7mo ago

Even in the slowest lane

143 comments

Trick is to not give a fuck about how fast other people are going, and cruise at 65mph (105km/h) at a safe distance behind a combination tractor trailer.
You can drive without much stress, because impatient drivers don't like to be in that spot behind a truck so you are less likely to be cut off. You'll have plenty of time to react to anything in front, and also be safe in knowing that if there is a pileup ahead, a clear path will be smashed through for you.
- Fuel efficiency will even be better in the slip stream.
  
  Unfortunately, to get the benefit of the slip steam, you gotta be pretty close to the back of the truck. If you have space for good reaction time, you're probably too far back
- Yeah, be at least far enough back be able to see the truck's side mirrors. 'Can't speak for all truck drivers of course, but when I'm driving a big vehicle I actually like that someone "has my back" like this. It's much nicer to have someone trailing me at a safe distance than to have an impatient driver trying to speed me up by traveling too close.
- Thank you for being mindful of the passing lane and staying behind another slow moving vehicle if you are going to travel slower than the flow of traffic.
  
  You are most welcome.
  There is only one bone I have to pick with people who make "slower traffic keep right", "the left lane is for passing", and "the flow of traffic" type of comments. That is in the case of a commercial vehicle travelling 65mph passing another travelling 63mph. This is a perfectly valid use of the passing lanes on a highway, unless signs or local rules indicate otherwise (e.g. no trucks this lane). In this case, 65mph is the flow of traffic in that area and everyone behind should be aware that they are travelling faster than the flow of traffic until the pass has completed.
- Also, following a truck will increase your mpg.
  And not because of the lower air pressure zone behind the truck; you have to get dangerously close for that.
  Truckers spend a fuck ton on fuel, so they have a huge vested interest in driving efficiency. My highway mpg rating is 27mpg, but I got 38mpg on an hour drive by chilling a safe distance behind a semi. It only added like 5 minutes tops to my trip.
  
  Exactly. Similar to how others responded to a similar comment to yours, there isn't much slipstream savings without getting into the danger zone of around 30m (100ft), which you can't get with 3 second gaps at speed.
  But you do get more fuel savings from driving at that slower speed, and from coasting and accelerating lightly/cruising. It perplexes me why people alternate gunning it with braking so much on the highway.
  
  Agreed, provided you're not driving very far.
  I go on several hundred mile trips almost every year (usually ~800mi), and going 10mph over the limit saves over an hour and can be the difference between making it in one day and having to get a hotel.
  So I'll hang out behind semis on shorter trips (<200 miles) and speed ahead on longer trips. It costs more in gas, but I make up for it in other costs.
- Yep. Like having an NFL running back in front of a high school player running the ball. And with adaptive cruise control, easier than ever these days
- Another benefit to driving the speed limit is that, on average, you are less likely to encounter a driver going slower than you in your lane, vs if you were driving faster. So you end up not changing lanes as often

Poor guy has blue pee

I mean as long as you're not sitting in the left lane people should leave you alone
- the only time you should be going the speed limit anywhere to the left of the furthest right lane is if you're passing someone who's going below the speed limit in the rightmost lane
  
  Exactly.
  Keep Right Except To Pass.
  40 states have “Keep Right” laws. Many of them have “must yield” laws that require slower traffic to move to the right lane if faster traffic approaches from behind. A few states have exceptions where you can use the middle lane temporarily in areas where there is a lot of merging traffic.
  There are a shocking number of people that cruise in the center lane slower than prevailing traffic. I don’t get that at all.
  
  ...the only time you should be travelling at any speed to the left of the furthest right lane is if you're passing someone driving more slowly...
- We all know these people live in the far left lane.
- It’s always the truck drivers, range rovers, bmws that are in the left lane going slow af

Here we're taught to go with the flow of traffic. It's safer to go the same speed as everyone else than to be the one car everyone has to go around.
- Where is ‘here’?
  
  Anywhere with sensible traffic schools. Accidents are almost always caused by drivers going 10mph faster or slower than the rest of traffic. Being the odd man out in this criteria is dumber than ignoring some numbers on a sign that everyone else is ignoring.
  EDIT: Since it's become apparent it needs stated for those of you who missed that week of Driver's Ed, and didn't read the manual; One: I merely quoted the manual; Two: it is INDEED the job of EVERY driver, regardless of their position relative to specific other drivers, to take any actions neccessary to avoid or mitigate an accident in the making. Idiots like you are the reason No Fault states exist.
- Here we are taught to follow traffic laws. Of course it doesn't make sense to do that to ridiculous degree but speeding because others are speeding is not something encouraged here. Flow of traffic makes sense if everyone is slowing down, then it's probably hazardous weather or something.
- Yeah nah. Any faster than 100 km/h is already way too fast. I still don't get how people are more comfortable going over it.
  
  What? On the highway the limit is 110km/h in some places here (divided highway) and it's pretty standard for everyone to be going 5-10km over the limit.

I like to imagine he's actively filtering pee out of the water by sucking it in through his ass and peeing out the filtered water.
- Pee is stored in the balls and filtered in the ass.

"Having a smoking section on a plane is like having a pissing section in a pool"
- People don’t realize that the idea behind that whole campaign was to get people to start ostracizing smokers, and also make the smokers feel ostracized, so that less people would smoke overall. And it worked!
  
  Maybe we should do the same for public pools.
- Bro, if you don't like it, just get out of the pissing corner!
  
  Yeah.. next thing you know you'll only be allowed to piss outside on the pool deck

Look at this loser! He drank a bunch of water and peed in the lemonade pool!

I'm from the UK and this isn't too much of an issue beyond the couple of usual idiots. Went to the US though and it was insane, we were getting overtaken by school busses going 95. We were at the speed limit and getting overtaken by almost everything.
- It's true. Cities set speed limits with the expectation that the average driver will be driving 5-10 over.
- You taking 95 mph or kph? Because a bus going 60 mph in a 55 is pretty normal.
  
  UK is MPH
- Every time I go on a road trip here in he US, it strikes me how everybody seems to want to drive the same speed regardless of the speed limit.
  Go 65mph in a 55 and I’m one of the slowest cars on the road.
  Go 75-77 in a 70 and I’m one of the fastest cars.
- ...when the speed limit's 85 it's pretty normal for traffic to move at 95; rule of thumb is less than ten over on highways and less than five over on surface streets...

in some cities such as LA, i found it safest to simply drive at the same speed as everyone else. obviously adjust for merging, passenger lanes etc but on those roads being the slowest can actually a danger to yourself and others.
glad i don't need to do this any more in my current city, just two cents
- They teach you in driver's education that you should match speed on the highway. Otherwise you impede the flow of traffic which causes far more problems.
- This is exactly what you should be doing. Matching speed with traffic is always the safest option. If you're going slower than everyone else, you're creating a hazard, almost as much as if you're weaving through traffic.
- Yup. If it gets too out of hand, they'll do a traffic break to slow everyone down. But going a significantly different speed than everyone else is something you try to avoid.

I tried, for a while, to obey the speed limits and my wife told me "Don't you see? You're risking everyone else by driving that slow!". She was right, but WTF?

Pff, whatever. If I've got a right hand lane to sit in and let people pass I'll do 10km/h under the limit (90 instead of 100) and save a non-trivial amount of fuel.
The cost-benefit on that shifts a bit if I need to make a longer trip, but for my usual drives in the 100-200km range that's an extra 7-15 minutes on a 1 to 2 hour trip, which barely matters.
- Time is far more valuable to me than gas. I have no problem with people staying in the right lane though you can drive as slow as you want there. The people who are the problem are the ones who want to get in the middle/left lanes and turn their brain off that's what causes traffic to back up. IMO police should enforce proper lane usage rather than speed. This would also stop traffic caused by everyone bunching up when they encounter a cop on the highway because they're scared to pass him.
  
  It's gotten worse the past few years. Everyone acts like entitled asshats. Middle lane under the speed limit, hammer lane going the same speed as the idiot in the middle lane. Most states it's illegal to pass on the right so you either break the law or you get to follow someone that thinks they're more important than you.
- It's crazy when you see people speed and overtake like maniacs just to see that they reached the gas station 20 seconds before you do. I really think it hurts some people's ego when they have to drive behind someone. "But but, i'm the king of the road..."
  
  If I'm not behind you I don't have to worry about you kicking up rocks onto my car, waiting for you to get off your cell phone at the light, I don't have to slow down because you can't handle taking a turn at the posted speed, ect. Yeah, I'll be the guy in front using my gas for enjoyment and open road. If I cared about fuel economy, I'd drive a prius.
  
  I just like to go zoom :(
  That said, I slow down to overtake other cars, or around other cars in general.

Problem I have is I’m always going faster than the slow lane, so I get over to pass and of course I’m not going fast enough for those lunatics (don’t worry, I don’t block them, I get back over as soon as it’s safe). Half the time I end up giving up and going slower than I want too just because it’s easier.
- The worst. Two lane roads always seem to end up as 5 under or 10 over. I just want to put my cruise control on!
- ...nothing at all wrong with passing slowly as long as you merge right afterward: lanes don't have speeds, vehicles do...

Not only that, a cop will probably pull you over for driving too normal.
- I know a guy who was straight up pulled over for drunk driving because he was going the speed limit. Cop said that only drunk drivers go the speed limit on that stretch of highway at night.
  
  I've heard this from cops I knew, as a more general rule; No one around here drives less than five over unless they are drunk, stoned, or into some shady shit.

Not sure if i care, i reach home in one piece and more fuel in the tank.
- What is safer though? Driving the same speed as the cars around you or have all cars passing you at a higher speed? My guess is the former.
  
  How high is your higher? If 20kmph/30kmph it's not that much different, if a lot of you people is 60kmph over the speed limit and you expect everyone to follow, you guys should really consider slowing down as a whole. If you rear-ended people driving 120kmph, then i must say, skill issue, you're probably not driving as safe as you thought you are.
  No wonder the toxicity toward bicycle commuter.

Also like wearing a mask in public

What limit? (said a German)
- Tbf, this kind of eases the peer pressure. If everybody's going as fast as they want, I can drive my comfy 110 km/h... Because that's as fast as I want.
  
  True. I prefer around 100 too most of the time. Though i also sometimes enjoy to pump it to 300. But it's rarely possible. And beyond that i wouldn't see happen considering how clogged it always is and how often slowpokes live in the leftmost lane and refuse to use the rear-mirror...

The speed limit is what's enforced here you are totally fine going 10km over the speed limit only excepion is school zones
- 6.2 miles over huh?
  
  Anything less than 5mph over the cops consider suspicious where I live. 6.2 mph over is slow-lane, but at least reasonable.

But when there’s only one lane on a mountain road and someone is going slow because they are scared of the mountains or scared of a tunnel for some reason…. Like dude pull over and let people pass
- Or go take a driver's training class so you're not afraid to operate a vehicle in its ordinary manner.
  
  As someone who lives somewhere flat, driving in the mountains is different due to the amount if focus and control I have to put into making sure I'm always in the lane. Going from a slightly curve every 2 miles to a sharp winding bend every 0.1 miles is a huge difference!

Blue piss

It’s really not about you .

Or talking to "conservatives".

The sticker on my battle car

...nothing wrong with driving as slowly as you want, as long as you keep right except to pass...

Look at it as practice in creative ways to change lanes

Get a motorcycle, fuck speed limits
- HELL YEAH BROTHER!
  
  thanks for your organs

Watch me drive slower than everyone else pressuring them into overtaking me thus increasing the chances of a collision because the government put up a sign that said so.
You're barely even saving any fuel. Maintaining speed uses much less fuel than getting up to speed, and depending on the gearing and aerodynamics of the car it may even be more efficient to cruise above whatever the speed limit happens to be. You're probably costing all the people who have to overtake you a bit of extra fuel, though.
Go the common speed as long as it's within the realm of reason. This is day 1 of driver's ed, people.
- Tell me how “the aerodynamics of the car” somehow just invalidate the drag equation that clearly states that drag increases proportional to the square of the velocity. Going 160km/h rather than 130km/h increases fuel consumption by about 30%. That’s what you actually learn in driver’s ed.
  Regarding “depending on the gearing” – do you realize how significant the overlap between the gears is? You don’t need to drive 10km/h faster to get into the next gear.
  
  Gearing of transmission and torque or the motor.
  
  You can drive a brick, and if you're in a line of traffic moving faster, your aerodynamics are much different than sitting in the slow lane with nobody in front of you. Drafting is real.
- The only thing pressuring them to overtake someone going the speed limit is their own stupidity. It's not my responsibility to ensure other people aren't going to kill themselves because they're irresponsible idiots
- My car gets its best fuel economy at 51mph.
  
  How much is it in liberty units?
  
  My car follows the laws of physics and gets best mileage at its lowest speed, with a tail wind. Yours would too if it weren't for the type of engine it has having a power level below which it can't operate efficiently.
  I suspect mine is also more efficient than yours at 51mph
- You are the worst, please don't drive.
  And if that was the lesson you got on day 1 of your drivers education, go ahead and shoot your driving teacher, before he can spreas more nonsense. This might save a few lifes.
  
  It makes sense when merging onto a highway.
  If it's busy and everyone else is zooming by, merging at a slower speed is dangerous. Speed up, match the flow (even if speeding), merge, then you can ease off to whatever speed you want. This is what I was tought in drivers' ed, and it makes sense.
  Once you're on the highway though, yeah, it doesn't apply anymore.

143 comments