Likewise. I feel much safer with semis than with cars.
I can sympathize with unreasonable work conditions, however, when on a hill, the “faster” semi can take several to many minutes to pass the “slower” semi while cars are stacking up behind them. By not being willing to slow down a few miles an hour, the driver is now stealing time from every single person behind him. By forcing all of those cars to slow down on a hill and then speed back up when the driver finally allows them to, the car engines are forced to work harder and burn more gas than if they had been allowed to drive in the left lane without having to slow down.
So, the driver can lose a little time and money or choose to steal time and money from a lot of people. Once someone starts profiting by stealing from strangers, they usually don’t stop unless they are forced to and will often escalate due to lack of negative reinforcement.
Ontario passed a law several years ago requiring trucks to stay in the rightmost lanes unless passing and this mostly took care of the problem. Many drivers are selfish or disobey laws but trucks are more noticeable - not convinced they are worse per capita.
On I-10 westbound between Tucson and Phoenix there’s a small rise, scarcely noticeable and only for a couple miles that had a third “trucks stay right” lane added. Apparently it was causing trouble.
On I-17 there are several such lanes but they are at locations that are at or near the grade limit on interstates – 6% – for miles at a time. The trucks bog down to 45mph or so.
Just out of curiosity, how much would it cost the slower driver to slow down 1 MPH for 2 minutes, thus giving the faster truck about 180 feet of extra room to pass?
I’ll be honest, a truck taking a minute or even two doesn’t bother me. But I’ve been stuck behind a truck taking over ten miles to pass, and that shit’s ridiculous.
It could cost her/him the next load, which will be given to the driver that didn’t slow down, and perhaps cost her/him a chance to be home for thanksgiving or Christmas.
Willing to put an actual number? Because I’m coming up with fractions of a cent. We’re literally talking about a couple seconds of lost time. Your hyperbole is appreciated and discarded.
My “hyperbole” is based on working at a trucking firm for over 25 years, and seeing what happens when someone arrives late for dock space. Being a few seconds behind your competition can cost you big when you have to wait your turn to get that load off your trailer, They get paid per mile, not per hour(for the most part), and reputation takes a big hit if you come in second or third in line to unload too many times.
Two or three seconds makes that much difference? Pardon my incredulity, especially given the number of other things that can cost truckers FAR more time far more often. But please, continue on how two seconds can cost an OTR trucker Christmas.
Correct. That came in at about the time I got my trucking license in Ontario. I’ve since given it up (and I no longer live in Ontario anyway), but Ontario truckers are, on the whole, pretty good at what they do. To this day, I still (in my own private vehicle), stick to the right lane, passing when I can, and returning to the right lane. Used to drive (heh) my ex crazy:
She: “Why are you returning to the right lane? That next truck is a mile ahead. Why not just stay in the left lane?”
Me: “Because that’s what we do. We’ll catch him, and pass him on the left, and return to the right lane. No biggie.”
Explained it once, not going to do it again.
Your “explanation” sounded like a fairytale.
That way lies confirmation bias. You can find any number of trucker fail videos on YouTube but nobody uploads videos of the boring hauls that are by-the-book, on-time, safe, and uneventful.
at one time truck driving was the bottom of the barrel career even below construction work and joining the military so you tended to have unsociable types who couldn’t get jobs anywhere else
in fact I remember a couple of students that were obliviously going no where in life being told "well your too stupid to build anything and too much of being assholes for the army you might be able to drive a truck if you put your brains together after you get expelled but I expect its a sign up line at the welfare office "
Things changed a bit when some of the larger outfits required a GED or hs diploma and started serious drug testing …
Or a “very special” episode of “B.J. and the Bear”.
Yesterday’s episode: on the Long Island Expressway, in heavy traffic, a big truck made a lane change (no signaling) into my lane. Unfortunately, my car was where he wanted to be but that didn’t stop him. Rude asshole, IMHO.
To be fair, we’ve been next to a large pickup which pulled the same maneuver.
My dad drove a truck years ago…starting pre-Interstate highways, I guess.
The gold standard in transportation must be air…how many crashes per million miles etc.? Well those pilots need a lot of training and education, hours of guidance, etc. The build from one certification to the next and it isn’t overnight.
With far lower requirements, I’m always amazed at how good truckers are. I also assume that if they have accidents they may not be driving long. Mrs L. once worked for a small trucking company. Their breakroom was muralled with graphic photos from gruesome crashes other company drivers had had, full detail. Couldn’t happen to you? Drive safe!
If you don’t like how fast truckers are moving, in my experience, it’s because of safety. They can’t cut sharp turns as easily etc. It’s part of the cost of reasonably priced goods on the shelf. You can find trucker posted videos on youtube showing idiot car drivers who pass, then jam on brakes in front of a trucker, thinking he can stop as fast as their little car.
Sure I have encountered a few truckers who are jerks but those pop up in any profession.
What I notice is an uptick in drivers who can’t be arsed to watch the road (texting, Facebook, whatever). Also Mrs. L and I have a new refrain: “Paper plates,” i.e. temporary tags. This refers to a car that someone just bought, probably with stimulus money or something. It’s new to them so they don’t know the controls, the vehicles are sometimes real beaters so it may be a first car, and they’re generally not the best drivers on the road. Some guy cut across four lanes at the last second? “Paper plates?”
4-wheelers in the city have their own set of issues sharing the road with Class B (straight trucks) and intra-city tractor/trailers. It’s a different environment than the highway, and can be significantly more aggravating for the truck drivers. I spent this summer driving a dump truck while working construction, back and forth through the downtown of a large city, typically loaded to full capacity or hauling a tri-axle flatbed hauling equipment or materials. The cars have no mercy on you. Half of them are texting, have clouds of weed billowing out of the car, or both. If two lanes are becoming one lane, they’ll race you to the merging point at the last minute, regardless of the status of any traffic light that may be in front of you. Towing a trailer around a tight turn down a narrow-ass street? They’ll honk for you to hurry up, as if the extra five seconds of extra caution are going to mean someone else gets the winning scratch-off ticket they’re heading to the gas station for. Speaking of gas stations, yes, by all means, linger for 15 minutes at the ONE pump that has diesel in addition to gas, after you’ve filled up your GAS car. And if I’m at a red light right at the peak of a hill? You don’t need to French-kiss my bumper, you know - this is a manual truck and while I’m competent at hill takeoffs, all it takes is one charlie-horse in my calf and I might wind up rolling backwards - the half-second it takes me to recover could mean big trouble for you. Oh, and that motorcycle? I can tell that it’s badass by looking at it and hearing it. I don’t need to SEE you put it through its paces in the middle of traffic, any more than I need to see what the inside of your brain looks like when your helmetless head meets the pavement.
Ah yes, dump trucks.
I’m not going to make a hyperbolic statement about how many, but a lot of dump truck drivers here don’t know how to run their own rig. They start out so slow I could walk across the intersection faster, and that is NOT hyperbole. And that’s when empty. These aren’t old trucks, relics from the gas-powered fifties. These are newer KW and Petes and Freightliners.
Or the dump truck driver a while back that rear-ended a car at a stop light while going about 50. Obviously he wasn’t on the phone, because professional truck drivers never drive and talk/text. (note to reader: he was. He claimed “the sun was in his eyes”) I forget how many he killed.