Date: Sat, 12 Sep 1998 12:47:28 GMT From: joshuanopsamess.net (Joshua Landess) Subject: Re: Tailgating is Evil
On Wed, 9 Sep 1998 18:56:04 +0200, "Edmund Blackadder" <israelssonnopsamnet.se> wrote: >So next time it happends, slowly push the brake pedal with your LEFT = foot >until you hear a little "click". Now you=B4re brakelights are on, and = the >tailgating driver should get the message. If it doesn=B4t work, try to = give >him/her a flash with the warning lights. >/Fredrik >-75 96V4 And you're right. I guess I just let it get to me sometimes. None of the more acrimonious responses of some of the others seemed to address my point in any kind of way. =20 I have never, for example, hung out in the left lane and failed to get out of the way of an oncoming vehicle, so long as I had a safe opportunity to move right. And generally I am good about keeping right, though there is often little prescription for this, as I travel a bit faster than most other vehicles. There are a couple of problems. First, in heavier traffic, if I am moving the flow of traffic (say, at 75 mph), I often leave a decent bit of space between myself and the car ahead, so as to allow for stopping distance if something should go wrong (so far as I can see, the amount of space that I leave is not some outrageous out-of-place amount). On many occassions, tg driven vehicles will deliberately interpret this as failing to keep up. =20 =46ailing to keep up is a separate matter, however, as I easily equal the speed of the vehicle in front of me. Since the more aggressive tailgaters can't conceive of leaving a reasonable stopping distance, they'd prefer to think that my driving, or the driving of the many like-minded individuals I see, amounts to traveling too slow, and they make it clear to us that, so long as we insist on a safe stopping distance, they'll be looking for a pretext to claim we're holding them back. To some extent this is moot, as I notice this behaviour less and less often. Perhaps the local cops have cracked down. And, while all this left-hand-lane discussion is part of the matter, there is still the matter of the tailgater-in-general. But you're probably right.... a simple assertion on my part that I'll not put up with it is probably the best thing. JL
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