As a Miami resident off and on for almost 19 years, I can definitely confirm this survey: Miami has the rudest drivers in the country.
Every time I think about this issue, I consider a comment made on M* not too long ago in which a driver was upset about an old guy driving too slow on the Interstate in Utah. The driver was about to pass by the slow old guy and perhaps even give him the finger, and when he got alongside the other car he realized it was Pres. Faust. Oops. That will stop you in your tracks.
My first question: what is the best Gospel-worthy way to deal with road rage? My solution has always been to simply either ignore it and/or apologize when somebody gets upset. Is there a better way?
My second question: SLC is not listed on this survey. Where do we think it would rate in terms of road rage? Are the Saints any better than people in Portland or Denver, for example?
I try to ignore roadrage when it happens. You never know if the other person has a weapon or might be willing to use their vehicle as a weapon (I’ve seen it happen before).
As for SLC drivers, they may not have made the list, but they sure drive like Jesus is their co-pilot and is there to protect them from harm or danger. I prefer Arizona drivers to Utah drivers!
I don’t have advice on the gospel-appropriate way to handle road rage, but I’m reminded of a conference talk where Elder Maxwell said there was no room for road rage on the strait and narrow.
Interestingly enough, my husband and I encountered some road rage just the other day. We got out of this truck’s way and for some reason, that made the people inside it think that they should open the back window and yell at us and flip us off. We then enjoyed the next five minutes discussing how we could have had them hit us and taken the blame and then gotten their insurance to fix our broken trunk.
Firebyrd, it’s amazing how many times I have swerved to avoid a collision with a bad driver in Miami and how many times doing that has gotten me flipped off/screamed at/honked at/yelled at. It happens literally every day in Miami. My wife moved here from Denver four years ago and still is in shock. Sometimes she comes home and you can still see the white on her knuckles.
Are you kidding, Geoff? Have you never been to Boca? I lived there for ten years and even Miami didn’t seem that nutty. Left turns from the right lane, right turns from the left. Ginormous Cadillacs with blind drivers driving straight atop the dotted line…a full 18 mph under the speed limit. Constant screaming with a nasal accent
My favorite South Florida bumper sticker:
When I get old I’m going to move north, and drive slow.
Oy vey!
My experience has always been that traffic gets worse the moment you cross the Dade county line on I-95 and/or the Turnpike. But Boca does have its share of bad drivers. Many of them are older than Pres. Faust. 🙂
My great-uncle (born ~1908) has been complaining about Florida drivers in general since 1989 at the very least (I was eight and he was 80, and he’d been living in Florida for twenty years by then.) He was a taxicab driver on Manhattan for forty odd years, and wouldn’t stop talking about how the Florida authorities let you go ten years without even walking in to the DMV to get a renewal (he thought there should be annual testing for anyone over 60.)
I tend to encounter the scariest driving on transition points: places where there are lots of city people who have to suddenly revert to “flashing red means a four-way stop”, and vice-versa. It amazes me that so many Ohioans have such difficulty with merging, when the freeways are (generally) so well-suited for it: I’ve been near collision far more often out here than I ever was in Los Angeles on the Pasadena Freeway (and there are, or were, stop signs at the end of some of those on-ramps.)
My approach to all aggressive drivers is to go slow and stay out of their way. But then, I’m known for saving my brakes to the point of absurdity: I generally take 400 yards to coast to a smooth stop without even touching my brakes, and I spend more time with my foot on the clutch than anywhere else. My sister usually makes a point of slowing down in the dead center of the lane on her way to turn into our subdivision (thus forcing the person behind to go the 35mph they’re supposed to, instead of the 65mph they want to); we both have an insidious passive aggressive “oh, then I’ll just follow the traffic laws to the letter, then. Naah!” response to angry or impatient drivers.
But I live in semi-rural Ohio, and I don’t drive quite like that when I visit a real city (Columbus doesn’t count.) I have been known to pull over to the side of the road and let crazy drivers get a few miles ahead, though.
My thoughts:
1 – In small town Alaska, where I grew up, there aren’t many roads anyway, and the few we had were two lanes. Drivers were fine. Also, heavy traffic was rare, except during tourist season.
2 – In Utah, I always felt the drivers were just bad drivers in general, but not rude. When I got my Utah Driver’s License, I found out that the written test was open book, so I decided Utah drivers were also ignorant. In Alaska I studied for weeks before taking that test, and I failed it by one question the first time (but passed with flying colors on the retake). In Utah, I just looked up the answers – no actual learning of the rules required.
3 – Here in Texas, though, I get the idea that the other drivers actually hate me (or anyone else on the road). Being as this is Austin, I also see people with Kerry bumper stickers actively going out of their way to harass people with Bush bumper stickers (and vice versa) on the road. I don’t have any bumper stickers, but every driver on the road seems convinced they are the most important car on the road and everyone else is their enemy who must be punished.
I hate driving in Texas.
Whenever I feel like the other person has been driving aggressively and has some irritation directed at me, I typically avoid eye contact as they pass. I pretend to fiddle with the radio dial usually. Personalizing it only escalates it.
But then again, I’ve never been in a single fight my entire life. So maybe it’s easier for me to avoid these kind of things.
One thing I would note though. Road rage cuts both ways. It isn’t just the guy aggressively weaving through traffic and tailgating.
It’s also that self-righteous blowhard who deliberately blocks a lane and tries to force his fellow human beings to “obey the law” as he sees it. That’s road rage too, ladies and gentlemen. Same angry attitude. Pay attention. If someone is pulling up fast behind you, GET OUT OF THE WAY. Everyone sharing your section of road will be much safer if you simply allow the gal with the lead foot to be on her way.
Do everything you can to facilitate the speed that your fellow motorists are going, no matter what speed that might be. It’s just safer to avoid the frustrated tailgating scenario altogether.
It also helps if you pay attention to the flow of traffic so you can actually notice that there’s a small hatchback about four car lengths back making multiple lane changes and headed your way.
I got yelled at a lot by people in St. George the last two days. A lot of exasperated disgusted looks. Nobody flipped me off. But it was my fault every time. Well, my depth perception is bad and I didn’t mean to run into that thing at the bank. Gee whiz, lady, have a little compassion. She looked quite Mormon-y, too.
I realize how little old people feel when people just speed around them and they are sort of lost and clueless.
All I yelled was “I’m sorry” over and over. I realized I sort of had an intimate relationship with these drivers because I felt true remorse, but couldn’t express it.
Been from Miami, I know exactly what this article means. I saw this survey a time ago, and I agree that Miami deserves this award. Especially to those with Pick-Up trucks ( No ofense to anyone ! ) but they always like to fight!