Is it you driving in the middle lane of the motorway or outside lane on a dual carriage way?

[muchalover]

Nobody is a perfect driver, including me.

But, why do people drive in the middle lane when they could easily pull in and stop the chaos they are causing behind them? Or pull in instead of driving in the outside lane of a dual carriageway when there is a large gap. On the M25 much of seems to be a fancy dual carriageway with 3 empty inside lanes. Why?

It's like advertising you're a crap driver and not willing to pay attention.

Or am I being unreasonable?

Oh my fucking god. You should not be allowed to drive

@Flickersy , by all over the place I mean random sections of roads. Signs saying 20 on one side and 30 on the other side of the same road. If implementing new rules at least make them make sense .

The A3 is utter hell for this. The junctions are all close together and those idiots in the middle lane make exiting a nightmare.

I also fail to understand why people won’t drive at the speed limit of safe to do so. Utter idiots doing 35 on a Sunday morning creating havoc.

Well as a “welsh twonk” as you so succinctly put it - I can’t wait for the 20mph zone to be imposed in restricted areas. It might actually slow all the tourist twats down driving though our town at a steady 40mph and ignoring the zebra crossings that my children regularly cross. Just that 10mph reduction could save lives. Bring it on I say!

A lot of the time you can sit in the left lane at 70/75 and pass those in the outer lanes who are sat there holding up the traffic. I tend to drive faster so end up in the outer lanes but move left as soon as I'm able to do so, often past many drivers in the middle lanes driving slowly!

@icallitasplodge explained perfectly!
this was my predicament coming back from Birmingham airport Friday !!!!absolute pain ! X

YANBU......Drives me fucking crazy!!!

Because you are in the way of those in the left lane wanting to overtake and in the way of those in the right lane wanting to move to the left. Learn to drive 🙄

Yes I find that quite often, especially at night. I’ll be driving a steady 70/75 in lane 1 going faster than the hoggers in lanes 2/3

So I should sit behind someone doing 50 or 60 in a long queue of traffic because someone cannot drive properly and pull into the empty inside lane? Which is exactly why people undertake.

I've got things to do, people to see, places to go, appointments to keep. No time for shillyshallying.

I try to drive properly but sometimes I feel I pay for it. I think the slowest I came up behind someone on the m25 the other day was under 40mph in the left lane. When people are doing such idiot things it’s hard to compensate at times if congestion or bends block the a view of the road ahead. Lane changing becomes nutty because of the idiots.

Also after the dartford tunnel the sheer wall of lorries means moving left is horrible for miles and miles. Some of them love to keep cruise control on and go up 2 feet behind cars, even if the car has nowhere to go. If you tapped the brakes at all you’d be a sandwich. The M25 at times does effectively have 1 or 2 lorry lanes at certain times of the day. If you get in them they will close the stopping distance to feet behind you.

I think I stayed right the whole time down the A12 the other days as it was flowing at 60 ish for no reason at all. Both lanes fairly equal. I do think people in general are driving slower.

Hopefully you will soon be caught and prosecuted

With luck you will be soon caught, prosecuted and, with luck, have your license suspended.

But no driver should be in a position to be undertaken. If you can be undertaken in free flowing traffic then you are in the wrong lane.

I’ve just had to pass a part 2 driving test to become an instructor, so I know exactly what the test requirements are and how motorway driving should be done.

To those saying you don’t need to get past a car and just slow down, the person doing 50-60mph in perfect conditions should be speeding up. Had I done this on the beautiful summer day that I passed my test I’d have failed, and I’d have failed had I not demonstrated that I was capable of going up to the speed limit of 70. Had my Lane approach been to stick in the middle no matter what it’d be a definite fail.

I understand why people do it, there’s a lot of nerves about motorways but you have to question why someone is on a motorway if their confidence and skills aren’t up to it. If that’s you, then consider going to your local driving instructor to brush up your skills, your observations (because I also think people aren’t changing lanes enough because they aren’t watching the road enough) and your confidence.

This will only get worse as more and more E-cars are used, people will cruise along at 55 to optimise their range, and will avoid speeding up or slowing down for the same reason.

I no longer drive in the middle lane since a young man jumped off a bridge in front of me.

Everytime im on a motorway someone is hogging the middle lane . When passing they all seem to have hands welded to the steering wheel with an intense straight ahead stare . Wonder if it's lack of confidence.

So it's OK for you to drive badly because you don't have time for "shilly-shallying"....?

Just wow!
how do you not notice your speed has decreased!
dangerous

Middle lane driving drives me mad! Then there are the ones that insist in staying in the outside lane, even when the other lanes are free. It makes driving so much more difficult.

How did these people ever pass their tests? I was taught [ many moons ago ] that you keep to the inside lane unless overtaking. You then go back to the inside lane. Nothing difficult about it . People just seem to make up their own rules now.

Come to the NE m25 one day in rush hour. You’ll see people managing to under take across all 4 lanes, weaving along all lanes in very heavy traffic that most people would consider nearly bumper to bumper. I do think part of it is also a reaction to the mad behaviour on the roads. Lorries tail gating scare people over, people who move left as you move right, without indicating or looking and going 80+. Lorries who box people for shits and giggles. People who do under 40. People who speed match any over takers.
I’m not a nervous driver, but I can see how a nervous driver might react to some of the madness. They perceive it as safer in the middle. I don’t agree with it, but to some extent it’s a product of the rest of it

This is absolute rubbish - what you're saying is that every other driver sitting in the middle lane is doing the exact same constant speed as you so you never have to move or change speed or overtake? BS. You're slowing down and speeding up and overtaking as much as anyone else because the middle lane is full of inept drivers like you who have the same attitude and refuse to drive properly. Or maybe you decline to ever overtake in which case you're sitting in a line of bad drivers and ignoring an empty lane to your left a lot of the time.

The left lane is the default. Other lanes are overtaking lanes. If you're not overtaking, MOVE TO THE LEFT.

The problem here is HGVs. It often isn’t safe to drive in the first two lanes where I am as the HGV drivers are rubbish and routinely don’t bother checking before changing lanes. It’s often much safer for you as a car driver to get out onto the outside lane as quickly as possible.

I created my mn username for a thread like this and it became obvious after 20 pages or so that the difference in responses is based on where people tend to do their motorway driving.

I'm used to driving on motorways where there are a lot of trucks and it would be ridiculous to keep zipping in and out, especially considering the inner lane is normally 10-20mph slower than the middle due to the trucks. So the middle lane is full of normal, reasonable drivers who do just sit there most of the time, but with the flow of traffic.

But I think some people drive on roads where that's less of an issue so most of the people in the middle lane are genuinely lane hogging and slowing down traffic.