Stop the Maryland Unsafe Driver

Posts Tagged ‘maneuver’

Drivers faced a long slog through the darkness as slippery roads made the ride home dangerous and delayed those those who depend on public transit.

Michael Bolden aka/Dr. Gridlock wrote about yesterday’s commute home after our say long snow. Read it at the Washington Post:

via Dr. Gridlock – A rough commute home.

(I was in the mess driving from Solomons to Huntingtown. I witnessed a jerk tailgating a snow plow. Yes a snow plow. The plow was in the fast lane pushing dangerous snow off the road but the moron behind him has to aggressively show his impatience anyway.  So what did the MUD do? He pulled his tiny car into the MIDDLE of highway 4 straddling the center line and stayed there. He cause a line of traffic in the slow lane to slow suddenly. As I did the sign of the cross, the plow turned left moving away from the MUD. The MUD drove on well above 50 miles and hour while the rest of us continued praying. The rest of the commute was not much better.  Some of the worst driving I have seen – again. This included the “hero” in the big gray pick up truck less than a car length off my rear bumper on Plum Point Rd. I finally performed the PORK maneuver allowing him to speed off and hurt someone else besides me.

During the twenty-five mile trip home I never saw one police officer. Marylanders do not appear to be afraid of the consequences of unsafe driving. Sadly, most of us should get MUD in our stockings this year or Santa should just fly by and ignore Maryland.)

Outrageous driving is now celebrated in a TV commercial. How special. Volkswagen has a commercial with three people in a new VW, two men in the front seats and one hysterical female in the back. I didn’t pay any attention to the commercial until the woman started SCREAMING, “SHOOT THE GAP, SHOOT THE GAP.”

She wanted the driver to maneuver the vehicle so the car would drive between two large semi trailer trucks at high speed on a busy highway.  She wouldn’t stop screaming until he did.  I couldn’t believe a car company would create such a commercial. It was beyond comprehension. Is this anthropological evidence that unsafe behaviors are a routine part of our driving culture now?

Now any of us driving highways with trucks are going to have to watch out for idiots looking for a gap to shoot.  My guess is that truck drivers won’t be too happy with what we should call the Volkswagen Gap Maneuver.  As an advocate of safer driving I see the commercial as grossly irresponsible.

It is not funny. It certainly didn’t sell me on Volkswagen.

Thanks to our reader “The Human Car” from Baltimore Spokes we have the video! The dealership mentioned appears to be in Pennsylvania.

DC MD and VA Law Enforcement Crack Down on Aggressive Driving; Campaign Kick-Off Highlights Dangers of Driving Aggressively in the Summer Months

BALTIMORE June 7 PRNewswire-USNewswire — With summer being the season of aggressive driving more than 90 state and local law enforcement agencies from Maryland Virginia and the District of Columbia are banding together to keep residents safe. The Smooth Operator campaign mobilizes its first wave of enforcement June 6 – June 12 and police across the region will be out in force to combat aggressive driving. Speeding has consistently been estimated to be a main factor in aggressive driving behavior. With children out of school construction activities ramping up and the influx of tourists the theme of this year s Smooth Operator campaign will be “Speeding IS aggressive driving and it STOPS HERE.”

“Drivers need to understand that keeping their temper in check and foot off the gas is essential to protecting themselves as well as other motorists ” said Sheriff Mike Evans President of the Maryland Sheriff s Association.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration NHTSA estimates that aggressive driving behaviors – speeding tailgating running red lights and stop signs improper passing and other dangerous driving maneuvers – has cost billions of dollars and may be responsible for one-third of injury crashes and two-thirds of highway fatalities. The probability of death and debilitating injury increases with impacts at higher speeds – doubling for every 10 mph over 50 mph that a vehicle travels.

“Aggressive driving especially speeding is a real threat to all who share the roadways and requires a pan-regional effort ” noted Colonel George F. Johnson IV President of the Maryland Chiefs of Police Association. “Close collaboration and cooperation across jurisdictions is what makes Smooth Operator so successful in both enforcement and education.”

Citations during four enforcement waves in 2009 totaled more than 408 577 – more than six and a half times the 62 000 issued in the initial year of 1997. Nearly 3.2 million citations and warnings have been issued since the beginning of the Smooth Operator program.

The 2009 Smooth Operator campaign was also successful in raising the awareness of aggressive driving behavior. Pre- and post-campaign public opinion surveys of Washington area drivers showed that the recognition of the Smooth Operator message increased 18 percentage points to 72 percent.

The 2010 Smooth Operator campaign enforcement waves are scheduled on the following dates

June 6 – 12 July 4 – 10

August 1 – 7

September 5 – 18

About Smooth Operator – www.smoothoperatorprogram.com Sixteen Washington area law enforcement agencies launched Smooth Operator in 1997 targeting motorists who drove aggressively. To enhance the annual law enforcement efforts public awareness campaigns and research began in 2000 and formed a cooperative interstate effort that is unique among the law enforcement groups and organizations involved. For more information visit www.smoothoperatorprogram.com SOURCE Smooth Operator.

RELATED LINKS http: www.smoothoperatorprogram.com

via Speeding IS Aggressive Driving and it STOPS HERE. — BALTIMORE, June 7 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ –.

While stopped for a stop sign located at Annapolis Neck Road and Forest Drive, a school bus was hit in the rear by another vehicle.

Read the ENTIRE story at EyeOnAnnapolis.com:

via Annapolis School Bus Accident | Eye On Annapolis.

(Following to closely perhaps? We do seem to be the following-too-closely capital of the USA. Maryland drivers of all ages use a following-too-closely tactic to get you to either speed up or move over regardless of the lane you are in and regardless of the speed limit. Safe drivers keep a steady speed and remain in their lane until the road killer decides where he/she is going to go. The difficult part of dealing with a tailgater is that you never know how much their frustration and anger has diminished their thinking.  When one of these MUD’s is far enough away you can try the P.O.R.K. maneuver as long as you watch the nut in your rear view mirror. These folks have been known to follow the maneuvering victim.  )

The road bicyclists use the death of one of their own this week to lobby the state for a mandatory three-foot buffer from cars. These road bicyclists choose some of the worst roads to ride on, rural route roads like Falls Road and the side roads of Upperco in Baltimore County, where if the state of Maryland wanted to do anything rational, it would ban the use of bicycles on all rural route roads without shoulders because it isn’t safe to operate bicycles on them.

Read the ENTIRE opinion at the Baltimore Sun:

via Three-foot rule will not make bicyclists safe – baltimoresun.com.

(What needs to happen?  Maryland drivers must decide to share the road in a safe manner with everyone else. I have years of experience bicycling on California’s back roads from the San Francisco Bay Area to Lake Tahoe to Mendocino County. There are far more bicyclists per mile there than in Maryland and I felt reasonably safe.  One major reason for the difference is not the roads but the drivers who use Maryland’s back roads. The driving culture in Maryland blames everyone and everything but the proximate cause – the aggressive reckless driver.

Slowing and passing a bicyclist is a safe, easy, and polite maneuver. You look for on-coming traffic in the opposing lane, judge the traffic behind you, slow down and wait for a safe opportunity to pass with adequate clearance.  Total precious driver time wasted insignificant to the number of lives saved.

The law requires an adequate clearance. I agree, that in a perfect world, such a law would not be required because everyone would have a modicum of common sense. That is unfortunately lacking in Maryland today. Most of our roads in Southern Maryland are of the two-lane country variety. Where are bicyclists supposed to enjoy their hobby if not our quiet6 bay-view country roads?

Until you have been on a bicycle and encountered a rude, reckless, thoughtless driver you do not have an adequate appreciation of the problem.  The editorial staff of the Sun needs to get a group together and go bicycling.

I’d guess that one reason we have so many school buses in the country is because drivers have made use of our roads impossible for children.  At first it befuddled me why Maryland kids didn’t get themselves to school and then I drove here. It is not safe on the road in front of my own home in a neighborhood with one road in and one road out.  The straight away begins at my front door and the race out of the area begins.  Drivers are OBLIVIOUS. Our culture of reckless abandon guarantees unsafe roads.

This is a problem solved at the grass roots level. Citizens of Maryland must DECIDE to drive safely. There are too many bad drivers to ticket. This does not however limit the need for enforcement and awareness building that expensive citations provide.

The answer is that all of the Maryland road killers need to slow down and enjoy the ride. Be safe, be happy, arrive alive.)

(STOP the MUD comment reproduced in full at baltimorespokes.org)

The acronym for Maryland Unsafe Driver is MUD. We’re encouraged by the old saying, “You’re name is MUD,” when we see the proposed license plate that is part of our suggested Maryland legislation. The idea that a seriously unsafe driver would have to put these federal safety orange plates or placards on his or her vehicle to remind others and themselves that they are convicted unsafe drivers is refreshing. Unsafe drivers are potential road killers and are nothing short of dangerous to the rest of us on Maryland roads.

We can see the MUD tags and be extra careful around those vehicles, but how do we protect ourselves from the road killer’s that have not been to court? (Read about our legislation idea.) We can always drive defensively. A defensive driver is aware of their surroundings, obeys all traffic laws, is courteous, and never displays rage using a vehicle or puts another at risk.

A worried safe driver lets the road killer proceed ahead out of harm’s way. We call this the “PORK Maneuver.” The acronym is short for “Pull Over for the Road Killer.” Pork? Pork comes from, you guessed it. So does that make a MUD a farm animal that enjoys wallowing in MUD? Some might say the farm animal is a lot more considerate, but for our purposes we’ll assume a road killer looks like one.

The PORK Maneuver must be done carefully because some road killers are paying little attention and may not understand what you are doing and why.  Before you pull over, be very careful. Plan your move to the side of the road and keep a periodic eye on the road killer. You do not want him following you off the road and colliding with your vehicle. Whenever you can safely do so let the road killer proceed ahead of you. Hopefully, the PORK maneuver will be noticed by the police and they will observe and take action against the the road killer.

(Drawing of pig driving used with permission of Ian at Pig on a Spit.)