The new Menace.

[DrFfybes]

Recently we've been doing a lot more lileage around the country, ferrying between Devon, Shrewsbury, and Saddleworth to visit mum. About 600 miles per week on a variety of m/ways and A/B roads and different urban areas. A few things have come to light....

In the South West, drivers are far more distancing than elsewhere, possibly doe to less traffic, but they do seem to keep some sort of distance. As you approach Bristol people do seem incapable of realising they're doing 70 rather than 40 but generally until you hit the M6 north of Brum cars tend to space out pretty well.

Van drivers still drive like [expletive deleted] on A-roads, completely ingnorant or ignoring of their speed limit or any potential hazards, top tip is that if I can' just stop a Z4M in the distance I can see it is unlikely the Transporter 3 feet off my boot could do the same.

However there seems to be a New Menace. For years the motorway tailgater has been sales rep in their Audi/BMW/etc, however this seems to have changed. The new categoruy seems to be 30-ish females in Mockroaders - Evoques, VW Troc, Qashcow, etc. Regardless of the conditions or speed these drivers will insert themselves into gaps you didn't even know existed, quite happy to follow 8 feet away on a pouring motorway, then dart across a couple of lanes to go around or under the car in front before darting over the chevrons for the exit or slamming on their brakes for the 50 limit camera that everyone else had lifted off for 500 yards previously.

Is this happening elsewhere, and is it a result of the higher driving position skewing perspective?

Paul

[Mike4]

Recently we've been doing a lot more lileage around the country, ferrying between Devon, Shrewsbury, and Saddleworth to visit mum. About 600 miles per week on a variety of m/ways and A/B roads and different urban areas. A few things have come to light....

In the South West, drivers are far more distancing than elsewhere, possibly doe to less traffic, but they do seem to keep some sort of distance. As you approach Bristol people do seem incapable of realising they're doing 70 rather than 40 but generally until you hit the M6 north of Brum cars tend to space out pretty well.

Van drivers still drive like [expletive deleted] on A-roads, completely ingnorant or ignoring of their speed limit or any potential hazards, top tip is that if I can' just stop a Z4M in the distance I can see it is unlikely the Transporter 3 feet off my boot could do the same.

However there seems to be a New Menace. For years the motorway tailgater has been sales rep in their Audi/BMW/etc, however this seems to have changed. The new categoruy seems to be 30-ish females in Mockroaders - Evoques, VW Troc, Qashcow, etc. Regardless of the conditions or speed these drivers will insert themselves into gaps you didn't even know existed, quite happy to follow 8 feet away on a pouring motorway, then dart across a couple of lanes to go around or under the car in front before darting over the chevrons for the exit or slamming on their brakes for the 50 limit camera that everyone else had lifted off for 500 yards previously.

Is this happening elsewhere, and is it a result of the higher driving position skewing perspective?

Paul

I do a lot of miles up and down the M4 and have noticed the same, although I'd put them at mostly around 40 than 30, these females in mockroaders (great term) who can't socially distance on a motorway. They also tend to randomly slow to 50-ish and hog the middle lane for a few miles every so often as they take their incoming calls I notice, as I pass them again having previously moved over from hogging the fast lane myself to let them go by.

My van is a Mercedes though, not a VW, so pleased your comments exclude me

[richlist]

If anyone tailgates me I just slow down. No point getting annoyed with them cos that won't change anything.......slow down, upset them some more and let them pass and get on with their day. It works best on A & B roads and tailgaters normally back away. I find it's nearly always BMW drivers.......what is it about BMWs that change a person as soon as they get behind that wheel ?

[Mike4]

If anyone tailgates me I just slow down. No point getting annoyed with them cos that won't change anything.......slow down, upset them some more and let them pass and get on with their day. It works best on A & B roads and tailgaters normally back away. I find it's nearly always BMW drivers.......what is it about BMWs that change a person as soon as they get behind that wheel ?

I'm not so sure they do change. I think the type of person who drives like this tends to behave like this in all aspects of life, and happens to be drawn to BMW cars as a brand they like to drive.

[Mike4]

If anyone tailgates me I just slow down

An old Motley Fool tip that seems to work is to use your windscreen washers. Often the tailgating car backs off when it's windscreen gets sprayed with your washer fluid.

Seconded. I picked that tip up too and it often works a treat!

[1nvest]

With the 20 m.p.h around town limits now, more often being tailgated by cyclists looking to overtake. Painfully slow if adhered to, and difficult to comply in a automatic without continually having your brake lights on.

[Mike4]

With the 20 m.p.h around town limits now, more often being tailgated by cyclists looking to overtake. Painfully slow if adhered to, and difficult to comply in a automatic without continually having your brake lights on.

There's something wrong with the adjustment on your automatic gearbox then. I reckon mine slows down to barely walking pace if I take my foot off the loud pedal.

I'll try it later and report back!

[Watis]

With the 20 m.p.h around town limits now, more often being tailgated by cyclists looking to overtake. Painfully slow if adhered to, and difficult to comply in a automatic without continually having your brake lights on.

There's something wrong with the adjustment on your automatic gearbox then. I reckon mine slows down to barely walking pace if I take my foot off the loud pedal.

I'll try it later and report back!

Promise me you won't try this in the middle lane of the M25 . . .

Watis

[Mike4]

With the 20 m.p.h around town limits now, more often being tailgated by cyclists looking to overtake. Painfully slow if adhered to, and difficult to comply in a automatic without continually having your brake lights on.

There's something wrong with the adjustment on your automatic gearbox then. I reckon mine slows down to barely walking pace if I take my foot off the loud pedal.

I'll try it later and report back!

Promise me you won't try this in the middle lane of the M25 . . .

Watis

Lol, the middle of four lanes?? !

[1nvest]

With the 20 m.p.h around town limits now, more often being tailgated by cyclists looking to overtake. Painfully slow if adhered to, and difficult to comply in a automatic without continually having your brake lights on.

There's something wrong with the adjustment on your automatic gearbox then. I reckon mine slows down to barely walking pace if I take my foot off the loud pedal.

I'll try it later and report back!

When new it used to sort of brake itself - but near 10 years old now and around 5 years ago it stopped doing that, so yes likely something 'wrong'. Due for renewal but with Covid just haven't around to even consider that yet.

[airbus330]

In my 7 years of commuting from the South West to Manchester the most aggressive driver award has always gone to Range Rover drivers. On my 225 mile M4 M5 M6 route the only place that seems to have unusually erratic driving standards is Birmingham, shocking lane chopping, undertaking, in fact just general mayhem! I think the BMW thing is overdone, I have not observed much difference from Audi and Merc drivers. I drive fairly quickly and if I observe someone approaching me in the mirror, I assume they are plod, so always get out the way and let them on their way. I like having people that drive faster than me around, it keeps the eyes of the law on them, not me!

[stevensfo]

If anyone tailgates me I just slow down. No point getting annoyed with them cos that won't change anything.......slow down, upset them some more and let them pass and get on with their day. It works best on A & B roads and tailgaters normally back away. I find it's nearly always BMW drivers.......what is it about BMWs that change a person as soon as they get behind that wheel ?

Many years ago, my Dad showed me a trick he used on tailgaters. He used to very lightly press the brake for a second so the brake lights came on and made the other person slow down, but accelerate at the same time, leaving a very frustrated tailgater far behind.

Possibly due to years of being a passenger in his car when I was young and experiencing his Starsky & Hutch style of driving, I'm the complete opposite, tend to drive well within the limit, respect distances and am very happy to stay behind a large truck and listen to my audiobooks, comedy shows etc. I can't see the point of getting stressed over an extra 10 minutes journey time. If I get a tailgater, I try and let them overtake asap.

Steve

[Mike4]

If I get a tailgater, I try and let them overtake asap.
Steve

Me too. I can never understand why not, but few complainers about tailgaters seem to like to do this.

Some tailgaters don't realise they are doing it and even if you slow down at a safe point for them to overtake, they don't. When I get a tailgater I'll often slow right down and indicate left. If they still don't pass I'll actually stop which forces them to.

Same with police cars. If I get one following me I'll indicate left and stop if safe to do so, so they don't get a chance to watch my driving and nick me for some minor infringement. I had one copper actually stop too and ask me why I'd stopped. He was put right off his script when I explained as a young lad with long hair in a fast car I was often being stopped, so when I saw him pull out to follow me, I stopped for him. Lol!

[dealtn]

...and am very happy to stay behind a large truck and listen to my audiobooks, comedy shows etc.

I prefer to have an unimpeded view of what's ahead of me than the back of another (large) vehicle.

[bungeejumper]

I agree with Mike4 that a lot of tailgaters simply don't realise they are doing it. It's just become a habit to them to hassle and hustle the car in front, and they don't mean it particularly aggressively. Which is no consolation to anybody, really.

France has long been a haunt for young women driving small cars at reckless speeds in town. (The old "Papa/Nicole" Clio ads seemed to have been adopted as an aspirational behaviour on the other side of the Channel.) But at least the French know that they'll get hammered by the law if they get caught using a mobile phone at the wheel. Not so in our area, where I've lost count of the times I've seen young women nattering away happily on their handsets while within two yards of my rear bumper. Not even room to brake so as to let them get past me.

Speaking of which, I have a vague recollection that it's an offence to brake ostentatiously in an attempt to scare off a tailgater. You don't get much sympathy from your insurance company either if a shunt should result. So by all means touch the brakes, but remember to floor it at the same time. The elderly drivers I see in automatics around here appear to have no problems with pushing both pedals at once.

I draw the line at giving way to a police car, though, unless it's on blues and twos. Suspicious behaviour, as my son in law (a chief inspector) informs me. Highly likely to be drunk.

BJ

[marronier]

Many years ago , I was discussing motoring with an older guy and grumbling about tailgaters and he said he drove close because he was told that if you have an impact ,your injuries will be lesser. He couldn't understand that if you kept a distance then you might not have an impact in the first place.

Most people don't realise that by keeping close to the vehicle in front ,this induces a greater disparity between forward vision and peripheral vision resulting in a state of hypnosis with open eyes. This increases the chance of a collision if the vehicle ahead brakes suddenly before you can wake up.

[Mike4]

I draw the line at giving way to a police car, though, unless it's on blues and twos. Suspicious behaviour, as my son in law (a chief inspector) informs me. Highly likely to be drunk.

Would that be a problem then, if one is not drunk? Was that not always the reason I was stopped (for no apparent reason to me at the time)?

As a teenager I'd say I used to get stopped several times a week hence the development of my policy at the time of stopping the instant I saw a copper. My parents used to get quite outraged at the frequency of roadside stops on teenagers around Addlestone. The only time I was ever challenged was the instance I described above.

But I think you're right, he took it as suspicious behaviour as the exact question he opened with was "OK so why did you stop here then son? There was no reason to stop." instead of "Is this your car sir?" When I explained why, he muttered something like well we like to check out scruffy youngsters in scruffy cars, kicked my front offside tyre and said "get those replaced", then without another word turned around, got back on his motorbike and rode off. I still think he quietly understood my point!

[Arborbridge]

I draw the line at giving way to a police car, though, unless it's on blues and twos. Suspicious behaviour, as my son in law (a chief inspector) informs me. Highly likely to be drunk.

BJ

I was stopped once picking my wife up from her office Christmas booze-up. I was adhering to the 30mph limit with the window open, which apparently was highly suspicious behaviour - enough to conclude I must have been drinking, which I hadn't been at all! For the life of me, I cannot remember why I had the window open, but that probably sealed my fate.

They apologised and let me pass on, being a white middle aged, middle class geezer. If I'd been black and young, I can't wondering if it would have been a different ending. Which reminds me, I've been guilty of not stopping when flashed by police to do so - but driving on for a half a mile until I found some where I considered it safe enough to do so. Glad I wasn't black then: it might have been a handcuff job.

With regard to aggressive drivers, the ones that take the biscuit are undoubtedly young women in small cars, followed by slightly older ones in giant cars who always seem to have left the house too late to adhere to the speed limits.

And as I get older, especially now after lockdown, it seems to me that practically everyone is going speed mad. Almost everyone seems to resent the fact that I drive to the speed limits and express their opinion by tailgating. By obeying the speed limits, it seems I have officially grown up, or perhaps become what the majority would call an old dodderer.

Arb.

[bungeejumper]

When I explained why, he muttered something like well we like to check out scruffy youngsters in scruffy cars, kicked my front offside tyre and said "get those replaced", then without another word turned around, got back on his motorbike and rode off. I still think he quietly understood my point!

I think policemen all over the world will take the opportunity to check out an old car once they've stopped it. At the one extreme, of course, they might find housebreaking equipment or drugs; at the other, they might spot a duff seatbelt or a rusty floor or a knackered tyre that might shorten your life. So I don't really take exception to their curiosity.

That's easy for me to say now that I drive 'respectable' cars, but it was also true in my yoof when my mates and I used to scratch around Norf Lunnon on ancient motorbikes (and in cars) that were frankly pretty ropey. (It cost more money than we had to keep them properly maintained.) It was always a pain being told by plod to go and get this or that fixed, and then to turn up at the police station later with the faults fixed, but we took it in the spirit in which it was generally intended.

In short, it was more Dixon of Dock Green than Mean Streets Sector 42 City Patrol. And I am perfectly sure that if I'd been a young black male who was being stopped for the nineteenth time I wouldn't see it in the same way. The police have a difficult line to walk, and I suppose the best way I can help is by not doing unexpected things that make their lives more complicated. If they're behind me, I'll drive on normally and they can wait. They'll let me know if they're not happy with that.

BJ

[stevensfo]

...and am very happy to stay behind a large truck and listen to my audiobooks, comedy shows etc.

I prefer to have an unimpeded view of what's ahead of me than the back of another (large) vehicle.

My earlier post said that I 'respect distances.'

I have been in a few accidents due to cars going too fast, too close, not looking etc. Never a large truck.

Actually I feel safer. It's like being in snow and having a bloody great snow plough in front of me.

Steve