Seems like most places are brightly lit at night. I can imagine people going years without ever using high beams.
Last night. I live in a small city, yes, but go a mile and BAM, country roads (…take me home…) You needs high beams on those suckas.
I use them to flash people doing stupid stuff on the road, like pulling out in front of me at a very slow rate of speed as if I don’t exist when I’m clipping along at 45-50. Otherwise last time I used them to drive was driving up from Lake Okeechobee to the Tampa area, after midnight.
Two nights ago, coming down a hill on a highway near my home.
When I drive back from the part of town my parents and g/f live in, I often cut through a particular park. This is in the middle of a very populated area, but the park is nevertheless pitch black at night, and it behoves one to use as much illumination as possible, as deer and other random animals live in those parts. So I use them frequently.
I flicked them on accidentally two nights ago. I wondered why the car across from me at the light flashed his, and it took me a good minute to figure it out.
Otherwise, hardly ever. I live in a nicely lit town.
Saturday night, taking the babysitter home. She lives at the very end of a long road that quickly turns into the country. I probably should have used them last night, stopping by my parents’ place–they live out there too, on a different road–but I know the road well enough that I don’t often bother.
Two nights ago, driving back home from Baker City, Oregon to Boise, Idaho (about 130 miles) I used my brights for most of the trip. Most of the driving was on the interstate (I-84) and there wasn’t a lot of traffic. The median is wide enough that dimming for opposing traffic wasn’t necessary, and where the median is narrower there’s a concrete wall that blocks headlights from opposing traffic.
Most places in the U.S. are not brightly lit at night. However the places where most of the people live are. There is lots of pitch black out there as soon as you drive away from the paths well traveled. My street is an old colonial winding road and still fairly rural. I use them sometimes for half a mile or so away from my house. I also use them when we go to the family farm in New Hampshire. It gets to be pitch black for miles there. I needed them all the time growing up in rural Lousiana as well as when I lived in Vermont.
A week ago when some idiot was driving through the parking lot with his highbeams on. I flashed him the beams quickly, thinking he’d get the point. He didn’t, he flipped me off.
All the time. I live 5 miles from the nearest small town. (This morning Scout and I flushed a flock of wild turkeys out of the trees on the woods behind our barn during our morning walk. She liked that!)
Although I will say that I avoid driving at night when I can because I’m not as good as I could be at spotting deer. Mr. S usually drives us at night because he’s got pretty sharp deer-dar.
The OP must live in an urban area.
I use high beams every night going hime.
I live in eastern Connecticut, in a fairly rural area (but only 30 minutes from the Hartford metro area). At night in my neighborhood, it is pitch dark. You can see the Milky Way easily from my yard.
Once I get off the highway, it’s high beams the whole way to my house.
It’s not just the lack of lighting on the road; it’s also spotting deer before you run into them. High beams can mean the difference between avoiding a deer and ending up with one splayed across your hood.
Most every day (when I was driving regularly). I probably didn’t need to - one of the roads I took home from work had okay lighting. But I have pretty crappy night-vision, and I was driving home around 3 AM, so I didn’t really need to worry about blinding other drivers. There wasn’t any reason not to use them, and it made me feel a bit better about driving in the dark.
Surely unless you confine yourself to urban areas you will use high beam all the time? Even where I live, which is very densely populated, as soon as you leave London you start to encounter unlit roads.
Quite frequently. Better safe than sorry, especially in my neighborhood where the local ankle biters and Hitler Youth play on the street and think a passing vehicle is a major inconvenience to them.
OTOH, just a frequently I see people driving at night with no lights on. And I am not talking within an hour of sunset, either, nor brightly lit streets. I’ve even flashed them with my brights and they never seem to get the hint.
This morning. It was dark, my area is quite rural. I use them nearly every time I drive after dark.
I find that if other drivers don’t use them you won’t either, but since they do you are forced to do so also so you can blind them as much as they blind you.
I live in a country (Dom Rep) where electricity is a precious commodity. Daily blackouts in some parts of the capital (Sto Domingo) of up to 12 hours or more – fortunatedly, I live in an area close to the Presidential Palace and the American Embassy, thus power around here is almost always the last to go.
But more to the point, you couldn’t drive here at all if you lacked high beams. Or I suppose you could if you don’t mind running over the odd pedestrian here and there or a few of the countless motorcycles that lack any sort of taillights or brakelights.
It’s not just a country, it’s an adventure!
I haven’t used them in decades. I’ve never found them particularly useful, even in areas far away from civilization. If visibility is bad, I just slow down.
Almost two years ago. I was driving from Columbus, OH to Dallas, TX. I was in rural Missouri at night and way too tired to be driving.
I haven’t been out of the DFW metroplex in the last two years, so never use my high beams.