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kastein
Aug 31, 2011

Moderator at http://www.ridgelineownersclub.com/forums/and soon to be mod of AI. MAKE AI GREAT AGAIN. Motronic for VP.
So remember that minivan with the schoolbus roof sign I mentioned that was doing 55 in the left lane while everyone tried to pass on the right because speed of traffic is normally 80?

Yeah, saw them again, except weaving back and forth in the lane and randomly tapping the brakes. Passed on the right... looked over... old woman driving it and talking on the cellphone at the same time. Kinda tempted to take pictures and send them to the company she works for.

e: apparently I never made that post. Basically, a white minivan with a fold-down SCHOOLBUS sign on the roof, in the left lane, doing 55, while talking on the cellphone. I see this idiot driving on i95 regularly and they are ALWAYS doing 55 in the left lane and jamming traffic up. The cellphone may be a new thing, though.

kastein fucked around with this message at 16:06 on Jan 29, 2014

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Jonny Nox
Apr 26, 2008




gileadexile posted:

Saw/juuuuust avoided a hellacious accident this morning while driving the work van.



Apparently the driver of the black car is pregnant, passes out. Hits the city scraper, which jerks out of the lane enough to hit the white SUV and spun it all the way around, into my lane and halfway up that rock wall. My coworker assisted while I gave protective oversight. It was a pucker inducing experience.

The worst almost accident I had was when I was being passed by a guy hauling a boat through one of the worst March storms I've ever driven in (lots of wind and rapidly dropping temperatures combined with thick draughts of blown snow) when an explorer came flying out of the center ditch and hit him, sending the whole works into my lane.

Brake, evade, say prayer of thanks for Bosch ABS + EBA, and made sure that no one was hurt, get the guy from the truck into my car out of the wind until the cops arive, etc.

On the drive home I finaly notice the coffee on my instrument cluster. Then the engine oil on my windscreen from the truck's drivetrain coming apart. He came within literal incehs of hitting me.

InitialDave
Jun 14, 2007

I Want To Believe.

Das Volk posted:

The British press have perfected the art of masturbating to turning the slightest, victimless infraction into a catastrophe only equalled by the Bay of Pigs or the Eastern Front.
Yes.

VideoTapir posted:

British drivers aren't trained for nor are their roads designed for those speeds; and their following distance was way too close regardless. Risk is a cost, and those you put at risk without their consent are victims.
In general, this is true, the issue I always take is that the police are somehow magically infused with the ability to drive fast safely, and that it is simply impossible for anyone not in uniform to do so.

rscott
Dec 10, 2009
They do have high speed training and flashy lights that say, "get the gently caress out of my way idiot", I think that makes a tiny difference.

Galler
Jan 28, 2008


To an extent. The lights and siren are frighteningly ineffective. A ton of people are so completely oblivious that the squad/ambulance/fire truck will be a block past them before they notice it and so many people react in a completely unpredictable fashion (usually dangerously wrong) when they do notice them that it can be easier to just not use them at all.

Also I went through one of the longest police academies in the US and spent a grand total of 2 weeks on driving. Of that time maybe a quarter of it had anything to do with driving fast and at best only about a quarter of that was spent actually driving. The rest of the time was waiting in line or doing push ups because someone did something dumb.

Anyone that's gone to any kind of race school has more training in driving fast than the vast majority of police officers. The police do, however, have more training in driving in stressful situations surrounded by retards.

InitialDave
Jun 14, 2007

I Want To Believe.

rscott posted:

They do have high speed training and flashy lights that say, "get the gently caress out of my way idiot", I think that makes a tiny difference.
So if I undergo the same training and drive on a deserted road (no need for blues and twos if there's no-one around), it should be impossible for me to be accused of driving dangerously? Unlikely.

I don't mind that the police have allowances to break the speed limit, it's necessary sometimes, and nor do I mind that this permission will not be extended to the general public, as there is no reasonable justification for them to need it. What I do mind is that the police's magic training means they're "safe" at high speed, but that anyone not in the police, regardless of whether they have received the same training, is not.

It's pretty much what Galler said.

Kia Soul Enthusias
May 9, 2004

zoom-zoom
Toilet Rascal

Galler posted:

To an extent. The lights and siren are frighteningly ineffective. A ton of people are so completely oblivious that the squad/ambulance/fire truck will be a block past them before they notice it and so many people react in a completely unpredictable fashion (usually dangerously wrong) when they do notice them that it can be easier to just not use them at all.

Also I went through one of the longest police academies in the US and spent a grand total of 2 weeks on driving. Of that time maybe a quarter of it had anything to do with driving fast and at best only about a quarter of that was spent actually driving. The rest of the time was waiting in line or doing push ups because someone did something dumb.

Anyone that's gone to any kind of race school has more training in driving fast than the vast majority of police officers. The police do, however, have more training in driving in stressful situations surrounded by retards.

I used to work behind a California Highway Patrol station / training center and they'd set up an autocross like course and spend quite a while practicing on those. Don't know about high speed maneuvers though.

Bugdrvr
Mar 7, 2003

The CHP bike guys all seem to be pretty good riders from what I've observed. I guess all of the bad ones aren't going to around for long though.

Galler
Jan 28, 2008


Police motorcycle positions are extremely competitive and the training is dramatically better. Patrol officers get the bulk of their training up front and then get some updates every now and then (frequency and quality depending on the department of course). Specialized positions after that tend to have a lot of highly focused training and anyone that doesn't cut it gets booted back to patrol and someone else gets their spot.

Kia Soul Enthusias
May 9, 2004

zoom-zoom
Toilet Rascal
It was actually the Crown Vics that I saw practicing. There might have been bikes too, but I don't remember.

8ender
Sep 24, 2003

clown is watching you sleep
I got to ride in a crown Vic during police chase training at the Ontario police college. They have a professional driver (the crook) in a Matrix S and he fuckin made a mockery of our trainee. They have a wicked old airstrip to train on like the top gear track.

Kill-9
Aug 2, 2004

You've got the cutest little baby face...
More examples of driving expertise from our friends in Alabama.

Donks on Ice. The newest extravaganza from the Ice Capades!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=luH1eBDJ4Dw

KozmoNaut
Apr 23, 2008

Happiness is a warm
Turbo Plasma Rifle


Do you have any idea how hard it is to get 30" low-profile winter tires?

Nidhg00670000
Mar 26, 2010

We're in the pipe, five by five.
Grimey Drawer

InitialDave posted:

In general, this is true, the issue I always take is that the police are somehow magically infused with the ability to drive fast safely, and that it is simply impossible for anyone not in uniform to do so.

In a British study, 123 of 501 accidents where found to have happened during pursuits.

The time actually spent at high speeds is negligible, even for the police. Most accidents happen during regular patrols, not car chases, which would indicate that better driving training overall would be of the most benefit, not pursuit or high speed training.

In a Swedish study the police where found at fault in 57% of multi vehicle accidents they where involved in, which would also indicate that they could use some more good old regular practice.

You can see this same reasoning when it comes to cops and guns btw. "Well I'm a cop, ofc I know how to use this" *magdumps into apartment building instead of firing a single shot with his MP5* (actual thing that happened in Sweden).

The Midniter
Jul 9, 2001

Galler posted:

Police motorcycle positions are extremely competitive and the training is dramatically better. Patrol officers get the bulk of their training up front and then get some updates every now and then (frequency and quality depending on the department of course). Specialized positions after that tend to have a lot of highly focused training and anyone that doesn't cut it gets booted back to patrol and someone else gets their spot.

I've seen regular patrol cars and bicycle cops in Charlotte, but never regular motorcycle cops. However, what I have seen on occasion around town are cops riding on enduro bikes mostly off-road. They've got some sweet livery on them. That's gotta be a cool fuckin' gig.

PT6A
Jan 5, 2006

Public school teachers are callous dictators who won't lift a finger to stop children from peeing in my plane

Nidhg00670000 posted:

In a British study, 123 of 501 accidents where found to have happened during pursuits.

Pursuits would only be a small fraction of high-speed driving, I would imagine. The much larger part would be responding to calls, especially if you have a large patrol area, I would think.

On the other hand, my friend, who's an RCMP officer, nearly put my Mustang into the ditch because he took a corner too fast, so I'm guessing they could use better high-speed driving training. I just assumed he wouldn't be a complete retard at high speed driving, but boy was I wrong!

Toymachine
Jul 2, 2007

Warning - Posts created under the influence of Codeine and/or Skittles

The Midniter posted:

I've seen regular patrol cars and bicycle cops in Charlotte, but never regular motorcycle cops.

Same. The only times I see motorcycle cops in NYC is during a cop funeral or a random pair of police motorcycles parked outside some restaurant that 50+ year old higher up cops took there on a sunny day.

InitialDave
Jun 14, 2007

I Want To Believe.

PT6A posted:

Pursuits would only be a small fraction of high-speed driving, I would imagine. The much larger part would be "familiarising yourself with a new vehicle", especially if you get caught.

Nidhg00670000
Mar 26, 2010

We're in the pipe, five by five.
Grimey Drawer
Reading up a bit, two older Norwegian studies (Froyland, 1983; Fosser, 1986) show that (Norwegian) police vehicles had a 2,5 times higher risk of accident in ordinary day to day driving than other traffic.

IOwnCalculus
Apr 2, 2003





Nidhg00670000 posted:

Reading up a bit, two older Norwegian studies (Froyland, 1983; Fosser, 1986) show that (Norwegian) police vehicles had a 2,5 times higher risk of accident in ordinary day to day driving than other traffic.

This seems like something that could be the result of a poorly controlled study. Police, even when not in a pursuit, are on the road far more than the rest of us, and spend more time on the side of the road than most of us (insert joke about your favorite target automaker here).

Phantasium
Dec 27, 2012

My commute is 4 minutes. 4.



This happened to me today. Some jackass in a lovely van decided to make an illegal u-turn following the red line during rush hour while I'm the yellow. Fairly standard road douchebaggery that I'm not typically used to, but then he had the gall to try and get into the lane I was in which caused me to have to push over into the far right lane (which I was going to do anyway). Cue honking and flipping of the bird, he can go gently caress himself.

Bonus points! That's not even a turn lane, if you were to just turn left there where the car is, you'd be going down a highway offramp. It would take 2 minutes tops to go past that intersection to get to a place where you could turn around (the DMV, hilariously enough). There was nothing about this that made sense!

Disgruntled Bovine
Jul 5, 2010

Phantasium posted:

My commute is 4 minutes. 4.



This happened to me today. Some jackass in a lovely van decided to make an illegal u-turn following the red line during rush hour while I'm the yellow. Fairly standard road douchebaggery that I'm not typically used to, but then he had the gall to try and get into the lane I was in which caused me to have to push over into the far right lane (which I was going to do anyway). Cue honking and flipping of the bird, he can go gently caress himself.

Bonus points! That's not even a turn lane, if you were to just turn left there where the car is, you'd be going down a highway offramp. It would take 2 minutes tops to go past that intersection to get to a place where you could turn around (the DMV, hilariously enough). There was nothing about this that made sense!

Sure there is. It would take 2 minutes.

nsaP
May 4, 2004

alright?
If it took two minutes he'd probably be late for work.

TrueChaos
Nov 14, 2006




8ender posted:

I got to ride in a crown Vic during police chase training at the Ontario police college. They have a professional driver (the crook) in a Matrix S and he fuckin made a mockery of our trainee. They have a wicked old airstrip to train on like the top gear track.

Picton? St. Lac hosts autox events there, and there's also usually a 2 day regional event there every year. It's such a great spot for it, 3rd gear slaloms at 120km/h :getin:

8ender
Sep 24, 2003

clown is watching you sleep

TrueChaos posted:

Picton? St. Lac hosts autox events there, and there's also usually a 2 day regional event there every year. It's such a great spot for it, 3rd gear slaloms at 120km/h :getin:

Aylmer Police College. They can pick up some wicked speed on it. It felt like the door sills were going to scrape the ground in the Vic I was in. They have it setup with fake intersections and streetlights as well.

8ender fucked around with this message at 04:54 on Jan 31, 2014

bigman.50grand
Mar 31, 2007
no
This is more of a "people you share street parking with".

A silver Toyota parked behind me yesterday and apparently wasn't impressed with my unmolested bumper. Fellow was kind enough to not only leave a nice crack in it when he drove off this AM, but a big smear of silver paint was left as a new aesthetic "feature" to my car. Lucky for me, Toyota driver didn't leave a note and left the scene of an accident... Imagine my surprise when I returned home to find that our paint-swapping friend had parked near the same spot, only now with a few streaks of Honda's finest vintage of 2003 "Desert Mist" adorning his front clip.

Thought about leaving a note, but this rear end in a top hat wasn't going to leave his info this morning so I doubt I'd get it now. Must have missed the whole California Vehicular Code 20002 "Hit & Run" thing in the drivers test? Have fun with a that misdemeanor and State issued fine, fucko.

kastein
Aug 31, 2011

Moderator at http://www.ridgelineownersclub.com/forums/and soon to be mod of AI. MAKE AI GREAT AGAIN. Motronic for VP.
Some joker with RI plates was on the mass pike tonight... doing anywhere from 50 to 95mph. No joke, they would surge forward and do 95 for a minute or two, then forget the throttle existed and slow back down to 50. All while sitting in the left lane.

I thought they were keeping an eye out for speed traps at first but quickly realized the speeds they were doing had no bearing on where speedtraps are, because they blasted by a few normal spots at 85+ and crawled through safe areas.

Phy
Jun 27, 2008



Fun Shoe

kastein posted:

Some joker with RI plates was on the mass pike tonight... doing anywhere from 50 to 95mph. No joke, they would surge forward and do 95 for a minute or two, then forget the throttle existed and slow back down to 50. All while sitting in the left lane.

I thought they were keeping an eye out for speed traps at first but quickly realized the speeds they were doing had no bearing on where speedtraps are, because they blasted by a few normal spots at 85+ and crawled through safe areas.

Drive without rhythm and you won't attract the worm

BabyMauler
Sep 19, 2005
RI drivers are the loving worst. They have no concept of life and just drive everywhere in this bubble of I'M RIGHT gently caress YOU, or they look so terrified hunched over the wheel going 35 on RT24.

But this week I have come to two observations:

1) the type of person that buys a white base model 14' Corolla (Because for some reason they don't have "I Gave Up On Life Beige") should not have access to LED headlamps. My retinas say gently caress your high beams. I could deal with high halogens, not these.

2) Passing people in newer Civics with the big LED spedo right on the dash, staring right the gently caress at them. Motherfucker I can see your going 42 in a 60 and I'm in the next lane. What the gently caress is wrong with you! As they just toodle along with a train of stupid behind them.

TrueChaos
Nov 14, 2006




8ender posted:

Aylmer Police College. They can pick up some wicked speed on it. It felt like the door sills were going to scrape the ground in the Vic I was in. They have it setup with fake intersections and streetlights as well.



Ahh nice. OPP uses Picton as well, and they spray paint their cone markers in place. Use chalk like the rest of us, you idiots!

mungtor
May 3, 2005

Yeah, I hate me too.
Nap Ghost

kastein posted:

RI plates

There's your problem right there. I'm surprised the entire state of Rhode Island isn't one apocalyptic burning traffic jam.

Post here when your 128/MassPike rage gets to this level and I'll work from home that day.

davebo
Nov 15, 2006

Parallel lines do meet, but they do it incognito
College Slice

It's hard to tell from that gif but did that beetle somehow manage to be the only car to just scoot over and land on all fours? That's pretty respectable.

Ror
Oct 21, 2010

😸Everything's 🗞️ purrfect!💯🤟


davebo posted:

It's hard to tell from that gif but did that beetle somehow manage to be the only car to just scoot over and land on all fours? That's pretty respectable.

Yeah, the Beetle did great. You can watch the high-speed footage here and they have a couple other angles.

xzzy
Mar 5, 2009

Ror posted:

Yeah, the Beetle did great. You can watch the high-speed footage here and they have a couple other angles.

Depends on how they get hit. :science:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FROL6QhTnKo

KozmoNaut
Apr 23, 2008

Happiness is a warm
Turbo Plasma Rifle



The beetle is by far not the most disturbing car in that video.

That poor 2CV :gonk:

TrueChaos
Nov 14, 2006




It just kind of... ceases to exist.

Friar Zucchini
Aug 6, 2010

In that first shot I thought the green car was totally hosed, mostly since (ahem) it was the last one in the line.

...It wasn't. The truck still ran into it, rather than pushing another car into it. :gonk:

TATPants
Mar 28, 2011

davebo posted:

It's hard to tell from that gif but did that beetle somehow manage to be the only car to just scoot over and land on all fours? That's pretty respectable.

It was one of the last two cars to get hit, so it had much less energy imparted to it. The front tires are pointed away from the impact, which probably helped as well.

InitialDave
Jun 14, 2007

I Want To Believe.
More to the point, it's rear-engined, so it's not as easy to kick the rear end up in the air as the other vehicles. If it were the other way round, I think it is likely it would have also flipped.

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randomidiot
May 12, 2006

by Fluffdaddy

(and can't post for 11 years!)

These are the drunks you share the road with.

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