I don’t believe that they test your ability to reverse round a corner because it is something you will need to do with some frequency after passing your test. It is simply a manoeuvre you do to demonstrate that you can control your car when reversing. The corner gives a target and you have to show that you can keep your vehicle close to, but not touch, the kerb.
I read Douglas Adams’ rant about “overtaking on the inside lane” as being something allowed in the US and barred in the UK. Can anyone explain this to me?
I live in Canada where the driving laws are very similar to the USA… I believe is is technically illegal but larger overlooked… even the police do it…
I admit that I do it myself often… I do not like doing it, but I have absolutely no choice… hardly anyone keeps to the right… they just pick a lane and sit there…
Just today I had to overtake on the inside on a highway on-ramp… the person infront of me merged at 60km (the limit is 100). Illegal or not, there’s no way I’m going to merge at that speed…
Although outside the city people tend to be much better at keeping to the right.
When I took drivers ed, we would get in trouble for NOT steering hand-over-hand. Also, I have never used my hand brake at all.
Yep… inside lane could be translated as ‘the lane next to you where cars should go slower’. In the UK this means the lane to the left of you when you’re travelling (a) in the outside lane of a dual carriageway or (b) when you’re travelling in the middle or outside lane of a motorway. Cars are not allowed to pass in a ‘slower’ lane, but of course some do.
everton, that happened to me too! Except in my case (and maybe in yours, I wasn’t sure) I had both the examiner and the examiner’s examiner (who was testing the examiner, not me) in the car. I don’t know who was more nervous, me or the regular examiner, but I do remember thinking there was no way on God’s earth I was going to pass. And I was right.
I think the reason for not passing on the inside is if you are legally overtaking a truck on the outside, and someone is doing the same thing on the inside, then both cars try to get to the middle lane without seeing each other. :eek:. I’ve seen this nearly happen quite a few times.
Living in Dubai, I know overtake all the time in the inside lane.
The issue with this is that if people drove properly - ie didn’t lane hog (driving at 80kmph in 120kmph zone in one of the middle or outside lanes) it wouldn’t actually be possible to overtake on the inside. You can only do it because people are driving along the wrong lanes at their own sweet pace, blocking you from overtaking on the correct side, the outside.
The other issue here that it really isn’t safe a lot the time to overtake on the outside lane. This is because many drivers are extremely aggressive and will squeeze past you via THE HARD SHOULDER rather than wait for you to pull back in past the vehicle you’re overtaking. ie you are going 120, overtaking a vehicle doing 100, and someone doing 200 (I kid you not, happens every day even in rush hour) zooms up behind you and just won’t wait.
I once heard that a certain sheikh here got so pissed off by a bad driver on the main highway one day he pulled him over, got him to open his window, and shot him in the foot. If only that sheikh did traffic patrol 24/7…
As a complete aside, anyone know what the standard parking space size is in the US? Vehicle size is generally bigger on average, so I guess parking spaces must be too.
UK standard (minimum) size is 2.4 x 4.8M, (with 6M roads between bays) which is quite tight for any reasonably big cars. What’s the minimum dimensions in the US?
As amarone said, reversing around a corner is just a test of your control of the vehicle - with the exception of driveways and car parks, you would hardly ever need to do it in the real world.
The reversing round corners thing: you have to remember that in Europe drivers have to cope with city streets that were laid out long before the motor car was invented. Many city centres have medieval (even Roman) street plans.
In countries where land is at a premium, even modern streets are much more narrow that those found in the USA, Canada etc. So, it is essential that a driver can maneouver is tight places, get in and out of small spaces etc. - problems that a driver in the USA (etc) almost never has to deal with.
Hence, the UK driving test places much emphasis on maneouvers such as multi-point turns and reversing round corners. Training and testing is usually done where there is plenty of space, but it is important to keep close to the curb to demonstrate that you could cope in a much more confined space.
Overtaking on the inside: in general British drivers do keep to the correct lane - moving over to the slowest lane available and not overtaking on the inside. But this does have the disadvantage that British drives frequently change lanes - British drivers typically go quite fast and any lane change is inherently dangerous so great care is needed.
I can understand why drivers in the USA and Canda behave differently. Having driven in the USA and Canada I must say that overtaking on the inside may not be such a bad thing if it also means (as it seems to) fewer lane changes.
Another feature of North American road that is not common in the UK is the bifurcating carriageway - you have to choose left or right and both ways seem to have equal precedence. In general, UK multi-lane carriageways have a distinct main route and a clearly marked slip lane for vehicles turning off to the left. It seems to me that the bifurcating carriageway blurs the distinction as to which lane is the inside lane.
Standard parking spaces in the US are 9’ x 18’, or 2.75m x 5.5m.
In crowded urban areas, some parking lots have a section of smaller spaces marked ‘compact cars only.’
These are no smaller than 8’ x 17.5’ (2.45m x 5.33m).
The space between bays is 24’ (7.3m) where the spaces are at right angles to the aisle. It can be smaller in a slant configuration.
Those dimensions are for parking-lot type configurations (perpendicular). On-street, curbside parking (parallel) spaces are narrower and longer, typically 8’ x 20’ (2.45m x 6.10m).
brad_d,
Tell your wife’s friend to take lessons from a driving instructor. The U.K. driving test is noticeably harder than the test for any state in the U.S. Your wife’s friend should have been told before she even considered getting a license about how difficult the test was. We can debate endlessly about whether or not the test is representative of driving in the U.K., but the point is that it is harder than a U.S. test and that it involves techniques that are little used in the U.S.
I think that this is part of a general principle: Don’t go to a foreign country and think that you can easily tell the citizens there about they can improve their country by adopting American habits. Even when you’re correct, you’re going to get hostile reactions. Your wife’s friend can decide after a couple of years of driving in the U.K. whether or not the techniques she needs to learn for the test are really relevant or not, but at the moment she doesn’t know enough about driving in the U.K. to complain about it.
I moved from the US to the UK about 7 years ago, and took the test in my American car (Chevy Lumina Z34). I passed the first time with just a couple comments. I was in an area that didn’t have any speed limit signs, and it seemed urban, so I was going 30 when I should have been doing 45. I also tended to drive thru the apex of small roundabouts. Since the car was so big and the street so narrow, the 3 point turn was more like a 5 point turn, but as long as I didn’t hit the kerbs it was OK. And being a left hand drive, the reversing around a corner was dead easy. I did my normal hand over hand steering that I was taught in Iowa driver’s ed in 1978, and never touched the parking brake (which was foot operated, not a hand brake) until the end of the test.
Overall I didn’t think it was any harder than the Iowa test. And people here are horrified when I tell them what drills we did in driver’s ed. The two scariest examples: Driving down a straight country road at 60, the instructor would reach over, grab the wheel, and pull right until 2 wheels dropped onto the shoulder. The other drill was in town, he’s say ‘turn right at the next corner’, then reach over and hold the accelerator with a yard stick to simulate a stuck throttle.
:eek:
Are they the aussie equivalent of R plates in Northern Ireland. R plates are a peculiarity of NI, I don’t think they are used in the rest of the UK or in the Republic of Ireland. Basically when you pass your test you replace the L plates with the R plates and have to drive at a max 45mph for the next year.
As for the OP I can see the common sense behind what’s been mentioned but I can’t for the life of me remember needing the handbrake for a 3 point turn.
The minor and major mistakes mentioned elsewhere, I was under the impression that any number of minors were allowed. A mate said he had his sheet filled with them. But then what would be the point of having them if only for the sake of embarrasing people.
Private cars aren’t permitted to drive in the Oxford city centre anymore, thank God, but in the 60’s I heard that crossing High Street was like trying to cross the M1.
Another UK driving question: somewhere along the line I picked up the idea that you are allowed to park against the flow of traffic in the UK. Is this true?
(In the US, if you are parked in the northbound lane, you must be pointing north. To point south is a ticketable offense.)
yeah, Hello Again, you can park any way that’s safe to do so.
eg, pulling across an empty street to park outside your house is fine, pulling into oncoming traffic isn’t.
Thanks again to all for very informative responses. I think I “get it” now to the point that I can coherently explain differences in laws & style to my wife and her friend. Wendell, I’ll pass your advice on, as it sounds like it might do some good.
Personally, I wish US road tests were more stringent - mine (Texas, 1986) was a complete joke. Knowledge of the rules (completely objective) was given far more weight than actual car control (somewhat subjective).
Actually, I went to the sample written test on the link ticker gave. The overall sense of the test (tone and scope of the questions) was very similar to the ones I’ve taken in Texas and California (when I moved, I had to take a written test only to get at California license). There was a good bit of terminology, signage and street markings that I simply didn’t understand, but other than that I don’t think they’re that different. BTW, I failed with a 28/35. (80%, which would have passed in CA and TX).
OK, one of the questions has me absolutely baffled. I have NO CLUE what the hell this is talking about:
[quote]
Which of the following types of crossing can detect when people are on them?[ul][li]Pelican[]Toucan[]ZebraPuffin[/ul][/li][/quote]
Huh?
LMAO.
It is (surprisingly) the case that the streets of Britain are literally crammed with Pelicans, Zebras, Toucans and Puffins. Sometimes you can hardly move without negotiating your way through a herd of zebra. We really should get round to doing something about them one day.