Whilst on the way to my mums today I got involved in road rage....
I pulled up behind a car at a set of traffic lights, the driver got out and tried to open my car door, which I tried to keep open, and started shouting at me then her son got out and threatened me!!!!
So I took their reg. no. down and phoned 101, and being where I was had a choice of 3 police forces, Hampshire, Surrey or Thames Valley, but as it happened the road I was on "belonged" to Thames Valley, so I gave a description and the reg. no. to the police and their sending an officer around tomorrow to get a statement......
As far as I know I did absolutely nothing wrong other than pull up behind her :evil:
The police said with the info and descriptions I gave they'll be able to follow this up as they said on the phone theres no such thing as road rage but bad driving or assault and they class this as verbal assault!!!
:o
These things should not happen the world is getting worse when it comes to crackpots, you did the right thing contacting the Police because you may have saved someone else copping abuse.
Quote from: Tackleberry on January 14, 2012, 08:12:39 PM
I pulled up behind a car at a set of traffic lights, the driver got out and tried to open my car door, which I tried to keep open, and started shouting at me then her son got out and threatened me!!!!
Who said women are the fairer sex ::) In my experience it's usually a bloke who gets road rage but, hey, I s'pose we all lose our cool now and then but my temper is always expressed in the car in either foul language or single digit gesticulation. I would never dream of getting out of the car and hurling abuse. I never even did that when some fool ran into the back of my car.
Quote from: newportnobby on January 14, 2012, 08:33:47 PM
Quote from: Tackleberry on January 14, 2012, 08:12:39 PM
I pulled up behind a car at a set of traffic lights, the driver got out and tried to open my car door, which I tried to keep open, and started shouting at me then her son got out and threatened me!!!!
Who said women are the fairer sex ::) In my experience it's usually a bloke who gets road rage but, hey, I s'pose we all lose our cool now and then but my temper is always expressed in the car in either foul language or single digit gesticulation. I would never dream of getting out of the car and hurling abuse. I never even did that when some fool ran into the back of my car.
Crikey Nobby you are gamer than me I just swear to myself these days, don't give the finger anymore just in case some thug shoves it where the sun don't shine.
I always remember when my niece was 7, I was giving her and her mum a lift one day and she asked 'Uncle Mick - what's a d**khead?' When I asked her where she'd heard that she replied 'Mummy says it all the time in the car' :smiley-laughing:
Seen plenty of road rage as a coach driver, and it's certainly getting worse! A lot of motorists (let's NOT call them drivers!) are completely ignorant of the highway code and the general rules of the road. Down here in Devon a lot of our A roads are single carraigeway, and people don't seem to realise that although cars are allowed to do 60mph, buses and coaches are only allowed to do 50mph, and articulated lorries are only allowed to do 40mph. This results in a lot of impatient motorists taking dangerous risks overtaking lorries and coaches, with a lot of serious head on collisions. 9 times out of 10, these impatient people are holidaymakers, often with kids in the car, and what's the rush, they're on holiday? ??? The 1 in 10 others tend to be people who think "I didn't pay £40,000 for my BMW/Merc etc to sit behind a stinking lorry/bus" These people are some of the most aggressive I have ever encountered, they will do absolutely anything to get past, with no consideration for oncoming traffic, often with appaling disregard for their own or anyone elses safety, and all too often we have to compensate for these morons actions >:( I must admit, it's got to the point now that I get a morbid satisfaction when I see someone behave like this, then a mile or two down the road see them wrapped around a tree :evil:
Not that I would wish an accident on anyone, but as a Sales Rep (yeh - all mouth and motorway) driving several thousands of miles a year I do see some seriously poor driving on all kinds of road, usually by people you would consider experienced or by people who have no idea how to drive on a motorway. I don't think any one section of drivers is particularly to blame. My attitude is better safe than sorry and I always allow plenty of time to get where I'm going as I'd rather sit for ½ an hour outside the customers premises than be driving dangerously to hit an appointment. As a Rep I've driven the equivalent of going to the moon and back twice, and have always had a clean licence. I want to keep it that way.
Overtaken by a Range Rover last week on my own road, while I was signalling right for the driveway, driving past a primary school and doing the permitted limit of 30mph...
On my first ever motorway journey, I was cruising along in the middle lane and got undertook by some d**khead in a massive range rover who must of been doing at least 90.
About 10 miles later, saw the same range rover parked up in the hard shoulder with a police car parked up behind it :smiley-laughing: :smiley-laughing: :smiley-laughing: :smiley-laughing:.
Don't get me started on motorway driving! Yes, Range Rover drivers are complete idiots, and worse still, Discovery drivers with 20 foot caravans! Coaches have speed limiters fitted, max 62 mph, yet the limit for cars towing is 60mph, lost count of the number of times I have been doing 62, and been overtaken by Landrover Discovery with said caravan doing probably 80+mph, then 10 miles down the M4 or 5 being held up for hours while the motorway wombles clear up the now wrecked car/caravan. Just before xmas on the M5 I was overtaken by Discovery, towing a horsebox, with a young ponytailed girl driving it past Gordano services, got down to just before Weston super Mare junction to find the traffic crawling, said Discovery on it's roof facing the wrong way, and bits of dead horse all over the carraigeway, I was carrying a group of schoolchildren, not a nice sight for them either :thumbsdown:
What i don't understand is why someone can take driving lessons and pass their test without once going on a motorway and then drive on the fastest stretches of road in the country without any experience........
Oh and people driving in the middle lane whilst overtaking nothing forcing other drivers into the outside lane really P@#s me off..........
I did motorway lessons with my driving instructor after passing my test. Although it was only 2 hours, I couldn't imagine driving on the motorway without that guidance!
One of the most dangerous thing I have witnessed on a motorway is someone stuck in the middle lane doing no more than 50mph! :o
Quote from: cookiescrumble on January 15, 2012, 12:35:51 PM
On my first ever motorway journey, I was cruising along in the middle lane and got undertook by some d**khead in a massive range rover who must of been doing at least 90.
About 10 miles later, saw the same range rover parked up in the hard shoulder with a police car parked up behind it :smiley-laughing: :smiley-laughing: :smiley-laughing: :smiley-laughing:.
Cookies,
Please don't take this the wrong way, but why were you 'cruising along in the middle lane'. If you'd been in the inside lane then the Range Rover driver wouldn't have had to undertake you!!!!! I know he was speeding and that is probably the reason why he was pulled, not for undertaking.
CLOD's or Centre Lane Only Drivers are the only people who really do p155 me off big style. I always pull over to the inside lane whenever I can, and I do 'cruise' along at about 80 useing my cruise control, and the amount of times I have to cross from the inside lane to the 2nd overtaking lane and back to the inside lane is ridiculous.
TGhe Police should be pulling these people over and doing them for 'driving without due car and attention', but the lack of Traffic Plod and the reliance on cameras is one of the reasons these idiots get away with it.
Right I'll get of my high horse now. ;) ;)
Regards
Neal.
P.S. I'm like Newportbobby and travel many many miles in a year, but as a Field Service Engineer.
What gets me is all the young boy racers who pull up alongside me and think they can entice me into racing them, just because I am pottering along in the slow lane trying to conserve fuel(Keeping it off boost) and just under the legal speed limit but knowing I have the power if I need it to get past something, unless a four lane stretch aka M25 round the Heathrow/Staines area when I use lane 2 or 3 depending on how busy it is with lorries.
I always thought the middle lane was for overtaking anyway. The outside lane for the suicide drivers.
Quote from: Calnefoxile on January 15, 2012, 01:47:56 PM
Quote from: cookiescrumble on January 15, 2012, 12:35:51 PM
On my first ever motorway journey, I was cruising along in the middle lane and got undertook by some d**khead in a massive range rover who must of been doing at least 90.
About 10 miles later, saw the same range rover parked up in the hard shoulder with a police car parked up behind it :smiley-laughing: :smiley-laughing: :smiley-laughing: :smiley-laughing:.
Cookies,
Please don't take this the wrong way, but why were you 'cruising along in the middle lane'. If you'd been in the inside lane then the Range Rover driver wouldn't have had to undertake you!!!!! I know he was speeding and that is probably the reason why he was pulled, not for undertaking.
CLOD's or Centre Lane Only Drivers are the only people who really do p155 me off big style. I always pull over to the inside lane whenever I can, and I do 'cruise' along at about 80 useing my cruise control, and the amount of times I have to cross from the inside lane to the 2nd overtaking lane and back to the inside lane is ridiculous.
TGhe Police should be pulling these people over and doing them for 'driving without due car and attention', but the lack of Traffic Plod and the reliance on cameras is one of the reasons these idiots get away with it.
Right I'll get of my high horse now. ;) ;)
Regards
Neal.
P.S. I'm like Newportbobby and travel many many miles in a year, but as a Field Service Engineer.
I was there, as the overhead sign posts told me I needed to be in that lane, to get to the place I wanted to get to ;). I don't hog the middle lane just for the fun of it, as I understand the nuisance it can cause....
Sorry for my post causing offence. Even as it was my first motorway journey on my own (well, with 3 mates in the car), I took what my instructor told me on board :).
I did further lessons after i passed to learn the Motorway too, and i encouraged my kids to do the same.
When i lived in Leicestershire in the 90 s the Police had a big thing about drivers pootling in the middle lane. They were on TV and all telling people they would get pulled over. It was funny to see them leaving 80-odd mph speeders alone and waiting for the middle lane hoggers. IMO it was quite right because 50mph in the middle lane is a major hazard.
But if we're talking about bad driving... Here in North Carolina the majority of drivers (male and female) are on the phone (it's not actually illegal yet - but since they are only driving and have 'nothing better to do' they call their mom), they dont indicate, they only use their mirror to see if their hair is looking good and they only use the windows to see if it's raining. I am amazed there arent more accidents. It's not surprising though when you know how simple the test is, i dont think that a 16yo has to learn any more than to make the car go forwards, backwards and stop, and what the road signs mean. The test takes about 10 minutes and 5 of that is getting to a nice quite car park to do the manoevers! Having done an advanced driving course, i am now putting all those "defensive" skills into practice constantly on the road here.
I'm sure it's not as bad as what i hear about Italy though. And the 4-way stop wouldnt work in the UK!
Quote from: Dock Shunter on January 15, 2012, 01:23:33 PM
What i don't understand is why someone can take driving lessons and pass their test without once going on a motorway and then drive on the fastest stretches of road in the country without any experience........
Because no politician dares to fight the road lobby. If they did then the thousands of deaths a year would lead to evidence based policy making. Mowing someone down carelessly being an offence with years in jail, speeding getting you a proper sized fine, 20mph zones would be come standard, cars would get speed limiters and so on.
It's really sad how scared they are. Our local council took over traffic wardens and did it's best to minimise their impact because they got lobbied by shops "it'll ruin our business" and the like. Now they are being lobbied by locals to set the wardens loose, in volume down all the permanently blocked up residential roads. Half the reason the roads by the shops are blocked is that the shop workers all park outside the shops too.
Grrr
Another stupidity is that you can get a driving license, not drive since your test for many years, then get into a car and drive. Legally I can do that. I've not driven (for medical reasons) for 20 years. Now I'm passed as fit to drive I can just walk down the road, buy a car, and go on the motorway. Likewise you can drive a mini for thirty years, get to 50, have the required crisis and drive a Ferrari with no training !
On the other hand - in most other equivalent situations I'd be obliged to show a continuous experience, vehicle familiarity and basic route knowledge.
Alan
Best roadrage i have ever experianced hapened on the way to work once, we were just outside sandown racecourse and the woman driving our minibus realised she was in the wrong lane so indicated and started manouvering to the left, she couldnt see at the time the taxi driver going far to fast planning on doing the same manouver with no idication and undertaking her in the process,
the taxi driver slammed on the anchors and hit the curb edge coming to a stop just behind us and not making contact with our vehicle, the driver immediately jumped out his car and stormed up to the drivers door of our minibus and started punching the window and shouting expletives at her to get out of the van,,,
this was the not very wise move,,,
in his fit of rage he didnt even seem to notice that I and my 8 colleagues all experianced doorman had got out of the van and had taken possition eitherside of him,,,,
the deflation of the look on his face was so priceless i nearly laughed at the time, i have never seen someone go from complete utter rage to slightly wetting themself to then offering to pay for any damage done to our vehicle without infact hitting it,,,
due to police presence for the event we were working at police quickly noticed the traffic incident and a police bike arrived and once told what happened the driver was gone over with a fine tooth comb and we were free to go,,
the biggest road rage often come from the smallest minds
My instructor took me on to the A1 from Northallerton to Darlington, scared the holy wotsit out of me but a great part of the learning process
Well I was driving or about to drive back when the motorways started up. 1st time I encounted them was going on a short holiday with my father driving up to the lake district.
2 lengths...Preston and Lancaster byepasses designated M6 made travelling easier. Father insisted sticking to the centre lane with foot flat on the floor (about 95 MPH)ball the way up both stretches of road. Now that wasn`t to bad but we had a 15foot single and a16 foot long double kayak strapped on a cheapy roofrack on the top.
By the time we got off the M way I was we***ng myself every time a gust of wind hit us.
My 1st driving on a motorway was without any instruction,rough idea of where it would take us and pure luck so I learned the hardway what Mways were all about :o
Quote from: Oldman on January 15, 2012, 01:56:24 PM
I always thought the middle lane was for overtaking anyway. The outside lane for the suicide drivers.
And you are right......until you get an artic doing 56½mph overtaking one in the slow lane doing 56mph, or come across a pillock tootling along in the middle lane (I will not undertake, don't trust em to stay put). I too am fed up with going from lane 1 to 3 and back again to 1 >:(
There just seem to be some drivers who think the outside lane is just for them too, and then there are those who just love to jink in and out of all lanes - grrr >:(
Unfortunately you can blame the E.U for trucks being restricted to 56mph (80kph) on motorways, and some companies (Tesco) restrict their trucks to 52mph , and some are even locked down to 50mph in a pathetic effort to save a few pence worth of fuel :thumbsdown:, so the guys who can do 56 will try and get past the slower trucks, as their tachographs (More E.U. crap >:() eats up their working day. Life on the road for truckers and coach drivers is a nightmare these days, and selfish car drivers who recklessly overtake, then cut in front and brake hard as they're coming off at the slip road really hack us off >:( As Jeremy Clarkson said, 3,000 people a year die or are seriously injured on British roads every year, HOW is it so FEW???? ???
Don't bring Clarkson into this please, just thinking about him is enough to introduce road rage in the likes of me!
And if that's what he said, he's as wrong as he usually is. Latest statistic is 1910 killed and 24560 killed or seriously injured.
http://www.dft.gov.uk/statistics/releases/road-accidents-and-safety-quarterly-estimates-q2-2011 (http://www.dft.gov.uk/statistics/releases/road-accidents-and-safety-quarterly-estimates-q2-2011)
Like the man or loathe him (seems to be no middle ground with him!), he is right, how do so few people get killed when you see the madness on our roads, driving in central London, or Manchester or Birmingham is like being in a Mad Max film set, and the lunacy on our motorway system, beyond belief sometimes!
Clarkson has made a character of himself before the new incarnation of top gear he did alot of genuine documentary and jernolism work, and correct statistics or not he has a point it's ammazing more people don't die, nearby where I live we had 2 fatal accidents with 10 miles in the same week,
This video can be a bit much for some people it's a compilation of Australian newzealand and European road safety campaigns sewn together with footage of real RTA's and some police chase stuff,,,,
The following link shows graphically the consequences of wreck less driving a shock and awe if you will,,, sorry if anyone finds it distasteful but I think it should be shown to those who do not drive safely as an eye opener
http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DUTRcH4e84xE%26sns%3Dfb&sns=fb&v=UTRcH4e84xE&gl=GB (http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DUTRcH4e84xE%26sns%3Dfb&sns=fb&v=UTRcH4e84xE&gl=GB)
Quote from: hairygit on January 15, 2012, 07:22:07 PM
Unfortunately you can blame the E.U for trucks being restricted to 56mph (80kph)
However the fact that the few moronic truckers who like to fill both lines going at 55.995 mph and 56.002mph trying to overtake is not the EU's fault. For the difference in time it'll make they should just sit in line in the slow lane instead of waving at each other in the cabs.
Alan
hi all
having been a HGV Class 1 driver i can confirm to everyone out there that there are indeed some BAD wagon drivers out there or should i
call them LAZY ???
it is very easy to drive a wagon on our motorways, you just point it in the right direction and put your foot to the floor and let the limiter do what it is designed to do.
easing off and just following another hgv requires the driver to think and use his foot to operate the throttle
the one thing that really used to get my back up was cars in the first lane going 50mph meaning you had to overtake someone who is legally allowed to go faster than you but instead just saunter along looking at the scenery
also you have to remember that HGV'S have a tachograph fitted and the drivers only have a limited time to drive in a day so any delay in their journey could mean the difference between getting home or not
and don't get me started about the stupid supermarket chains limiting their fleet to 50mph to save fuel
if it is a long flat run then yes it does but if you are dealing with hills then the lack of momentum they have requires more fuel to get the wagon up a hill as the engine has to work even harder
this is just my point of view on the subject
dave :thumbsup:
I'm in total agreement, we have tachographs in our coaches too, and driving hours run down alarmingly fast at times. We are maybe lucky that our speed limiters are set to 62mph, but that is only because of the E.U., we were allowed to do 70 until they butted in! There is absolutely NO evidence that this is any safer than 70 in a coach, in fact, there have been more coach accidents since speed limiters were fitted, particularly with national express coaches where the timetables were not changed when speed limiters came in, resulting in drivers travelling too fast on slip roads and motorway interchanges (remember the one on the M4/M25 interchange about 5 years ago?) to try and maintain time? Trucks and coaches have never been safer with A.B.S as standard, so the E.U should keep it's nose out of our traffic system, maybe anyone who drives for a living should vote U.K. independance party next time :evil:, even David Cameron had the balls to stand and so no to the last lot of financial bile they tried to rope us into! ;D
Part of the reason for the standards dropping in relation to driving standards is this devil may care attitude and belief that the airbags in every part of a cars interior,coupled with abs brakes,traction control and electronic stability programs fools people into thinking they are invincible and cannot possibly be killed or injured whilst driving their big,posh,intelligent cars.
Ford based an earlyish ad campaign for the last shape mondeo with a thing called "intelligent protection system",which turned a lot of them into maniacs,Nissan did something similar with the Primera while Skoda did something truly outlandish.
Skoda came up with the best campaign when it just said,"Its a Skoda,honest".
No frills from them,no boasts it'll save my life if I drive like a race driver everywhere,its why I bought one.
Also,I have a long held belief,that as a bus driver,which is what I do at the moment,if I'm driving along a road towards a cliff with a sheer drop off it,someone in a car or van will overtake me to drive off the cliff first.It may seem a bit mad but one of the things lacking in peoples driving abilities these days is anticipation,or a total lack of it,and heing able to see further than the end of their car bonnets or headlamp beam,not reading the road and conditions.
A couple of years ago,as an example,Iwas stuck at the bottom of a hill,behind a colleague of mine who was stuck at some traffic lights and couldn't go anywhere due to snow making the hill impassable.So as we waited for our managers to come and supervise our safe reversing moves to clear the road,a chap in a Volvo V70 came round the corner just a bit too quickly.Now you could actually see the esp at work individually braking each wheel to keep it from losing control and crashing.The bloke was having an incident in his trousers as well by the look on his face and was relieved to get round without crashing.The bloke in the car behind who took the corner at the same speed in an older car did not fare so well though and ploughed straight into my colleagues bus.Donut was not a word we used to describe his incompetence,nor was it the police's word either.
The main problem is that no one seems to have the time these days and everything is a massive race against time.It needs to stop now.
Pete :NGaugersRule:
Just a few observations on the the comments so far.
There is no slow or fast lane. You should keep to the left unless overtaking. Motorways are the safest roads with around 3% of crashes. All you need to do is keep a safe following distance (2 seconds) and concentrate.
You will all be pleased to know that we driving instructors will be able to take our charges on to the motorway network sometime this year. (Date not yet set by Transport Minister). So if you see a driving school car on your local motorway he has'nt taken a wrong turn!
:o
its not just the fact that people just don't have time anymore
it't also the fact that there are so many non qualified drivers out on the roads its frightening
here's an example
a few years ago me and a co-worker took a tractor unit each over to hull docks to pick up 2 new trailers off a boat. We were a bit early so sat in my unit waiting for the trailers to be cleared :thumbsup:
10 mins later another tractor unit appeared and started to hitch up to another trailer
some 45mins later he had still not managed to hitch up so me and my mate went over to see why he was having so much trouble only to be told that he knew what he was doing and would we kindly leave him to get on with the task
anyway 5mins later he had hitched up and left the docks in which time we had done the decent thing and informed the police what we had just witnessed and that they may like to have a word with said driver
when we left the docks we came across said driver at the side of the road with the police
when it went to court it turned out that he was using his brothers license and wasn't even a full license holder for a car
now that was FRIGHTENING :o :o
dave :thumbsup:
I agree totally with the comments since my last post,
My car has ABS, AWD, and will break the speed limit from 30mph in less than 5 seconds but NO Airbags - they were not fitted to Japanese cars in 1994.
I know I could drive the car at it limits, but I also recognise my own limitations, even though I held a competition licence for many years and have seen so many close shaves .
I now try to plan journeys so I can have a break every 100 miles even if only for 10 minutes.
It just clears the grey mist that helps me keep my concentration is at its best.
I still get there when I say I will be there even if I leave 30 minutes earlier.
I have driven underpowered commercial vehicles with Tacho's and trailers so know how commercial drivers feel.
Touch wood the only 2 accidents I have had since passing my test(1974) are where I was stationary and people drove into me.
Now I don't want to tempt fate by talking about how many accidents I've had over the years so I won't.Suffice to say there are those that will say they've never had an accident but seen a few in their mirrors,more than likely due to their lack of common sense or road sense.
People just don't realise that sitting in the middle lane on the motorway means that to execute a legal overtake from lane one that you must take your eyes off the road in front to look in the mirror then check over the shoulder for the blind spot.At 70mph this means you have travelled the length of 3 football pitches just to do this.
When was the last time you saw a footballer run the length of one football pitch whilst looking backwards?
It just doesn't happen,but we,as drivers are forced to do this regularly.And as for illegal,unlicenced drivers,these should be locked up when caught and left to rot.The police or road crime units as they are called now spend most of their days tracking and chasing after the same people only for them to get off the charges brought against them due to technicalities or lack of proof or poor police investigative procedures et al.They think its all a big joke,only thing is thay one day they'll have a big accident and hurt either themselves,their friends or some innocent person going about their business.
Tomrrow night on channel five,Police Interceptors is back on and is featuring South Yorkshire Police's ANPR Interceptors.Now this program does get on my nerves a bit due to that bloke who narrates the program and that they keep overdubbing the engine noise with a Jag straight six sound.I do like the sound of a jag engine but is completely out of kilter with a Subaru flat foor or Evo engine.They never do it on Traffic Cops or Road Wars do they?
Pete
Driving home last night on a dual carriageway, behind a queue of artics, came up to a slip road joining from the left. Two cars on the slip road, and the second decided to jump in after the artics had gone by (probably didn't see me) and caused me to slow down - fair enough. The he slowed right down to let the first car in, causing me to nearly stand mine on its nose. What a dope. I should have realised he was a wally driver when I first saw his car, a customised white Astra, with zig zags on the back, red stripe on the side and blue lights on the top! Glad I didn't hit him, it would have been deemed to have been my fault, I bet.