I not only drive to and from work, but because I'm in construction I also spend a portion of my day driving either to the job site or between job sites, often hauling a trailer that weighs over double what my truck does.
Just this morning I had a woman swearing at me and giving me the finger, with her two small children in the vehicle, because I abided by the 4-way stop outside an elementary school and she tried to run it.
Between the cell phone users, and the middle aged women in their SUV's that can't do a shoulder check or read a single lane sign, and the guy with the chronic one-upsman syndrome who guns it to 30 over the limit just to pass you on the highway and go slightly under the limit.
IMO only about 20% of people on the road actually follow the rules because they know they're right and help keep them and their passengers safe. Then there's probably another 60% who generally follow the rules simply because they don't want to get a ticket. The last 20% just don't give a shit, do what they want, when they want and god forbid they don't get it.
I'd also say there's an additional 10-30% who are purely seasonal drivers known the other 7-9 months as "cyclists". They only come out in the winter, and are likely responsible for as many if not more accidents than inclement weather. Living in southern ontario I actually dread the roads on that first heavy snow because, no joking around, I'm actually worried I'm going to kill someone and it won't be my fault.
I don't think driving is doing society any good except at providing a way for the stupid, and the stupidly unfortunate, ways out of the genetic pool.
Are you really saying that many cyclists who switch to driving in the winter are characteristically terrible drivers? This is just really at odds with my cycling experience - A biker always needs to be on the defensive just based on the fact that the average driver is likely to not even perceive a smaller vehicle. Even though I haven't seriously biked in several years, I'm still generally aware of what most cars are going to do before they actually do it. (Then again, I guess I've also seen my share of moronic bikers - the kind that think they don't really need to think about what they're doing as long as they're doing it slowly). The first snow is indeed always a mess of bad drivers, but I blame that on people forgetting how slippery snow really is.
It's not so much the snow, it's that the cyclists disappear when it starts getting near freezing, which is the exact time you get a bunch of awful drivers on the road.
I don't mean to say all bikers are bad drivers, I'm just saying the correlation between the two events (the absence of cyclists from the roadways and the new presence of masses of bad drivers) is uncanny.
There's always the bad cyclists that just scare the crap out of you, like the 60-70 year old man who's wobbling about 2 feet from side to side, essentially rendering the bike lane useless. But in my experience as a driver, I've only seen a handful - and by handful I mean one or two - cyclists that actually obey the rules of the road. I see them run red lights and stop signs, I see them go on the side walk to cut past cars to make a right turn. etc
In my experience it is the cyclists who are trained to keep a careful eye on everyone else on the road and anticipate what others are going to do, because if they do not, they die. People who are always driving are much less aware of what their high speed air-bagged (only on the inside, of course) steel tanks can do to a human body, especially if the thing they might hit is just 70kg and not a 2 metric tonne object.
Speaking as a person who has had several accidents with cars while biking and zero accidents while driving.
"Living in southern ontario I actually dread the roads on that first heavy snow because, no joking around, I'm actually worried I'm going to kill someone and it won't be my fault."
Yeah, in Calgary people lose their shit when there's a light dusting of snow... it's ridiculous.
I think your percentages and impression of safety are off. Not sure what part of the country you live in but around here(Boston) going only the speed limit on the highways will get you about run off the road resulting in all sorts of unsafe driving. In other words going the speed limit doesn't make you safe, and going 10mph over the limit doesn't mean you don't care, the safest speed to travel is with the flow of traffic.
Additionally I happily drive well over the speed limit when visiting Maine, 2 lane wide highway, nearly straight, 5 exits in 180 miles and nearly no traffic. A speed limit of 65mph isn't about whats actually safe, its about government bureaucracy (and income from tickets).
Just this morning I had a woman swearing at me and giving me the finger, with her two small children in the vehicle, because I abided by the 4-way stop outside an elementary school and she tried to run it.
Between the cell phone users, and the middle aged women in their SUV's that can't do a shoulder check or read a single lane sign, and the guy with the chronic one-upsman syndrome who guns it to 30 over the limit just to pass you on the highway and go slightly under the limit.
IMO only about 20% of people on the road actually follow the rules because they know they're right and help keep them and their passengers safe. Then there's probably another 60% who generally follow the rules simply because they don't want to get a ticket. The last 20% just don't give a shit, do what they want, when they want and god forbid they don't get it.
I'd also say there's an additional 10-30% who are purely seasonal drivers known the other 7-9 months as "cyclists". They only come out in the winter, and are likely responsible for as many if not more accidents than inclement weather. Living in southern ontario I actually dread the roads on that first heavy snow because, no joking around, I'm actually worried I'm going to kill someone and it won't be my fault.
I don't think driving is doing society any good except at providing a way for the stupid, and the stupidly unfortunate, ways out of the genetic pool.