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aggressive drivers don’t save time

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  • November 23, 2017 at 11:43 am #906633
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    PRSboy

    Sort of vaguely connected,

    Sort of vaguely connected, what is the view here on traffic calming measures, e.g chicanes, forced give way zones etc?

    There are a couple near us which demonstrates the problem they cause- unecessary huge queues in the morning, extra noise and pollution, near misses as people barge through, and I cannot see what good they actually do.  Even the most pathetic car can hit over 30 from a standing start only a few metres on.  Whats more, Mr or Mrs Impatient then has to make up the valuable time lost by driving even quicker!

    Seems like removing them would be an easy win to reduce local congestion and improve air quality with no impact on, or possibly improving, safety.

    November 23, 2017 at 11:22 am #906631
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    Simon E

    @ madcarew – a mate of mine

    @ madcarew – a mate of mine told me that back in the late 70s he regularly drove home to mid-Wales from Birkenhead and back at the weekend. At first he tried to get there in the shortest possible time (about 2½ hours) but at some point decided to try driving at what he called ‘sensible’ speeds. He was surprised that his journey was barely any longer – a handful of minutes IIRC.

    November 23, 2017 at 10:07 am #906629
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    madcarew

    Speeding is pretty pointless

    Speeding is pretty pointless unless you have a straight, clear road. I had a ‘race’ with a friend who is a (weekend) racing car driver, and a pretty aggressive driver. We were both going for a weekend away to a town 200 miles away. I encouraged him to drive in his normal fashion, which is  driving as fast as he could when he could, and overtaking whenever vaguely possible. I drove the same course, leaving 10 mins behind him, and never exceeded 60 mph, or any local speed limits. After nearly  4 hours  he had got to our destination precisely 8 mins quicker than me. This speaks to 2 things, the dearth of overtaking opportunities on NZ roads, and the utter pointlessness of speeding. 

    November 23, 2017 at 9:01 am #906627
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    Anonymous

    In urban areas, speeding is

    In urban areas, speeding is pointless.  You save far more time by being in the right lane at the right time, being assertive with road positioning (not the same as aggressive) and using intelligent routing systems (Waze/Google Maps etc) to distribute traffic load over the network – which means that councils need to be cleverer about introducing filtered permeability and other measures to ensure that traffic only distributes over suitable roads rather than creating rat runs.

    November 23, 2017 at 8:55 am #906625
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    PRSboy

    In my experience a good

    In my experience a good decision on which lane to be in at a roundabout etc can make far more of a difference to a journey time. 

    What the report does not recognise is that some people like driving fast… its not a means to an end, but an end in itself.  Or, they are not being aggressive to save time, but are being so because they think they are more important than the cyclist.  This is a psychological issue.

    Generally, the importance of the time saved is an illusion.  Rush to work, then wonder about making a coffee etc. 

    Rarely is the time saved likely to make a real impact, unless you are a medic!

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