Bad Drivers

OLDYELLAR

has anybody else been subjected to bad drivers?i just noticed recently how careless some drivers are , im not exactly a great driver myself or anything , but at least i have the courtesy to use an indicator. people that drive right out in front of you and attempt to pass you when another car is passing and force you into the hard shoulder , or worse still the ditch . its very unfair on lthe other road users , im annoyed by how much of it i see , does anybody agree with me on this?

rymus

I think every road user has at some point been subject to another drivers stupidity. There are indeed an incredible amount of idiots on the road. I notice this even more being a bike driver - in fact on the way to work (only about 1 hour ago) a woman in a fiesta pulled right in front of me without indicating or anything... missed me by only a couple of feet. At least she had the courtesy to apologise tho...

But yes I agree, the roads are getting worse and worse

OLDYELLAR

rymus you were lucky with that one in the fiesta , the other day a guy in a ford focus pulled out in front of me and i was on a scooter and he didnt miss me , i went straight into his door , it was kinda sore , and since then i have been really noticing the amount of careless driving on the road .

rymus

I sincerely hoped the focus driver stopped to check if u were alright and give u the opportunity to beat him senseless with your helmet

I'd love to see an unmarked police motorbike.. like the unmarked police cars obviously.. someone to catch dangerous drivers with their pants down! That might make langers in cars think twice before they pull off some magical traffic dodging feat of driving idiocy.

OLDYELLAR

you know what rymus thats possibly the best idea , i heard in a long time , drivers seem to be less courteous to motorcyclists , or is it just me? oh he stopped alrite , sure i could barely talk with ths shock he started laughing an goes "i really expected you to fu*k me out of it" at this stage i gladly pointed out that he was in the wrong and that my insurance wouldnt be involved , that kind of stopped the grinning.

ando

I myself have come quite close to knocking down a number of motorcyclist riders, not because of my bad driving, but because of them motorcyclists roaring up behind me, not giving me a chance to move out of the way. I don't have a chance to even see them. I'm driving a company van and its doubly hard to see the blind spot, but motorcyclists are just to blaim as the drivers, well except oldish women (40-55) drivers, they seem oblivious to whats going on around them

The only motorcyclists I see in time are usually ones with their headlights on full blast. At least I can see them, and prepare to move out of their way when they want to overtake.


Also, while I'm on this topic, Taxi Drivers are even worse.... they think they own the road... some dont even bother to indicate when coming out of a bus lane into your lane... you know, I'm running against the clock to.

seamus

Well, I can sympathise with some car drivers and van drivers such as ando, being a former car driver myself - sometimes bikes appear out of nowhere, especially on city roads. I leave my sidelights (right word?) on the bike on all the time, to give me a little extra visibility, but there are no excuses for plenty of drivers - they seem to think we're on pushbikes, the way they pull out, even when they see us coming.

It all has to do with the mirrors - no-one fecking uses them in this country!! I've been in taxis, where the driver has looked over both shoulders (but not in the mirrors at all) before changing lanes, I mean wtf - how dangerous is that?

All that said, how many people here can put their hand up and say they have never made a stupid mistake on the roads?

ando

Originally posted by seamus
I've been in taxis, where the driver has looked over both shoulders (but not in the mirrors at all) before changing lanes, I mean wtf - how dangerous is that?

so we're agreed, taxi drivers are the worst lol

and yeah, ofcourse, I've also made mistakes, the biggest of which was when I just started driving, going around one of them m50 roundabouts, not thinking they were controlled by traffic lights :eek: woops !!

OLDYELLAR

have to agree with ye on the taxi drivers , not all of them though , one day i got this taxi into the city centre , aw man i was well scared but id say not half as scared as the pedestrians because he was driving that near to the footpaths .no the driving on irish roads all round leaves a lot to be desired , i actually reckon that most of the time people do see you , but regardless of having the right of way or not , they`ll take the chance and hope you stop in time . fair enough blow them out of it or give hand gestures , but where will this get you? absolutely nowhere , because they just dont care , i dont think theres enough done about the careless driving in the country.

Kegser

I agree some motorcyclists can be a bit over zealous with their overtaking to say the least.

Personally I always ride around with my full low-beams on especially around town. The only downside is it can sometimes confuse other drivers into thinking you're moving a lot slower than you actually are.

Overtaking is something that should be done in obvious places..... I've seen some riders take filtering to extremes and seen a few smack into cars because of it.

There are bad motorcyclists and there are bad car drivers... the only difference being a bad car driver has an awful lot more weight with which to inflict damage and pain.

ando

yeah, but if a bad motorcyclist does a stupid overtaking move, and happens to hit you, he blaims the driver of the car for his bad driving ??? I remeber some idiot on a bike tried to over take me on the left coming up to a set of traffic lights near merrion square... bloody hell, didnt see him and I cut him off. The next thing I knew he was banging his hands off the left side of my van... 'Ya F*cking wanker.. give me some F*kcing room'

I cant exactly slow down, roll down the window, 'sorry old chap, I did'nt see you, pardan me' :mad:

seamus

Time to bring it back up.......Some motherfúcker this morning decides to not even look as he enters the spawell roundabout. seamus hits the front brake (an old BMX reflex) and slides out on the wet tarmac. Ow, instant sore forearm. B@stard B@stard B@stard B@stard. I'm still quite pissed about it :mad: Thank God for gloves (and the fact I was only doing 10-15 mph). B@stard.
And on Wednesday, a mate of mine had a little fender bender with a tosser who decided he'd break a red light 4 secs after it had gone red. Mate hops out of the car, other driver says 'Are you ok?' (while still sitting in his driving seat), Mate says 'Yeah, fine.'. Other dirver has quick look around and speeds off. Wanker. Something definitely has to be done about these fúckers. :mad:
Who's the new Minister for transport?

OLDYELLAR

i dont know but yeah total agreement with you , something has to be bloody well done about them , its no wonder there are so many accidents on the road .i

Saruman

There are muppet black spots i have noticed.. like coming from the airport M1 taking the sliproad off to go onto the roundabout that will take you on the M50 northbound... there are 3 lanes of traffic on the bridge... the 2 on the left are for the M50 but muppets going around have a tendency to go into the for right lane for going around the roundablout and then forcing themselves across a lane of traffic at the last minute... whats is their problem? Cant they read the road markings? Spanners... that drives me nuts.. every single day i use that route and every single day i see at least 3 idiots doint that! I always try and get into the far left lane so at least i wont be one of the drivers getting cut off by them.

Also recently i was hit by a woman in a micra... i dont think it was so much bad driving as it was bad car.. it was a 94 micra.. i got a replacement micra and My GOD they suck.. the breaks are such it requires twice the stopping distance as my car... And the one i got is a 01 so i shudder to think what her 94 is like.. And she hit me at only 30 mph at most, well she would have slowed down but traffic could only move at 30 mph at most on the road we were on.

Happened once before though and this was bad driving.. i was at the airport roundabout after picking my brother up. Stopped at red lights... handbreak up, foot on break.. always stop like that.. anyway there was a car behind me. Now there was an accident on the other side of the roundabout, nothing to see and next thing whack... some spanner in a jeep smacks into the guy behind me and he is then shunted into me... luckily i did not get pushed into the other guy in front of me. Anyway only thing i can think of is he like most idtiots in this country were gawking at the accident.. there was nothing to see but oh no he had to take a good long look... there is no other excuse as it was not even bad weather.. in fact it was a nice dry day out... thankfully short of a scratch there was no damage to my car and i did not bother claiming for a little mark.. im not the type... but the woman who hit me last week did some damage, not on the outside but on the inside.. crumple zones pushed in so spare wheel stuck etc.. im picking it up later today.

Victor

Originally posted by Saruman
There are muppet black spots i have noticed.. like coming from the airport M1 taking the sliproad off to go onto the roundabout that will take you on the M50 northbound...

Do you mean clockwise (Eastbound) from the Airport to the Malahide Road?

Saruman

If you are coming from the airport on the M1 towards town and you take the turn off to go northbound on the M50, its the roundabout you take to get onto the M50 im talking about

azezil

What I've noticed with a lot of motorcyclists is that they think the rules of the road don't apply to them. Stoped in traffic I've often seen motorcyclists weave in and out through traffic just to get to the front of the cue!!

Infact I don't think I've ever seen a motorcyclists wait in a cue at traffic lights...

Saruman

When i had my moped almost 5 years ago now... i did very little weaving... no point the cars usually go faster than my moped could anyway.. but most moped drivers think they are going the speed of sound and hold up the cars on roads... on a 30mph road fair enough.. car cant go much faster than moped with out breaking the law but on an open road.. damn them!!

Actually my biggest gripe is cyclists!!! i have NEVER seen one pay any attention to traffic lights since i got my car!! Not one!!! Every one of them goes right on through thinking they are exempt from the rules of the road which to my knowledge is far from the truth. Also places like the knocmaroon hill in chapelizod.. the idiots hold up a mile of traffic cycling up that hill at slower than a snails pace instead of getting off the bike and walking up on the path. Its quicker and takes a lot less engery to do!! muppets.

Victor

Originally posted by Saruman
Actually my biggest gripe is cyclists!!! i have NEVER seen one pay any attention to traffic lights since i got my car!! Not one!!! Every one of them goes right on through thinking they are exempt from the rules of the road which to my knowledge is far from the truth.

I think cyclists will obey traffic lights (a) when motorists give them a fair deal (b) motorists obey the rules of the road.

OK motorists, hands up, who knows what stop line (a) is for (b) what it looks like?

Stephen

I was nearly killed by some stupid fukking idiot **** in a fiat punto yesterday. I was heading home doing about 40mph and this moron just pulls straight out in front of me from a housing estate without looking. I had to swerve across to the opposite side of the road to avoid her. Nearly came off the bike and into the ditch. The stupid bint just drove off too. I felt like doing a u-turn and chasing after her to bend the ear off her.


GRRRRR :mad:

OLDYELLAR

today i actually drove into the city (waterford that is ) and i really dont like driving in there because im not very good around the friday evening heavy traffic , well anyway i came to this junction where i had to stop to turn off to the right , next thing this one goes into the lane beside me as though she were turning to the left but as i went to pull out , the ar*e wipe starts turning to the right and nearly hit me , so i starts blowing the horn like mad , she stopped anyway so i drove out but jesus it was so dangerous , i wonder if she was pulled in at the junction beside a scania would she have tried it ? no too right she wouldnt and the only thing killing me was that i didnt have time to get her reg number and report the idiot !as for that point about motorcyclists weaving in and out of traffic ........i never do that mainly because you wont get very far and the people you weave past will make a point of trying to pass ypu back at every opportunity and they also get very piss*d off .

Eye

okay, well as a biker i have to say this is an interesting topic, yes there are tons of maniacs on the roads, and yes some of those nutters do have bikes, but it's those few that give us bikers a bad rep....

now before anyone comes along and says "oh like your a perfect driver?" no i'm not, no one is, we all make our mistakes, it's a matter of wether or not you learn from them, i know i do.

with regards to weaving in and out of heavy traffic, yeah you will find most bikers do it, i do....but only when it's safe to do it, because i have a cruiser is a fair bit wider than yer average sports bike so i can't weave in through lines of traffic, i go to the outter lane and work my way slowly up from there whenever i can, if there is traffic coming against me i pull in so as not to be in the way, when it's gone i pull out and move on a bit more, works a treat going up the quays in waterford because in a car on a friday it can, and has in the past taken me over 20 mins to get from the tower hotel to the bridge, on the bike you do it in 5 mins very safely

i know for car drivers it can't be easy spotting a fast moving bike coming up from behind, but like myself, i'd say about 90% (just guessing here) of bikers (not talking scooters here) drive with their head lamps dipped to try and help with this, we do this more for our own safety because we know it's not easy spotting bikes on the road and anything we can do to help you see the bikes in plenty of time, alot of us try to do, personally i always drive with lights on, even on a scorching hot summers day (not that we get many of them here ) and more often that not i have a bright yellow reflective vest on over my jacket too, anything that helps me to stay alive on these chaotic roads i'll try.

and another thing, while alot of car drivers think of us bikers as inconsiderate pricks, you may of may not notice this but if your driving along in your car on a good road, suddenly you see a bike coming up from behind and you move in to give the bike ample room to get by, chances are the biker will give a salute to say thanks for doing that, i know alot of truck drivers often do that for me when they see the light in their mirror they often pull into the hard shoulder to let me pass, the least i can do is say thanks s i almost always salute, same goes for any cars who do the same for me, and i see a hell of alot of bikers who do this not just one or two hear and there.

oh yeah and before i finish with my 2 cent worth, as for those taxi drivers....oh god they are the worst drivers i've seen, have yet to meet one that's not in such a hurry to get somewhere that they will yeild the right of way to you, hell only this evening coming out of waterford i had a taxi pull out infront of me going down o'connell street, i had right of way on the street doing about 20mph heading towards the bridge and this taxi was trying to turn onto o'connell street from one of the side streets, i damn near drove into the side of him as he made a mad dash for it at the last minute

anyways, will leave it at that for now, must stop my ranting and raving and go to bed now