You drive just fine, everyone else sucks, and here is why

"DMCVegas" (DMCVegas) 04/28/2015 at 02:22 • Filed to: None

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Everyone complains about other drivers and how bad they are. You probably do too, and truthfully you’re probably right. Though it’s not a matter of skill, so much as it is local customs. And we’re not talking about some foreign exotic land, but merely states in America.

Now I learned to drive in Las Vegas, and that place is a damn hodgepodge of bad drivers from everywhere else. And I’m not just tossing that out of spite or anything, but it’s the truth because infrastructure is so much different than other places that it is in the land of road rage and child neglect that is Southern Nevada. And it is infrastructure that has a larger impact than you think upon driving customs.

Until I started traveling on business trips across the country that allowed me to explore such exotic locals like Ohio, I never realized this fact. It’s not always that other people are “bad” drivers, it’s just that their driving skills, and more importantly habits simply do NOT match their new environments. And it’s as eye-opening as it is depressing when you see what other people have to put up with.

Merging lanes:

Low-volume, cloverleaf traffic interchanges in the Midwest don’t have acceleration or deceleration lanes. There is just a lane on sometimes a rather short bridge as you can see in this handy-dandy accompanying picture. So as soon as you get on, you have to immediately change lanes and THEN speed up. Or cut over and quickly hit the brakes. Because if you don’t, you just wind up getting dumped onto a lane going in the opposite direction, or otherwise just miss your turnoff entirely. Which is a truly awful habit people have where they end up always cutting you off either to get over, or after they’ve gotten over they slam their brakes in front of you.

And then there is Texas with long double-white lines on the merging sections of the on and off-ramps. And if you cross them, it’s a nice fine that cops in the Lone Star State just LOVE to write tickets for.

Needless to say, people from Texas tend to be gun-shy about merging lanes. So you get the mix of people that suddenly cut over without warning, and the others that won’t friggin’ move to let you over at all. Why? They’re just not used to any of this.

Acceleration lanes: Given the facts of those aforementioned short lanes in the Midwest, some people will just come barreling out into traffic like a damn rodeo bull out of the chute. And then in places like the Southeast with low-volume highways and byways, there’s always plenty of time to stop, rather than simply yield so you can keep going. Intact, in lots of cases, they don’t even have acceleration lanes, and the low traffic volume dictates that they should stop.

Which again is why some people drive like maniacs, and others just congest traffic behind them on the damn ramps. They’re scared because they’re just not used to the need to quickly accelerate.

Oh, and one more thing too about the South. Given the fact that there are not only a lack of acceleration lanes on many highways, there is also the small town mentality of trying to be ultra-polite in traffic. Whether this is a sign of genuine good-will, or just the fact that people are afraid that the other person is someone they know (which somehow happens I can attest to. Even in Houston, I have randomly run into my in-laws at random times across the metroplex for some inexplicable reason), it’s unknown. But people will slow down just to try and be friendly to let the other person pass.

Now this may seem like a good idea, but believe you, me, it is not. In fact, it just creates more congestion, and leaves you open to be rear-ended by an inattentive driver. But people carry this horrible, horrible habit with them across the states to their new homes, and just make traffic worse for everyone...

Also, for everyone’s sake, please do not take this sign too literal.

Do yourself a favor, and don’t simply drive friendly. Drive intelligently. Intelligence leads to courteousness. Friendliness does not. Mentally handicapped people are friendly, and we do not let them drive, now do we? And as you know, there is a very good reason for that.

I’m sure that most confused elderly drivers out there who have mistaken the gas for the brake pedal and caused a crash are friendly people. But now matter how cheery you are, that does NOT make up for a lack of driving ability.

So don’t be friendly. Be intelligent and responsible.

Dual Left Turn Lanes: In Nevada and California the Inner LTL may only go to the inner lane of the next street, while the Outer LTL can choose either the middle or the outer lane as necessary and applicable. As you can easily see below in a satellite picture of Sahara & Decatur in Las Vegas. On if the valley’s busiest intersections. Just follow the turn lane markings (ignoring the leftover accident debris in the middle of the intersection).

In Texas and other states, no, it’s completely reversed. The outer turn lane is locked into only the outer lane of the street you’re turning onto, and the inner lane gets free reign of the inner or middle lanes. So you constantly get people trying to occupy the same lane at the same time, and it results in massive confusion and anger. No one is trying to be the boss of the road, they’re just assuming that the other driver is wrong based off their own driving habits and the laws they’re used to. Especially in both Nevada and Texas where as more Californians move down south, the amount of out of state plates indicates that Texans are fleeing to Nevada for some reason... Texas Hold ‘Em maybe? I’ve no idea.

Left Turn Yield on Green: The Midwest and Southeast has never even heard of such a thing, and is perpetually confused by the concept that a green light means that they don’t have the right of way.

Bless their little hearts, regional transportation departments are trying to introduce this concept with the training wheels of a flashing yellow arrow in order to reduce traffic congestion. But once they come out West, they’ll all still be just as confused by the pairing of a green arrow with a solid green light...

Driveways: This bugs me the most. I absolutely HATE it! On the west coast, driveways have full aprons. Meaning that on each side of the driveway, it’s a full ramp that flares out to the street, and may have a minor inch or two drop-off. Why? Because the curb continues in a straight line, but then dips down to the level of the driveway. The dips in the bent result in two isosceles triangles on either side that make up the apron, and make tight turns in and out possible.

In Texas and other states, this doesn’t exist. Nope, there is no apron gradient, and the curb itself just curves into the damn driveway at full height, sometimes even extending UP in order to meet the hight of the driveway was you can see here:

So if you take too tight of a turn entering or exiting a driveway down South, you’re going to be driving over the curb and slamming your tires into it, or off of it. Not fun at all. So how do you avoid it? You absolutely MUST swing wide turns everywhere you go like you’re pulling a trailer. Which explains why when you’re turning, you’re always veering into other people’s lanes. And in order to avoid compressing your spine, or damaging your suspension (as I have), you need to turn wide. And this is one of the worst habits that transplants just can’t seem to break.

Roundabouts: Don’t even bother. No one understands what the hell these things are, and seem incapable of any possible comprehension. Sometimes people just give up and put up stop signs, which defeats the entire damn purpose. Mostly though it seems like municipalities just gave up on them entirely. Vegas has these things both in one of the more affluent communities, and North Las Vegas has some in the slums. Which is perhaps the greatest example of American understanding of Roundabouts as displayed in this picture right here:

Off of Carey Ave. in NLV is this fine example brought to us via Google Earth’s Street View camera. Sure we see the obvious sings of people carelessly driving over the island by the tire marks and the displaced decorative rock. Not just on the curbs, but across the entire thing. What isn’t apparent, aside from the square posts that the city gave up on replacing after consistently being knocked down, are those large rocks in the center demonstrating how often this happens. Back around 1996 or so when this intersection was first converted, those used to be huge, and I do mean HUGE boulders. Almost 2 DECADES of bad drivers have been slamming into those once boulders as they speed through this neighborhood, and knocking them down into little rocks as they have been slowly fracturing after every impact.

I suppose that it just goes to show no matter what, some people will never learn something that is new to them. Adaptability may be an amazing trait of mankind, but not so much for an individual.

beardsbynelly - Rikerbeard > DMCVegas 04/28/2015 at 03:04

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ROUNDABOUTS ARE STREET LEGAL CHICANES WHY DO PEOPLE USE THEM WRONG?

ViperGuy21 > DMCVegas 04/28/2015 at 07:16

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Fantastic article man! I’m here in Texas so I definitely have some understanding of this, but I learned to drive here so Texas is “normal” to me

SidewaysOnDirt still misses Bowie > beardsbynelly - Rikerbeard 04/28/2015 at 07:39

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ATTACK ALL THE TURNS!

beardsbynelly - Rikerbeard > SidewaysOnDirt still misses Bowie 04/28/2015 at 07:50

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Mr2 owners know what’s up

thebigbossyboss > beardsbynelly - Rikerbeard 04/28/2015 at 07:56

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When I was 16 and very stupid....I followed a car to a round about, in which one exit was blocked (never opened) and one went into a school yard therefore most traffic goes left from the direction we were coming. Knowing the car around me was going all the way around the round about, I went left (the wrong way) through the round about and beat them out the exit. Best pass ever. And by best I mean most stupidest.

nFamousCJ - Keeper of Stringbean, Gengars and a Deezul > beardsbynelly - Rikerbeard 04/28/2015 at 08:11

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Is there a rule/law that says how many times I can take the roundabout without exiting? May need to know...for reasons

revrseat70 > DMCVegas 04/28/2015 at 10:02

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As someone who has lived in Alabama (small town politeness and wide births), North Virginia (eclectic mix of all these because of DC transplants), Washington DC (city designed by the same guy who designed Paris so it confuses everyone and moves super slow because of it + tourists), Minneapolis (Cloverleaf drama, just like you described), and DFW Texas (eclectic mix of new transfers from the whole country, overly aggressive + over confidence + everyone else is going to look out for me so I shouldn’t have to + some sheepish mergers from the country driving in the cities + people who have no idea who yields to who on the crazy oncoming traffic lane crossover merging sections + absolutely no understanding of the passing lane by cars nor commercial vehicles = an average of 2.5 accidents a day on my morning commute of just 12 miles, by interstate) I’d say this is the most accurate article I’ve read on OPPO. Good work

revrseat70 > revrseat70 04/28/2015 at 10:10

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It’s also worth discussing how regional culture affects driving tax.. I mean police activity. In the south, 10 miles over the speed limit on a nice day is not enforced like 2 miles over the speed limit is enforced in the midwest/northern states. For example: Alabama drivers drive the speed limit in the middle lane because of this and pass at around 10 mph over the speed limit in the left lane. This actually prevents accidents by keeping the left lane mostly clear and traffic more predictable. Trucks don’t get over in the far left lane (as much) because they simply can’t keep up with the people passing. In Texas, cops driving tax any and everyone driving 1 mph over. So every lane is occupied by people driving the speed limit (or even 10mph under for reasons I haven’t gathered yet) and those seeking a quicker trip (even just speed limit speeds) are forced to weave through every single lane, increasing danger and decreasing flow and predictability.

DMCVegas > revrseat70 04/28/2015 at 10:58

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Much appreciated. Thank you!

DMCVegas > revrseat70 04/28/2015 at 11:10

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I know *exactly* what you mean about Texas roads getting clogged up! I’m not a fan of traffic enforcement as it usually is just an excuse to go after petty offenses for revenue generation. But this is something that law enforcement has stated they’re cracking down on, and I’m actually glad about code enforcement in this case.

Some states have it as a law, others don’t. Or if they do, the certainly don’t enforce it. Or in this case it’s another driving custom that people just aren’t used to. If you look at freeways such as I-5 in Southern California, it’s usually about 3-4 lanes wide in a single direction. So if the driver in front of you is doing 1mph slower, you can easily change lanes and lazily drift past them. That’s not something you can do on a two-lane highway in Texas. The left lane is for passing only with the right lane being for travel. And once you change lanes, you need to hit the gas and pass the vehicle, and then safely get back over as quickly as possible. Otherwise that’s “Impeding the flow of traffic”, and you’ll get fined for it.

http://www.txdot.gov/driver/share-r…

Now granted you also see this in other Southern states too, but less outside drivers mean it’s less of a problem. Letting people pass was one habit that I took back with me to Vegas, and when you let someone pass, it freaks them the hell out. It’s like they’re expecting you to road rage and throw something at them. So they always proceed with caution.

As for speeding, I usually only get to go about 4-7mph over in Texas. I’m either dealing with congestion in the big city, or on the 80mph speed limits on the highways out of town, it just starts killing my fuel economy.

Best thing I can recommend though is to ALWAYS follow those traffic signs. Whenever I come to a small town, I *never* go over the speed limit, always under. And if I’m approaching a town and it warns me about a drop in speed ahead, I don’t prepare to slow down, I press the brake pedal and slow down immediately to the lower speed. That was something I learned in Nevada, and it’s never done me wrong with the local small town cops. But I’ve seen plenty of other people who ignored those signs get pulled over as they unwittingly fly past me.

DMCVegas > ViperGuy21 04/28/2015 at 11:25

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Thank you!

Yeah, when I drive anywhere in Texas that isn’t a metropolitan area, it’s always uniform drivers. Houston however is the absolute worst city I’ve ever driven in. Los Angeles can’t hold a candle to it.

First is the suburban sprawl that keeps on encroaching into the rural areas. So these small town communities out of no where go through that phase of massive congestion and sudden freeways cutting through them. 249 from Tomball to Magnolia is the premier example of this. So suddenly what was just a quiet turn off in the country becomes the big city in just a few short years. All thanks to real estate developers who are buying up old farms and converting the fields to housing tracts and shopping centers.

But the worst in Houston is the infrastructure. I-10, a major interstate bottlenecks down to 2 lanes around the Downtown area @ I-45. 2 lanes! Then you have all of the exit only lanes on the LEFT side of 45 & 59.... I totally get why people start driving slower through interchanges if they’ve driven in places like Houston. Or Dallas with those terrifyingly narrow lanes....

ViperGuy21 > DMCVegas 04/28/2015 at 18:11

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Yeah, my uncle lives in Houston and when go visit we always hit Houston at rush hour no matter what time we leave here. Or Houston is always in rush hour....

Ad_absurdum_per_aspera > DMCVegas 06/03/2015 at 14:00

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I think any boomtown is going to be a driving hell for a while. Bakersfield, CA went through that for some years — it had big city amounts of traffic but the drivers didn’t yet have the coping strategies to deal with it, so you had the aggressive yahoos in overpowered, bad-handling pickemups, and the truckers and travelers trying to make time cross-country mixing with unexpectedly heavy local traffic, and the people of all sorts who didn’t realize how suddenly and unexpectedly the traffic ahead can turn into a sea of brake lights... It didn’t help that this was happening during the advent of the cell phone.

Throw in some traffic engineering that for various reasons is stuck in a previous era (the 58/99 interchanges, for instance, or the near-shoulderless two-lane death strip of 58 en route to I-5) and it was a guaranteed mess. Maybe still is.

Then at some times of year, at night a fog rolls in that can make driving more like navigating a submarine through a sea of oatmeal... and depending on which way you’re headed, it can stay like that for a couple hundred miles. The out-of-towners, especially, don’t necessarily know how to deal with that either.

asenna > DMCVegas 06/03/2015 at 14:02

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This is a common situation that most people seem to screw up in this situation the red arrow (car) is turning onto a side street and the yellow arrow (car) is also turning onto the same side street but it has its own turn lane that comes onto the side street further down. In this case the yellow car should yield to the red car but it seems like a majority of people out there don’t know what to do in this situation.

desertsoldier22 > DMCVegas 09/13/2019 at 09:02

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I learned to drive in Germany, I live now in Houston. Yes everyone else does indeed suck.