Absolute arsehole drivers! AIBU to think there should be compulsory 'retests' every 5 years?

[BubbleGirl01]

To remind them that they need to use their indicators, that they need to wait until the road is clear until they pull out, that they should not jump lanes into the path of another car without any indication that they are going to do so and that their desire to get home is not more important than almost killing other people/wrecking someone else's car.

Two near misses in the space of 30 seconds with 4 DC in the car. I am fucking raging!

some people who drive use their cars to get cheap control over others, such a trying to pull in front of you expecting you to stop to let them through they think they own the road, its their way of getting control in their sad little lives.
Annoying yes but you shouldn't let it control you by showing emotion.

I've always driven Smart cars and assumed that people who drove like arseholes around me were doing so because my car was small and (they assume - I actually remap all my engines) slow.

The past fortnight whilst I'm wauting for my new Smart to be ready to collect, I've been driving a Toyota Hilux, roughly the size of a school bus and scarily quick and powerful. Guess what? People still drive like arseholes! I'm in awe at some of it: tailgating me so closely that I can't see them over the spare wheel on the back; nicking the parking space I'm half reversed into; trying to barge past on a single track road. Do folk not realise that they're going to come off worse than a bloody great SUV with a towbar and bull bars if I have to brake hard/don't see them in time?!

Treat everyone as a potential hazard and a knobber and you won't go wrong.

Comtesse a Hilux is properly slow! Very worried that I have to share the road with someone who thinks it is 'scarily quick and powerful.' If the performance of a Hilux scares you then you have no business being on the road.

I do believe there are lots of people on the road who don't actually remember/know the highway code properly- or fail to keep up to date with it. I also think there are lots of people driving who passed their tests when the volume of traffic was much lower, and so have never really been taught how to drive in very busy situations.

I think a full retest every 5 years is a bit much, but a short test including theory every 10 years might remind people of the rules and catch out those who really shouldn't be driving or have picked up a lot of bad habits. I do agree that some poor drivers would drive properly on test day, but equally if you always drive badly, or don't know the rules I think it would be a struggle to fake it for test day.

I do think there is a difference between those who, say, knowingly speed when they think it's safe to do so and could just keep to speed limits and rules when taking the test, and those who have got lazy with indicating, so it's no longer a habit and might forget on a test.

richthegreatcornholio Did you read the part where the poster says that they re map the engines? or did you just fancy having a go?

Shrub do you know what a remap is? Even a remapped Hilux will be chuffing slow.

Yes I know what a re map is. Thanks. My DH had a 3L hilux as a works vehicle and that was certainly not slow, it was in comparison to my fathers Porsche but all things relative it wasn't "slow".

ComtesseDeSpair

Interesting - my dad had a Honda Jazz. He then decided to get a new one and gave us his old one. I was a bit concerned about having it because I thought it had a granny image and so it proved - people always pulling out in front of us etc etc because they assumed we were grannies. Funnily enough, Honda actually designed it as a family car!

Anyway in 2010 we decided to get rid of it and bought a Toyota Auris. I was stunned at the difference. I'd be driving along the main road near my house and see someone come down a side road and they'd STOP. And wait for me to go by! It was an amazing difference.

However, it's now quite old, so I'm clearly not allowed to be on the road again and often feel that I'm either invisible, or I should just disappear.

As far as a retest is concerned, there's probably grounds for making everyone who didn't do a theory test originally do a course now. I didn't do one, I think they were introduced around 1994 which means most people over about 40 who learnt around the age of 18 won't have done one.

I know what a re map is. Thanks. My DH had a 3L hilux as a works vehicle and that was certainly not slow, it was in comparison to my fathers Porsche but all things relative it wasn't "slow".

A 3l diesel Hilux will remap to approx 205bhp, up about 35bhp on standard. You're delusional if you think it wasn't anything but dog slow. 0-62 may have dropped to about 10.5secs if you were lucky - a total slug. Anyway my point is that someone finding that 'scarily quick' has no business being behind the wheel of a vehicle. Anything slower than 7secs to 62 I would class as slow and anything slower than 9secs as dog slow.