I saw this headline and just HAD to go read the story...

Aussie drivers 'rude and self-centred'

What??? Worse than Chicago drivers??? Could it be? Let's see what they had to say...

Others will use an emergency stopping lane to overtake, park in a disabled space and won't let others in to traffic if the roads are busy.

Hmmm... well let's see. Most of the drivers here will use anything vaguely resembling a wide enough space to let their car through. If that's the emergency stopping lane... no problem, if it's the grass verge... why do you think they drive SUV's? If it's some potholed expanse - they'll risk having their car swallowed whole to get a leg up on the next guy in traffic.

Disabled spot parking... I've heard people brag about borrowing a disabled sticker to park in those spaces... I guess the fines have gotten high enough though - unless it's the Christmas season - you don't see too many of the spaces full.

Letting people in... it depends on the person driving. I've learned to be an offensive merger when I want to get into another lane in high traffic. If they won't let you in - just move on over. When they get scared enough, they'll back off...

Of the 68 per cent of drivers who said their car had been damaged while parked, 88 per cent said the person who damaged their car did not leave their contact details.

The survey found 16 per cent of drivers admitted that if they damaged a vehicle in a car park and nobody saw them, they would consider not leaving their details.

Ummm... they're surprised by this - or they expected the respondents to lie?

Nearly 80 per cent of NSW people had seen able-bodied drivers park in disabled spaces, the highest in Australia.

This is a bit tricky. Mind you - if someone stops in a disabled space and then sprints into the store - that is a good indication that they don't need to use that space. OTOH - I know a woman who looks perfectly normal outwardly. But has had bad hip trouble for years. When her kids were small - she couldn't even pick them up - and she had a hip replacement at age 35 it was that bad. But when she didn't have to use her crutches - you'd swear she was abusing the disabled parking space... so you can never tell.

More than 60 per cent of Australians surveyed said another driver had stolen their car space while they were clearly waiting for it.

Ha! Only 60 percent? But this is why I refuse to wait for parking spaces - if I can't head to the back of the lot and park right now - I don't need to be there!

Not only that - I don't see any mention of highway drivers that are on the inside lane and decide... oops that's my exit over there... promptly doing a diagonal across 3 to 6 lanes of traffic at 60 to 80 mph (depending on the time of day) - I'm not counting any that happen at a slower speed... that's child's play.

This last one made me laugh the hardest...

One in 10 Australian drivers and twice as many in Melbourne, have their car stereo playing loud enough for other drivers to hear it, even if they have their windows up.

Can hear the music with the windows up... BWAHAHAHAHAHA... When we lived in Elgin - I had cars driving past my house at 3am in the dead of winter that would rattle EVERY window in my house (even in the back). There was even a sympathetic newspaper story where they interviewed one of these morons. This kid said that since he spent so much money on his stereo... he should be able to listen to it as loud as he wanted to! (we must thank the public schools for teaching such interesting logic) I think you won't be surprised to find out that the idiot reporter never even questioned the kid's stance...

No, I think on the whole, Chicago drivers pretty much take the cake for rudeness. I have noticed that drivers in Massachusetts seem to be pretty courteous on the regular roads - it's been very impressive. (although I have yet to drive the Mass Pike at high traffic) I shall have to relearn how to be a nice driver...

Posted by: Teresa in Travel at 02:18 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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