People's impatience at traffic lights

Desmo

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I don't know if it's something I've only recently noticed but so many people seem to be jumping lights on the way in to work these days. I only have to travel to the other side of town but as usual these days, that can't be done without coming across umpteen sets of traffic lights. What I'm noticing more now is that people seem to be jumping quite a few of them just to keep moving. Do we really have so little time that we need to start getting through the lights even as they're turning red?

I know we've probably all been amber gamblers at some time and I don't see a huge problem with that as if you're approaching the lights and they start to turn it's often safer to keep moving and go through. But I see many people blatantly going through red lights just to tag on to the end of the queue and to keep making progress.
 
I see it every day up here too.
As you say, not even ambler gamblers.
Just blatant ignoring of red lights, like they are discretionary rather than compulsory.
The trouble up here is that traffic light cameras are non-existent, so until they have an accident and witnesses say they ran a red light there is little deterrent.
 
I got hit by someone going thru a red light. Mine had gone green, and he gunned it like "oh it was orange and i couldnt stop". After he got really angry at me and had to go to hospital for "injuries", when the police (which i had to call due to Section 5 assault) said all the injury they could see was a phone-shaped bruise on his cheek :rolleyes:

At least i was in the car on not on a bike:

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41hkrhsd_1Y&feature=player_embedded[/ame]
 
I got hit by someone going thru a red light. Mine had gone green, and he gunned it like "oh it was orange and i couldnt stop". After he got really angry at me and had to go to hospital for "injuries", when the police (which i had to call due to Section 5 assault) said all the injury they could see was a phone-shaped bruise on his cheek :rolleyes:

So did justice prevail?
Was he done?
 
He was 80% in the wrong, i was 20% because i could/should of avoided his illegal manoeuvre apparently, i think they said something like "just because you have a green light, dosent mean you should proceed thru a junction". For the record there was a double-decker bus mostly blocking my view from his direction of travel.
Assault didnt stick because no other witness came forwards: this was rush hour on London Bridge :rolleyes:
I believe he got a fat health payout.

So no, overall i feel justice was not served.
 
if you got a green light everyone carrys on driving they not going to slow down

police eh come up with excuses

my dad nearly got killed few years ago he was waiting to set off and he so in is mirror a speeding car and he went back of my dads car and got a claim for whip lash and he got off with no ban or points for shooting though a red light which he admitted to police

also the car my dad was in all back of the car was crushed in so lucky people wasnt in back
 
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I've noticed this more too recently. Worse though is usually its 3 or 4 cars going through a red at once. Not just once chancer.

I've also noticed a huge change in average speed of cars over the last couple of years. So many people now trotting along at 50-60mph on dual carriageways. Big expensive cars and white van men being the most noticeable new members. I guess the cost of fuel is having a big impact on the way people drive.
 
So many people now trotting along at 50-60mph on dual carriageways. Big expensive cars and white van men being the most noticeable new members. I guess the cost of fuel is having a big impact on the way people drive.

same here , worringly though i am seeing cars tailgating wagons to get in their slipstream :eek: , i saw one that close the other day i thought he was getting a tow :facepalm:
 
I tow a 20ft trailer behind a 20ft van, a few months ago I was a few yards from a set of lights when they went to amber, the law says that if any part of the vehicle crosses the line after the light has gone to red you're deemed to have jumped it

I watched the light on the other side of the road and thought, yes just made it

I looked in the mirror and 3 cars had followed me through :eek:

A lot of it is to do with drivers getting cheesed off at the amount of lights, if someone drops a frisbee in the road the council are out in minutes to put lights round it
 
I've also noticed a huge change in average speed of cars over the last couple of years. So many people now trotting along at 50-60mph on dual carriageways. Big expensive cars and white van men being the most noticeable new members. I guess the cost of fuel is having a big impact on the way people drive.

it is not just carriageways, it is electric car mode every were they go and there on the anchors faster than accelerating it is like there doing an emergency stop:rolleyes:
the worst ones are the slip roads to motorways i mean coming on the motorway at 30-40:facepalm: overtaking on the slip road i got the look of death today:laugh: joke is it was pretty dull/dark and he had no lights on:confused:

cost them more on brakes ect though than fuel in the long run as a cars theses days do need energetic run now and again if not we may see big fat Bmw Mini's in the near future :D
 
What gets my goat is the amount of time it takers for the person at the front of the queue to get moving after the lights have gone green - often I can count 5 seconds before the first car has got moving !! Added to this, the people following all seem to dawdle waiting the the light to go to amber - only when this happens do they put their foot down..... Often, on my way to work, people will brake for an upcoming, distant green traffic light believing that they won't get through it because it is currently green, so by the time they get there it will be red - yes it is a self-fulfilling prophecy, but usually not for them - for us poor schmucks a car or two behind them who won't run an amber or red light that would have been green if the stupid @#$! in front hadn't slowed down for the green.....
 
What gets my goat is the amount of time it takers for the person at the front of the queue to get moving after the lights have gone green - often I can count 5 seconds before the first car has got moving !! Added to this, the people following all seem to dawdle waiting the the light to go to amber - only when this happens do they put their foot down..... Often, on my way to work, people will brake for an upcoming, distant green traffic light believing that they won't get through it because it is currently green, so by the time they get there it will be red - yes it is a self-fulfilling prophecy, but usually not for them - for us poor schmucks a car or two behind them who won't run an amber or red light that would have been green if the stupid @#$! in front hadn't slowed down for the green.....

i share your pain brother , truly i do :mad:
 
I've noticed this more too recently. Worse though is usually its 3 or 4 cars going through a red at once. Not just once chancer.

I've also noticed a huge change in average speed of cars over the last couple of years. So many people now trotting along at 50-60mph on dual carriageways. Big expensive cars and white van men being the most noticeable new members. I guess the cost of fuel is having a big impact on the way people drive.

"White van men" have a 60mph speed limit to stick to on dual carriageways. 50mph on single carriageways.



Amber lights in New Zealand are on for far too long. I'd guess about 7 seconds. That might not sound like much but count it out and imagine how many cars can zip through at 30mph. Because of that, everyone floors it instead of slowing down. I've always been taught that amber means "stop" but it feels daft when I've come to a complete stop before the light has changed to red. I don't think a lot of people actually go through on red, but it does happen every now and then. No one's going to die because they went through on amber, but it's a sloppy habit and leads to lax driving styles.
 
BrokenArrow said:
"White van men" have a 60mph speed limit to stick to on dual carriageways. 50mph on single carriageways.

That's means nothing though. Just because they're meant to doesn't mean any of them do. Having worked for dhl briefly I can assure you that nobody sticks to these limits. So the recent trend I've noticed isn't down to imposed speed limits.

Heck a few years back you could be cruising along in the fast lane at 80mph and you'd have a queue of transits tail gaiting you waiting to get past. Quite aggressive some of them too.
 
That's means nothing though.

It means stop complaining about people doing the speed limit. I got fed up with people tailgating me and flashing their lights because I was doing 50mph on a windy road with a fully loaded 3 tonne van.
 
Eh? I wasn't complaining. I'm actually one of the 50-60mph club on dual carriageways. I was merely mentioning that I've noticed more people joining the dark side recently. I think you need to take a festive chill pill ;)
 
It's the general impatience of drivers these days. Only yesterday I was walking along where this car was trying to pull out from a minor road onto a major road turning right. The major road was busy and the guy behind this car was tooting him and trying to push him forward. It was ridiculous.
 
It's the general impatience of drivers these days. Only yesterday I was walking along where this car was trying to pull out from a minor road onto a major road turning right. The major road was busy and the guy behind this car was tooting him and trying to push him forward. It was ridiculous.

I hate that! That really is my pet hate.
 
It's the general impatience of drivers these days. Only yesterday I was walking along where this car was trying to pull out from a minor road onto a major road turning right. The major road was busy and the guy behind this car was tooting him and trying to push him forward. It was ridiculous.

no the driver was just an idiot and there is a few of them around:thumbsdow.
 
Gunnzie said:
It's the general impatience of drivers these days. Only yesterday I was walking along where this car was trying to pull out from a minor road onto a major road turning right. The major road was busy and the guy behind this car was tooting him and trying to push him forward. It was ridiculous.

I'm not sticking up for this guy at all, but the flip side of this is that I do encounter 'dawdlers' at junctions every day.
People who really are far too cautious.
Especially at one junction I have to cross, which is where we're sitting in the middle of a dual carriageway and crossing oncoming traffic.
People sit there, wanting massive gaps that will never come.
The traffic is only doing 40mph and there's hardly ever a time when nothing is coming at all.
I now situate myself behind drivers so that if it's obvious they're a dawdler, I can pull out from behind them and cross the dual carriageway safely myself, leaving them sitting there like the terrified, incompetent plums they are.
At least I'm not forcing them on by tooting/revving etc.
 
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I agree but I can assure you this guy wasn't dawdling. There were no gaps available - everyone was out sales shopping I guess and the road was very busy. All the guy behind was doing was risking an accident by stressing the guy in front to pull out into a space that just wasn't there.

I know where you are coming from though. My mother in law is a really dithering driver. I've been a passenger in the back of her car before and looked out the back to see some very irate drivers following her ;)
 
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My Dad was run over by a teenage girl who jumped a red light back in 2005. He was 65 at the time and in good health, but unfortunately he fractured his hip and suffered problems with it right up until he died 5 years later.

It does annoy me that that he had to suffer the rest of his life just because some selfish person could not wait 60 seconds for the lights to change green.
 
i saw complete total and utter disregard today at some lights , i was stopped at red for 3-4 seconds when a car went through in the other lane :facepalm:
 
FZR400RRSP said:
I now situate myself behind drivers so that if it's obvious they're a dawdler, I can pull out from behind them and cross the dual carriageway safely myself, leaving them sitting there like the terrified, incompetent plums they are.
At least I'm not forcing them on by tooting/revving etc.

I'd be VERY careful doing that.

Slightly different situation but busy road in a junction to turn right into minor road.
Guy behind me got fed up of waiting for me. Pulled across at same time as me (he thought it was clear enough, so of course so did I) and I nearly ended up turning into his passenger door and had to slam on my brakes with my arse sticking out in oncoming 60mph traffic!
 

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