planetgeli
There's no future in England's dreaming
Oh c'mon. Interesting your post ends with the word 'practical' when your suggestion is about the least practical idea there could be.
Driving Standards
- Thread starter hash tag
- Start date
Oh c'mon. Interesting your post ends with the word 'practical' when your suggestion is about the least practical idea there could be.
mojo pixy
interesting times
What's impractical about it? I don't see that, but I can't say I've exactly planned it out. I do know almost nobody will agree, especially drivers 
But is that what impractical means, Nobody would agree so it can't work. I'm not convinced that consensus is necessarily the best way to make laws, where road safety is concerned.
But is that what impractical means, Nobody would agree so it can't work. I'm not convinced that consensus is necessarily the best way to make laws, where road safety is concerned.
Saul Goodman
It's all good, man
I think that's a bit OTT. Not least because every street in England would need a test centre on it in order to achieve this.
existentialist
Tired and unemotional
I've often thought that would be a good thing for all drivers. In my Utopian paradise, drivers would be encouraged to develop their skills with training, IAM-style observed runs, etc, along with regular tests. People who didn't want to do training could carry on driving, but with various restrictions on what they could drive, etc. People who did might enjoy discounts on insurance, I dunno, reduced road tax, etc.
It's a bit weird, when you think about it. We take people through a very basic training and not very many hours of driving, all with an instructor, then we get them to take a test and say "off you go." It's a bit like finishing medical school and suddenly finding yourself in an operating theatre doing surgery. Pass Plus is a nice idea, but I think it should be integrated into a general "driver skills improvement" approach, with a combination of mandatory and voluntary aspects to it.
I'd probably ban fewer people, too. Sure, for deliberate (subject to the differences in what some of us consider "deliberate") offending, like drink driving, a ban's perfectly in order. But I don't like the "totting up" ban - it seems unhelpful to address someone's routinely substandard driving by depriving them of the opportunity TO drive. I reckon a totting up ban should involve a regular attendance at naughty driver school, where you're trained and tested to show you've improved. And if you haven't, then out with the banhammer.
mojo pixy
interesting times
Not every street, come on. A lot more, yes, but not millions.
EtA, it'd also create loads of jobs, staffing the centres and running the tests etc, so win-win really.
Last edited:
bimble
floofy
As it is now there was over a month to wait every time I had to book a driving test, because they're that busy. I don't think regular tests for the whole driving population is the answer. But tighten it up so you know that you risk losing your car if you do one big mistake seems reasonable.
existentialist
Tired and unemotional
I suspect that a significant chunk of the 45 million active driving licences in the UK would cease to be active not very long after the test regime began...
I'm in sums mode. Let's say (worst case) 45 million drivers. Let's be generous, and suggest testing every 10 years. So that's 4.5 million drivers per year.
In 2016/7, nearly 1.75m driving tests were conducted (incidentally with a pass rate of a bit over 47%). So yeah, you'd need to quadruple the existing provision to account for it. But is that such a terrible thing? In any case, as autonomous vehicles become more of a reality, self-driving is likely to become something of a niche activity, so you might quickly find that you were 10 year testing drivers at not very different a rate than we're currently testing new ones.
Saul Goodman
It's all good, man
People who sit in the outside lane of a motorway and force others to undertake them. They're worse than Hitler and should be banned without any warning.
weltweit
Well-Known Member
When someone comes past you on the inside (left hand side) on the motorway.
bimble
floofy
What is so bad about that that you include in the list of really bad dangerous things?
weltweit
Well-Known Member
Other drivers don't expect people to whizz up the inside and if they move to the left at the same time it can cause a nasty accident.
It is because it isn't allowed in the UK that it is dangerous, in America you can over or undertake, it makes no odds, but at least there you are expecting it.
planetgeli
There's no future in England's dreaming
Undertaking IS allowed in the UK if the traffic on the lane to the right is slow moving or stationary.
However, it might be considered careless driving in certain circumstances. It’s dangerous because, even when undertaking a middle lane hogger, they have already proved themselves to be a shit driver so might also not indicate to move back into the left lane.
However, it might be considered careless driving in certain circumstances. It’s dangerous because, even when undertaking a middle lane hogger, they have already proved themselves to be a shit driver so might also not indicate to move back into the left lane.
mauvais
on reddit or something
It's important to the free & safe flow of traffic that people return to the left when not overtaking. Once you start passing on the left you actively prevent that from happening and become part of the problem. Plus as others have said, safety relies on expectation and this is not expected.
weltweit
Well-Known Member
I don't agree with you. I have been stuck in a queue in the fast lane, waiting for someone driving slowly at the front to move over and people have come past on the left seeing if they could make a move and queue barge. They couldn't they just had to wait like the rest of us.
mauvais
on reddit or something
You won't like this, but if you were stuck in a queue waiting to overtake then you weren't overtaking anything and should have stayed left. There is a balance to strike but ultimately when everyone decides to do the same, everyone has to end up in the rightmost lane and the other lanes are entirely empty except for the two vehicles at the front, which is obviously wrong.
Also there's no such thing as the fast lane, but that's a greater degree of pedantry.
weltweit
Well-Known Member
That is a cop out, I had to wait for the cars in front to move over and so should the vehicle behind me who was themselves staying in the outside lane up until it found itself behind the small queue when it thought it could undertake.
It can be frustrating when all three lanes are blocked, even if they are progressing at a reasonable rate, but that does not permit attempted undertaking.
mauvais
on reddit or something
Moving to the left to pass is a different and significantly worse thing to staying in lane and passing traffic once it slows.
Dense queues - high speed or otherwise - aren't really what I mean though.
planetgeli
There's no future in England's dreaming
It's for overtaking.
bimble
floofy
Yeah but the rules say, be in the left lane, unless you’re overtaking, then get back in the left.
This should be in the learning to drive thread shouldn’t it .
planetgeli
There's no future in England's dreaming
Yeah but the rules say, be in the left lane, unless you’re overtaking, then get back in the left.
This should be in the learning to drive thread shouldn’t it .
If someone is overtaking in the middle lane, and you wish to overtake both them and the inside lane, that's what the right hand lane is for. Then you move back to the left.
Also ; Audis
planetgeli
There's no future in England's dreaming
You'll soon get used to driving at 70mph.
You do know lorries are largely restricted to 60mph? And all aren't allowed in the right hand lane? So if you get a lorry doing 58 in the inner lane, and a lorry overtaking that one at 60mph in the middle lane, and taking about 3 miles to do so, you'll soon find yourself in the right hand lane.
existentialist
Tired and unemotional
Ideally, the 2nd and 3rd lanes are both lanes in which we should temporarily find ourselves only when overtaking vehicles in the lanes to the left of us. In practice, that doesn't happen a lot. But it should.
Saul Goodman
It's all good, man
Once you start driving on the motorways, even at legal speeds, you will understand why there are three lanes.
Similar threads
