To expect people to know how to drive on motorways even on Sundays?

[gogohmm]

Sitting on one now, seriously annoying (I'm not driving!) why are Tesla owners sitting in the middle carriageway when there's very few cars in the left hand carriageway? 45 miles per hour is not the speed limit, it's 70! Ditto other electric cars why?

I travel quite a lot, and Sunday drivers are the worst. You can have quite a few dangerous situations because of their lack of experience, fear, lacking observation etc.

One of the problems though with motorways is you don't drive on them till after you pass UNLESS your Instructor is authorised to escort their Learner pupils onto motorways

They are a completely different driving environment to A Roads and B Roads

It's difficult to get about without going on a motorway in some areas . So someone going from a learner to new driver , going onto the motorway , possibly with a more experienced driver and P plates ..... they are fodder for the lions

Certain stretches of the M25 where the inside lane is just bumper to bumper HGVs are a nightmare. If you pull out to overtake they won't let you back in. They won't let you in to access an exit lane. They monopolise the first 2 lanes by constantly pulling in and out to overtake each other with almost no warning to other users of lane 2. I don't blame some motorists taking up residence in lane 3 tbh. And as a regular user if the M25, the chances of anyone travelling at 70 are fairly slim.

It was an eye opener reading some previous MN threads where it became clear that some drivers pick the lane they think matches their speed and then stay in it .

On lots of the M25 the inside lane regularly turns into an exit lane for the next junction so people that know the road tend not to use it unless they want that junction as you can get trapped by lorries in lane 2 and not able to continue on the motorway. Tbf the system works quite well for those who know the road and are not caught up by their lane splitting off.

You can receive a fixed penalty for middle lane hogging.

I've also noticed this a lot recently. I must look deranged as I'm shouting thinking in my car 'fucking move over!'
I've also noticed that in a 70, people like driving at 50, in a 50 people drive at 40, in a 30 people drive at 15/20. Does my head in but I guess it's because I travel a lot at the moment so maybe I just notice it more.

There is currently little to no training on how to drive on a motorway and so I think many people just don’t understand the rules. There should be a motorway element to driving tests. Also, sadly, too many people in the roads who should not be driving at all!

One of the reasons we got rid of the car was because driving means interacting with everyone else who is driving and people are a bit annoying. I am pretty keen on our future with fully autonomous vehicles.

If you want to drive a car, you have to accept that everyone else will also be driving a car on the same roads. You can't control how they drive, there is no enforcement these days (thank you to the Tory government and those who vote Tory for all the police cuts), so this is how it is.

I've said this for years.

So overtake on the right hand side. Not worth seething over. And I've never seen a car do 45 where there's a 70 speed limit, are you sure you haven't missed a sign for 40/50 mph?

For my first (unplanned) drive on a motorway I was driving for a good 10 minutes in the second to left lane of 4. I kept looking over thinking the empty left lane looked like a proper lane but assumed everyone must know something I didn't. Eventually we caught up with someone driving in it and I knew it was ok to move over. I still have no idea why it wasn't being used. It was completely empty.

As a regular user of the M62 I find the variable speed sections frustrating due to other drivers who slam their brakes on at virtually every gantry - even when they are already travelling at 70mph. I saw a minor accident last week in a resulting traffic wave ( www.vox.com/2014/11/24/7276027/traffic-jam ) which of course causes more delays.

Sunday drivers can be identified by the hunched over death grip of the steering wheel, as their bad driving results from lack of confidence. Sunday drivers are terrified of changing lanes, so get to the middle lane and then don’t change until their exit, regardless of traffic conditions. Regular weekday middle lane hoggers are just lazy or distracted, haven’t looked in their mirrors since they last reversed their vehicle, and have no concept of courtesy to other road users.

In days gone by it used to be a box of tissues and/or a cushion or hat on the parcel shelf that gave away a Sunday driver.

When I passed my test ( far too many years ago to count … I’m 47) my driving instructor spent a lot of time taking me on the motorway and making sure I knew how to drive on them. Don’t they do this anymore ?

Pass plus lessons are still an option but obviously incur a cost. Most people I see in the middle lane are waaay past the new driver stage anyway.