Although this is not in the spirit of the question, it is good advice nonetheless. For New Englanders (and everyone else driving in places with cold winters), always keep your gas tank at least half full and have water in your car. You never know when you might get caught + stuck out in a storm.
To this I’d add a flashlight, a blanket, extra gloves, and a shovel. And maybe a homing pigeon.
Is it a specifically British (or European) thing to use hazard lights for this? You can hit them when you realise you’re going to have to brake hard for a blockage or queue, and get on with using the brakes to do their job.
Great suggestion - wonder if I’ll remember it in six months? 
When parking in a parking lot pull through the first space into the second. That way you won’t have to backup and you can see clearly as you pull out. It is worth it to me to have to walk further to the store than having to take a chance backing up.
Anticipate what the others on the road might do. If you are in a clear lane that is moving freely next to one that is stopped expect someone to try and pull out into your lane. This usually happens just as you are going to pass them. Be prepared to stop quickly (or at least aim for the driver’s door thus doing the rest of us a favour and eliminating the idiot!).
Normally when you activate your full defrost setting the A/C is automatically activated.
Don’t drive on the railroad tracks. (Over them as crossings are OK)
Don’t block intersections, even minor ones
If you are holding up traffic move right / pull over / allow the pass / encourage the pass (when a passing opportunity comes up for traffic behind you, pull to the right of your lane take the foot off the gas a bit and perhaps encourage traffic to pass with a wave)
When you enter a flow of traffic, either by changing lanes or turning onto the road, accelerate as quickly as needed to minimize the disruption of traffic flow in the lane you just entered - yes that includes the one car coming up behind you.
How to Drive in California
The rules of stop signs don’t apply to you; you need to get to your destination on time, and that’s clearly the #1 priority at any four-way intersection. If someone going the other way gets pissy about it, go right on through anyway. He’ll chicken out.
It’s legal–nay, required–to go over the speed limit if everyone else is doing it. Anyone who has had enough of going to traffic court, and refuses to drive over the speed limit, is a dangerous asshole and you should let him know by tailgating him and leaning on your horn.
Anyone trying to merge into the lane you’re currently in, is clearly insulting your manhood. Do everything you can to keep him out, even if you need to get into his lane.
Don’t use turn signals, ever. They piss cops off and they could even get you killed.
You may see a hundred cars braking 20 feet ahead of you on the freeway, but that doesn’t mean you have to hit the brakes. Take your time; speed up so you can get there quickly, and then assess the situation.
Cop business is fascinating; by all means, slow down as much as you need to to get a good look at the guy being pulled over.
No, the curb is ideally used as the primary mechanism by which the car is secured, not the brakes nor as the backup. Keeps the tension off transmission as well. It’s just used as an arcane test question today however, not one in a hundred even understand why, I don’t think. Chalk another one up to beauracracy.
Stay out of the left lane on the highway. It’s reserved for important people who always drive 10-20 mph over the speed of traffic. Like me.
This is why you should never leave more than 9/10 of a space between you and the car in front of you. If you leave anything more than that someone will immediately fill it and apply their brakes, forcing you to fire your laser canon.
(Freeway Survival 101)
Around here, sometimes it’s necessary. Some of our curbs are actually rounded to encourage it. More than a few streets are narrow enough that parking a truck-width car without the two right wheels on the curb will impede traffic. Everybody driving past (on either side of the road) has to do a delicate little dance around your car - even my Civic will have a mirror sticking out into the other lane when I move around one of these guys.
Must be. In the States the hazard light is used to signal a stationary vehicle or maybe a vehicle in tow. Trucks going up a steep grade will also put on their flashers.
Using the A/C to help clear a window requires that you add more heat to the air. If the air cools the windshield it will cause condensation on the exterior of the glass. Even the best windshield wiper can’t effectively deal with a continously condensing surface.
Saw this late:
I’d like to refine this slightly to say “tap your brakes rapidly”: please do not pump your brakes to the point where the car is actually jerked to a stop (or near stop) each time. To the person behind you it initially looks like something is wrong with your car, to your passengers it’s annoying as hell, it can’t really be good for your brakes (though it probably doesn’t harm them much, either), and it’s completely unneccessary. The brake lights go on well before the brakes actually engage, so just tap them enough to make the lights go on.
I fully agree that this is a good thing to do, though, because it does catch the attention of other drivers better than just your brake lights coming on and staying on would.
Yes, you clarified my intended message. But there are times when you need to brake hard so short firm braking is also a good idea to avoid locking them up.
Braking is an art unto itself and should be taught as such on a driving course devoted to it. The worst thing that you can do is lock up the brakes and then try to steer around an object. The result is an almost guaranteed loss of control in a spinout. IMO, anti-lock brakes should have been mandated long before airbags.
If you are behind a truck going through an intersection, and you can’t personally see that the light is green, don’t just assume that the light is still green. Let the truck go through so you can see the light and stop or go accordingly.
Simple: assume that everyone else on the road is incompetent or even malicious in their driving habits, and don’t trust them. I don’t mean this as a snarky or cutesy answer, but as a serious cornerstone of defensive driving. Assume that everyone else on the road is on the verge of fucking up at any moment.
I you are driving a regular vehicle, do not tailgate motorcycles. They can stop incredibly quickly, giving a car no chance to avoid running them over.
Also related to stopping distances, don’t pull out onto the highway in front of transport trucks if it is going to mean they’ll need to slow down. Those trucks have huge stopping distances and it might be impossible for them to slow quickly enough to avoid flattening you. This happens to truck drivers all the time and it makes them crazy. Just wait and let them go by and pull in behind.
For winter drivers: During slippery conditions, when waiting at a red light, leave a bit of space in front of you. That way, if someone who is coming up behind you misjudges the distance they’ll need to stop behind you and risks sliding into your vehicle, you can move ahead and create more space behind you for the approaching car to use to stop.
How to Drive in California, Part the Second
Driving is not a means of transportation, it’s a way to prove everyone that your car can go lower/higher than everyone else’s. Regardless of whether or not you ever go off the road, your #1 goal should be to procure a gigantic pickup truck and lift it up so high that if you ever T-boned another car you’d slam right through the driver’s chest and kill him painfully; then, drive like a maniac. This will win you respect.
Despite the fact that everyone else in the fast lane is going 80+ mph, you should go 65 and hold up everyone else who actually has somewhere to be. Go on. You deserve all that following space.
A special one for the police force: You’re above the law, and don’t you forget it. Change your mind about pizza for lunch? You don’t have to wait until you get to the intersection to turn around; just pop a Uey right over the median! Late to a stakeout? Go 95 on the freeway until you get there! And by the way, no it’s not unprofessional to put a Jack in the Box Antenna Ball on your cruiser.
I was responding to several posts saying to turn the wheel toward the curve when your front end is pointed downhill and away from the curve pointed uphill. One of them was from someone who seemed pretty knowledgeable, so I think I understand them to be right.
Are you saying they’re wrong about the pointed uphill / turn wheel away from curb thing? I want to get this.
fetus, you forgot the rule that says if traffic is stopped at the light then, no matter how far back you are, you must pull into any lane you can to get to the front of the line, and hit the gas to be first out of the gate at the light change, so as to get ahead of anybody that was in front of you.
Also, in California it is your right, nay, your civic duty to get into the intersection at all costs when you have a green light, regardless of whether or not you’ll make it to the other side. The through traffic going perpendicular to you is less important than you, and the people turning right onto your street will just have to use some ingenuity and clever bumper maneuvers to get in.