Thursday, August 29, 2013

Useless and or Boring?

When our oldest son was about three years old he asked me the reasons for having traffic signs. I explained him the different reasons and I remember looking at him and our younger son (who was one month old at that time) with great emphasis on the importance of communication between fellow drivers.  I was twenty-three years old and was preparing for the test for my learner's permit.  Not a whole lot has changed since then when it comes to driving except that my husband thinks that I drive too fast for a woman.  I say that I drive within the speed limit, follow all the rules and am a defensive driver. I mean, I have to be one. As beautiful and breath taking the view is on Route 9W, I hardly get to enjoy it. The morning commute does it to you. You become one of them, the robotic and attentive driver you need to be, because there are some people who love their coffee and want it in one hand while holding the steering wheel with the other. Then there are people who have their smartphones sitting right on the steering wheel and as soon as there is a red light their thumbs are at work.  So what do I do? Nothing. There is nothing I can do. I used to tell my coworkers about the importance of safe driving, I would get the look and the nod you would get from a person who thinks that you are too old for this world. Well, I guess I am, but am not ashamed because I do see signs and think that they are important.Sign 2 - Yield Just about twenty years ago, my husband ended up hitting a car, because the driver did not yield. She said that he was supposed to have slowed down, as he knew that she would join. Luckily, no one was hurt and no damage was done to either of the cars. This was a proof that he did try to slow down. When I told this to some one at work, they said that the "Yield" sign was useless and boring. It confuses people. One person actually said that it was to settle litigation in case of an accident. Some people say that there should just be a "Stop" sign or nothing at all. I am not so sure what the fate of the "Yield" sign should be, but I hope that people understand that the sign means that you let people on the main road go before you or else there can be a crash. I end up yielding all the time even though I am on the main road, because people are not understanding the sign correctly. They think that there is room for argument when it comes to an accident. We were in LA a couple of weeks ago. There was one thing I liked about some of their highways. There  actually are stop lights at junctions where you join the highway. It changes quite frequently depending on the clearance. I wondered for a moment if the Highway Dept. thought less of the drivers' intelligence, but then I realized that maybe we should have that in New York as well. Perhaps then there will be fewer crashes instead of one every couple of weeks at some intersection.


25 comments:

Launna said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Launna said...

I think some drivers are beyond inattentive... it drives me crazy. Get off the smart phone, pay attention to what you are doing. These same people act like they have no idea why an accident happened....

Great post Munir :)

Geo. said...

Thank you, Munir, for raising this subject. The "Yield" sign is so important because it alerts the attention of drivers, especially at interchanges at which a total stop might also be dangerous, but too many drivers have no attention to alert.

Hilary Melton-Butcher said...

Hi Munir .. I think phones are the bane - they totally distract ones thoughts ... eating a sandwich is ok - that's sort of standard ... but if you're having a conversation or worse texting .. you need to concentrate - and that means not on the road.

I have to say I drive much more carefully now and keep a much larger space than I used to ...

Cheers Hilary

Granny Annie said...

Sometimes the Yield sigh is at an angled intersection and I have to crane my neck to see if anyone is coming. I would rather stop so I can take a good look and not chance the blocked vision.

Ron said I drove too fast and hat other criticisms of my driving skills. I reminded him that I have never had a ticket in my life. He said yes, but I was causing other people to have accidents trying to avoid me. Hum?

cube said...

I used to love driving when I was younger. Now it's just a pain in the butt. The biggest complaint I get is that I drive too slow... I have the best driving record in the house (a husband, a 19 year old and a 23 year old)... maybe there's a lesson there.

Shelly said...

Very good post, my friend! I want to snap my fingers in front of some of those inattentive drivers sometimes, just to wake them up.

yaya said...

Working in surgery I see up close what happens when you don't yield. I see what happens when you text while driving. I see what happens when you are under the influence and drive.I've heard the cries when a parent finds out that their child died in a car accident. Yeah, rules are so useless and boring.

Ghadeer said...

Hmm...this is embarrassing but...I've never heard of the 'Yield' sign before...sounds like something we could use in the Middle East (if only traffic signs were given more attention)

Optimistic Existentialist said...

The yield sign can create such confusion sometimes! I bet more accidents happen around yield signs than any other sign LOL.

joeh said...

Yield means, "It is YOUR responsibility to not get hit, the driver on the main road has 100% the right of way."

It does not mean "Step on the gas and try to beat the A-hole on the main road!"

In New York and New Jersey most people think traffic signs are merely suggestions.

Birdie said...

According to my husband there should be no stop signs, traffic lights or yield signs anywhere. He thinks there should be traffic circles everywhere. Whenever we go trough one he gets very excited and I have to hear the speech about how the world would be better off if there were only traffic circles. "Yes, dear.", I sigh.

Mariette VandenMunckhof-Vedder said...

Dearest Munir,
Yaya did sum it up best! Their is so much ignorance nowadays and NO respect of signs, nor elderly etc. etc. Everybody seems to be living in their own ´illiterate´ bubble and only being connected to their cell phone (aka ´smart(?)phone)... But they can ALL be in for a very rude awakening and the sad part is that often OTHERS pay the ultimate price!
Young people from the age of 16 till 22 are causing most accidents and often between midnight the weekend hours till about 2:00 AM on Monday morning... It has all to do with discipline and responsible driving.
You are NOT old but only living proof that you are a responsible driver!
Hugs,
Mariette

Teresa Cypher said...

Wonderful post, Munir! How have you been?

Drivers who refuse to yield (who have a yield sign) are a pet peeve of mine. I actually will argue this point to anyone who brings it up. (there's not much I'll argue about) In PA, you must yield right of way to moving traffic if you are merging etc. But I think some drivers believe it must mean the opposite. :-)

Kate OMara said...

Alas, it's still up to the driver, not the sign to understand the communication...:)

Cat said...

Where I live, they have the sign, and triangles painted on the road to show that a yeild is coming up. I tend to slow down if I see a yeild, most people here treat it as a stop when traffic is coming... But some treat it as a green light (sigh). I think that is why we are taught defensive driving... (yet another sigh).

Cat

DWei said...

If you fail to understand this sign in Canada, prepare to get sued when you hit someone and are at fault.

The sign exists for a reason, and usually only people of lower intelligence or care fail to understand it.

Dee said...

Dear Munir, thanks for stopping by my blog. I've signed on as one of your followers and hope to come to your blog weekly to discover what's happening in your life.

As to signs and lights, I lived for 38 years in the Twin Cities and there, too, the planners put lights at the junction of the entrance ramps and the main trafficways. It does help with the flow of traffic and also with keeping accidents from happening. Peace.

loverofwords said...

We have lights here as well. So many of our drivers are impatient and rude and are on their cell phones while trying to enter a highway. Going first is their mantra.

Dawn@Lighten Up! said...

I drive an hour each way to work every morning, and I'd say about every third person I see is texting.
So many a-holes.

Jan said...

You are so right about ataying alert and conscious when you are driving. When we do the same journey day after day we can easily fall into automatic pilot. It sometimes scares me when I realise my mind has been elsewhere and I have not been aware of the last 10 mins or so driving! The I know it is time to vary my route. As for Yield signs I think they must be like our "give way"s. I always stop and look, even if it is just for a moment. Silly not too really. Thanks for your visit. x

Michael Offutt, Phantom Reader said...

I rented a car in L.A. and I actually loved driving there. We got caught in a huge traffic jam, yet everyone was so polite. I signaled to change lanes and they let me in. And the traffic actually flowed smooth, despite the number of cars so that it only delayed us about an extra 20 minutes. I was quite surprised and made the statement that I could do that every day as long as people were polite.

Where I live (in Utah) we have the rudest drivers I have ever seen. People flip you off here, they don't let you in when you lane change so that you are basically run off the road, and they are just very aggressive.

A little while ago, a woman and her child were run down on a crosswalk as a car sped around those that were stopped. The child survived, but the mother died. It is absolutely terrible.

Attentive driving and signs are important. But I think people also need to be schooled on etiquette when driving. Respect the other driver's space. Allow them in. Stop when other cars are stopped because you might not see a mother and child trying to cross the street. And do not drive if you are distracted in any way. These are all things we could do as a society to make things better.

aspiritofsimplicity said...

I always pay attention to the yield signs. Perhaps I am in the minority.

The Purple Assassin. said...

The yield sign isn't present in India either. I'm sure it's something that could add to the deduced accident rates.
The frequency of those needs to be checked!

Gossip_Grl said...

Several years ago they removed all the yield signs around here and it was said that Everyone knows they need to yield, but they don't. We just saw a side swipe accident yesterday because of it. The other thing is we have noticed in the last months that many of the stop signs have been removed and again it was said that people know they have to stop, except they don't. The sad thing is if 2 cars collide at those intersections that the stop signs were removed the driver who pulls out in front of you gets a failure to yield ticket and if you were the unlucky person that hit them you are ticketed with the Failure to maintain control of your vehicle which makes no sense at all.