AIBU to get annoyed at drivers who let me out of side streets or in traffic?

[Manchestermanchester]

I turn right into work every day. There is a turning lane and there are many business where I work. The traffic coming towards me isn’t bad as there is a set of traffic lights that keeps the traffic light.

However I’m always getting flashed to turn right when I don’t see the point - I can wait an extra few seconds for cars to pass.

This annoys me because I’ve already got it in my mind to turn right when the road is clear (it’s never more than a few cars). It’s not just a simple case of turning right as soon as I get flashed - I have to look to see there are no cyclists (we have plenty), that there are no pedestrians are crossing the road and check again to make sure the road is also clear and the driver has travelled at speed to me and will crash into me. Waiting for a few cars to pass, which takes a few seconds seems the preferable way.

There is also the insurance issue. If I turned and I crashed into the other car, or indeed a car that stopped in front of the car letting me out, I’m at fault. Furthermore I might get rear ended. Plus I don’t flash people a thank you for letting me through. It’s too easy to mistake that for “come over through” plus I’ve got to have both hands on the steering wheel.

No doubt I’ll get a bunch of people saying I’m rude or whatever, are you going to pay for my insurance claim?

This is to do with your confidence over driving.

I drive down a busy road do work and have to wait to take a right turn off the main road in to a side road. I often get people coming the other way down the main road hwo stop and flash me to try and let me a cross their path off the main road. Sometimes I can't take them up on their offer because there are cyclists coming down the cycle lane on their inside. The driver trying to help me sometimes then becomes furious and I am sat their pointing at the cyclists who I am not willing to run over just to be polite. It's easier if everyone just sticks to the rules of the road and keeps their right of way. Oh well, just one of those things we have to put up with in life!

In the course of reading more driving threads than is good for my blood pressure, I’ve come to the conclusion that the more experienced the driver, the more tolerant they are on the roads. It seems to be relatively new drivers with not many miles under their belts who get steamed up about obeying the rules to the letter. Those of us who have been driving a long time understand that a lot of driving you see means you roll your eyes and carry on.

I came nose to nose with a woman on my side of the road coming out of a car park yesterday. I waited for her to reverse back to her side and carried on. These things happen.

I got in an accident cause of this. Didnt know the road well, 2 cars flashed me out and i didnt realise that the traffic flowing to tge right had 2 lanes.

I think it may be illegal to flash people out.

I think this is about you not having confidence to read the road and make decisions when someone offers you a chance to move.

Agree with this.

People who are hesitant and nervous drivers tend to be the ones who cause the accidents. That’s probably an irrelevant comment, but I’m shocked that so many of you get angry at drivers who are trying to be courteous. If they’re stopping to let you in and you feel it’s dangerous just thank them and wave them on, common sense really.

I often wonder too if people that always let people out think of people behind them or if they are just invisible to them.

Do people really get upset being behind a car letting someone out?

It’s a few seconds and you can easily make it up.

There’s a lot of twatty behavior out there when driving. I really don’t think letting people out is a big deal.

It's all about being chill. In some cities, you might not get a break in traffic for the whole of the rush hour. Of course people are going to be considerate and leave gaps.

Flashing, I don't personally do unless on rare occasions where it can't really be misinterpreted

To say thanks, round here we use either left right indicators or hazard lights afterwards

It's no big deal.

I'm totally with you, OP - and I am not a new driver. It just slows things up. Fair enough if you are turning left, otherwise, unless there's a huge lane of static traffic it is just a pain for all the reasons you mention.

the other thing that annoys me is when there are cars parked on my side of the road, I pull in to let the oncoming traffic pass, since it is their right of way, and then the oncoming car will flash me to go. What a fecking waste of their time, mine and the people behind them! Except usually, there is no-one behind them, so it is totally pointless. By the time they've stopped and flashed and I've pulled out, they could have been past and I'd be pulling out anyway.

Again, if it is queuing traffic, I do see the point, of course. But all these people telling themselves they are being 'polite' are actually not reading the road a hell of a lot of the time.

I think if someone shakes their head or doesn't take you up on the offer of allowing them to cross your path or to go in front of you, accept it and drive on. Those people who get pissy and start waving arms about looking annoyed mouthing about you being ungrateful etc are just dicks. You don't know if the person you're flashing can see it's not safe when you haven't yourself (such as bikers or cyclists) or there's in fact a massive gap a couple of cars behind you and you're just holding folk up for no reason.

During your driving lessons were you given lessons on stopping and waving and flashing other drivers through? No, you were not

I also wasn’t taught how to drive in snow or use a drive thru. Not sure I’m understanding the relevance of what you’ve said?

That’s because there’s no relevance at all.

The only time this is reasonable is when there is congestion or slow traffic.

Slowing down to let people turn across traffic is frankly baffling - it's not in the highway code, it goes against the principles governing right if way. If there's someone behind you, it might surprise them, if there's no one behind you, why let someone out in front of you?

Blackcat once is OK. Continual gets a bit annoying. It also depends on what other impact it has.

@BlackCatSleeping Do people really get upset being behind a car letting someone out?

I did on one journey. The woman in front me kept stopping dead in the road to let people out. It was most certainly not a heavily congested city but a normal road through a not very busy small town. Plenty of traffic lights and gaps in traffic. You never waited more than a minute or two for a suitable gap but she stopped for everything including someone who was just wanting to cross the road walking their dog. Through the town we thought "WTF?!" However, the town road opened up into a 60mph A road where she actually came to a complete stop, halting the traffic to let a tractor out. The farmer looked at her like she was mad (she probably was tbh)

I need to turn right to go to work and if no one ever let me go, I would have to sit there for ages. One time no one let me past and I sat there for 10 minutes. Surely it makes more sense for a queue of cars to stop for 10 seconds than one car sitting idle for 10 minutes? Sitting idle is a major cause of emissions in the air so it's actually better for the enviroment for 10-20 cars to stop for seconds than it is for one car to sit waiting to get let out or not at all. It's also more dangerous for a car to be left sat in the middle of the road waiting to turn than it is for a queue of cars in a flow of traffic to stop

Yes it’s fab that you have the same safe driving habits I have.

Some might call it uptight and under confident

This annoys me too! I thought I was the only one.

I simply prefer to make my own judgement about when to go, especially in situations when the generous driver doesn't have full visibility of everything.

I don’t mind if it’s busy traffic. What I do hate is when I car decides to stop and flash me when it’s completely clear behind them. Just carry on and I’ll go in the giant gap behind you. What’s more is that they cause such a delay they often close the gap which is irritating.

In the course of reading more driving threads than is good for my blood pressure, I’ve come to the conclusion that the more experienced the driver, the more tolerant they are on the roads. It seems to be relatively new drivers with not many miles under their belts who get steamed up about obeying the rules to the letter. Those of us who have been driving a long time understand that a lot of driving you see means you roll your eyes and carry on.

Exactly. Your driving lessons and test are designed to (ideally) prevent you from having or causing any basic accidents, but they aren't there to teach you to be a fantastic driver.

They're the equivalent of when you first learn to read - Rosie Red-Hat and Billy Blue-Hat give you a decent basic grounding in word structure and simple language processing rules to get you started, but they don't enable you to understand and appreciate Shakespeare at age 5. In fact, at 5yo, if you're only used to the early readers books, you'd likely look at a page of Shakespeare and declare it "not a proper book - it's all just silly!"

There's a reason why, when a pioneering new complicated surgical operation is being attempted for the first time ever, they don't get a newly-qualified surgeon (with all of the official textbook procedures still fresh in their head) to lead on it, but rather they choose somebody with decades of experience under their belt.

What's that old phrase about the wisest people being the ones who appreciate just how much they don't know....?

Round our way if people didn't let you in at rush hour you'd still be sitting waiting to turn after half an hour!

OP, you are responsible for your own actions. Just because another driver has flashed you does not mean that they are saying that they have checked every possible hazard in each and every direction and that you are totally safe to proceed. That is your responsibility. What they are saying is that they are willing to allow you to move in front/across them, or whatever the layout of the junction is

Exactly?! They’re just trying to be nice. They’re not saying ‘I checked all the lanes and you’re good to go’. That’s your job. If you don’t want to do that or don’t feel confident, just signal no thanks.

It all seems a bit stick-up-arse to me and reminds me of the drivers you see cautiously peering over the steering wheel and bonnet because they don’t really know how to adjust their seat.

Bold fail 🤷‍♀️

I simply prefer to make my own judgement about when to go, especially in situations when the generous driver doesn't have full visibility of everything.

You can still opt to go or not. No amount of judgement will get you out of an otherwise blocked side street.
Lots of under confident drivers on here.
Do you cope being flashed out on the motorway by drivers allowing you to merge into their lane?

I get more annoyed when i flash or indicate or wave to let someone out and they wait there looking gormless:(