What's with the extra dose of blinkered driving in recent times?

My area in south Dublin suburbs was really lovely and quiet today, that's why folk decided to come meet me locally and stroll the Dodder Linear Walk rather than gravitate to the traditional beauty spots. However, as I was crossing the road locally on the green pedestrian light, just ahead of my entourage (as I tend to strut out faster), I was nearly toppled by a large SUV (I have a small one) which broke the lights at speed, screeched to a halt ahead of me and reversed, with driver with his face buried in shame. Only modern cars have really great brakes and don't screech to a halt, they come to a halt in jig time. I had ducked sharply backwards out of the way; a year and a half ago I would have been mowed down as I was doddering about on sticks with the bad knee. There were little screams of horror from others around who thought I had been hit.

This is the second time within only a couple of days, in the same area, I have seen drivers go through red lights in a hurry. The previous one had stopped on a green before proceeding through the red and nearly mowed down a lady trying to cross on her green light with the aid of a wheeled walking aid.

I'm seeing increasingly disgraceful behaviour where people (and it happens to be almost always men these recent times) are driving in a state of "virtual blindfoldedness".

Can anybody explain what's behind this recent accentuation of the issue?

Leg End Reject

On their phones or staring at the display screen thingy ( can't remember the proper name).

sligojoek

The primary school that my children attended is serviced by a pedestrian crossing across the main Sligo to Donegal/Derry road which can be very busy in the mornings. For years I watched cars trucks and vans drive through obvlious to the lights and crowds of people crossing. One thing I instilled into my children from an early age is, to wait until cars both ways had come to a full stop before crossing. The green man only proves the bulb is working.

Jequ0n

Sounds like someone is trying their best to clean up the streets

ulster

[Deleted User] wrote: »

My area in south Dublin suburbs was really lovely and quiet today, that's why folk decided to come meet me locally and stroll the Dodder Linear Walk rather than gravitate to the traditional beauty spots. However, as I was crossing the road locally on the green pedestrian light, just ahead of my entourage (as I tend to strut out faster), I was nearly toppled by a large SUV (I have a small one) which broke the lights at speed, screeched to a halt ahead of me and reversed, with driver with his face buried in shame. Only modern cars have really great brakes and don't screech to a halt, they come to a halt in jig time. I had ducked sharply backwards out of the way; a year and a half ago I would have been mowed down as I was doddering about on sticks with the bad knee. There were little screams of horror from others around who thought I had been hit.

This is the second time within only a couple of days, in the same area, I have seen drivers go through red lights in a hurry. The previous one had stopped on a green before proceeding through the red and nearly mowed down a lady trying to cross on her green light with the aid of a wheeled walking aid.

I'm seeing increasingly disgraceful behaviour where people (and it happens to be almost always men these recent times) are driving in a state of "virtual blindfoldedness".

Can anybody explain what's behind this recent accentuation of the issue?

I see pedestrians just walk out into the middle of the road; wasn't there some idiot in Dublin who tried to cross a motorway. To be honest I blame social media/smartphones for the frying of people's brains.

I think it's the Lockdown, and driving ability getting rusty.

I was on the M50 last week. Driving on the M50 can be very disagreeable at the best of times, but I saw some seriously vexing driving — unsafe swerving, inconsistent speeding up and slowing down, and the ubiquitous Novice driver who seems to love tapping the brakes.

The Sunday drivers are out every day of the week. On the country roads where I live, we regularly have dawdlers from out of the area, drifting along winding roads at a dangerously slow speed, taking in the scenery. A hard resort to the horn usually hurries them on. Some of them should have their licences taken back.

I'm not someone who is affected by road rage, or especially sensitive to bad driving, but the deterioration seems to have been noticed by many others I've spoken to.

A Tyrant Named Miltiades!

A Tyrant Named Miltiades! wrote: »

I think it's the Lockdown, and driving ability getting rusty.

I was on the M50 last week. Driving on the M50 can be very disagreeable at the best of times, but I saw some seriously vexing driving — unsafe swerving, inconsistent speeding up and slowing down, and the ubiquitous Novice driver who seems to love tapping the brakes.

The Sunday drivers are out every day of the week. On the country roads where I live, we regularly have dawdlers from out of the area, drifting along winding roads at a dangerously slow speed, taking in the scenery. A hard resort to the horn usually hurries them on. Some of them should have their licences taken back.

I'm not someone who is affected by road rage, or especially sensitive to bad driving, but the deterioration seems to have been noticed by many others I've spoken to.

I loathe the M50, I avoid it at all costs. A major memory is when having my knee replacement that the anaesthetist had just attempted to stick a needle in me (unsuccessfully) when he received a phone call from his son who had not long been involved in an accident on the M50 (one of several during that day) and was in A&E just having received news he had broken his neck. "Dad can you be here?"' The failed needle wax left sticking out of my arm until the nurse pointed it out, be fire he fully anaesthetised me for the procedure. Good news was that spinal cord remained intact in son, but I was traumatised by experience :pac:

ulster

ulster wrote: »

I see pedestrians just walk out into the middle of the road; wasn't there some idiot in Dublin who tried to cross a motorway. To be honest I blame social media/smartphones for the frying of people's brains.

I certainly didn't walk out in middle of the road nor did the lady on the frame. We had the green light, the middle of the green light. The car I saw break the red had actually stopped at the green in front of me as I was driving, totally blinkered to their circumstances. Today the man approached at quite some speed around a curving road. When driving that road from Windy Arbour to Milltown Bridge I always slow down considerably as there is quite the abrupt change in the pedestrian and traffic pattern, it if driving alertly this should prove no issue.

frozenfrozen

I'm not a prolific beeper but I feel like I stopped accidents today by beeping. People are so distracted. All over the road, missing lights, pulling out without even considering looking..

0lddog

Deleted User wrote: »

.....Can anybody explain what's behind this recent accentuation of the issue?

Loss of driving skills due to minimal driving during lockdown may be part of the issue.



Phones are a pest too. :mad:

0lddog

0lddog wrote: »

Loss of driving skills due to minimal driving during lockdown may be part of the issue.



Phones are a pest too. :mad:

There seems to be a whole lot more driving in recent past couple of weeks. I have a hybrid CH-R, got a text from Toyota to remind me to keep it going and have kept it running as far as I was permitted.'even when I had been seriously unwell and unable to drive for weeks in the past I have never lost the skill, or the prudence to take particular mar care as I was reacquainting familiarity with the road. People now seem not to care at all, as if they were driving a Tesla programming for US roads.

0lddog

With your aviation background, few would be as aware as you of the issues around deskilling.

Of course I could go full grumpy ol' geezer and go on about how smarts in modern cars deskill and desensitize drivers to the dangers of the driving....another version of children of the magenta

Montage of Feck

Once it was the driver touching knobs now it's knobs touching screens. Putting all the controls onto touchscreens in modern cars can't be a good idea.

gameoverdude

Only Joe can solve this. I'll call him on Tuesday.

Stihl waters

When it comes to pedestrian crossings always assume the driver won't stop, although I've often seen people walking or running straight out onto them it's never a good idea to depend on someone else to keep you safe, like cyclists going up the inside of a truck it's nice to be in the right but that won't do you any good if you're dead

0lddog

0lddog wrote: »

With your aviation background, few would be as aware as you of the issues around deskilling.

Of course I could go full grumpy ol' geezer and go on about how smarts in modern cars deskill and desensitize drivers to the dangers of the driving....another version of children of the magenta

My car is high tech, but I feel it relieves me to entirely concentrate on the road in front of me, behind me, to either side of me. It allows me apply focus to scan frequently, and pay more attention to reading the road, cyclists, pedestrians, other drivers.

Yeah, flying required multitasking in broader skills, but never quite the degree of moment-to-moment focus that driving does. If I haven't been at the wheel in a while I feel an amount of trepidation becoming of my reduced skills and reaction and adjust my driving accordingly. I think a lot of people now are living fully across their skill base on autopilot and probably doing little particularly well.

gameoverdude

gameoverdude wrote: »

Only Joe can solve this. I'll call him on Tuesday.

1850 715815, de Lahvlahn is open now.

fullstop

[Deleted User] wrote: »

My area in south Dublin suburbs was really lovely and quiet today, that's why folk decided to come meet me locally and stroll the Dodder Linear Walk rather than gravitate to the traditional beauty spots. However, as I was crossing the road locally on the green pedestrian light, just ahead of my entourage (as I tend to strut out faster), I was nearly toppled by a large SUV (I have a small one) which broke the lights at speed, screeched to a halt ahead of me and reversed, with driver with his face buried in shame. Only modern cars have really great brakes and don't screech to a halt, they come to a halt in jig time. I had ducked sharply backwards out of the way; a year and a half ago I would have been mowed down as I was doddering about on sticks with the bad knee. There were little screams of horror from others around who thought I had been hit.

This is the second time within only a couple of days, in the same area, I have seen drivers go through red lights in a hurry. The previous one had stopped on a green before proceeding through the red and nearly mowed down a lady trying to cross on her green light with the aid of a wheeled walking aid.

I'm seeing increasingly disgraceful behaviour where people (and it happens to be almost always men these recent times) are driving in a state of "virtual blindfoldedness".

Can anybody explain what's behind this recent accentuation of the issue?

Simple answer, people are **** and think their time is more important than anyone else. You generally get 2-3 people breaking every red light in Dublin these days. Had similar myself today, was out for a run and waiting to cross at a pedestrian light. Light goes green and I go to step out, and a taxi decides he doesn’t want to wait another cycle of the lights (i had seen that he was edging on amber, trying to turn right with 2 cars in front of him and no filter light, so fully expected him to break it). When I pointed up to the light he broke he blows the horn at me. There are bellends like this all over the roads these days.

The problem is that the guards do **** all about it. I saw a guy break a red (4-5 seconds late) opposite City Hall a few months back, Garda car behind him puts on the sirens and blue lights and I think he’s getting done for it, but no, the Garda car just wanted to break the lights as well, tuned off the blues and went on their merry way :rolleyes:

One thing I'm hugely grateful for in my car is a dual beeper, a dab for a nudge to prompt a driver to a minor situation and the louder alarm horn to warn of a more drastic situation at hand.

gctest50

There should be rising bollards at school crossings at least



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O0wY-hvMC44

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O0wY-hvMC44

sligojoek

I've been up and down to Tipperary every 2 wks for the last year

Sligo to Tuam, then motorway to near Loughrea. After that it's all sh1t roads to NW Tipp. I've always had the M17 from Tuam to the M6 almost to myself. Coming back up last Sunday and everybody was out and about. Stuck behind some lad for about 30km near Knock doing 80 KmPH . When I eventually got past him I took a sidewards glance and he had an iPad in landscape mode on top of the steering wheel. Blew the horn and pointed at the iPad. Got 2 fingers in return.

It was the closest thing in my life today I ever got to being run over in my life, weirdly I didn't even feel the fright, though others did around me. I think I was super-alert as I seem to be these past weeks for some reason, quite the opposite to most of society

jk23

Definitely echo what is being said here, from my job driving around a city you are putting your life in your hands crossing the roads unless you see the cars stopped at a light or at a junction otherwise you are much more safer to wait until it's clear....

fullstop

sligojoek wrote: »

I've been up and down to Tipperary every 2 wks for the last year

Sligo to Tuam, then motorway to near Loughrea. After that it's all sh1t roads to NW Tipp. I've always had the M17 from Tuam to the M6 almost to myself. Coming back up last Sunday and everybody was out and about. Stuck behind some lad for about 30km near Knock doing 80 KmPH . When I eventually got past him I took a sidewards glance and he had an iPad in landscape mode on top of the steering wheel. Blew the horn and pointed at the iPad. Got 2 fingers in return.

Another thing that seems to be rife. I was driving in the N7 one Friday evening a few months ago. Fella in a branded van, all over the road and random braking and weaving and I was wondering what the fcuk he was at. When I passed him I realised he was watching Netflix or YouTube on his phone on the dash. A supposed professional driver doing this is a disgrace.
I looked up the company and sent an email to the ‘info@‘ email address and thought I’d hear no more about it. In fairness, within half an hour i had an email back from the MD thanking me for flagging and saying he takes it very seriously and would speak to the driver.

TrangiaCoffee

The amount of cyclists doing the same thing is ten fold. Even doing it on pavements. They don't even hit the brakes on seeing red.

Your Face

Deleted User wrote: »

I have a small one

lol

Atlantic Dawn

I'm thinking of getting a rear facing dash cam fitted with the amount of drivers going right up my hole where I sometimes am bracing for colision, this is in 50/60kmh zones that people think it's a race track they are on.

Strumms

frozenfrozen wrote: »

I'm not a prolific beeper but I feel like I stopped accidents today by beeping. People are so distracted. All over the road, missing lights, pulling out without even considering looking..

Said it in another thread, the last year / 18 months the standard of driving has nosedived, I’m in an RTA the other day, stationary in traffic, and a few other near misses... it’s probably a reflection of not only driving but of the lousy selfish behavior that’s prevalent in Irish society that’s crept in over the last decade.

I’m not a beeper but I’ve been using it much more as a necessity than out of anger or frustration... it’s cûntville out there.

More disgraceful driving this afternoon. Somebody who dozed off for the duration of a red light at a busy junction, another driver who nearly rammed into me as I duly gave way to a pedestrian already crossing a road I was turning onto. The man behind blasted me with his horn, I returned gesture with my fingers curled so as not to give him the full f-off and set him in an even more dangerous state for rest of his journey. .

Jequ0n

[Deleted User] wrote: »

More disgraceful driving this afternoon. Somebody who dozed off for the duration of a red light at a busy junction, another driver who nearly rammed into me as I duly gave way to a pedestrian already crossing a road I was turning onto. The man behind blasted me with his horn, I returned gesture with my fingers curled so as not to give him the full f-off and set him in an even more dangerous state for rest of his journey. .

You know what they say when you keep attracting the same kind of trouble ...

gameoverdude

Jequ0n wrote:

You know what they say when you keep attracting the same kind of trouble ...

You mean them getting blasted from behind with some man's horn?

frozenfrozen

or needing to wake someone up at a red light? bit of a stretch to blame OP there..

Jequ0n

Simple. There are multiple scenarios what happened here.

The car behind could have been to fast and the driver didnt keep the required distance, therefore got a fright when the OP hit the brakes.

Another option is that simply that the driver behind had not seen the person crossing the road already as their view was blocked by the OP's car. For all you know they only noticed the OP braking suddenly and for no reason. So many options here, so sometimes its just not as easy to judge.


Don't get me wrong, i get annoyed by other drivers all the time, but it's generally the slow and over-anxious ones that get on my nerves. Yes, there are plenty of bad drivers out there, but sometimes the reason for a bad maneuver is nothing but a different perspective.

Wibbs

Montage of Feck wrote: »

Once it was the driver touching knobs now it's knobs touching screens. Putting all the controls onto touchscreens in modern cars can't be a good idea.

It is for the manufacturers as it's far cheaper to produce screens and software than produce physical buttons and knobs. It;s even easier to update the range too. It's more down to economics than anything else and people have gotten so used to screens and think of them as more advanced so.. And I agree they are potentially much more distracting. As far as muscle memory goes it's a lot easier to press a button or turn a knob on your car stereo or heating/cooling than do so on a screen with menus. Once you're used to a car you can do it without taking your eyes off the road, or it might take a momentary glance. Not so much with a touchscreen. Never mind alerts like emails/texts, even looking at GPS screens. Plus the systems between brands, sometimes between models isn't consistent so a new "operating system" has to be learned. There's a lot more mental overhead. But nobody is going to go back to old fashioned buttons when you have an singing and dancing touchscreen. We like the novel and we like gadgets.

I've been driving daily throughout the pandemic. It was bloody fantastic at the height of it. Driving from Dublin to Wicklow town and passing a handful of cars on the way there and two on the way back. Bliss. Apocalyptic, but bliss. TBH I haven't noted any new lack of care myself. The ok driver to muppet ratio doesn't seem to have changed.

I have noted far more pedestrians about in the burbs because of the restrictions, gyms being closed, people cooped up at home with kids and that. So maybe more pedestrians means more close encounters between them and cars, especially of late as traffic has started to return to some sort of normal? Fewer rush hour cyclists too, but more leisure cyclists during the day.

Potential-Monke

Saying it for years, the driving test needs to be updated to reflect modern driving, and it should be repeated every... I'd like to say 5, but 10 years at the minimum.

Potential-Monke

Potential-Monke wrote: »

Saying it for years, the driving test needs to be updated to reflect modern driving, and it should be repeated every... I'd like to say 5, but 10 years at the minimum.

I was going to say here I'd actually almost volunteer to sit a refresher short driving test, akin to the "check-ride" (snigger) in the aviation world. A 10 minute test around the block to assure that driving standards have been maintained, with one or random tasks required. If failed, then a required couple of lessons before re-test. If you fail more than twice, then it's back to square one with Learner Permit, full set of lessons, full test etc. Sitting a theory test might be an option too, but would want to be updated and more extensive for modern driving. Having to learn it off would at least put it in mind to some degree when driving. I'm sure online simulation in various situations could be used too, presuming a full licensee is well familiar with controlling a car. Would keep us all on our toes a little bit more. Easier to keep up the standard that re-learn ahead of the test.

I'm really going to sound like Victor Meldrew here but "I don't believe it!". I had the green (had turned green 10 seconds as I approached) to turn right onto Milltown Road from Churchtown Road, when my brakes went on when a black Volvo came through from the red from the left. It subsequently went through another red pedestrian light, and wavering around the road a bit, but I caught up later. I could see the middle aged/older silver haired driver with her head turned to her passenger as she was talking. I reckon the woman is probably deaf and turning to hear her passenger's conversation. In this case I could clearly see she was not paying attention ahead at all. A positive menace in the road.

fryup

Leg End Reject wrote: »

On their phones or staring at the display screen thingy ( can't remember the proper name).

yep saw two young ones in the front of a car (driver & passenger) driving along the road and both staring at their smartphones unbelievable - any point in reporting them if i see them at it again??

The lady I saw earlier today in the Volvo obviously bought the car with a view to safety and sense, but has since abandoned it to drive whilst looking her passenger in the face whilst in conversation on the move. However she may have inherited car or may be mainly another family member's. Still I feel she, like many, have just switched off and aren't bothering any more. Insurance companies have taken note of trends in driving behaviour, especially as per Liveline, where it was said that there is an addition to the premium on retired drivers because they basically gave more tube to be driving around. Our general accident stats haven't improved, and it seems to me that people working from home are quite "mobile" at times.

Wildly Boaring

TrangiaCoffee wrote: »

The amount of cyclists doing the same thing is ten fold. Even doing it on pavements. They don't even hit the brakes on seeing red.

Try being the cyclist when there's morons with ipads in landscape mode over the steering wheel and van drivers looking at netflix.
It's a pleasure!!!!

I've been commuting throughout but luckily on country roads. Notice more "Sunday drivers" about but nothing too bad.

Cycling was an absolute joy on the quiet weeks but no use in a 5k limit. Now, not so much

Wildly Boaring

Wildly Boaring wrote: »

Try being the cyclist when there's morons with ipads in landscape mode over the steering wheel and van drivers looking at netflix.
It's a pleasure!!!!

I've been commuting throughout but luckily on country roads. Notice more "Sunday drivers" about but nothing too bad.

Cycling was an absolute joy on the quiet weeks but no use in a 5k limit. Now, not so much

You'll be glad to know there are at least •some• drivers like myself who anticipate cyclists' road use and hind back without issue where necessary. It's the ones who don't who are the problem