Comments on: Road hog that doesn’t want to be overtaken

By: B

Wed, 23 Jan 2008 17:14:26 +0000

This has happened to me many times in the past. It is not the duty nor the business of the driver being passed to enforce their own petty rules of the road. The car passing has the right of way once the opposite carriageway is clear. In Ireland the rule to give way to traffic from the right has been discarded. Now it is assumed that you can push anyone across any amount of traffic to get your own way.

By: Blanco

Blanco — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 02:23:08 +0000

Barnie,

Why don't you have a look at the rules of the road book,page 56? You might see this little gem "DO NOT ACCELERATE WHEN YOU ARE BEING OVERTAKEN."
There's also a mention of aggressive driving / road rage in the book.
Overtaking a car isn't necessarily dangerous. It is though when the selfish, pigheaded gobshite accelerates and puts all their lives at risk. With people like that, and people like you defending such bad behaviour it’s no wonder there are so many road deaths in Donegal.

By: John Smith

John Smith — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 01:11:32 +0000

This seems to become more commonplace these days. Little "Road Safety Warriors" on the prowl. The driver dawdling ahead of you at 80 km/h thinks "Oh, what a scary speed this is". Others on the other hand would like to get past him and travel at the completely appropriate, safe and legal speed of 100 km/h. But the person in front thinks his estimate of what a safe speed should be has to be more important than what the speed limit actually is. So he will do his best to keep anyone behind him. Therefore he speeds up, moves out, flashes and everything else to make overtaking as difficult and dangerous as possible. He thinks he's protecting people from themselves.
Best Case: whether you get past or not, both drivers will be stressed, angry and even more aggressive.
Worst Case: Both cars in the ditch, with possible injuries or even fatalities.
Bottom line: Killing yourself and others to prove a minor point.
If someone wants to overtake me (and it does happen and I'm not slow), I move left and slow down.
Result: The person overtakes and I continue at my own speed. I'd rather have him as far away from me as possible, rather than sitting 3 inches from my tail end the next 10 miles.

By: Niall O'K

Niall O'K — Mon, 21 Jan 2008 19:47:25 +0000

Barnie, when someone is being overtaken, it is common sense (and, I believe, a rule of the road) that they do NOT accelerate - as doing so would make it difficult and potentially dangerous for the person overtaking to complete the manoeuvre.

The point that fordrsfan is making is perfectly valid, although if, as you say, it was a very dangerous stretch of road, (- and if visibility was poor and/or there wasn't enough space/straight road, etc. -) it's certainly debatable whether overtaking was a sensible idea there in the first place.

Without some sort of visual evidence, however, all we have is fordrsfan's word for it that it was him who was in the right here.

By: Barnie Moore

Barnie Moore — Mon, 21 Jan 2008 15:43:18 +0000

Talk about the pot calling the kettle … !

You really should be aware that although you might have been travelling faster than the car in front, and thus gaining distance, the vehicle in front may have accelerating and at a rate greater than you.

Lose two points, and return to your home position.

As you should know, this is a very dangerous stretch of road with a number of fatalities over recent years. Eejits attempting to overtake carelessly/recklessly won’t make it any safer.