I have been commuting weekdays from East London to King William's Town & back again for work purposes for the last two & a half months, and my biggest issues with inattentive drivers are the following:
1. The huge preponderance of people who, although they DO manage to abide by the 'Keep Left. Pass Right' rule, will NEVER EVER pass anyone, as they almost ALL drive at speeds of between 80 & 100 km/h (sometimes even as slow as 60 - 70 km/h) on the N2, which is a dual carriageway & has a posted speed limit of 120 km/h for 99% of the 60 km trip.
This means that, if you are travelling at 120 km/h in the right lane (which you have to do to avoid the abundance of 'tortoises') & a faster vehicle approaches you from behind, and you move over to the left lane to let them pass, you invariably have to then brake suddenly from 120 km/h to whatever the much lower speed of the slowpokes are in the left lane, then move back to the right lane again and accelerate back to 120 km/h again in order to overtake them & get back up to the posted speed limit of 120 km/h once more.
This 'speed concertina' effect (Slow, Slow, Quick, Quick, Slow) gets repeated countless times during the 35 - 45 minute journey - and then you have to deal with it once more on the return trip back again in the afternoon.
2. The sheer amount of drivers who DO NOT USE INDICATORS AT ALL when changing lanes, again causing you to have to brake sharply to avoid either being sideswiped or colliding into the back of them, as in most instances it is someone who (as mentioned above) is driving at a MUCH slower pace than you are, but has decided to overtake another vehicle that is going even SLOWER than they are.
3. The number of people hugging the tailgate of a large truck that's chugging along at 80 km/h or so, and just sit 5 metres or so behind it for kilometres on end, when they could very easily INDICATE (when safe to do so), move over to the PASSING LANE, speed up by as little as 10 to 20 km/h or so & safely overtake the truck, then move back to the left lane again and continue along with their journey, and be able to actually SEE the road ahead of them, instead of just staring blankly at the rear number plate of the truck for hours on end or, as I've also noticed, plodding along in the spray field of the truck tyres in rainy conditions, which then impairs their forward visibility even further.
4. The amount of drivers that have NO clue that, when driving with ONLY DAYTIME running lights (DRL's) on before sunrise, after sunset, or in rainy / misty / foggy conditions, in most cases they have NO TAIL-LIGHTS AT ALL illuminated and are in fact almost INVISIBLE to anyone driving behind them.
In ANY of the above-mentioned poor visibility conditions, TURN ON YOUR HEADLIGHTS (dipped beam) and do NOT put on ONLY your PARK lights (Hello, the name says it all - they're usually little 5W globes used to illuminate your vehicle to other drivers when PARKED and NOT in motion - FFS!)
If your car has an AUTO HEADLIGHT SETTING - then for the love of all that's holy, TURN IT ON - to make your vehicle VISIBLE by having the headlights automatically TURN ON (usually 35 to 55W Xenon or halogen globes) in low-light conditions, so that OTHER motorists can see you clearly!
5. The number of people - mainly in VW, BMW or Audi cars (and the occasional Kia or Hyundai) - that have their rear FOGLIGHT/S on in CLEAR WEATHER conditions during daylight hours.
6. The number of people who appear to be carpooling and have 4-5 occupants in small hatchbacks or sedans (usually VW Polo or Toyota Auris / Corolla models), and NONE of the rear seat passengers are wearing their seat-belts.
6. The large majority of single occupant vehicles who, even though there are NO passengers AT ALL in the back seat, have ALL 3 rear headrests FULLY EXTENDED, severely limiting their view via the rear-view mirror, as they have 3 huge blind spots now obscuring their view through the back window - FFS! - retract the rear headrests fully if there's NO-ONE in the back seat, so you can actually SEE what's behind you, BEFORE you make a sudden lane-change (without using their indicators in most instances)!
Rant over - I hope you all have an enjoyable long weekend - and safe travels if you are on the roads at all - as there are usually MANY, MANY DUMBASSES out there that you have to contend with during your trips.
because they don't bother to look at the arrows on the ground
