Funeral Procession!

cson

Ok the thread title may be a bit misleading but it does have some relevance. Driving home the other day I found myself behind a tractor as often I have before. I was about 10 miles from my house, now on 8 of those miles there is a very generous hard shoulder. The tractor was doing 20km/hr max. Now I would have overtaken but the various conditions didn't allow it, on-coming traffic, bends etc. I looked in my mirror after about 5 mins of following it and no joke I'd say there was upwards of 20 cars following it. A couple of impatient people decided to do some very risky overtaking manouevres that very nearly ended up in them crashing.

My question is this; why the **** didn't the bollocks pull in? I mean as far as I could see he had fully functioning mirrors, there was a big hard shoulder and its not illegal to pull into it. Is it ignorance?

Stephen

The response I usually get when I ask any of the tractor drivers I know about why they don't do it is that nobody will let them back out onto the road when they do pull in.

The ones that drive on-road at night with rear work lights blazing should suffer slow and painful deaths though.

Marcus.Aurelius

Pure, unmitigated arrogance and selfishness, best displayed as always by the ordinary unskilled Irish drivers.

It's disgusting behaviour, and its all too common, quite frankly.

Avns1s

Stephen wrote: »

The ones that drive on-road at night with rear work lights blazing should suffer slow and painful deaths though.

I agree. You come up behind them not knowing whether they are coming or going and then you can't see what in front of you from the glare.

I can't understand that the Gardai don't take a more firm line on these.

_Kaiser_

Avns1s wrote: »

I can't understand that the Gardai don't take a more firm line on these.

For the same reason that they don't (really/seriously) crack down on driving in bus lanes, blocking yellow boxes/junctions, unaccompanied learner drivers etc etc - the majority of them don't care, neither do their superiors, or the department of transport and as is usual with this backwater we live in, there's no accountability anywhere along the line.

If the government put in the investment in education and enforcement, and the insurance companies stopped paying out on claims where someone was driving illegally, and the Gardai actually enforced the existing laws (rather than helping the RSA/Department make up new ones) you'd see a BIG change is traffic flow and attitudes on the roads.

But this is Ireland, where EVERYTHING is run on the principle of "ah sure it'll be grand!", and where we as a nation just accept it every time.

cson

I've said it before on the Learner Legislation Furore threads but the Govt need to stop putting the cart before the horse. Roll out a Traffic Corps independent of normal duties and voila we might get somewhere. Instead we get big brother cameras pimped out to the lowest bidder.

Anyway on topic, I think that the sort of ****e acting I encountered the other day contributes to deaths on the road. Driving at that speed without making any effort to pull into the avalible hard shoulder makes impatient drivers angry and we all know what that does to decision making....

Rowley Birkin QC

And tax-paying tractor owners should pull in for you why exactly?!!

Yes it is common courtesy and I do it when conditions allow but maybe he was in just as much of a rush to get home and couldnt afford the 5-10 mins it would take to pull in and get back into the flow of traffic again. Pulling into the hard shoulder in a tractor is a risky business anyway, people shoot out from junctions into the hard shoulder, then glare at you as they see the front weights heading in through their passenger windows.

High&Low

bigkev49 wrote: »

And tax-paying tractor owners should pull in for you why exactly?!!

Yes it is common courtesy and I do it when conditions allow but maybe he was in just as much of a rush to get home and couldnt afford the 5-10 mins it would take to pull in and get back into the flow of traffic again. Pulling into the hard shoulder in a tractor is a risky business anyway, people shoot out from junctions into the hard shoulder, then glare at you as they see the front weights heading in through their passenger windows.

I thought slow vehicles (tractor driving at 20km/h in 80 km/h zone would count) were obliged to pull into the hard shoulder and allow faster vehicles to overtake...

wil

Kaiser2000 wrote: »

For the same reason that they don't (really/seriously) crack down on driving in bus lanes, blocking yellow boxes/junctions, unaccompanied learner drivers etc etc - the majority of them don't care, neither do their superiors, or the department of transport and as is usual with this backwater we live in, there's no accountability anywhere along the line.

If the government put in the investment in education and enforcement, and the insurance companies stopped paying out on claims where someone was driving illegally, and the Gardai actually enforced the existing laws (rather than helping the RSA/Department make up new ones) you'd see a BIG change is traffic flow and attitudes on the roads.

But this is Ireland, where EVERYTHING is run on the principle of "ah sure it'll be grand!", and where we as a nation just accept it every time.

I couldn't find a single thing I'd change in your post to make it more factually correct other than adding a "h" in to "sure".;)
Are you me?:D

I can just hear BigKev assuring us it'll be grrraaannd all the way from Cork to Dublin at 40 kph stuck behind his Lamborghini RS.:eek:

Golferx

bigkev49 wrote: »

And tax-paying tractor owners should pull in for you why exactly?!!

.......................

tax-paying ? Are you having a laugh? What tax, exactly?

siralfalot

maoleary wrote: »

Pure, unmitigated arrogance and selfishness, best displayed as always by the ordinary unskilled Irish drivers.

It's disgusting behaviour, and its all too common, quite frankly.

who? the tractor drivers, or the muppets who risk lives by overtaking in stupid situations?

I've nearly been killed a number of times while diving a tractor, you would not believe the risks people take in order to take a few mins of their journey. I try to be courteous to other road users and pull in where i can in order to let traffic go, but when you are driving a €100k machine that has no suspension and weighs 8 tonnes you're pretty limited as to where you can pull in when you are going at road speeds ie 50kph

Golferx wrote: »

tax-paying ? Are you having a laugh? What tax, exactly?

the same road tax that every tractor owner in the country is obliged to pay, I pay my tax, I'm entitled to drive on public roads, I have a job to do, you have a job to do, so deal with it.

maidhc

We had this thread before, but the reality is that if you drive a tractor on the roads all day everyday.... you can't be pulling in all the time!

I don't drive on the road in a tractor much, maybe once or twice a month, and I am always pulling in, but I can see how you would get sick of it, especially when so few drivers even give a wave or a flash to signal their thanks!

You get ignorant tractor drivers (as you do all drivers), and I have a major issue with 16 year olds being allowed to pilot modern tractors which are more like artic trucks.... story for another day though.

Chevy RV

Is it not illegal to drive on the hard shoulder for insurance purposes due to the fact that it is for emergency / breakdown only?

Rowley Birkin QC

wil wrote: »

I can just hear BigKev assuring us it'll be grrraaannd all the way from Cork to Dublin at 40 kph stuck behind his Lamborghini RS.:eek:

John Deere 6930 actually

Maidhc and siralfalot said it all perfectly. I'll let people by as often as I can, when conditions allow, but i'll be damned if I pull in for every clown that comes up within 2-3 feet of the back of the low loader/whatever I'm towing.

Also, I take exception to that "grrraaaand" and "shure" comment wil. Wee bit childish IMO.

Marcus.Aurelius

siralfalot wrote: »

the same road tax that every tractor owner in the country is obliged to pay, I pay my tax, I'm entitled to drive on public roads, I have a job to do, you have a job to do, so deal with it.

I'm sure you're the type who uses the hard shoulder where possible (and safe) to allow other road users to overtake you when you have a convoy building behind you.

Right?

Marcus.Aurelius

Chevy RV wrote: »

Is it not illegal to drive on the hard shoulder for insurance purposes due to the fact that it is for emergency / breakdown only?

No, you may drive in the hard shoulder for short periods to allow other traffic to overtake. You should not use it around blind corners or up hills where you cannot see a reasonable distance ahead. Prolonged and unnecessary use of the H/S is illegal.

Stephen

Chevy RV - you're thinking of a motorway hard shoulder.

rliston

maoleary wrote: »

No, you may drive in the hard shoulder for short periods to allow other traffic to overtake. You should not use it around blind corners or up hills where you cannot see a reasonable distance ahead. Prolonged and unnecessary use of the H/S is illegal.

Chevy RV is right, you are not insured to drive on the hard shoulder.
I asked my insurance company, as i often drive on mainroads, and they comfirmed this.

Marcus.Aurelius

rliston wrote: »

Chevy RV is right, you are not insured to drive on the hard shoulder.
I asked my insurance company, as i often drive on mainroads, and they comfirmed this.

That's hilarious, its part of the road surface. According to Quinn Direct, from whom I have a letter confirming it; it doesn't matter.

Motorway hard shoulders are the exception, perhaps you confused the two?

_Kaiser_

It really is shocking how many people don't know the basic rules of the road...

You may briefly pull in to the hard shoulder (if safe to do so) to allow faster moving traffic behind you to pass. This is different to actually driving in the hard shoulder (as some cheeky feckers do on the M50).

mcirl2

The worst is the bastards that drive at ya with the full headlights on. They have no lights above the wheels so you are blinded and cant tell how wide the fu*kers are.

This happened to me on a narrow country road before and I got away with only my mirror getting smashed off. Lucky I wasnt killed. Wasnt going so fast.

Those headlights are deadly.

Anyone have this problem before?

Tomas_V

maoleary wrote: »

That's hilarious, its part of the road surface.

No it isn't.

siralfalot

maoleary wrote: »

I'm sure you're the type who uses the hard shoulder where possible (and safe) to allow other road users to overtake you when you have a convoy building behind you.

Right?

yes I do where applicable, but as said, tractors or any other vehicals are permitted to drive in the hard shoulder for an extended period of time.
As for lights? most tractors can be hard to judge at night time, that is true as the headlights and dip beams are clustered together in the centre of the bonnet. there should be marking lights under the indicators but these can be difficult to see, personally i use the mid mounted working lights that are mounded at a level just above the front wheels, focused straight down on the wheel. any white lights mounted at a higher level, or facing the rear should be off at all times when on the public highway