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If you're only two lengths away from the car in front of you while driving at highway speeds, you are tailgating. Back off. It's far more dangerous than speeding.
- Help me out with this, because it's driving me crazy. Whenever I leave anywhere close to 2 seconds between me and the car on front of me, someone cuts in, and I'm now too close to them, so I slow down, leaving a 2 second gap, and another cuts in. Rinse, repeat. I end up being the slow ass that everyone keeps zooming around unless I tailgate.
  
  It just be that way. Idiots will see your safe following distance as their opportunity to switch lanes. Just keep being the safe one.
  
  Just... Don't care? Let people in and adjust the distance with them. Driving is an involved process, get a car with adaptive cruise control if you want one that will do exactly that for you.
  
  I guess it's more than just "caring" - I feel that we'd all be a lot safer if we were all going the same speed instead of inviting people to dodge in and out
  
  It would be safer if we were all riding the train/bus. Getting in a car in america is accepting the risk that you share the road with everyone. no matter the qualifications or mental state we still all gotta get to work/grocery store/wherever, and the only way is by ~4000 pound metal speed box.
  Worrying about safety on the highway is about making sure you are in situations you can handle and react to, staying attentive to the styles and mental states of other drivers and being a step ahead of the road conditions
  
  Unfortunately I can't see how public transport would be feasible without accepting that the vast majority of places I might want to go are simply inaccessible, and the places I could go would take 3-5 times longer. Case in point, there are no public transportation options to get to my son's high school. It would be a 35 minute bicycle ride. I can drive there in 12 minutes. Getting to my local Wegmans would take 37 minutes by bus. I can drive there in 9 minutes. I live on the outskirts of a medium size city on the east coast in a low density residential neighborhood.
  
  But people need to change lane sometimes and if you're the one giving them the space to do so then more power to you, don't complain
  
  Just be safe. You're still close to your desires speed
  
  Let them hop in and keep your 2 seconds. I used to have a 40 minute commute and on a busy morning would have 10-15 people do that. Know how much time that sets me back? 20 to 30 seconds. Following this rule I have a 25 year clean driving record and I guarantee these lane hoppers can't make that claim
  
  it's probably even less, maybe even negligible because of traffic lights at either end: you can't calculate a single journey because you're never going to hit the same light exactly the same every time. I have four lights between my house and the freeway, and 7 between the freeway and one of the sites for my job. Each one adds between 0-60 seconds randomly for an average of 6 minutes sitting and waiting per day. I would have to have a commute of like 120 miles of uninterrupted freeway driving for that to matter.
  
  Beyond “don’t care” - you get to be the traffic hacker who improves traffic for everyone. yayyy
  
  Anyone who wants to test how this can work?
  
  Check this old-school site:
  traffic-simulation.de
- At 65mph, you cover two car lengths (~30 ft) in about 1/3 of a second.
  Typically human reaction time for braking is about 1.5 seconds.
  If something went seriously wrong in front of you (like a sideways car, or a hidden obstacle in front of the car in front of you) you would have covered 10 car lengths before your foot touches the brake pedal.

192 comments