WTF Semi drivers?!

[Imprezive]

I know I'm not the only one that gets pissed off about this.

Scenario: You are driving on I-5 a 4 lane partitioned freeway, heading South towards Los Angeles, California. You are in the fast lane traveling at a pretty good clip (approx. 75-80mph). Traffic is moderate, and there are several cars in front of you. Suddenly everyone is braking, and you all slow down to about 55-60mph. "WTF?" you think, as you begin to wonder what is going on in front that has made you slow down so abruptly.

After about 10 minutes traffic speeds up and you discover that not one, or two, but THREE FREAKING SEMI'S all decided they just HAD to pass one specific Semi truck that, although they were all breaking the speed limit of 55mph, was probably only going about 1mph slower.

What the hell? Why? Over a long distance 1mph could possibly add up to what like 10 or 15 minutes of driving??? Stop holding up traffic you assholes! I'm sick of getting stuck behind you while you take 10 minutes to pass one another!!!!

[quicklook]

75-80 mph is way to fast for that stretch of highway.

you should slow down a bit.

[corsair]

despite the rant, which we all can probably relate to, that method of semi passing is what breeds the animosity between 4 wheelers and those 18 wheeled behemoths...

I remember a time when I was cruising at 5 over and passing a column of semis going up a grade in the Allegheny Mountains of West PA and all of a sudden a truck no less than a car length ahead of me in the right lane cuts me off to try to pass going up the grade... he was going like 55 to my 70 and I wasn't the only car passing at the time. You think for professional drivers they'd show some professionalism and make smart decisions, but that's why they're driving trucks and we're sitting here ranting about them.

[n2x4]

You think for professional drivers they'd show some professionalism and make smart decisions, but that's why they're driving trucks and we're sitting here ranting about them.

You got it!

[joeWM]

75-80 mph is way to fast for that stretch of highway.

you should slow down a bit.

haha 75-80MPH to fast on I-5? thats nothin man ppl mobb ass on I-5

[quicklook]

does not make it right or safe.

if everyone else went out and bought honda civics does that mean it is ok to do so?

(adapted from my father's jumping off the bridge speech when i was 16)

[corsair]

I just went out and bought a Honda Civic

[Imprezive]

I go 80mph in the twisties...

80 is nothin, its the new 65mph. I-5 is mostly straight and is always divided, so unless you are falling asleep or staring at your radio for long periods of time its hard to lose control.

I'd have no problem going 70-ish, but then you get passed by all the ppl doing 90mph, and you catch up to the guys doing 55-60 in the slow lane way too fast and have to constantly weave through the lanes to keep your speed at 70ish.

The thing that amazes me most is what corsair mentioned, when the trucks pull right in front of you with no concern, they hardly even turn their blinkers on before beginning the lane change.

I think they are made because most of them are fat slobs who have no home and their only friends are other fat slobby truck drivers who they talk to on the radio.

[beatersubi]

Being a diesel tech and having dealt directly with truck drivers for longer than I care to have, I can say, with a great deal of certainty, that truck drivers are truck drivers for a reason. And it ain't their personal hygiene or people skills.

The other day, on my way home, a dumb mother trucker cut me off, in the fast lane on I5, doing about 65mph to get around a truck in the next lane who was going slower. Its my personal opinion that the main cause of this mayhem is that our driver training is given in whichever language the potential driver speaks, but the roadsigns are only in english. The obvious solution then, is to make all the roadsigns in every language in which the driver training handbooks are written.
Or to simply require that commercial drivers UNDERSTAND AND SPEAK ENGLISH, our national language and the one in which the roadsigns are written.
But, of course, that would be insensitive to the (illegal) immigrants, and present and unfair challange to those simply trying to eek out a modest living here.

I swear, the liberals are intentionally making it harder to be a patriot.

[/rant]

[James614]

Roadsigns don't say anything about not cutting off cars next to you to pass someone at 2mph faster than their going. That, should actually be covered in their driver training, and since it's given in their native language apparently there's no damn excuse for them to do it!!!

I'm on the road all the time for work, and yeah, I see this crap ALL THE TIME!

You have to be careful too. I've had a truck pull into the left lane with no signal, as I was passing him. It wasn't a big deal to me, there was plenty of shoulder for me to get right out of the way, but a soccer mom in a van full of screaming kids may not have noticed him in time. Meanwhile I get hammered with my first ticket in 2 years because I apparently committed the most horrid of all crimes, I made a right turn on red even though there's a No Turn on Red sign!. My ass belongs in jail, I could've killed someone.

[evolutionmovement]

I do that all the time. They put up a bullshit no turn on red where it had previously been OK (and even before that, there were no lights at the intersection at all) right by my house. If you can't be trusted to make the kind of judgement required to determine when it's safe to take a right on red then you have no business being trusted driving at all, but that's government for you.

In Detroit they allow left turns on red and even straight through red "if you feel threatened", whatever that means (it means you're white so you can get away with more shit). The official reason was that a study showed that people wasted x amount of time and gas and polluted n amount every year sitting unnecessarily at lights (the city has amazingly low traffic). I think the actual reason (like why they also repealed mandatory insurance) was that nobody obeyed the law anyway so changing it to match majority (or at least large minority) behavior gave the cops one less thing to get yelled at for not enforcing, but the sensible argument works as well.