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Irish drivers.

Comhrá

I would agree with the commonly held view that us Irish drivers aren't great where discipline and observation of the rules of the road are concerned.

However, last week I had two elderly visitors over from the US and I was driving them around in the nice weather in Limerick City & county as well as counties Clare and Kerry. Heavy traffic almost everywhere we went, especially Dingle, Castleisland and Killaloe, Co. Clare.

They were of the opinion that Irish drivers were the most courteous and considerate they had seen anywhere.

Being elderly, they were slow getting in and out of the car and getting across streets.

I have to agree, most drivers stopped for us, waved us through and showed patience with our lack of pace. No-one showed any annoyance.

They mentioned that in the US, motorists would honk horns a lot of the time and generally show much less tolerance for being delayed, even for a short period.

I felt proud to hear we are doing somethings right when behind the wheel.

Sometimes we're a bit too critical of ourselves.

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Diabhalta

Terrible driving everywhere all the time.

This, two weeks ago. BMW appeared from the right, girl in the white Peugeot in front of me started braking and almost stopped. I beeped at her, she accelerated.

Like I said, everywhere all the time every.single.fcuking.day it's somebody who's not able to drive in a correct manner. It's like 3 out of 10 drivers are just sh1t at it in Cork city, elsewhere in Europe it's a lot better. It's like 5 drivers out of a 100 so they at least blend in and you barely come across them.

Diabhalta

Pedestrians are completely something else, the light is red but this guy with the girl start walking regardless and when they see the bus they start running right in front of it. Zero survival instinct. I've seen that video where the bus ran over a woman on patrick street like month ago? So weird, why crossing the road when you're not supposed to? And walking right in front of a bus like that. Special kind of stupid.

GPoint

Appreciate your efforts pulling screenshots from dash cam. Been in Cork only handful of times and every time I was stuck in city center road works and ended up following wrong lane as a result. Must have been unlucky.

Beautiful city though, when no traffic!

Diabhalta

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124524333#Comment_124524333

25th of December is a good time to go for a spin. Or any late night is good too (after midnight mid week). The NPC's are out there in full force usually between 10am-8pm usually doing their stupid thing with their stupid cars/vans/buses etc. After 8pm the chances to come across an idiot are lower and lower.

L drivers used to be ok before covid, but since the covid finished (2022 I think?) it's getting worse. L plates are now unpredictable too, they're mostly a hazard on the road. N plates (whatever that means) same.

GPoint

Tik tok generation grew up and got their L plates :)

Diabhalta

Well, lots of foreigners from third world countries too have their L plates now.

mikeecho

Hgv drivers are absolutely sh y te on my daily route

They stop on round-abouts. to allow other hgvs to join. Likewise on the main rd, 100km limit, and they come to a complete stop to allow other hgvs to join the road

D ick heads of the upmost.

Hailtothethief

Irish drivers well behaved, courteous and considerate? Don't make me laugh! People are indecisive, they crawl along causing a rolling roadblock, nobody indicates, nobody uses mirrors and they are obsessed with the "fast lane"

I've driven in France, Spain, Italy, Germany, Denmark, Luxembourg, Belgium, Netherlands and all (except the ring road in Luxembourg, Paris and Rome) were more relaxing to drive on compared to Ireland. You knew what people were going to do, they indicated and were decisive in their actions. Yes the speeds were higher and you learned lane discipline driving through rush hour traffic in Munich....

I've family members who find it a lot less stressful driving through the middle of Spain in a motorhome compared to driving here.

I'm not mentioning driving in Tanzania (rules, what rules?) UAE (like here but more expensive crashes), India (don't hit the cow) and Vietnam (go with the flow while sitting on the horn).

Edit - Don't ever thing about speeding in Denmark. Camera are EVERYWHERE so people all obey the speed limits....

Gooser14

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124429910#Comment_124429910

So would you be undertaking if you drove at the speed limit in the left lane?

Diabhalta

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124524832#Comment_124524832

lane hogging, another Cork classic.

last year in May, 6AM. Literally no traffic anywhere around, only this van and this lorry.

he's doing 100 in the right lane, when the lorry that's quite far away is doing like 90? It would take him forever to overtake that lorry.

In this case I went around him, because what am I supposed to do? stay behind him till he notices me and moves aside? or what? I'm not waiting, I don't want him ahead of me blocking my path. He probably thinks because there's no traffic it doesn't bother anybody.

no, I wasn't doing the speed limit of course.

Diabhalta

Different day, 6:30AM

this guy got sick of it and just went around

…and he's gone. it's just too early for this kind of driving, stay in the middle lane till you want to overtake. period.

Diabhalta

Three cars.

They would not survive on Autobahn with this kind of driving, they would be actually dangerous there. I had cars overtaking me on their limiter at 250 km/h couple of times. 170-200 km/h and more is standard there. Imagine these morons driving there, hopefully cops would take care of them. Thr way Autobahn works you really are danger and in danger if you're lane hogging. You see a car far in the distance in the mirror, few seconds later he's right behind you because he's doing 200+. I would not recommend a low IQ Cork driver going there.

Diabhalta

btw. roughly this is what 250 km/h looks like when you're doing 120km/h. I definitely enjoyed driving on Autobahn more than driving on South ring in Cork city ugh 🤮

https://imgflip.com/gif/atke2d

reubenreuben

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124525370#Comment_124525370

My experience on Italian motorways.

You see a fiat 500 overtaking a lorry then suddenly dart to the slow lane because a Ferrari or whatever is flying in the fast lane. They would get beeped/flashed out of it if they didn't. I've seen/heard it many times.

Here it's like they own the lane or something. Idiots and dangerous.

Seth Brundle

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124525617#Comment_124525617

…the slow lane…

Irish drivers in a nutshell 🙄

Hotblack Desiato

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124521142#Comment_124521142

Well when I was learning to drive the Rules of the Road told you to pull over into the shoulder on a single carriageway road to allow other traffic to pass, if you were holding up others. This was when the normal national primary route was a WS2. In fact the ROTR still says this

Hard shoulders on a motorway are a different matter and have a continuous line not a broken one.

Hotblack Desiato

Stay in the middle lane till you want to overtake. period.

Close, but no cigar…

GPoint

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124524832#Comment_124524832

I hear an advocate for lane hoggers?

You have to carry on at the speed limit in left lane, yes!

Options? Beep and flash them from behind? Too much hassle sometimes.

Gooser14

I'm absolutely not an advocate for hoggers. It's was a genuine question.

GPoint

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124526575#Comment_124526575

Ok I misread it then. They leave you no option but to pass on left, unfortunately.

Gooser14

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124526584#Comment_124526584

I put the question to ChatGPT & got the following response:

"You're highlighting a genuine frustration, and it's one reason lane discipline is emphasized on motorways.
The key distinction is that the Rules of the Road don't generally give one driver's breach of the rules permission for another driver to ignore a different rule. If a vehicle is improperly remaining in the overtaking lane, that driver is in the wrong. But the legal question is not "who is more wrong?"—it's whether passing them on the left is permitted.
In practice, there is a grey area that often gets debated:
If you are travelling in the left lane at a steady speed and a slower vehicle is lingering in the right lane, many drivers would simply continue in their lane and eventually end up ahead of the slower vehicle.
On the other hand, deliberately accelerating or using the left lane as a means to pass a vehicle on the right would generally be regarded as undertaking.
The difficulty is that the Rules of the Road are written primarily around the principle that overtaking should be done on the right. They don't explicitly create a broad exception that says, "If someone is lane-hogging, you may pass them on the left."
From a practical enforcement perspective, if you were maintaining your lawful speed in the left lane and a vehicle in the right lane slowed relative to you, it's not hard to imagine a Garda viewing that differently from someone who moved left specifically to get around a slower vehicle. But that's a matter of circumstances and interpretation, not a clearly stated entitlement.
So your argument is understandable:
"Why should I be forced to slow down because another driver is misusing the overtaking lane?"
Many motorists would agree with that sentiment. The issue is that road traffic rules are designed around predictable traffic flows and reducing side-swipe collisions. Passing on the left is generally considered less predictable than passing on the right, which is why the rules favour the latter even when the right-lane driver is at fault.
If you're asking about what would most likely happen in the real-world scenario of:
you're already in the left lane,
travelling steadily at 120 km/h,
you did not move left to get around them,
and you simply continue while a slower right-lane vehicle falls behind,
that is generally viewed quite differently from a deliberate undertake. But it's still a situation where the official guidance is less clear-cut than many drivers would like."

The last sentence is interesting.

road_high

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124525370#Comment_124525370

most dithering Irish idiots would be ploughed out of it on the continent where traffic moves quickly yet competently

GPoint

Undertaking is manoeuvring into the left to pass a vehicle. If your lane is moving faster then you carry on. But I always extra careful doing it because lane hogger may also not know that they have a mirror in the car not only speedometer which they don’t use.
If you want to be pedantic about rules of the road you would have to flash and beep them out of the lane.

evftw

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124525370#Comment_124525370

I think the Irish Driving Licensing should involve a week of driving in Germany after the N period. It would be really educational. Only the thickest of the thickos would not learn the "you have no rights, only responsibilities at the overtaking lane".

I have started to call the useless drivers "Special Needs" to calm my nerves on the road. These are the types that drive at 59 km/h regardless of the actual speed limits. The ones whose car has apparently about 10 BHP when pulling off the lights or during acceleration towards their 59 km/h after they just sloooowly pulled in front me when I was doing 100 a couple seconds before. These are the ones that have absolutely no situation awareness and just bumble (well not really, more like fluctuate) about in their own world and are always totally shocked when something happens, like they meet a walker or another car comes by. That's when they turn into the disco drivers whose brake lights start to flash a merry tune. These are those that have no visibility when it rains as they don't know how to operate the HVAC system.

Leaf on the road: Brake! Corner on the road: Brake! Somebody gets a point in the Sunday game: Brake! Another car: Brake! The traffic starts to move: Stay on the brakes for another five seconds leaving a huge gap and cause the traffic lights to change back to red as they detect no more cars coming. Then break the red light.

The opposite is the aggressive driver who always tailgates the car in front regardless of when speed the car in front does and how long a queue there is ahead of the car in front of them. Tailgate mercilessly even if the car in front is 20k over the limit. They are also the original disco drivers as they drive so close to car in the front that they nervously tap the brakes every couple of seconds. And they keep missing all the overtaking opportunities as they are too close to the car ahead of them. I just usually indicate and pull over and let them to attach themselves to the back of the car front of me.

GPoint

I like this thread.
Good read before commuting home!

ofcork

That expressway bus has to straddle 2 lanes by Victoria cross as it's too narrow to take the corner.

GPoint

The bus reminded me …

There are bus hoggers. They will sit in a normal lane and slow down traffic but will not take the bus lane which is empty!

Diabhalta

Cork city, definitely the biggest village in Europe.

guy just sits there in the car like this, like why?

Or this, what is this?

First of all this woman was driving slow AF and then at the lights she stops like this? Another spa.

Diabhalta

Guy in the blue Renault not indicating left, he totally looked like he has no idea what's going on, where is he going or what's actually happening in general. Who is letting these people drive?

Diabhalta

N driver completely missing the fact that his/her light is red and starts accelerating suddenly with our two lanes that go straight. I beeped, rest is up to them I guess.