It’s strange, my coworker said the roads were really crazy last night. First light i tunred at, left turn by the way, with green arow, dude ran the red and almost hit me. Is it something in the water?
I think it’s a barometer for the overall mental health climate. We’re any combination of overworked, broke, tired, we got news organizations trying to keep us mad at each other all the time…and then we get on the road where it’s easy to pretend those other metal boxes aren’t filled with human beings.
I’m not above it. I’ve participated in my fair share of road rage parties. And I don’t have any solutions, just observations and memes. That’s all I got.
It’s deeper than that.
People have been doing this since cars became fast. There’s something in our brains that automatically turns driving into a battle.
Nah, it’s not just driving cars - I’ve seen the same happen with shopping carts in the grocery store.
I don’t know. I have never seen a shopping cart dispute half as bad as the aggressive/asshole drivers I see every damn day. I think it’s the anonymity…
Have you been to Costco?
This is a really good observation.
And there aren’t any traffic laws for shopping carts. Of course they are also less deadly.
but a whole lot more dangerous when you have 4 turning wheels instead of 2
I mean, you roll up on anyone in an aggressive/adversarial manner, regardless of the situation, you’re more likely to encourage pushback than agreement/compliance. Even if it’s just the perception of aggression, our primate brains are wired to stand our ground. Doesn’t matter who’s wrong or right, it’s about locking horns. It’s why online arguments are the way they are.
So… Aggressivity always escalates if people interact at random without a cooling period?
That’s quite a hypothesis. Seems realistic. I wonder if anybody tested it.
I’ve got a solution. It’s called a train.
Works really well when the nearest station is over a dozen miles away from your home, and you’ve got a full load of shopping bags with you.
I’ve got a solution for that one too. It’s called a train station. We need to build more of them.
Who needs the actual railways, amirite?
It boggles the mind that Americans cannot figure out any other way to buy groceries than by using a car.
I cover all of our shopping needs comfortably with a bike along with walking to the closest store.
The problem is that you’ve fundamentally fucked up your built environment, and trying to paper over your failure with car apologia is just not going to cut it
What about a bus?
Buses are awesome too!
But I think any bus route that runs for more than 5 years should just be replaced with a tram at that point, because trams are even better. Buses are great for temporary changes to routes, but they can’t beat trams for efficiency or convenience.
My city doesn’t think long term investment. Our bus routes change every few years also, because of construction or other reasons.
Better than nothing
Has it started getting hot out where you are recently? There is always a spike in bad driving when the weather gets nice.
“in these hot days is the mad blood stirring” -Romeo and Juliet
An important game maybe? Being Brazilian, I’ve always refrained from driving before big soccer games started, like World Cup or championship finals. People were crazy trying to get home.
This is every day where I live. It’s madness. Otherwise, the place is paradise. Beautiful area. People are great here. Until you get them into a car. Then they are inattentive, pushy, and unsafe. People die every single year. Kids on bikes get plowed over. It’s insane.
At a 4-way intersection, if I stop around the same time as a car to my right I always yield to them according to the “right hand rule” of right-of-way. But everyone else wants to go only by “who reached the line first” and they want to time it down to the millisecond. And guess what: they always, always determine that they arrived first.
Funny how that works. They’ve changed the rule from “right of way goes to whoever arrived first, defer to car on your right when in doubt” to “it’s always my turn.”
Yeah, they put a drug in the water known as DHMO. It drasticly affects your brain and motor functionality.
😳 are you telling me they put water, in the water?
Yo dawg I heard you like DHMO…
There’s cocaine in the water so maybe
If there’s heavy traffic in your city and private cars are still preferable to public transport, your infrastructure is shit and you should go pester your politicians about it
What do I do if the public transit is pretty good and the city is walkable, but all the jobs are in office parks 40 minutes out of town?
Pester your politicians that they forgot a part of the walkable city. Either a walkable workplace or work from home.
Hello, yes. I work in construction. I carry 50+lbs (23+kg) of tools and/or material to work (which constantly changes locations as buildings and projects finished being built).
How do I fit into the walkable city plan?
I never claimed everyone could work from home. But I think you’ll agree, that your commute would probably become quicker and less stressful, if the majority of office workers could stay at home.
Less traffic if you have to drive, less crowded public transport. As a side effect life in the city might also become less stressful, as the noise from traffic reduces.I never assumed you meant that everyone should. I was just curious as to how my side of things would function in your concept. I have often had the same questions about the 32 hour workday for us blue collars. Often in our cases, the thing we’re lacking is time instead of being able to consolidate work.
So the city isn’t walkable, then
Define walkable.
I can walk to literally everything I need in my daily life except my job, and the share of residents lucky enough to work in the city can walk or bike to those too. My city scores incredibly high in both walk and bike scores; this drives real estate prices up, which drives employers to the suburbs, and—wouldn’t you know it!—the cheapest places to build office parks are situated away from the commuter transit.
except my job
That’s not walkable. The definition is not that difficult
The definition is not that difficult
Idk if you’re trolling or just obstinate, but if you don’t explain the exact definition you are using, it is impossible to determine what meets it and what does not.
For example:
Walkability is a measure of how accessible services and amenities are by foot or transit. A city is walkable if a broad range of these are thusly available.
Sure, your definition works. Your place of work is obviously included into the list of location that needs to be accessible, since it’s somewhere you commute to almost every day.
Fair enough, but I would contend “a broad range” is compatible with “all but one”
They’re not being obstinate. You are working very hard not to understand that your job has to be walkable too.
Let me just walk my 315lb welder to work each morning. Can I borrow your kids radio flyer after you walked them to school?
If only the only people that use cars on a daily basis were the ones that actually need to, maybe you wouldn’t be so bitter and angry about it.
If your job makes you take a welder home with you at night, you need a new job.
Have you ever heard the term welding rig? Gas /diesel welder? Self-employed? Field repair? Millwright ? Heavy equipment? Residential fence/gate repair. Structural? You know all those things that require mobile welding.
Walkable: jobs, homes, and basic essentials shopping coexist near enough to each other.
It’s not walkable if you only have 2 out of 3.
I’m in an odd situation where there’s heavy traffic but we have very good bike lanes and bike trails. Yet I am afraid to use the bike lanes most of the time because the drivers are so insane. And half the people who do ride bikes end up doing it wrong because they feel unsafe: they ride in the bike lane against traffic or just ride on the sidewalks where they become the threat: to pedestrians.
Public transport would still alleviate the issue by moving a portion of the drivers off the roads. Which, in turn, will make bike lanes safer.
Yes. I’m not sure how it’s the infrastructure’s fault that we don’t have better transit though. Better transit would mean busses here as we have decent bike support and regional rail. We do have busses, too, but for them to be better they need to go more places that the cars are going.
And actually the biggest reason we have so many cars is they keep building more and more housing further and further out from our town, which then needs to pass through our town to get anywhere.
There’s multiple layers to this, but if all you wanted to say was “your infrastructure is shit” then, well, you’ve said it.
Because improving infrastructure makes these layers easier to deal with. More bike and bus lanes, more car traffic restrictions, extending public transport routes to suburbs, even building tram lines potentially. All of this and more will make your town better and all of it is possible if you pressure your elected representatives enough.
The reason you have so many cars is because people in charge prioritize the comfort of cars.
How could having my own personal space that operates on my schedule ever not be preferable to being crammed into a smelly tube with a bunch of other people?
Maybe if you gave even a fraction of care that you give your car to the people around you, it wouldn’t be smelly and crammed.
What am I supposed to do about either of those issues?
Refer to my original comment
Pester politicians? To do what? Tell people to shower and lose weight?
To build more public transport instead of parking lots and highways lanes. Then you’ll have enough space to travel comfortably.
Literally the first 2 posts as I opened the app
These ‘zipper merge’ vs ‘early merge’ arguments are really the worst. At the same time, the lack of consensus fully explains why merge zones like that are such a mess.
I remember driving through OK, and the state law is “early merge.” I thought it was all bullshit, buuut they have studies 1 year after they implemented it that it actually cut down on traffic somehow. I still believe the late zipper merge is better. Use the whole road until you can’t!
Its funny that 102 comments will lead to meta reaction posts here in the fediverse
The clear solution is to park on the tracks inside a light rail station.
Edit: post context
I assume it shouldn’t be one at street level. Do you recommend an elevated station or an underground one?
This was an elevated station
lol elevated for sure https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/69951707
https://maps.app.goo.gl/GC4RDV68mTKNzDyx5?g_st=ic
I have you tagged as “Seattle” already, so this is our city! She turned onto it south of here where it’s at grade, but this is the Mount Baker station where it is elevated.
I was aware of the full situation and joking about it.
And while I’ve spent a fair amount of time in Seattle since moving to the PNW I generally prefer to not explicitly narrow it down more than that. (And yes I understand that Seattle is wildly overrepresented on here).
Fair enough! I just like having all my “locals” tagged. It’s so fun to see them around. I love the PNW!
What discussion? Zipper merge is a well defined technique.
More like half the people know how to zipper merge and the other half try to justify merging a mile early and getting angry when people pass them and zipper merge properly.
Let pedestrians and cyclists go first. Scramble walk is okay and sjould be encouraged
I like how I stumbled into your
sjouldright after you made me imagine the scramble-walk. Somehow my brain crossed circuits and when I readsjould, my imagined scramble-walker slipped on wet pavement and half fell (and then recovered, by hitting the word “encouraged”, lol).Brains are weird.
I hate scramble walks that act like you can’t still walk while traffic is going. The light is green just turn the walk sign on.
50/50 about it. My premise was for stop signs and or yield signs in general. But for traffic lights I’d rather it red light all around and pedestrians go where the heck they need. Like in Chicago there is busy intersections in a densely populated neighborhood that has foot traffic of bars/restaurants etc. but pedestrians have to abide by traffic’s patterns?? Like that one-five driver decides to make a right turn and bam either you hit someone or someone rear ends or block the bus or just make long queue for the cars who go past the cross walk…
I support this wholeheartedly. Cars should be banned.
Sorry bud, you’re the party that doesn’t understand zipper merging.
GO AS FAST AS POSSIBLE DON’T STOP DON’T YIELD ONLY THE STRONG SURVIVE
Some people think that if there’s a hwy lane closure in 30 miles, you’re the asshole of you don’t immediately merge over
I don’t mind personally, but don’t assume that your blinker means I HAVE to let you in
Definitely. I personally merge earlier, knowing it’s less efficient and will put me back relative to zipper merging - just to avoid the stress of trying to get in between potentially uncooperative mergees. But I also don’t get too mad at the mergers - maybe they’re in a legit hurry
and will put me back relative t
And everybody else in the lane.
You do, though, depending on where you live. It’s the law in plenty of countries, and for good reason. Lanes are meant to be used until they end, and the best strategy with traffic is a zipper merge. Every-other car should be from the ending lane, assuming there are cars in the ending lane. If you aren’t letting the next person in to the continuing lane, you are an asshole, and a dangerous driver.
And some people think inflating numbers proves their point.
Plus, If you have 30 miles of signs telling you to get over and you wait until you are forced by the actual lane closure, yes you are the asshole.
I will not be taking questions.
If you have 30 miles of ending lane warnings, you should still ride it until the actual end. It’s best for congestion. Leaving a whole lane unused is pointless. It’s better for everyone if you wait to merge.
If there’s a lot of traffic it makes sense to try and find room to merge early though
“Early” being relative to the specific vehicles involved. Lorries/tractor-trailers need a LOT more time to find an opening before a merge than a “four-wheeler” does, for example.
Besides, it’s long been proven that “zipper merging” - which is basically waiting up to almost the last second to merge - is the more efficient method.
Came here to find this argument.
Well done everyone!
It’s more efficient if people let you pass in front of them. Which they might not
Not very efficient if you have to stop next to a moving lane lol
That’s a training issue more than anything else. People have never been taught how to merge well, and so inevitably everybody has their own “camp” when it comes to best practices. Those who complain about “fairness” typically have a more myopic view than those who take “the big picture” into account (or they have a faulty “big picture” in mind). I’ll grant that a good number of those “cheaters” are indeed just being selfish pricks, but statistics still show that zipper merging is best in the end. Far too many people care more about their illogical feelings than the facts, tho.
Zipper merging is ideal in certain situations but not all of them. It reduces the total “length” of traffic the choke point, but doesn’t necessarily increase the total throughout. It’s primarily meant to prevent traffic from backing up to other lights and intersections on the road. The throughput optimum for lighter traffic is to merge earlier (though not miles back) to maintain speed, and people who force their way in at the last second cause the standard “traffic wave” problems. That’s why it isn’t quite as clear cut as people make it - the optimum behavior is situational and that level of complexity is not well gasped by your average person who is profoundly uncurious of the world around them.
Then there’s the issue of people wanting to zipper merge in places where it is completely inappropriate because it blocks a travel lane. This was a weekly debate on our local subreddit when I was still using it. The number of people who insisted that a highway interchange should be treated as a zipper, despite that blocking the main road, is high enough that I am convinced that the zipper narrative has been a net negative. Though I also concede that most of these people would still be idiots about it without the plausible justification for bad behavior.
Zipper merges are always more efficient, though the problem is idiots don’t understand what they are. They are not racing up to the last moment you need to merge. Ever. They are never that. Ever.
They are ONLY two rules:
-
If you need to merge, roughly match speeds with through-traffic once you’ve identified an opening, line up with that opening, and merge.
-
If you’re in the through-lane, make room for roughly 1 to 1 cars to be able to merge in.
It is a whole different matter to occupy all of closing lanes or merge lanes. Solves a totally different problem. The people insisting it’s part of zipper merging are idiots that do not understand zipper merging.
-
Nope. Waiting until the last second is not zipper merging.
I said “basically” to imply it was being stated in a simplistic manner for expediency. The article I linked to gave the full story, and I’d rather they read that along with proof it provided. You’re nit-picking, which isn’t surprising considering your other responses.
It always makes sense to merge at the last safe moment, but only if everyone else is doing that which requires everyone to trust each other and I can trust myself but I can’t trust any of you fuckers, etc.
Yeah, it would take a concerted, long-running campaign to reeducate drivers on the topic, as well as a nearly unified backing from those in a position to deliver it. Considering how political issues have been going downhill for so long that we’ve effectively sunk well past unheard of new lows, I’m not holding my breath on that one even though it really shouldn’t matter that much to them to be worth fighting over.
We all were supposed to be taught it in drivers ed.
The problem is most people are shit drivers who don’t know the law or the rules or even the guidelines.
I’d say a fair amount to have at least some idea that they’re doing things they really shouldn’t, but just DGAF. It feels like the majority of the populace have become significantly more selfish over the years, but will never admit that to themselves - let alone anyone else. It’s the dog-eat-dog mindset inching towards its inevitable end.
If there’s a lot of traffic it makes sense to try and find room to merge early though
Not at all. You destroy a smooth process where both lanes drive at the same speed. It turns into a stop and go in one lane while the other keeps getting filled with new cars from the back that join at the last moment.
Only because of dumbasses who won’t let everyone zipper merge. If we could actually educate people on how to zipper merge, we wouldn’t need to pull off a heist to get out of an ending lane.
If only. But as things stand, I’d rather merge early than have to stop next to a moving lane. Less dangerous too than to try to merge from zero to however fast the other lane is going.
Some people eat up rage bait like a fine meal
That implies taking the time to appreciate its finer qualities. I’d say it’s more like feeding time at the trough.
Something something milk before cereal something…
Hot tip: if your bumper to bumper during congestion or construction periods. You need to have at least 2-3 (minimum 1) car spaces between you and the car/truck in front of you. This way you’ll maintain a steady speed (maybe btwn 2-9 mph) rather than coming to complete halt every stretch.
Even hotter tip: on a highway, if the line on your right is free, switch to it. Left line(s) is only for overtaking.
Once drivers learn this simple rule, speed limits can be lifted on certain highway parts so whoever wants to go faster now can fulfill their desire.
Edit: I did check few stats about fatal car accidents. I am very surprised that Germany has many road sections without a speed limit and is #15 on the least fatal car accident country, while US is #114. In fact, Germany’s fatality rate on the road been steadily decreasing since 1970s with a slight increase at 1991-1992.
Funny how the country that has no speed limits and mostly 3 lines per direction roads is one of the safest countries to drive in. US should take notes.
But but but but
(Continuing on the meta where slowbros and campers took aim at a bumper sticker that said “keep right” with strawmen)
That just invites people to keep pulling in front of you, and now you’re driving slowly while the lane in front of you is moving faster, and you’ve become the traffic jam.
Just like like my comment - you got hooked for no reason. The congestion is already there why are you gonna pile up… on a queue…
You try to keep 3 car spaces in front of you. Someone pulls in front of you, so now there’s only 2 spaces. So when traffic starts moving again, you stay still and wait for there to be 3 spaces. Then somebody pulls in front of you, so there’s only 2 spaces in front of you, so you stop and wait for there to be 3 spaces in front of you…
Everybody behind you is going slower now because you won’t match the speed of traffic.
(Depends are you in stretches of congestion or are is it all clear?) Okay what’s the point if there traffic ahead. You’re gonna speed up to get up to that car who jumped in the lane to come to complete stop? I see various types of stop gaps in 30 mi stretches and seen phantom stops for reason (or ppl on their cell phones¿) My friend, no disrespect but I’d like to keep steady speed (albeit it’s 2 or 5mph) than come up to a cars rear bumper and sniff their exhaust pipe.
It’s not about making sure I’m close. It’s about not increasing the traffic issues.
If you’re working so hard to keep multiple car-lengths of distance in congested traffic, you’re required to travel slower than traffic. The lane you’re in travels more slowly for anyone behind you.
Yeah, people in the next lane over can pull in front of you and relieve traffic in that lane, but that just results in more lane switching in front of and behind you, leading to more fender benders.
Yep. Tailgating causes fullstops.
increasing FB type paranoia
This post was sending me, none of yal know how to drive like a standard human.
Um comparing this to my thread. Your off by two community posts…
God damnit , now I gotta go watch police academy 1-765 now
Who holds back the electric car?
Who makes Steve Guttenberg a star?
I didnt open that post cause I knew immediately that it would devolve into the age old fight of when to merge. This confirms I made the right choice, to always merge instantaneously when a sign that lane is ending is first seen in the distance.
I thought everyone would just get along and be happy
Hot take:
No matter how good or crap you think the traffic laws are in your place are, the best bet is to follow them because if you don’t you will likely have to pay a lot of money that you probably don’t have to just throw away. Speed limits are limits, meaning maximums, merging should go like a zipper, yielding to traffic already up to speed is safest, driving without substances impairing your body is safest.
Its quite simple but a lot of people think they should be allowed to rebel against the laws and get away with doing whatever they want because the rules shouldn’t apply to them specifically.Don’t mind me, appropriating this meme.
Be. The. Sunshine.
Be the honest dark cloud fogging up the narrative.
Just here checking in on the narrative.
It’s dark and foggy. But you’ll have to bear with it.
