What is the straight dope on flashing your high beams to pass someone?
It’s not a habit I’m in (I always thought the flashing blinker on the left side of my car should suffice as a signal), but I’ve seen others do it many times. Some people take it as rude, others say it is just another signal to alert the other driver of your intentions.
So which is it?
It seems to me it used to me more common. I rarely see it anymore, and would consider it rude.
NJ has a pass on the left lane rule. If you’re in the left lane (the ‘passing lane’) and not passing, a faster driver might flash high beams behind you. It’s New Jerseyan for “get the f out of the way.” Flashing high beams is illegal in NJ (only valid use is for deserted dark roads). But blocking the fast lane is also illegal.
I would imagine that flashing the left blinker would most probably never even be noticed by the driver in front of you, so why bother? And if you’re not in the leftmost lane anyway, then I never thought there would be a need to alert the driver in front, provided you pass him slowly, carefully, and good-manneredly.
But if you and he are in the left lane already, and you want to get in front of him, then this New Jerseyan thinks that flashing is much better than honking or passing on the right. So much so, in fact, that I fear that I’ve misunderstood the OP.
It seems rude to me. I can understand if the person in the left lane is going under the speed limit, or barely at it. But if I’m going 15 over and someone speeds up behind me in his Saturn Ion and starts flashing his high beams at me, I am not going to play nice with him.
If you had written “… if I’m going at the speed limit …”, then I’d keep my mouth shut. But if you’re already breaking the law by going 15 mph over the limit, I don’t know if you have a right to complain about the guy who wants to go 20 over it.
(Let me repeat that: “I don’t know if you have a right to complain.” Civil discussion about whether or not one has such a right is welcomed.)
I think the OP is talking about a 2 lane road. One lane in each direction. And yes, I will sometimes give a quick flash to indicate I’m passing before I pull out into the oncoming lane.
If someone is going slow in the left lane and won’t move over when there is plenty of opportunity to, I think that a flash of the headlights is perfectly appropriate to remind them that they should be in the right hand lane.
Absolute speeds aren’t really relevant. The important thing is the relative speeds and positions between all the involved vehicles (at least three). If the driver in front on the left lane is passing, or is about to, and would have to brake if moving right first, then he’s doing the right thing, and ‘flashing’ him to move over is inappropriate. If he’s neither passing nor in position to pass, different story; really he should have moved right already, when it was clear that the vehicle behind was overtaking him.
I’d rather have someone flash their lights at me than pass on the right. Often, I’ll see a driver approaching me from behind quickly, and I’ll put my right blinker on, start to move over, and see that they have moved over, and then we do a little zig-zag thing, which is more dangerous than passing someone ought to be.
There have also been a few times where I was just not paying attention behind me. A brief flash is a fine way to get my attention so I can move over.
That said, I’m sure there are some dicks out there driving way to fast and flashing their brights at everyone, and some other dicks out there who think its their duty to enforce safe driving speeds by refusing to move over for someone driving too fast who would take the flash as a slight. But that’s just being dicks; there’s nothing fundamentally wrong with flashing lights to signal “I want to pass; please move over”.
We should all strive not to be dicks while driving.
You flash to pass on a two-lane road when you have to go into the opposing lane in order to pass. There’s no need to flash if you’re passing using a lane going in the same direction.
It doesn’t matter how fast you’re going, you should only be in the left lane as long as it takes to pass, then move back right. If he wants to drive 30 over, let him by… it’s no skin off your nose, and you’re the one in the wrong by “blocking” the left lane and not letting him pass.
EDIT: That said, to answer the question: I drive on the west coast, mostly Washington State, and I’ve never seen anybody flash their brights for anything ever. (Athough it used to be common a few years ago for people, during daylight hours, to flash their regular lights to warn you about an upcoming speed trap.) But then again we don’t honk horns here, either.
I was actually thinking of both situations when I wrote the OP, although living in Maine puts me on two-lane roads for about 80% of the driving I do.
This is the “people who drive faster than me are maniacs, people who drive slower are idiots.”. What cured me of that was when I was taking a snake bit dog to get anti-venom, and had trouble with people hogging the passing lane. Now I accept that the maniacs might have a fine reason for wanting to drive so fast. The dog lived another 10 years or so, BTW.
I suppose I should have made myself a little more clear. This is more actual to how I drive. When I lived in NC, it wasn’t really a thing, everyone just got into the “fast” lane if you’re going to be “fast.” Whatever that means. But since I’ve moved to Indiana, I’ve learned to only pass in the passing lane. So… if I’m going 15 over in the left lane, then it’s because I’m passing or about to. Otherwise I am in the right lane. And if I forget, then I’ll move over.
I understand the rebuke from everyone though. I definitely don’t mean to block a lane with “my speed is the new speed limit.”
Every time this topic comes up in a message board (or used to come up in Letters to the Editor pages in a newspaper–remember those?) it ends up in endless rants on both sides.
I will just say that in Virginia it is state law that you must move to the right to allow overtaking traffic to pass upon an audible or visible signal, which is generally taken to mean blowing the horn or flashing the lights.
Same in Indiana, but not in North Carolina (at least as of 7 years ago).
I though flashing was done when there was no passing lane to get someone to pull over. It might be a convenient signal for passing on a two lane road by going over the dotted line, but on a multi-line highway it seems undue, all that’s needed is to signal your lane change.
A lot of the time I see people just tailgating the person in the left lane to get him to move over. Which is pretty much the worst option.
In my experience in the US, it seems to be generally regarded as an aggressive move, although this may vary regionally. So I don’t do it here. When I was living in Central Europe, it was regarded more as a neutral signal of intent to pass, that’s it. Never noticed anyone getting pissy about it.
It would be very rude to demand that someone pull over on the shoulder so you can pass, unless they are going well below the speed limit for some reason, and I mean like 15 MPH in a 40 zone.
Nobody flashes their lights on a highway to signal that they are changing lanes to pass. They flash lights when they are behind someone doing 55 in the leftmost lane with nobody in front of them.