This is pretty much my take on it. If you wanna pass me, pass me. In my experience, honk = “watch what you’re doing a-hole!” and high beams are painfully intrusive and thus aggressive. Either way, I’ll likely make a concession just to get your crazy ass in front of me, but my blood pressure will rise for a bit.
If there’s an 18 wheeler driving along with his turn signal on, it’s considered polite if you’re in the lane he wants to move into to hang back and flash your lights telling him it’s okay for him to change lanes.
Why wouldn’t it? I’m always aware of vehicles on all sides of me and check all my mirrors for signals and intentions of driver behavior. Don’t most drivers?
nm
I live in the Pittsburgh area, and have been told by numerous people who drive cross country for a living that PA has the worst drivers in the country. Not sure if that’s true but it would not surprise me at all.
Anyways I have never seen vehicles using high beams to indicate they want to pass and have never heard of it until I read this thread. Around here the way to tell someone (in the left lane or otherwise) that they’re going too slow and you want to pass them seems to be, speed up until you’re an inch away from their back bumper. If they refuse to change lanes after a half mile to a mile, pass them in the right lane, then cut in front of them without using a turn signal (middle finger salute optional, some do it and some don’t). If they won’t move and you can’t pass in the right lane drop roughly 3-4 car lengths behind them and swear at them for miles.
I have not done this to anyone myself (I use the right lane unless I’m trying to pass and rarely go more than 10mph over) but witness it constantly every single time I drive.
Never mind, already addressed.
Equally addressed.
Back in the day, b4 ffourlane hiways and freeways, when a faster truck was approaching a salower moving vehicle from the rear, the faster truck would flash the slower truck as to ask, " is there enough room to safely pass, the slower truck would respond by intermittently flipping the marker lites off then on again to let the vehicle to the rear know whether it was safe to pass.
Yes, this is what I see as well. But to be fair, a lot of the time the person driving 55 in the far left lane just refuses to budge when someone is behind them clearly wanting to pass; high beams or horn be damned. It’s passive aggressive dickhead shit and I see it all the time. Then, the minute you go to pass them on the right, they suddenly find the gas pedal and speed up to prevent you from passing.
Flashing can be done aggressively or politely.
Flash someone in conjunction with tailgating–obviously aggressive and obnoxious. Holding a high-beam blast, just like leaning on the horn in a non-emergency, is also an announcement that you, the following driver, are an asshole.
But if you hold back at a fair following distance, and give the preceding driver a chance to see you and move over on their own if they are not passing (and, verify for yourself that they really are not passing), and only then, if necessary, give your lights a tap–that’s fine.
Agree. If someone behind me wants to pass and does this, I happily signal right and move over so they can.
It’s more common and accepted in Europe. Here in the US, it’s less common and might be perceived as aggressive (even rude), but if more people did it like Peremensoe describes, it can catch on and become accepted here.
Yes. In theory. But, in my experience, where I’m at, any use of the high beams, no matter how polite, seems to be taken as a challenge. I simply don’t do it in the US.
If I flash and the person moves over for me, as I pass I give a “thank you” wave. I think that help. Also, my flash is a quick one, not long-held high beams shining in their rear view mirror.
One data point is that many wiring diagrams call the high beam blink thing the “flash to pass switch,” even on American cars. So there’s at least some recogition from the auto industry that that’s what it’s for.
See, I think that among most reasonable drivers in the US this would be the case too. But reasonable drivers don’t camp out in the passing lane, so most of the time you can’t count on it.
And then, when he has passed and gotten far enough in front of you, flash again telling him it is safe to move back in the lane.
At least that’s the way it worked on two lane roads in Texas 40 years ago. Everyone seemed to consider this type of flashing polite.
Actually, the correct way to “flash” to truckers is, instead of LO BEAM - HI BEAM - LO BEAM, it’s OFF - ON - OFF. That’s a single flash, and I usually do 2 or 3 flashes. In other words, OFF - ON - OFF - ON - OFF - ON - OFF
With more cars having DRLs these days, it becomes harder to do. The contrast between lo & hi beams is much less than on / off / on.
With the advent of Daytyime lights and automatic "lytes on "hardwired into vehicles now, sometymes it is difficult, if not impossible to do anything beside Hi-Low beam.
Another point to make; the Hi-Low beam switch used to be floor mounted, now most vehicles on the road have the trigger built into the direction lever, and sometymes when trying to signal i have actually also flashed hi beams at the same tyme, quite unintentionally.
Yes that’s what I was referring to with DRLs: daytime running lights.
When a truck has passed you and has enough room to merge back to the right and in front of you in your same lane, flashing them to let them know it’s clear is polite, and when they have completed their merge the cool thing is when they flash their lights on - off - on - off - on to say “thank you” to you. Especially at night because it’s easier to see. Once you get the timing for doing this and know what to look for, you’ll see truckers flashing similarly to each other, day or night, and you’ll be able to do it during daylight hours and see the truck lights flash. It’s been done this way for decades and is still done today.
I like to imagine a sort of automotive utopia where people use left lanes for passing, and if they somehow forget, a flash of the high-beams will send them back to the right lane apologetically.
In reality, people in the United States are generally clueless when it comes to driving, lane discipline, etc. I’ve had a “flash to pass” result in slowing down, brake checking, you name it. People here see the flash as an aggressive move, because they’re dumb.
I also tend to flash my headlights on/off or do the high-beam thing when people are driving around in the rain at dusk (or any number of similar situations) without their headlights on. I can’t believe the number of people who do this…it used to be a car here and there, lately it’s a pretty fair percentage of the cars on the road. With certain paint colors (silver is really bad) the car is basically invisible without lights on…and no matter how many times I flash my lights at them, they can’t manage to put down their cell phone and Big Gulp and flip the damn lights on.
If I was a cop I wouldn’t waste much time on speeders, but I’d damn sure pull all these morons over.
You are not describing the whole of American drivers. While there are exceptions, most I encounter are pretty good. What region are you mainly driving in?
Are you certain none of them were in position to pass, themselves, albeit more slowly than you would have liked? Are you certain, SpeedwayRyan, that you were not following any of them closely enough to be construed as tailgating?