To still be upset about this dreadful driver?

[Netcurtainnelly]

Mr net Curtain and I were driving down a country road on Friday and realised we were being tailgated.
I looked round and the driver was featuring us to go faster. We did not as we were already driving to the speed of the road

We just ignored him and carried on. Next thing he or someone behind him starts blasting the horn furiously obviously trying to get us to go faster
We did not eventually the driver turned off

It really unnerved me and made me nervous. I can't believe that people are prepared to cause a crash on a road just because they want you to hurry up.

Has this happened to anyone else? have experienced tailgaters before but never someone blasting their horn etc. So dangerous.

Fair - well, that one is confusing because it is 60 or 70 depending on the road and the problem is that it often appears on roads that shouldn't be more than 30!! So maybe we need to scrap those and invent a new one everyone actually understands.

No, you need to learn your Highway Code.
It's actually different depending on the road and the vehicle you're driving.
That's why they have a single symbol.

It sounds like you want spoon fed so you don’t have to think for yourself.

And in what speed limit…is a question the OP appears to be avoiding answering.

As per my pp’s tailgating is dangerous and not defensible.

That said, I’d also argue that “driving at the speed of the road” (very ambiguous from the OP) could potentially also be dangerous depending on how that sentence is interpreted and acted upon.

I live and drive rurally. If I had someone doing this to me, I would find a place to pull over and let them pass. There are safe passing places, and if it is a rural road, it is unlikely that there would be traffic.

I'd always prefer to have people like that in front of me, rather than behind me. They may have been an idiot,but there may have been an emergency. I prefer to think the best of people, rather than their worst.

I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt as the only time DH ever drove like this, our firstborn child was literally about to crown in the passenger seat, and the driver ahead of us would not speed up or pull over and in fact slowed down. Bit difficult to communicate that it’s an emergency! So if I’m not comfortable driving a bit faster I always pull over as soon as it’s safe so they can go around me.

Yes, that was what I was wondering. It’s quite relevant to her post…

You’re avoiding the question many of us have asked: how fast were you actually going? And what was the speed limit?

If you were tootling along at 30 in a 60, then I’m not surprised that people got frustrated.

I’m not excusing the aggressive behaviour of the drivers, but the fact that you met two drivers who behaved like that suggests you were at fault too.

I do think the NSL sign is a cause of confusion though. Firstly it's inconsistently deployed - not there on say, a reasonable B road, and suddenly there on a tiny back road. But I know that some drivers take it to mean 'I can do 70 and no-one can stop me!' I've heard this expressed.

Apart from other considerations, signs are expensive things to produce and expensive to erect. Years ago I was told a small road sign cost nearly 1K just to put up - labour, partially closing the road etc etc. I often wonder what the point of them is.

Another point - a pp mentioned being hassled by an ignorant driver while she had pulled in to allow a horse to pass. When I learned to drive there was an emphasis on the fact that roads (apart from Mways and some new roads) are for ALL road users: pedestrians, horses, cyclists etc. I've noticed a change in culture about this - a lot of drivers totally disregard the rights of other types of road user.

One of the little country lanes I have to use daily does have walkers and horses on it but you still get the idiots whizzing along and making no concession to horses, for example. I wouldn't like to walk along it myself, even though I feel I should, just to make a point!!

Here's a controversial view, but I think there's truth in it: over the last 30 + years since I passed my test, there's been a huge move to the countryside, or suburb-countryside by people who don't know much about it. They have little understanding of the needs of horses, farm traffic and walkers and make no concessions to the fact that they're driving on what is often little more than a track.

Our roads are very popular with cyclists and even on some long straight roads there are dips that could hide a cyclist. I always drive with the awareness there could be someone fallen off a bike in a dip.

My driving instructor taught me how to drive the lanes at speed safely, slowing into bends and covering the brake while you can't see past the bend then accelerating out once you can.

I've had someone do this to me before and eventually overtook on a blind bend and caused a crash.

Some folks are either unfamiliar with driving on country roads or over confident because they haven't experienced why the road speed limit is set as it is.

It's unsettling but as my dad used to say to me...

Your name isn't Nigel Mansell

And that guy seems to be late for an accident.

Many Scottish roads between towns are still like this even without the move to the countryside from towns.

National speed limit differs on different types of roads.

I think people just think it will never happen to them but it might and they should remember it

Not just for horses and cyclists but they should slow down and take more care for the sake of other drivers that they haven't seen yet around the bend or dip in the hill.

ive seen many many written off cars by young drivers, and also unfortunately some deaths. Young men in particular are a menace on these types of roads.

as for driving the speed limits - I once shouted too fast at someone using my small terraced road as a rat run. The guy shouted back it was a 30 speed limit. On a street which took less than a minute to get from one end to the other, where there were kids, pets, old people and cars parked on both sides. With that kind of attitude, I despair.

as for driving the speed limits - I once shouted too fast at someone using my small terraced road as a rat run. The guy shouted back it was a 30 speed limit. On a street which took less than a minute to get from one end to the other, where there were kids, pets, old people and cars parked on both sides. With that kind of attitude, I despair.

I was hit from behind while stationary at a junction, coming out of a cul-de-sac which was about 200 yards long...at most. The young male driver (in a merc) had whizzed off from his parking space to cover this miniscule distance. He said 'I was only doing 30!'. While not technically illegal, in that context 30 was way, way too fast. Some drivers have no sense, wisdom, judgment etc etc and are a liability.

Similar happened in my parents cul de sac. Driver would not accept he was wrong as he was under the speed limit. Insurance company disagreed!

Or.. just thinking of ways to keep others safe on the road.. but do continue the snarky comments, they're why I come here. It's entertaining af

she said she was going at the speed of the road. If others want to speed, that doesn't make it reasonable to harrass her!

I feel for you. I have a very small car and this happened to me whilst driving on a motorway flyover, a full-sized lorry behind me. It was extremely upsetting, and has dinted my confidence in driving, especially on the motorway.

Lots. And I noticed it particularly moving from Surrey to Norfolk. I just slow down so they can overtake. If they can’t it’s tough. You need to be driving at a speed suitable to the road and weather conditions, that means slowing if you cannot see how sharp a bend will be. Suggest you very obviously film the idiot getting his number plate on record.

Well the road wasn't actually moving was it, so does that mean she was doing 0mph? It seems pretty obvious that if the OP was doing the speed limit then she would have just said that. Instead she's said - twice - that she was 'doing the speed of the road' which is so ambiguous as to be meaningless, and leaves open the possibility that she was going unreasonably slowly. That doesn't excuse tailgating which is the preserve of the imbecile. However living in a touristy rural area that contains a fair few destinations beloved of the Sunday driver, I do understand how annoying it can be when you're stuck behind somebody that clearly doesn't know how how to drive on a road without a white line down the middle, but also point blank refuses to pull over or even just move over enough to allow an overtake.

hmm, you have a point. I guess we don't know what speed she was going. And it can be annoying when someone is going slowly (and I admit to overtaking when it's a lot lower than the safe speed). But agreed that tailgating is not on!

It really doesn’t.

OP might have been an older driver who can drive safely but has slower reaction times. She might have been a new driver or a driver new to UK roads driving with extra caution to match their experience. There are plenty of reasons people with every right to drive on the roads and who are doing so safely might be going under the speed limit.

Trying to hurry people along by driving dangerously behind them is both illegal and antisocial. And if doing so causes them to speed up past their ability and have an accident the tailgater will be a hell of a lot more delayed than they were going a bit slower than they wanted to.

It’s asinine behaviour any way you look at it.

Doesn’t ‘speed of the road’ mean ‘driving to conditions’? You’d go more slowly on the same road if it were driving rain with huge puddles you could aquaplane in, foggy, icy, etc. and beyond that the national speed limit doesn’t mean you can safely drive at max speed on all parts of rural roads.

Completely understand how people driving slowly in rural places they don’t know is frustrating to locals, but you don’t want the tourists driving as fast as locals without the local knowledge of the roads. And riding on their bumpers won’t give them a chance to find a place to pull aside. Aggressive driving helps no one ever.

Reading between the lines, sounds like you were really driving too slow, if not only the car behind you, but then another car behind them catches up behind them, and is angry enough to blast their horn. Sounds like your fault for driving too slowly. If you're driving properly, people behind do not tailgate, and certainly no one behind them joins the queue and then uses their horn. It just doesn't happen. You were probably going too slowly.

Ummm, how on Earth can you "overtake" on a country road, without first doing something that may be perceived as "tailgating". You can't overtake on a country road from a long way behind the car in front.