I pride myself on trying to be a
good, responsible, courteous driver, giving way when needed, keeping a safe following distance, accelerating and braking
evenly, and I try to keep up, as much as possible, with the general flow of
traffic.
I think though I cannot tolerate is
slow drivers, and an American car journalist correctly labeled them as the
Anti-Destination league. People who given enough road, would start accelerating
slowly, and then continue to accelerate until they hit the to speed, causing
enough havoc along the way to allow some authorities to institutionalize you,
people who are on the road for no apparent reason. They also have member who
insists on driving in the fast lane, way below the minimum speed limit. Rightly
so, in some countries they are fined, as it is equally as dangerous for people
to drive too slow.
Like I said, I am considerate,
and understand if you are in an unfamiliar surrounding, I completely understand
you are nervous, and don’t have the confidence you need to be on the road.
Overly cautious driving, and slow driving can be dangerous. These people tend
to be selfish, hogging a lane, and creeping along at snail pace, braking for
absolutely no reason, causing you, the frustrated person behind them, to brake,
and this has a chain effect, right through the car stuck in the line 25 kilometers
behind you.
Driving slow or over cautious in
my opinion is more dangerous than speeding, because the behaviour of these drivers
are unpredictable. Now before you stop reading, I am stating slow drivers, and
not drivers who keep to the imposed speed limits. Yesterday I was stuck behind
a lady in a Toyota Fortuner for 15 minutes. There was ample time to turn into
the main road, but every time she pulls off, she brakes, hard! Rolls back, and
waits again, and only a good 30 seconds later the car she is waiting for
passes.
The queue behind me was backed up
all the way for around 500 meters, and this is usually a very quiet road. What
happened next? People started getting fed up, climbing the sidewalks, holding a
competition on whose hooter makes the most sound, and throwing fingers out the
window. Yet this lady stayed. When she finally did let go, she nearly caused 3
accidents, because instead of driving off like a normal person, she was crawling
at 30 km/h over a blind hill, right at the spot where she is supposed to be doing
60. Her indicators also didn’t work.
In the US alone, a study reveals
that nearly a third of drivers were in a near miss situation because of slow
drivers, and in the worst case, you would be found guilty of the accident,
because proving you were speeding (while overtaking) is easier than proving she
was going slow.
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