Road rage...

[Gyrogearhead]

There was a piece on NPR (National Public Radio, Here in Houston it's the University of Houston's radio station) about this, where they asked a NYC cabbie why this was true and what it meant. His reply was that if you "hassle" someone in Los Angeles you're lible to get shot so folks out there are carefull not to insult other drivers.

In NYC on the other hand, he said, you can do anything you are big enough to get away with but no one is going to shoot you.

Interesting outlook! I guess he hasn't heard of the NYC mob.

[Kawabuggy]

I live in Houston and can admit to being "flustered" by other drivers. When you stop to think about it, and put a face on the problem it becomes apparent pretty quickly. Most, well maybe I'm using that a little too liberally, but MOST people I see on the roads doing stupid things are FIRST GENERATION drivers. This has nothing to do with age, but more so the fact that millions of our fellow motorists in this fair city have only previously ridden donkeys back and forth to market. Now they find themselves across the river, and cousin Juan has loaned them a 4,000 lb. automobile. There they go with no insurance, no license, no inspection stickers, no registration, no prior experience, no brakes, and no chance in hell that they will be able to navigate the streets safely. Because they did not grow up in an environment where their mother, father, aunts, uncles, and older nieces, nephews, & cousins grew up driving, they don't have that skill or knowledge passed on to them. How can you "teach" someone something when you can't do it yourself, & have no practical first hand experience? You can't.

Now instead of getting upset, I make it a personal goal to get to my destination without having any interaction with other drivers. That means give them their space. Stay WAY FAR back. I realize that trained monkeys could drive better than most here and that's how I visualize them sitting behind the wheel. You've seen those movies where they use chimpanzees and make their lips move while someone else does the voice over? Yea, just imagine those same monkeys behind the wheel and you will start driving a lot safer. And this applies to ALL drivers! I'm not just singling out any one nationality because if there is one thing that we are all equal at-it's lack of good driving habits & skills.

If you ever watch police approach an intersection you notice that they are trained to hang back away from the intersection. They were taught that most accidents happen at intersections and so they approach them cautiously. Me too.

The bottom line is, it is only going to get worse. Getting upset, or experiencing rage because of it just does not help the situation. Now this is what I want everyone to do tomorrow; Take your favorite rechargeable razor, grab the newspaper, and fresh cup of coffee, and your MP3 player. Saddle up with all of your gear, hit the streets, set the cruise control while you read the paper, enjoy your coffee & tunes. Use the steering wheel to support your newspaper. You can't beat 'em-so join them! Oh, I almost forgot the most important part-increase your insurance coverage! Be sure to specify "Non-Insured motorist" coverage as having that is like having a winning lottery ticket in your pocket that WILL be cashed very shortly.

[03Lightningrocks]

I live in Houston and can admit to being "flustered" by other drivers. When you stop to think about it, and put a face on the problem it becomes apparent pretty quickly. Most, well maybe I'm using that a little too liberally, but MOST people I see on the roads doing stupid things are FIRST GENERATION drivers. This has nothing to do with age, but more so the fact that millions of our fellow motorists in this fair city have only previously ridden donkeys back and forth to market. Now they find themselves across the river, and cousin Juan has loaned them a 4,000 lb. automobile. There they go with no insurance, no license, no inspection stickers, no registration, no prior experience, no brakes, and no chance in heck that they will be able to navigate the streets safely. Because they did not grow up in an environment where their mother, father, aunts, uncles, and older nieces, nephews, & cousins grew up driving, they don't have that skill or knowledge passed on to them. How can you "teach" someone something when you can't do it yourself, & have no practical first hand experience? You can't.

I don't know if there is any truth to what you said here, but that is one of the funniest posts I have read while visiting this forum.

[03Lightningrocks]

..."New Yorkers were most likely to wave their fists or arms. They were most likely to lay on the horn and they were most likely to make some sort of obscene gesture," said Michael Bush, of the marketing and consulting company Affinion Group, which commissioned the survey.

Dallas/Fort Worth came in second as the worst road rage city followed by Detroit, Atlanta and Minneapolis/St. Paul. Miami ranked a distant seventh.

Yahoo News

Let's be careful out there...

Living and driving around the Dallas area, I can believe this is accurate. I am surprised we are not number one.Funny, I have had more women road rage on me the past couple years than men. I had one nutty woman follow me into a gas station. Crazy woman rolled down her window and started cussing at me. To this day I don't know why or what I had done...LOL. She just drove off.

My daughter had some guy trying to scare her by riding up on her and cutting her off. I have guys who work for me all over town. We had her lead the guy to where a couple of my bruisers could discuss his manners with him. He turned off a block from the interception. I even spent an hour searching the parking lots of the businesses on the street he turned on. That guy will never know how close he came to a total lifestyle change.

[Gyrogearhead]

Kawabuggy, and "Amen brother!!"

[USA1]

whats all the hoopla...my daily drive could'nt be more relaxing.
.........no one gets in my way..pedestrians yield to me...little girls cry...
..............................life is good...

....the only problem is that my NRA sticker keeps falling off..guess it does'nt adhere well to rust...

[joe817]

whats all the hoopla...my daily drive could'nt be more relaxing.
.........no one gets in my way..pedestrians yield to me...little girls cry...
..............................life is good...

....the only problem is that my NRA sticker keeps falling off..guess it does'nt adhere well to rust...

I knew it had to be you even before I saw your sig. line!

[ELB]

Road ragers need to be sent to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, for desensitization. Not that the Saudis and all the ex-patriates there are roadragers, its just that grossly excessive speed, cutting each other off, six cars across on four lane street, left turns from any lane of a multi-lane street, running reds, yellows, greens whatever, all horn and accelerator, no brakes...Inshallah. They would soon fry out from the intensity of the experience, and driving back in NYC, LA, Houston, or whatever, would then seem so mellow and calm, they'd wonder what they ever got excited about. It's not uncommon in Riyadh to see six or seven cars across a four lane road, all waiting for the light to change (on the occasion that everyone actually stopped), and the first two or three rows all have their left turn signals on --- to turn into a two lane street. (Note: all streets in Riyadh are one way, or they have a SUBSTANTIAL median barrier down the center. Otherwise there would be 100-car pile-ups on each block). Once the light changes, the race is on, and because most of the vehicles are white, it looks like you dropped a sack of white rats with automobile horns in the intersection, and they are all trying to run through the same hole to the cheese at the same time.

The Ring Road that goes around the city is something like a giant NASCAR circuit, without the decals. People everywhere like to talk about 100 mile per hour drivers, but on the Ring Road and the major highways, they really do run 100+. The Ring Road and the major highways have an emergency lane on both sides, left and right, and we called the left one the "Allah" lane -- because if Allah hadn't intended for you to drive on it, he wouldn't have had it built, would he? And you better be hauling donkey when you are in that lane, otherwise you will have somebody parked in your trunk in no time.

Most (all?) are petrified when they first drive there, and it takes them forever to get someplace (and they get honked at and cursed in multiple languages) because they are way too slow, too chicken, and they never get thru the intersection. Eventually you learn you have to take the same chances everyone else does, and you start doing some extreme drivng yourself -- darting thru gaps in the traffic, forcing your car thru four lanes in 30 yards to make your next turn off, slaloming between slower vehicles full of chickens and such, cutting across a vacant lot because the intersection is all jammed up, pushing you car inch-by-inch inbetween others during a traffic jam -- things your driver's ed instructor never even envisioned. You get yelled at and honked at a lot, I used to blow kisses back -- would make'em madder. Amazingly enough, it mostly works and everyone gets where they are going. Sometimes with a few dents.

There are some spectacular accidents tho.

[The Annoyed Man]

I've lived most of my life in the Los Angeles area until I moved here 3 years ago. I once had an enraged motorist brandish a pistol at me because my 55 mph in a 35 mph zone wasn't fast enough for him - the idiot. . . .

[bryang]

I have to...notice: "have to"....go to Dallas two or three times a year and being from a relatively calm West Texas town...it is a nightmare. I never know which will happen first, get ran over or shot!!

I have learned a few things, like people become very angry when you drive the speed limit. The best part is because of being from out of town it is hard to find my way around and where I need to turn, while trying to check the map for a quick refresher of where I am at, and at the same time doing 90mph with someone stuck to my back bumper, screaming, honking and waving his fist at me... or at least I thought it was a fist.

Anyway, I'll leave the big city to you younger folks with nerves of steel, three times a year is plenty enough for me.

-geo

[03Lightningrocks]

Anyway, I'll leave the big city to you younger folks with nerves of steel, three times a year is plenty enough for me.

-geo

Honest to God, If I didn't have to live here to work, I would get out tomorrow. I am looking forward to retirement in the country.

[surprise_i'm_armed]

As a Boston native, I was quite surprised to see that Boston did not
make the list of top road rage cities. Granted, I left in 1988, but going
back to see family, I still see some crazy things.

People from other cities talk about road rage and I just think they are all amateurs.
Pedestrians in Boston jaywalk into traffic, thinking that the law will make motorists
stop. The drivers aim at the pedestrians and then just miss them with a honk of the
horn and the 1/5 of a hand salute, with a quick stab on the brakes and/or burning rubber.

The streets started to be laid out in 1620 and New England was heavily wooded, so the streets
are not laid out in parallel lines. Plus the City of Boston is constantly changing the directions
of all the One Way streets.

Atlanta - I lived there too. I didn't really see any road rage to speak of, but if you like to
speed, then Atlanta's your town. My lead foot had free rein there. For 7 years I drove as
fast as I could handle all the time. The Georgia cops would stop me, look at my DL and ins
card, then say "Please slow down", and would not give me a warning or ticket.

Texas was such a drastic downer when I got here. People are slowpokes on many roads,
and they don't seem to realize that "Green means hit the gas." The cops really work the
revenue patrol here with constant speed traps. Contrast that with Georgia where the
public drives like "Wild Bill" from Dawnsonville, a Nascar driver.

Saudi Arabia - They road race and have drifting competitions on the street, mixed in
with the average family driving down the street. The kill bystanders all the time!!

[ClarkLZeuss]

Road ragers need to be sent to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, for desensitization. Not that the Saudis and all the ex-patriates there are roadragers, its just that grossly excessive speed, cutting each other off, six cars across on four lane street, left turns from any lane of a multi-lane street, running reds, yellows, greens whatever, all horn and accelerator, no brakes...Inshallah. They would soon fry out from the intensity of the experience, and driving back in NYC, LA, Houston, or whatever, would then seem so mellow and calm, they'd wonder what they ever got excited about. It's not uncommon in Riyadh to see six or seven cars across a four lane road, all waiting for the light to change (on the occasion that everyone actually stopped), and the first two or three rows all have their left turn signals on --- to turn into a two lane street. (Note: all streets in Riyadh are one way, or they have a SUBSTANTIAL median barrier down the center. Otherwise there would be 100-car pile-ups on each block). Once the light changes, the race is on, and because most of the vehicles are white, it looks like you dropped a sack of white rats with automobile horns in the intersection, and they are all trying to run through the same hole to the cheese at the same time.

The Ring Road that goes around the city is something like a giant NASCAR circuit, without the decals. People everywhere like to talk about 100 mile per hour drivers, but on the Ring Road and the major highways, they really do run 100+. The Ring Road and the major highways have an emergency lane on both sides, left and right, and we called the left one the "Allah" lane -- because if Allah hadn't intended for you to drive on it, he wouldn't have had it built, would he? And you better be hauling donkey when you are in that lane, otherwise you will have somebody parked in your trunk in no time.

Most (all?) are petrified when they first drive there, and it takes them forever to get someplace (and they get honked at and cursed in multiple languages) because they are way too slow, too chicken, and they never get thru the intersection. Eventually you learn you have to take the same chances everyone else does, and you start doing some extreme drivng yourself -- darting thru gaps in the traffic, forcing your car thru four lanes in 30 yards to make your next turn off, slaloming between slower vehicles full of chickens and such, cutting across a vacant lot because the intersection is all jammed up, pushing you car inch-by-inch inbetween others during a traffic jam -- things your driver's ed instructor never even envisioned. You get yelled at and honked at a lot, I used to blow kisses back -- would make'em madder. Amazingly enough, it mostly works and everyone gets where they are going. Sometimes with a few dents.

There are some spectacular accidents tho.

Man, I gotta say, this incredible word picture had me laughing my brains out, to the point where my wife asked me, "Are you all right?" like I'm on drugs or something. I've heard, too, that in Saudi Arabia, people drive with their brights on...ALL the time. True?

[stevie_d_64]

I have learned to drive defensively aggressive...Or is it agressively defensive...I dunno anymore...Growing up in Houston you either survive or stay off the 610 loop...