Are terrible driving habits on the rise?

"Proceeded to flip me the bird. So I slowed down in front of him, still not main road."

vs

"By me? We were slowing anyway, to come to a junction, to join the actual road."

That's the sort of inconsistancy that makes your narrative difficult to take at face value.

If he went two miles out of his way just to give out to you that's a bit over the top.

Unless he did a U-turn right after having words he may have been going that way anyhow and just took the opportunity when you stopped.

If I thought I was being followed I'd be inclined to take some anti surveillance measures e.g. drive in a circle / loop and check if the car is still behind. If it was I'd find a safe public space to stop rather than my own house.

I had already sent a flare up to inform my unit commander. Damn comms were down.

AC-130 above!!

Cameras at lights that take picture and actually follow through with fine might soften some coughs.

I live.in a medium size town. Not many traffic lights here but the number of drivers blatantly going through red is unreal.

Phone use is off the charts too. The amount of drivers, women in particular, holding the phone out in front of their face while driving their crossovers etc and with no appreciation for their safety, their passengers safety or other road users really pi$$es me off.

They will be the very ones whining and lying on the roadside when the proverbial hits the fan.

Iv been driving 15 years. The last couple since covid iv become more nervous on the roads with all the dangerous driving iv seen. I drive roughly 20000k a year.

Yesterday a guy was bombing it on a narrow coastal road. Barely missed my mirror.

A few weeks ago a guy pulled out infront of me at a roundabout. He never even looked right. Had to slam on to not hit his drivers door.

Earlier in the year a guy slammed on the brakes at a 100k infront of me. I manged to stop and not hit him but the 3 cars behind me were in a pile up. Even tho that arsehole caused it he got away unscaved.

I've noticed an increase - and several other posters have alluded to the same - in drivers on main roads stopping repeatedly to let those on side roads out - and in so doing, holding up the vehicles behind them on the main road. This is foolish as not only does it prevent the intended free-flow of traffic on the main road, it might also tempt the frustrated vehicle behind to overtake, just as a driver tries to exit from a side road. I'm not referring to merging traffic or where there is clearly a tail-back down a side road, but where there is one car sitting in a side road, I can't see why you would stop to let it out.

I'd prefer if you didn't and I live down one of those side roads that can be a pain to get out of.

People stopping the main road traffic to let people out of b roads is dangerous. I've had people stopping their lane, urging me to come out to cross 2 lanes when the road is not clear. If the driver had just driven normally, I'd have gotten out sooner and all the other drivers wouldn't have been kept waiting

Please stop doing it. While the gesture is appreciated as someone who lives down a lane, its not following the rules and can have unsafe outcomes.

People just have to wait for the gap.

In a perfect world everyone should be alert to cars suddenly stopping for no apparent reason. The truth is though most drivers are not fully clued into the road in front of them 100% of the time as they ought to be, and most drivers in Ireland have an average level of skill. This is something we have to accept.

Using the swiss cheese model of failure for an accident that involved a car getting rear ended because the car in front stopped on a main road to let someone out:

Car stopped inappropriately on main road

Driver behind not paying attention

There could be other contributory factors, such as road surface, weather, traffic levels etc, where if any of them, if they had not occurred the accident would not have happened.

So the correct way to prevent these kinds of accidents is to address all the causes - drivers should be more attentive and cars shouldn't stop on main roads unless in an emergency. The recommendations is not a case of one one or the other.

If you're stopping on a main road to let traffic from a minor road out, you need your licence revoked.

It's more complex than that. You can't control the other road users who may try to undertake your stopped car assuming it's turning right or cars on the other lane arriving quicker than anticipated, or the driver you're allowing onto the road being distracted and then panicking when they feel they're holding up traffic.

I've seen all of those things happen because someone tried to do a good deed by letting someone onto the main road by stopping traffic behind them

Out in the real world I regularly let traffic out when its safe to do so and will continue to do so, when its safe to do so. Thankfully there are many more courteous drivers out there that reciprocate when its safe tp do so. Long may it last

Yes, I let people out all the time too. But stopping on a main road when there's traffic behind you, as discussed in this thread, does not fall under "when it's safe to do so". If there's no traffic behind you, what a re you letting them out for? Just keep going and everything's fine, you're being more courteous to them by allowing them to join the road quicker.

999 times out of a thousand, you'll end up being the major contributory cause of an accident and I repeat....ANYONE who regularly sees someone waiting to join there road and decides to actually stop and let them in, needs to have their licence revoked. If you can slow down a bit to allow them join, then yeah, or delay taking off from a standstill to let someone reverse out of a garden or hold back so someone can do a U-turn....yeah, all fairly common and courteous. But that's not what the poster was describing above.

If you're driving down a main road and someone is waiting to join and you have to come to a complete stop to allow them to join, you're a numpty and shouldn't be on the road. You keep being courteous all you want, I and everyone else on the road would prefer if you could behave in the manner that we're all taught as that's what keeps us all safe.

Don't be polite, be predictable.

Almost, that's a part of what I'm saying. Seems like your reading comprehension is up there with your driving skills.

I'm saying STOPPING ON A MAIN ROAD TO LET OTHERS JOIN THE ROAD IS NOT SAFE DRIVING, seeing as you're finding it difficult to get your head around it.