times as if you were just following the guy in front. and 2) you will be accelerating as part of your overtaking, again reducing your breaking distance.

No. Mirror, signal, mirror, manouevre. You should not be looking in your mirror while overtaking.

Zulu

GreeBo wrote: »

If you dont have more than one side then its not a debate. In this scenario we do have two sides so its a debate. Personally Im not willing to debate for child pornography so you wont get a debate from me.

FYI its perfectly normal for people to take opposing sides of a debate whether or not they happen to believe in their side. Thats how you learn how to debate.

esel wrote: »

No. Mirror, signal, mirror, manouevre. You should not be looking in your mirror while overtaking.

+1

@GreeBo: Fail.

GreeBo

esel wrote: »

No. Mirror, signal, mirror, manouevre. You should not be looking in your mirror while overtaking.

GreeBo wrote:

The point I was making was that if you are checking your mirror prior to overtaking

Did you see it this time? Do I need to make that bigger or provide a definition?

Zulu wrote:

@GreeBo: Fail.

Double beating for you for not researching your quote before silly responses.

Zulu

GreeBo wrote: »

Double beating for you for not researching your quote before silly responses.

Meh, in for a penny, in for a pound-ing! :pac:

oddone

This was quite a contentious thread by the looks of things but rather than start a new one I just wanted to ask a related question on lane discipline.

I was driving to Dublin from Limerick on the M7 recently.

After passing the Naas turn off where the motorway merges from two
lanes into three I found myself in lane two (or the middle lane for some)
as there was traffic merging from a slip road to my left (not sure what junction that is) and other traffic passing in the outside overtaking lane.

From driving at approx 120kph on the M7 I had to drop my speed to just over 100kph as I notice (for some strange reason) the speed limit reverts to 100k on this new three lane stretch from Naas to Dublin.

This was at approx 10am and the road was busy but not too bad.

As soon as I got the chance I moved into lane one occasionally using lane
two to overtake a number of slower moving tipping lorries and a few who were incapable of driving at over 50mph ()on this excellent road surface.

However here's where it gets frustrating:
Whilst in lane one and driving along at approx 61-64mph, lane two literally filled up with cars doing the same speed who were driving parallel to me
whilst as usual you had your cars for whom the speed limit does not seemingly apply hogging the overtaking lane 3 speeding and not moving back in.
I had a bit of clear road to the next car in front of me at one point and was quite happy as I was making good time and as I don't traverse that route all that often was thinking what a grand stretch of road it was, however next thing there's a jeep who has pulled out up ahead who is moving much slower than me, I check my mirrors in plenty of time (as I know I will have to overtake this vehicle to avoid having to slow down considerably), as above, my mirror is full of lane two hoggers literally bumper to bumper, the car nearest to mine (I'm in lane one) is behind me probably moving a few mph slower but I am approaching the slow moving jeep quite rapidly and wish to make my manoeuvre :
X |
| |
| B
| |
A |

The jeep is represented by X above, I am behind in A
and the car to my right is B.
B is driving slower than me in lane two, I am now up behind the jeep
and have been forced to lower my speed to maintain a gap between me and the vehicle in front (the jeep).
The car in lane two (B) is quite content to carry on at approx 55mph (I'm guessing) whilst he is being continually overtaken by those behind him
(cars are coming up behind him in lane two at greater speed and overtaking using lane 3 before cutting back into lane 2 in front of him up ahead.
So here is why staying in lane one is impossible in this country due to the lack of common sense of others.
So I have two choices, I can 'undertake' the car in lane two by speeding up, meaning I will have to be within a few feet of the jeep so i can merge into lane two ahead of the car that is alongside me or I can grit my teeth, come off the gas considerably and lose time waiting until the continous stream of middle lane hoggers have gone by and I can safely overtake the jeep in front.
Putting my right indicator on illustrating to to those in lane 2 that I wish/need to merge into that stretch to overtake didn't work either as the cars in lane two were too concentrated on maintaining their own speeds and had no interest in allowing me the time or space to safely make my move plus the fact that the 3 lanes were getting busier and busier and they could probably not have safely moved into lane 3 to allow me out either as it was chock-a-block too.
In the end I had to allow a long stream of cars go by in lane two before eventually being able to overtake swiftly and safely before moving back into lane one.
But this is just a small example, I try to obey the ROTR and be a safe driver as much as possible but it's easy to understand why there is such poor lane discipline and why we have lane hoggers, (please understand that I am not advocating it in anyway as it is one of my biggest sources of frustration when on the roads) as trying to obey the rules and do the right thing is often made impossible by the ignorance or lack of common sense of others.
So I lost a few minutes and I got there safely albeit minus a few hairs but I had been reading this thread
a few nights before and I remember saying to myself that I can see why some who had admitted staying in lane two
as this was the only way to could make time / progress had done so.

Steve

I landed in California a few hours ago and drove form the airport to the hotel. There is no 'no undertaking' rule here and it works very well. You pick a lane according to your ability to drive and how far your exit is. Nobody gets upset and it generally seems to work well.

I really wish lane discipline law could be clarified in Ireland.

cyclopath2001

SteveC wrote: »

I really wish lane discipline law could be clarified in Ireland.

The law is fairly clear:

1: Drive on the left.
2: Yield to traffic in other lane when changing lane.
3: Don't overtake on the inside unless traffic to the right is 'slow-moving'.
4: Be considerate to others.
5: Don't be evil.

We have many other laws that are even simpler, such as stop on amber, don't park on the footpath and don't exceed the speed limit. Despite the clarity of these laws, they're ignored.

I don't think the clarity of the law is really the problem.

Capt'n Midnight

SteveC wrote: »

I landed in California a few hours ago and drove form the airport to the hotel. There is no 'no undertaking' rule here and it works very well. You pick a lane according to your ability to drive and how far your exit is. Nobody gets upset and it generally seems to work well.

there are 6,800 of these
enforcing the law and chances are if you hit someone they could be armed
in Florida drivers are allowed shot you if you get out of the car and walk over to exchange details !

GreeBo

I had a long spell on the m50 yesterday and stayed in lane 1 unless overtaking or letting someone merge on. I spent about 50% of this journey boxed into lane 1 by drivers in lane 2 going at the same or a slower speed than I was.
To overtake them I had to slow right down to let them pass in and then wait for every car behind me to overtake.

I dont think driving in lane 2 is the problem, its driving too slowly in lane 2 that causes (me) issues.

Wibbler

GreeBo wrote: »

I had a long spell on the m50 yesterday and stayed in lane 1 unless overtaking or letting someone merge on. I spent about 50% of this journey boxed into lane 1 by drivers in lane 2 going at the same or a slower speed than I was.
To overtake them I had to slow right down to let them pass in and then wait for every car behind me to overtake.

I dont think driving in lane 2 is the problem, its driving too slowly in lane 2 that causes (me) issues.

I'm not backing the right lane hoggers here, but:

For the two lane sections of the M50, congestion usually means that the overtaking lane becomes a de-facto driving lane and as such there will be times when conditions cause it to move slower than the left lane.

Also, with both lanes chockers, it's not as easy to find a safe opening to slip back into the left lane so folks tend to stay put in the right lane for longer.

randomer

I was on the M50 last night, and it was fairly empty. I found it funny that everytime I saw a car coming onto the road, they went straight from the merging lane to the overtaking lane even though there was no traffic in the driving lane.

There is a perception out there that the right lane is the "fast lane", and this is a big part of the problem.

Omcd

Might have been said before, as I havn't time to read all this thread, but heres my two cents worth :

IMO bad road design is partly to blame for encouraging drivers to keep to the middle lane on three lane dual carraigeways rather than to the left lane. Take the Naas Road for example, so many entrances onto it with sub standard merge lanes, and cretins who appear to think just because they are coming out of a filling station with little or no merge lane it gives them the right of way to chug almost point blank straight out in front of traffic coming down the leftmost lane at 100k (with no space to righthand lane to change into) rather than to be patient and wait for a safe gap. Also Red Cow interchange, there are short merge lanes coming out of tight spirals which dont give traffic enough room to speed up appropriately before they have to merge.

GreeBo

Wibbler wrote: »

I'm not backing the right lane hoggers here, but:

For the two lane sections of the M50, congestion usually means that the overtaking lane becomes a de-facto driving lane and as such there will be times when conditions cause it to move slower than the left lane.

Also, with both lanes chockers, it's not as easy to find a safe opening to slip back into the left lane so folks tend to stay put in the right lane for longer.

For me, in the 2 lane sections all bets are off. Everyone in lane 1 is at least doing 60kph, obeying ROTR to the letter (including speed limits) would mean lane 2 is empty.

/edit by 2-lane I mean the parts currently being updated to 3. Not the existing untouched 2-lane sections.