Why was it okay for all of you to speed for years on end but suddenly you have to drive under the speed limit? And you say you do it to annoy the other drivers and you get a kick out of it. Are you special in some way?
Public roads are not there for you to use for amusement.
Yes, just like everyone who lived there did for years. It’s in the very first post. It was fine when they did it, but now there’s something so wrong with it that they have to stop it. Instead of actually trying to get the “problem” solved, the decided to add to it by their game playing in traffic. The worst possible course of action.
I’m not one for selective enforcement, but surely you can see the difference between a 3500-pound car being driven at 65 mph vs. a 40-ton truck. Especially if these vehicles are being driven in a municipal area.
Agree that the residents shouldn’t have been speeding to that degree before the coal trucks came along. Regardless, though, the coal-truck-drivers are courting disaster here. Frankly, their company should be laying down the law on this issue, because the liability they face if an accident occurs is staggering.
And maybe if the locals had handled this right the problem would have been solved. As pointed out above, sheriffs or state patrol should have been notified, not a lone local cop. I think a county sheriff would love to raise a bit of cash by ticketing apparently hundreds of speeding trucks every few days.
I also find it hard to believe that someone that lives in a rural area isn’t used to this type of stuff from harvest time. Live on a road used by sugar beet trucks sometime.
I wouldn’t want to be hit by either since I doubt all these local people are driving Mini Coopers. Besides, kayaker already told us everyone has been doing this for years on end and there have been no problems. All him and his friends have to do is keep driving like they always did.
This, but actually, for a different reason. On the highway, I am alert for deer, bear, moose, and farm animals. I pay attention to what might come out of the woods or a corn field, but those are set back from the roads. In a small town or any city, it is people, pets, and sometimes runaway toys and such that can dart out between parked cars and you need the lower speeds to react. The one time I got a ticket for speeding in town was when I was a new driver and not truly aware of the hazards. I was given an appropriate lecture and I realized that the cop was 100% right.
I don’t speed in town. Taking a life isn’t worth the time it will save.
This applies to the truckers, too. If they don’t like the traffic flow, they can find alternative routes. And locals walking the walking instead of just talking the talking is an active demonstration, not passive. It’s leading by example. If the truckers think that locals obeying the speed limit is dangerous, they can advocate for increasing the speed limit.
No, it’s just a really stupid idea. Blocking traffic on a public road is a bad idea. Your walking the walk stuff is just bullshit. Read his posts, he thinks this is funny. “Oh no, I had to wait until a truck passed before I could turn on the road! I’ll show them by driving really slow!”
Come on, seriously. How many rural roads do you think come out of a coal mine? These trucks aren’t going anywhere because a few people drive slow in front of them. Do you think they’ll just throw up their hands and close the mine?
Obeying the speed limit is not blocking traffic. People actively obeying the law and advocating that others do so as well is a good thing. (And, given recent moderation, advocating that someone not obey the speed limit is against board rules.)
It is not courteous driving. You may know those coal trucks aren’t on the way to the hospital in an emergency but you don’t know that in all cases, so as long as you can find a way to let other vehicles pass you to go faster you should do that and not deliberately hinder them. I certainly will not be understanding of people driving at minimum speed and not letting me get around them.
So the traffic engineers are all idiots and everybody ought to drive the speed they like.
Unless it’s slower, of course. They’re only supposed to drive faster.
I’ve told this before, but when I was living in South Bay, Palo Alto’s speed limits were typically 5mph, occasionally 10, slower than similar roads in the surrounding cities. I would amuse myself by driving at the posted limit and the frustrated Beemer drivers behind me could screw themselves. Let them complain to their city council if they don’t like it.
How many times does it have to be pointed out that the OP admitted to intentionally driving more than 20% below the limit just to annoy those truck drivers. Both the truck drivers and OP n friends are dicks.
Tell me what you think of it his story:
Years ago when the Sheriffs Office I was on switched to Laser guns they got rid of all their hand held radar guns. Myself and a couple other Deps bought them for next to nothing and kept them in our personal cars. They just plugged into the cigarette lighter. Then when we were on the freeway and someone with a fuzzbuster zipped past us we’d turn it on. Didn’t even have to aim it. Could leave it sitting on the passenger seat. It would still set off the radar detector causing the other car to slow way down. Then we’d turn the radar off and the driver would speed up again. Rinse, lather, repeat. You could fuck with someone for a hundred miles. Even invented a game for it called “trolling for brake lights”.
Now, we were keeping the detector crowd from speeding, but also harassing the living shit out of them by constantly making their birddog flip out.
Were we enhancing safety or just being dicks? I have to admit it was a lot of fun. Especially watching the other driver turn his head around and around looking for a squad car and all the while it was me in my wifes mini van.
That’s kind of how they do their jobs. Traffic engineers often use the 85-percentile method. Remove the MPH signs on a stretch of road and set the new limit according to the speed of 85% of the drivers’ self-limitations, rounded down to the nearest 5.
Hehehe, as a detector owner, I applaud you. Though, I wouldn’t be too terrified unless it was KA signal, and I wouldn’t be actually terrified, I’d just slow down for quite some time at the first blip. I doubt you’d be able to screw with me for long, because I have a bladder the size of a thimble, and I’d pull off to pee long before you got bored.
Ehh, I don’t really see a material difference. This is one of the instances where intent or being a dick doesn’t really factor into this. You just happen to be broadcasting radio waves in a FCC permitted way. Their reactions to them are their problem. I’ve recently ended up dumping an aggressive driver into the hands of a radar gun I knew was there. I was trying to slow down and get out of the passing lane because I had gotten a blip that worried me, but the person I was passing decided to speed up. I ended up getting over while they blew by me at the same moment my radar detector decided to go nuts. I didn’t make them go 90+, and you didn’t make them own a radar detector.
If one wants to pass someone driving the speed limit, they should use their signal and illegally pass in the oncoming lane. I certainly wouldn’t play games with people to stop them from passing, but if I am driving the speed limit, I do not feel any obligation to pull over on the side of the road for their convenience. I will use turn-outs if they are available, but the shoulder of the road is out of the question.
I drive the speed limit on our rural roads because I don’t want to hit an animal or child. I drive the speed limit (in the right lane) on the highways and freeways.
I don’t care at all if you are understanding about this because I really don’t care about you at all. You are just another driver tailgating me until you get up the nerve to pass going around a blind curve.
I do agree that the OP is happily demonstrating jerk behavior. Double standards are never a good thing.
ETA that cruise control rocks. My current car allows me to activate it at 26mph and I use it all the time. I hit the button to get it ready as soon as I start the car and as soon as I’m up to the speed limit, I set it. A great thing about this is knowing what I can say if a cop pulls me over and asks me how fast I was going. All I have to do is point at the display.
Ka wasn’t a thing in 1990. Oh, it existed but hardly anyone used it yet. And many detectors weren’t detecting it. Hell, in the very late 80’s Car & Driver predicted Ka band and photo radar wouldn’t be a thing and refused to test a Gul unit that could detect it. Were they ever wrong. And Laser had just raised it’s head. All falses were on X-Band. K-Band was the tone to fear and that’s what those hand helds were, K-band.
This. So much this. Speed limits are often obviously too low, but the fix is not for everybody to just agree to break the law and give the cops justification to profile and pull over whoever they want.
Driving the speed limit is not “blocking traffic”.
I only agree if the person is driving substantially under the posted limit.
Maybe both? But anything to keep those maniacs in check is a good thing in my book.
If this situation has motivated everybody in town to suddenly obey the speed limit, that can only be a good thing. I hope it sticks long after the coal trucks move on.