Righteous Right Laners

[MisterD]

If you can't afford to drive at 100km, you refuse to drive at 100km, or your vehicle won't travel at 100km - either buy a more economical, reliant vehicle or stay the fuck off the motorway!!

Actually the optimum speed to get the maximum traffic down a stretch of road safely is about 80kph / 50mph. That's the point at which increasing speed starts to be offset by the need to have bigger spaces between vehicles (for those saying "Eh?" to themselves).

[Marmoot]

1) Was there any courtesy sections in the training or tests?
2) What is the law for this?

Yup to both. Same as speeding.

[Mikkel]

Actually the optimum speed to get the maximum traffic down a stretch of road safely is about 80kph / 50mph. That's the point at which increasing speed starts to be offset by the need to have bigger spaces between vehicles (for those saying "Eh?" to themselves).

Interesting - it does make sense though

[eliot-ness]

If you can't afford to drive at 100km, you refuse to drive at 100km, or your vehicle won't travel at 100km - either buy a more economical, Reliant vehicle or stay the fuck off the motorway!!

Aghhhh, please, not a Reliant.

[pete376403]

[
Originally Posted by Pixie
Did you call her a FAAHN CAAAHN

QUOTE=Mrs Kendog;1399821]No, but I might next time.... if I knew what it was... plz enlighten me.[/QUOTE]

I guess you've never read Fred Gassitt. But try saying it out loud, with an Aussie accent.

[cs363]

[
Originally Posted by Pixie
Did you call her a FAAHN CAAAHN

QUOTE=Mrs Kendog;1399821]No, but I might next time.... if I knew what it was... plz enlighten me.

I guess you've never read Fred Gassitt. But try saying it out loud, with an Aussie accent.[/QUOTE]


Ah! Fred Gassit.....them were the days!

To be further enlightened take a look here: http://dem0n.qgl.org/fred.htm

Anyway, back to the thread - regardless of the rights & wrongs of speeding, the golden rule of driving is KEEP LEFT.
Self appointed traffic Nazis are helping no one including themselves with their self righteous attitudes - this is the kind of driving attitude that causes road rage incidents.
What is needed is a dose of common courtesy on our roads (and elsewhere for that matter) allied with some common sense (something else that seems to be rapidly dissapearing in this nanny state).
So what if the guy roaring up the outside lane is speeding? You aren't and you are keeping left and being a goody two shoes, hopefully people will learn from your example. If you give him more space to speed the chances are he will reach terminal velocity that much faster and further away from everyone else and nature will determine his course.
The police are employed to catch speeders and is something that they do really well, unlike many other roles they are paid to fulfill. Let them do their job and be thankful they aren't out there ticketing people that fail to keep left (as they should IMHO).
And don't start me on those plonkers that pull out just in front of you and then take forever to get up to open road speed, instead of pulling out into the HUGE open space behind you...
Causing undue wear on your suspension, brakes and tyres and the uttering of a torrent of expletives. (They also don't seem to have working mirrors either...but that's yet another story...like the one where the driver that insists on travelling at 70-80km/h on the open road without letting faster traffic pass, but then hits town and the 50 km/h speed zone and sails merrily on at 80...)
Rant over...for now

[cs363]

Didn't know wankers like that proudly owned up to it....thought it was complete lack of driving skills and road awareness.....
Karma takes care of the likes of him, just in case he is wondering why some many " bad things" are happening to his poor old soul....
Just hope that when he gets taken care off, he doesn't take people with him that WILL be missed....

Beware of pimpelfaced geek on 250 hyosung..... sometimes he drives his mummies car, thank god I don't live in Auckland....

He obviously didn't read the tag line at the bottom of your posts before he owned up..... what a Blackpool Rock, to quote our cockney mates

[Mikkel]

Aghhhh, please, not a Reliant.

Reliant made a space shuttle... or someone made a space shuttle out of a Reliant Robin.

Do a search on youtube, it's brilliant

[cs363]

Reliant made a space shuttle... or someone made a space shuttle out of a Reliant Robin.

Do a search on youtube, it's brilliant

Yeah that was the Top Gear boys, bloody funny.

[Mort]

I get these bastards every single day on the way in to and back from AKL

• Drivers who "reserve" their space in the outside lane because they expect to pass a vehicle they can see on the horizon .
• Drivers who do it quite willfully. You pull up behind - they move over - and they pull out again after you pass - WHY ???
• Drivers who absolutely refuse to move over - no matter how patient or insistant you are to get by. W A N K E R S

NZ drivers are the worst motorway drivers in the world. The Motorway is used as a place to relax, read a book, make a call, look around... ANYTHING but concentrate on the job of driving and being aware of other road users.... BASTARDS.

[Brett]

I don't care whether someone is doing 140kph, if the road ahead is clear and it is just them with someone faster behind them, then they need to keep left.

The amount of people who will fricken sit in the fast lane at 80,90,95kpoh for FRICKEN MILES is astounding. I have taken to hooting and flashing my brights at them. Pass, then get the hell into the left hand lane. Many other drivers in many many other countries can get it right. How come drivers here cant?

[Max Headroom]

I find this a fascinating topic.

I worked as a sales rep around Auckland for over 20 years, travelling the motorway at all times of the day, every day of the week. I have spent a huge amount of time on the open roads of the Nth Island, and even now I still clock up 50-70,000kms annually in a variety of vehicles and bikes.

The motorway/open road speed limit is a blunt instrument. The limit of 100kph is applied universally to young and old regardless of skill level or experience (and this diatribe isn't a criticism of the speed limit as such!). It is also applied across the board to 1956 Morris Oxfords and 2008 Porsche GT3's. Now, I spent a lot of time in old Morris Oxfords in my distant youth, and I'm here to tell you that they don't have brakes. They have a centrally mounted floor pedal that when jumped on with both feet in anger will cause the car to gently slow down, but stopping quickly is an unknown concept to an Oxford driver. Emergency stops are executed exclusively by hitting an unmoveable object. Combined with glow-worms at the front thoughtfully provided by Joe Lucas, a set of crossply tyres, and a top speed (on a good day!) of 115kph, one can only marvel in amazement that these vehicles are legally allowed to proceed on our open roads at the same 100kph as everyone else. Yet our yuppie 2008 Porsche GT3 driver can be pinged for 111kph by an impartial hidden camera van in the name of road safety, and nobody has too much sympathy because he clearly has too much money anyway!!! This in a vehicle capable of almost three times our speed limit.

I realise that there are some places where higher speeds aren't desirable, but my point is that the capabilities and safety margins of the different vehicles on our roads vary widely, as do the drivers.

The pet frustrations I experience are:
* the slow drivers in the fast lane on motorways
* folk who don't appreciate how dangerous it is to fake-brake the cars behind to get them to slow down. Last time I checked, the cops don't like that practice either since it has resulted in several nasty accidents
* the drivers on the open road that travel at 80-90kph until they hit overtaking lanes and then inexplicably speed up to 115 so that nobody else can overtake
* vehicles that are clearly travelling together in convoy, sitting below the speed limit yet travelling so close together that nobody can jump one car at a time, yet it's too dangerous to overtake two or three cars in one go
* cars or trucks that are travelling below the speed limit and are aware of it, and pull over to the far left of the road into the gravel even though it's not remotely possible to overtake safely, so you get sprayed with stones and debris

If I have someone wanting to overtake me, I let them go. I figure that they can keep the cops occupied, not me. Staying in the left lane also draws less attention from police.

Of course, choosing a lane in peak-hour traffic on a multilane motorway where the vehicles are moving at 5kph is a completely different situation, and becomes a game of strategy and forward planning!

My $0.02

[Badjelly]

If I have someone wanting to overtake me, I let them go. I figure that they can keep the cops occupied, not me. Staying in the left lane also draws less attention from police.

Of course, choosing a lane in peak-hour traffic on a multilane motorway where the vehicles are moving at 5kph is a completely different situation, and becomes a game of strategy and forward planning!

I agree entirely about letting people overtake.

I think a lot of the right-lane hogging arises because people have learned that when the motorway is nearing capacity, i.e. still moving at 80-100ish but getting crowded, then you will get where you want to go faster by staying in the right lane. A solid queue forms in that lane and if you move to the left you lose your place in the queue.

On the other hand some people just drive in the right hand lane all the time. What on earth are they thinking?

[Swoop]

Once I get the forward firing machineguns fitted, these cocksuckers are TOAST!
Sit in MY right hand lane will they???

[Horse]

* the drivers on the open road that travel at 80-90kph until they hit overtaking lanes and then inexplicably speed up to 115 so that nobody else can overtake

Yep, those idiots are commonplace in this part of the country. No motorways here, our passing lanes are a precious resource that are uniformly squandered by these farkwits.

* cars or trucks that are travelling below the speed limit and are aware of it, and pull over to the far left of the road into the gravel even though it's not remotely possible to overtake safely, so you get sprayed with stones and debris

Another pet peeve of mine. On the Palmy-Wanganui drive (which I do frequently) they love to pull over just enough to suggest a possible overtaking opportunity, but invariably without leaving enough actual room to do it, and smart inspection of the road in front of them reveals that the space they're currently pulled over into is about to expire and cause them to frantically pull back into the lane, which is why I don't attempt to get around them.