Torquemonster
Enthusiast
Some great posts here.
The fact is on the unlimited speed autobahns in Europe the road toll is much less than in the USA or here in NZ per mile driven/vehicles on road. However - that does not mean it would be the case if both our countries adopted the same policies on the better roads.... for reasons outlined above...
In Europe - there are two lanes for travelling and a third is for speed or overtaking. If you dick around on the third lane and don't keep an eye on your rear vision mirror at all times and move over well in advance - you become public enemy number one - NOT THE SPEEDSTER.
The psyche of US and NZ drivers however is to "compete" therefore we get brainless thoughts in drivers heads like "If 75mph is good enough for me its good enough for the punk behind me!" As long as that kind of spirit lies in the minds of many drivers it would be chaos to open up the road laws without major re-education.
Then there is another fact that no one here has touched on: Not all drivers are as competent as you are, in fact the vast majority of drivers would not be capable of safely handling a controlled slide or a crisis defensive driving situation, or anything out of the ordinary for them. This does not make them dick heads or morons - they either simply do not have the judgement to access approaching speeds that you take for granted, nor the judgement to cope with too many things happening around them at once. They may be very good at other things - but in this they have all the can cope with just driving normally. It may be they are not able to drive a lot better due to the way their brain functions, or it may be they have simply never been taught - whatever - when you fly past one of these drivers twice their speed - it might be safe as houses to you - but it scares the absolute **** out of them.
They did not know to glance at their rear view mirror every 7 seconds, so did not know you were behind. The sound and visual as you flash by panics them - especially if you (like I have so many times - its taken me 20 years to work out - thanks to my wife
that it frightens people) cut back in quickly after you pass. Even though you have not cut them off as you are going so much faster and there is no way they could hit you once passed.
What do people do when they panic?
They may swerve in fright - and might do anything irrational.
That is why some of them ph the cops - to us it was a walk in the park and we passed grandma or [******] along the way. To them it seemed like we were on a death march. Their brain just cannot cope with the speed we drove at. And that could be your sweet old grandma you love dearly or it could be the executive next door who simply can't drive like you and can't therefore comprehend how you can do that safely.
Lesson - be considerate of others when we come across traffic. People who have driven fast like us on this board (I've driven literally hundreds of thousands
of miles at speeds averaging over 80mph and many of those over 100mph thru twisty turns and mostly on what you would call secondary 2 lane - 1 each way roads) have a totally different mental reference to driving than Jo average who has abided by the speed limit plus a bit at times. When we came up behind them to pass at warp 9 - they have no clue we're coming. And we wondered why they would sometimes pull suddenly out in front of us to pass something in front of them while we used all our driving experience to scrub off enough speed to avoid rear-ending them and cursing their stupidity!
YES they did a stupid thing to pull out without looking - here's the point - GET OVER IT! That is what we have to deal with and thank God we survived our stupid years... if we are good drivers we have to drive taking into account the most stupid person in front of us or alongside us. That's the burden we must carry - thinking for the thoughtless drivers around us - if we wish to aovid a posible accident we didn't expect.
When the road is open however and the visibility good - hey - lets enjoy our freedom - and hope no cop is lying in wait.
re being a tittle tat - I'm the last to worry about reasonably competent fast driving - however I have called the cops once for dangerous driving - a lunatic in a hot V8 saloon and a woman (his wife?) passed me at warp speed into oncoming traffic - a huge semi! The truck swerved to the shoulder I did the same - [******] shot thru the middle and if we hadn't done that he would have been jellimeat into 42 ton of truck. If that wasn't enough - I caught this guy up 15 minutes later (he was not a young punk - he looked like a businessman) - he got caught behind traffic - a max sized B-Train (a 34 wheeler 2 trailer semi)... so what does our hero do - he powers his V8 out to pass this 60ft rig into a blind sweeper - only to find another semi coming the other way - this time he literally gets crossed up with smoke coming off the tires as he flicks the car sideways between the two rigs, straightens up then disappears into the distance. I was appalled and very angry - all i could think was "my wife and children could be in the next car this guy heads towards"....
what happened? Nothing. The cops took the call, promised to look into it - nothing happened. Too busy revenue collecting.
Ever notice that police rate performance by decreases in crime by % - except for traffic - where they privately judge performance by dollars collected.... more fine dollars does not equal lower death toll or less accidents.
The fact is on the unlimited speed autobahns in Europe the road toll is much less than in the USA or here in NZ per mile driven/vehicles on road. However - that does not mean it would be the case if both our countries adopted the same policies on the better roads.... for reasons outlined above...
In Europe - there are two lanes for travelling and a third is for speed or overtaking. If you dick around on the third lane and don't keep an eye on your rear vision mirror at all times and move over well in advance - you become public enemy number one - NOT THE SPEEDSTER.
The psyche of US and NZ drivers however is to "compete" therefore we get brainless thoughts in drivers heads like "If 75mph is good enough for me its good enough for the punk behind me!" As long as that kind of spirit lies in the minds of many drivers it would be chaos to open up the road laws without major re-education.
Then there is another fact that no one here has touched on: Not all drivers are as competent as you are, in fact the vast majority of drivers would not be capable of safely handling a controlled slide or a crisis defensive driving situation, or anything out of the ordinary for them. This does not make them dick heads or morons - they either simply do not have the judgement to access approaching speeds that you take for granted, nor the judgement to cope with too many things happening around them at once. They may be very good at other things - but in this they have all the can cope with just driving normally. It may be they are not able to drive a lot better due to the way their brain functions, or it may be they have simply never been taught - whatever - when you fly past one of these drivers twice their speed - it might be safe as houses to you - but it scares the absolute **** out of them.
They did not know to glance at their rear view mirror every 7 seconds, so did not know you were behind. The sound and visual as you flash by panics them - especially if you (like I have so many times - its taken me 20 years to work out - thanks to my wife
that it frightens people) cut back in quickly after you pass. Even though you have not cut them off as you are going so much faster and there is no way they could hit you once passed.What do people do when they panic?
They may swerve in fright - and might do anything irrational.
That is why some of them ph the cops - to us it was a walk in the park and we passed grandma or [******] along the way. To them it seemed like we were on a death march. Their brain just cannot cope with the speed we drove at. And that could be your sweet old grandma you love dearly or it could be the executive next door who simply can't drive like you and can't therefore comprehend how you can do that safely.
Lesson - be considerate of others when we come across traffic. People who have driven fast like us on this board (I've driven literally hundreds of thousands
of miles at speeds averaging over 80mph and many of those over 100mph thru twisty turns and mostly on what you would call secondary 2 lane - 1 each way roads) have a totally different mental reference to driving than Jo average who has abided by the speed limit plus a bit at times. When we came up behind them to pass at warp 9 - they have no clue we're coming. And we wondered why they would sometimes pull suddenly out in front of us to pass something in front of them while we used all our driving experience to scrub off enough speed to avoid rear-ending them and cursing their stupidity!
YES they did a stupid thing to pull out without looking - here's the point - GET OVER IT! That is what we have to deal with and thank God we survived our stupid years... if we are good drivers we have to drive taking into account the most stupid person in front of us or alongside us. That's the burden we must carry - thinking for the thoughtless drivers around us - if we wish to aovid a posible accident we didn't expect.
When the road is open however and the visibility good - hey - lets enjoy our freedom - and hope no cop is lying in wait.
re being a tittle tat - I'm the last to worry about reasonably competent fast driving - however I have called the cops once for dangerous driving - a lunatic in a hot V8 saloon and a woman (his wife?) passed me at warp speed into oncoming traffic - a huge semi! The truck swerved to the shoulder I did the same - [******] shot thru the middle and if we hadn't done that he would have been jellimeat into 42 ton of truck. If that wasn't enough - I caught this guy up 15 minutes later (he was not a young punk - he looked like a businessman) - he got caught behind traffic - a max sized B-Train (a 34 wheeler 2 trailer semi)... so what does our hero do - he powers his V8 out to pass this 60ft rig into a blind sweeper - only to find another semi coming the other way - this time he literally gets crossed up with smoke coming off the tires as he flicks the car sideways between the two rigs, straightens up then disappears into the distance. I was appalled and very angry - all i could think was "my wife and children could be in the next car this guy heads towards"....
what happened? Nothing. The cops took the call, promised to look into it - nothing happened. Too busy revenue collecting.
Ever notice that police rate performance by decreases in crime by % - except for traffic - where they privately judge performance by dollars collected.... more fine dollars does not equal lower death toll or less accidents.
