Ottawa is where Montreal exiles its citizens who are (by comparison) competent drivers.
When we first moved to Toronto, and I was driving down the Don Valley Parkway, I was commenting to the husband that drivers in Ontario are just so polite… and literally 2 seconds later, some woman came zooming around me, honking her horn and shooting us the finger…
I think there’s something in the Tim Horton’s coffee that makes em drive nuts here… 
I never thought I’d see the day that someone misses driving in Denver. Take random drivers from all the cities mentioned in this thread and toss them in with us 12 remaining natives who refuse to stop for red lights or signal (ever), add snow, shake well.
HA-ha! Frank, and also - good luck.
While it isn’t as knuckle-whitening as the streets of Atlanta, Knoxville TN is its own unique sort of driving hell, a city where everybody drives as if they’re 82. Prepare to stop at yellows.
I spent a few weeks as a crazy, jay-walking teen in Ottawa. I found the drivers to be very attentive, as I was not run over. I also found them to be infinitely patient, as I was not shot for being a complete jerk. That being said, the bit about the license plates is the funniest thing I’ve read in a while.
My town recently touted the fact that they have the “safest drivers in Illinois.” I called bullshit on that.
Worst drivers, anywhere in the world, must be those in India. Anyone who has ever been ferried about that great country in a bus, taxi or auto-rickshaw and not had their pulse raised to heart-attack levels must be on some kind of sedative.
One memorable journey involved a cab going at 60 mph through the streets of Delhi in dense, pea-souper fog with about 10 yards’ visibility, trucks and cars and at one point a sacred cow looming out of the mist and the driver slamming the wheel from side to side at the last minute, often driving on the wrong side of the road (I think, because we couldn’t even see the kerbs).
My Indian former assistant was learning to drive in the UK. She went back to Delhi over the Christmas vacation, and decided to take a couple of lessons there, too, as they were much cheaper. She said at one point she was approaching a parked car on her side of a narrow street full of pedestrians, market stalls, and bicycles, and hurtling towards her were both a bus and a truck, side by side. She, sensibly, pulled in behind the parked car, and the instructor admonished her, saying “Faster, faster! You can get through there! There’s enough room! Put your foot down!” She cancelled the rest of the classes until she got back to the UK.
I often wonder how people who have learned to drive in countries like that can adapt their driving style to the local norm when immigrating. It must be really hard.
Y’know, I’ve noticed that. They’re very good with pedestrians, and - as you say - very patient. It’s other cars that they don’t give a shit about.
No movers yesterday, so I took my mattress and box springs up very early this morning; on the top of my car and very slowly, figuring that at 7am on a Sunday I wouldn’t be holding up too much traffic. I still got honked at when I didn’t leave a light change with a jackrabbit start. :rolleyes:
I certainly didn’t learn to drive in a crazy-ass place like India, but I can tell you that learning to drive on back roads in rural Alberta sure didn’t prepare me for the big city driving of Baltimore and DC. I’ve become much more assertive and less polite, to my chagrin.
Slight hijack - you know, you are supposed to stop at yellow lights if you can safely. Following this law, like that apparently old, out-dated one about stopping at red lights and stop signs, will get me rear-ended some day.
jjimm, in my experience, it seems that the worst drivers for being dangerously slow and timid are Asian drivers (including Indian) - I’m guessing these are not people who ever drove in Asia, but came to it later in life in Canada. There’s a happy medium between dangerously aggressive and dangerously timid.
Once again, I’ll put in my plug for mandatory extensive driver instruction before being allowed to challenge a road test, and continuous driver re-testing throughout our lives (and when we move to a new area). We have an appallingly laissez faire attitude towards something as dangerous as driving in North America.
Little historical note–when we moved from Ontario to Alberta in the very early 60s, my parents (who held Ontario licenses) did not have to take an Alberta road test to get their Alberta licenses. They just traded their Ontario licenses for Alberta ones at the DMV (or whatever it was called in those days). But when we moved back to Ontario some years later in the 60s, they had to take an Ontario road test to get their Ontario licenses back. I don’t know when things changed, but your idea is not a new one. Perhaps it should be brought back.
Daffyd, it’s not the Tim’s coffee. It’s the fact that she’s a Torontonian, and thus the most important person in the world, and it is of utmost importance that she get where she is going immediately, and since you can’t possibly be as important or be on such an important mission, you must get out of her way or face the finger.
I can say that because I used to be a Torontonian, and a Toronto driver to boot. Man, I had a lot of important places to get to in that city. I’m getting better though. 
Having recently moved to Ann Arbor, I would say the community’s propensity run red lights is at a rate comprable to what I saw in Buenos Aires.
I know, I know, college town = young drivers. I could also a attribute it to the fact that there is a large international community here with less strinigent driving mores. But it’s not just the student aged population - in fact, I’d say that it’s the middle aged crowed in their Priuses than anyone else. Frustrating, but scary more than anything. I’ve had more near misses in the last 3 months with people who think that it’s okay to just keep rolling through the intersection during a red than in my 6 previous years of driving combined.
C’mon folks! Learn to drive.
Maye it’s the Tim Hortons coffee.
Oy! The drivers in Montreal are worse than Ottawa, but BOTH are worse than Albany, NY. As much as I complain about traffic here, I have to remind myself that anyone north of me and anyone south of me (Hi, New Jersey) drive like assholes.
I’ve had a few bad days in Atlanta, but overall I don’t see what the big deal is. You want to move over, you do it. If your car fits, it fits. Everyone uptight about it really stresses and panics, but at the end of the day, everyone seems to have a good idea about space. How many accidents do you see? Especially on the highways? Someone is doing something right.
It’s rather fun going 20 over on 75/85, only to be passed by everyone else going 10 more than you, including cops. Chill out and drive, man.
The passing on the right is perfectly legal, actually. It’s just not smart to do all the time. I usually do it just to get away from the 'tards in the left lane.
In Austin, turn signals are a sign of weakness. That or they mean: “I have noticed there is empty space to this side. Please fill it quickly so as to avoid pixies taking it over.” I think the major problem is our streets, though: five way intersections, three stacked left turn lanes under selected 183 North cross-streets, the highly logical “Even streets are one way west and odd streets are one way east except when they aren’t” pattern of our downtown grid…
Tucson drivers suck. Stupid, cocksucking, motherfucking, brainless, arrogant, bag-o-shit assclowns. My rage for them burns with the heat of the Springfield tire fire. All of them are in some kind of fire-assed hurry and can’t be bothered to spare a drop of consideration for others on the road.
Fuckwits. Fuckity-fuckity, fuck fuck FUCK!
by Boyo Jim:
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Sing it Brother! Boyo Jim knows of what he speaks! What a freaking disaster! I have a son living in Mineral Point, he works in Dodgeville, but daycare is in Mt. Horrible, oops Horeb. Occasionally I have to pick up the little one if he is working late. A nightmare. My brother is a road engineer, he has been designing road since 1981. I have a call into him to find out why traffic circles are a good idea, but he hasn’t called back yet.
My vote for the worst drivers: Newark. They make the worst asshole driver in Chicago look like Mr. Courtesy with Miss Manners riding shotgun.
Ottawa and Hull are chock full of government bovinaucrats, so it is regrettably understandable that many drivers in those cities have neither the talent nor the initiative to drive well.
Israeli drivers are horrendous, but after a couple days in Egypt, I was longing to get back to the comparative sanity of Israel and its thoughtful, pleasant drivers. Egyptians are the WORST drivers EVER. (I havn’t been to India, but I can’t imagine they could be worse. No one could be worse.) I remember my guide book said that the accident rate in Egypt is 44 times that of the US. I believe it.
Amazingrace, drivers in San Francisco are also horrible red light runners. I’m scared to cross the street there, I swear.
Ya know Frank , I could have sworn we warned you about O-town drivers in several threads already.
Just stay frosty for the first several weeks and get used to the traffic patterns.
Declan
Nuh-uh. FUCK-U!-lanta is more like it!
Hell, I thought that the folks in Philly, New York, New Jersey (fuckin’ Turnpike!)–hell, pretty much the entirety of I-95 from New York down to DC (it gets better, mostly, from there to South Carolina, IME)–were assholes. Now I know that they’re just mostly idiots, because Atlanta? The drivers there are one sorry lot of malicious sons-of-bitches.
It’s like, "Yeah, I very clearly see your signal, and I realize that, for the last mile or so, you’ve been trying to (safely) get over so that you don’t miss the exit that’s now 25…15…5 feet ahead of you, but you know what, buddy? FUCK YOU!
Yeah, I-85, I’m lookin’ at you!