To think if you can’t drive to speed limits you shouldn’t be on the road?

[TheTruthAboutLove]

I know, I know that a speed limit is a limit, not a target.

However I’m talking about the ones who go much much slower than the speed limit on roads - which in my eyes is just as dangerous as people going over speed limits.

Tonight on my 30minute commute home I was behind;

A taxi which couldn’t decide what lane to be in so straddled both, doing 25mph in a 40mph limit

A car doing 30mph on a 60mph limit

On a motorway, and behind a car doing 50mph

Surely people need to realise this is just as dangerous as driving fast? I don’t tailgate, I stay the correct distances away from other cars so there isn’t any pressure, but these cars slowing right down are creating huge tails of traffic behind them which is horrific in rush hour!

Doing 30 mph on a 60 limit road because of what you are carrying in the vehicle is EXACTLY the time when a sign on the rear window and pulling over for others to get past is needed.

Morning. Resident HGV driver here.

Slow drivers for us mean under 50 on a single, or 56 anywhere else. You think we're speeding, but our speedos are MUCH more accurate, and they're regularly calibrated. Our top speeds vary between 52 and 56, depending on the limiter setting.

Mostly we drive to the conditions. What we hate are the wobblers, the brake checkers (I run at 40+ tonnes), and mostly of all the ones who simply don't pay attention.

@AlexaAmbidextra

You are right, but tailgating could lead to a conviction for dangerous driving and a 12 month ban. Not really comparable

The thing is, the speed limit can be a really blunt instrument.

The road past my house is residential BUT it is wide, well maintained and with good visibility. It has a limit of 30 mph.

Equally, the final road I drive down on the way to work has a limit of 390 mph. However, due to parking it is essentially single lane, with an extremely narrow section on a hill, and with very poor visibility due to a number of corners.

To do the same speed on both roads would be mindless stupidity - as the person overtaking me on my approach to work last week found out, as they stormed past me and then very nearly caused a multi-car and pedestrian accident (they were still probably doing less than 30 mph).

Equally, on some country roads with a formal designation of 50, someone who knows the road well might well take it at 50, as might most people in the daytime. At night, in the rain, as the 'lead driver' - no, 50 is not sensible, and I have lost count of the times I have been overtaken by someone who as soon as they have become the lead driver have instantly slowed down to the 40 I was doing as they have realised how poor the visibility ahead is (much easier to follow another driver than b the lead driver in those circumstances).

50 on a clear motorway - no. However, I would say that most people who describe fellow motorists as 'doing 50 on a motorway' probably observed someone doing 65, but they themselves were doing well over the speed limit of 70, so the relative speed seemed low.

30 not 390!

You will find that driving under the speed limit therefore impeding other road users may be classified as ‘driving without due care and attention’ and you may be issued with a fine and penalty points on your licence. So I wouldn’t be too smug if I were you

With 87% of drivers speeding over the limits set & breaking the law I doubt the police would have time or resources to be apprehending drivers not speeding and causing a queue of other cars/vehicles which is unlikely to cause injury to others.

Be far more wary that dash cam & helmet cam footage is being submitted to police in large numbers now through digital upload. Police sit & view footage & send Relevant prosecution through the post

I think that this is more of a discussion about when the roads are clear and safe to drive to a higher speed and drivers refuse to through stubbornness or smugness (as PP have alluded to). There are streets where I live where it would be dangerous to drive to a speed limit. However as an example there is one which is a straight line, literal straight line running adjacent to the train track up the coat - it’s a 50mph limit and I think people just don’t observe the speed limit signs and because there are street lights they drive to 30mph. It’s a mixture of behaviours, but people should travel at a sensible speed - just like drivers shouldn’t pull out of a junction if it’s going to make a car change speed or direction due to their action. And I’ve been driving on two separate occasions today where cars have pulled out, I was doing 40mph and had to slow down to 20mph when they pulled out and couldn’t quicken up speed.

Today I’ve realised just how awful supermarket car parks are. Another car, with an old man, his wife and what looked like a younger relative in the car pulled out infront of me. I beeped the horn, the driver didn’t even flinch, did it again and he didn’t realise I was beeping at him. In the end the younger relative wound his window down and apologised for the driver not looking and said he’s hard of hearing. Great.

50 on a clear motorway - no. However, I would say that most people who describe fellow motorists as 'doing 50 on a motorway' probably observed someone doing 65, but they themselves were doing well over the speed limit of 70, so the relative speed seemed low.

Nope. I generally encounter them whilst joining the motorway, either behind them on the slip road whilst they dither about crossing the line and joining faster traffic or already on the motorway. I get past them as quickly as I can. (Yesterday I was being someone who joined at 45mph. Death wish.)

the roads are clear and safe to drive to a higher speed

I think that can sometimes be really difficult to judge. On an unlit, country road at night, a driver familiar with the road will know e.g. that the next bend is gentle, whereas the one after that is sharp, and the road is clear because otherwise you'd see lights coming the other way. Therefore, in their perception, the road is clear and safe to drive at a higher speed - and they will be frustrated by a slower driver.

However, in the other driver's perception, the road is totally dark outside their headlights' reach, and they can't see clearly ahead because the hedges show that there is a bend. So in their perception, the road is not clear, and they need to drive at a slower speed.

Equally, on a motorway, one driver will drive at just on / a tiny bit below 70 mph - because that is the speed limit. Another will 'know' that this is a fast motorway (the M40 is a fast motorway, for example, whereas much of the M5 and M6 is traditionally much slower) and therefore perceive that the road is clear and safe to drive at 80 mph.

cantkeepawayforever
I agree with you on most of that.
I don't know on the motorway front though. There's loads of threads on here where people say they hate motorway driving, haven't driven on a motorway put passed their test years ago, defending ridiculously low speeds because the world shouldn't be impatient. etc.

One dual carriageway near me has a really busy junction/intersection and generally people tend to slow to 55/60 because of this. Even the knobheads slow down because it's known for being a blackspot so it's rare to see reckless driving on that section. The major problem is that some people drive to the end of the slip road trying to merge at 30mph and/or stop at the entrance, or drive at 40mph and then pull into the middle lane to let people on in advance of the slip road joining (but they just pull out a good 15-20mph slower than the general traffic).

I can entirely believe that some people can't drive appropriately on dual carriageway and motorways and take the approach of "can't do it and won't try to be better".

NeedanExpert - because of where I join motorways, and where I merge onto other motorways in typical journeys, it is rare for the traffic I am joining to be going much faster than 30 mph on a good day, so it's not a problem I often encounter.

Being the driver of a very small car, I do find the fine art of merging between two lorries both going at 30 mph just a little hairy on occasions, though!

I drive a Kuga and feel nervous about being sandwiched between 2 lorries.

On Wednesday I was driving on a 4 lane stretch of the M1 near Sheffield at about 8.20 am. I was in the outside lane behind a car doing 65. There was no-one in the third lane!

This is the kind of driving that infuriates other drivers.

I drive a Kuga and feel nervous about being sandwiched between 2 lorries.

Hyundai i10 here....

Another situation I'm not fond of is 3 lanes through a narrow laned 50 section of the motorway through roadworks, if I ever find myself in the middle lane with lorries on either side (worse with 1 behind as well). I may BE safe, and I'M certainly not causing anyone any danger, but I don't FEEL terribly safe with 2 huge lorries on either side, each with one set of wheels on the lane markings of the narrow lanes, all moving along in parallel at 30-50 mph...

I know what you mean. I drive up and down the A1 frequently, and there is a long roadworks section in North Yorkshire that I don't like driving through.

@Ginfordinner I drive on that section of the A1 too and I’m not a fan of it - I’ve found though to lorries credit they tend to stay in the inside lane and very rarely have I seen them move over.

That’s another place where cars will drive at 35/40mph in the 50 road as they are so unsure driving in it - I get the amount of people who avoid motorways, but they are the safest places to drive so excellent practise for people.

I will be driving that section tomorrow - twice. Off to collect DD from university as her train has been withdrawn.

There was a stretch of road where I used to live, 50mph going into 30mph, and what used to confuse me was all the drivers who'd do 40mph consistently through both. I never got the point in that.

@LochJessMonster
That’s not petty it’s dangerous; if you are on a main road you shouldn’t be slowing or stopping to let out from side roads, it’s impeding the flow of traffic.
Selfish stupid driving causes accidents.

Why do some motorway drivers speed up when you pull out to overtake them

Some do it because they are immature and dangerous.

Some speed up because the road surface has become better or similar. Or, even more likely, they've stopped looking at their mobile phones!

I had someone do it to me a few months ago (twice) and I am not confident enough to really go fast to get past them as they speed up so I just gave up and tucked in behind. My chance came a few miles down the road where I got past him on a roundabout. T'was really annoying though.

@LochJessMonster If you're telling the truth about letting the tractor in, I'm astonished that they actually pulled out. It's quite stressful driving a tractor on an NSL road knowing that there are people behind you.

I'm going to put my money on "things that never happened".

I could not agree with you more OP!!
It's a pet hate of mine. People regularly do 40 in a 60 round here.

The worst part is people trying to join a motorway or dual carriageway and I'm trying to join and they slam their breaks on or try and join at 40. Had someone try and join the motorway at 30 the other day. ARE YOU TRYING TO FUCKING KILL US BOTH?!

Speed Kills. Whether that's high or low.
Hesitation Kills.

Here in East Yorkshire the roads are full of incredibly self-righteous drivers (usually hairy-nostrilled old men) who think it's really clever to drive well below the speed limit, especially where it's too dangerous to overtake. It's their little bit of power. What they are trying to prove I don't know, it's infuriating for everyone else. The other problem here is the obsession with stopping to let people out of side roads, even when they are turning across the traffic. Many times I've had to brake sharply because the person in front of me has done an emergency stop in order to stop the traffic to let someone out. Yes, it seems like good road manners BUT it's incredibly dangerous to take it on yourself to change hte rules of the road. I've witnessed several accidents caused by this in the last few months. Having moved from North London where speed & pulling out into your path are problems, I actually feel at more risk here.

There's good and bad reasons for driving below the speed limit as I see it.

"A taxi which couldn’t decide what lane to be in so straddled both, doing 25mph in a 40mph limit"

Bad. Possibly lost, which is why the driving test now includes a test of your ability to drive safely while also navigating.

A car doing 30mph on a 60mph limit

If it's road where 60 is clearly safe and reasonable this is bad. If it's a country lane that's 60 mph "by default" then it's reasonable - on these sorts of roads you drive at the speed you judge appropriate.

On a motorway, and behind a car doing 50mph

Not unreasonable in the left lane, that's only slightly slower than the lorries. Though a driver who finds themselves being overtaken by lorries should speed up a bit IMHO. Unacceptable in the middle or right lanes in clear traffic. I sometimes do 55-60 on the motorway if I want to save fuel.

On roads with many speed limit changes a driver might miss the change, though I do think the 40 everywhere crowd are obliviots.

You are right, but tailgating could lead to a conviction for dangerous driving and a 12 month ban. Not really comparable

Nishky. So what? I was talking about driving slowly, not tailgating. I wasn’t comparing the two. You are.

My spare tyre is a thin temporary one designed to get you home. Last time I had a flat tyre I had to drive back on the motorway on the spare and your not allowed to exceed 50. I kept to the slow lane but still got beeped at by arsey motorists who had no idea why I was driving slowly.
People are too quick to judge.