Those Turn Lane Knuckleheads

There should be a citation (or firing squad) for those drivers that sit through the whole green arrow cycle and by the time they get thru, the light changes and they are the only one who got to go through the intersection. They are distracted by something and don’t realize the light has turned green. Some cycles are very long before your arrow turns green again and it never fails that it’s pouring down rain and you would have made your destination way way sooner when this happens. Sometimes I just want to push them through with my truck.

That’s what horns are made for…

That's what horns are made for...

Exactly…and I’ve been using mine more and more…as people LOVE to text while at stop-lights. And if I’m even 4 or 5 cars back and the guy in front isn’t moving…I’ll honk…For some reason some people don’t like to honk their horn.

@MikeInNH I was just getting ready to post that your horn is useless when you are three or four cars back. I can hear everyone else honking and I’m still stuck at the light.

I was just getting ready to post that your horn is useless when you are three or four cars back. I can hear everyone else honking and I'm still stuck at the light

If I hear someone honking…then I won’t honk…but more often then not…the cars between me and the front car won’t honk. So I end up honking.

If folks are honking and they’re still not moving, then I’d suspect there’s something keeping them from going. At least I tell myself that to keep my blood pressure down…

People sit like that because their car has a problem. The nut behind the steering wheel is loose.

The problem of distracted drivers is clearly getting worse.
Whether it is the ones who I see swerving, or the ones who sit through green lights, or the ones who are driving well under the speed limit, there is an obvious problem with people who are distracted by…texting…phone conversations…electronic devices of various kinds…and God only knows what else.

Do I have a solution to the problem?
Other than honking my horn to try to wake up these dunderheads, I have no solution.

There are statutes that prescribe penalties for some of these distractions, but these laws are clearly not a deterrent, and I don’t believe that there is even much enforcement of these regulations.

99.99% of the time, the car runs very quickly through the light and continues on down the road as if nothing happened. If there was some “problem”, they must magically repair themselves because I never see the vehicle pulled off to the side of the road.

You do, I trust, know what I mean when I say “the nut behind the steering wheel is loose”?

TSMB - I think @casper was referring to my comment. And I was talking about a traffic problem, not a car problem. I don’t have any trouble getting folks to move once I honk at them, unlike, apparently, folks in @casper 's neighborhood.

My neighborhood is often referred to as “heaven’s waiting room” or as I call it…“the city of the living dead”. We are the 2nd or 3rd largest populated county in Florida. These incidents I’m referring to have nothing to do with traffic or mechanical problems. Just idiot drivers.

They often ackowledge my honk with a one-finger digital salute.

Oh, Florida…that changes everything. You have my condolences!

And there ore many OTHER instances where the citation should be written to the driver in FRONT !
’'Impeding the flow of traffic ‘’ is sorely under-used.

Actually they they train new drivers in our state from my personal experience with my daughters recent driving school, no pulling into an intersection to stack up for a yellow turn. Been stuck behind them also. Safety police 1 point. It is apparently law in WI. Being as I have never had a road test since 1970, and it did not come up on the written or vision test I could be ignorant of the law, but go ahead and do it anyway. Better see if I am on the no fly or watch list!

It’s not worth getting angry. Hit the horn if you sit longer than 10 seconds after the light turns green. You do need to give them some time to respond. I find that many people won’t move after the light turns green for at least 5 seconds, so I give them a little break. I don’t lean on it, but give them a couple of toots to wake them up. If they still don’t move in a reasonable time, I toot more emphatically. The first person in line does have an obligation to move unless they are stalled. Then they are obliged to turn on the emergency flashers.

@jtsanders please see previous response, to go out on a limb, they do not teach the speed limit is plus 8 over posted either, but it seems everybody does it.

You know in the grand scheme of things, sitting through an extra light is really not very significant over 50 years. A polite toot of the horn as a reminder but sometimes you never know what that driver may be dealing with at that time. We’ll be dead soon enough anyway without wasting time being angry.

I flick my lights at them first, then a beep of the horn. Around here the turn lane light is green for a maximum of 15 seconds. Today I got behind one who started moving as soon as the light changed, the problem was that it took him about 15 seconds just to drive through the light. This was after getting stuck behind another elderly person who just stopped in the middle of the road to figure out where it was that he was going.