It’s no secret that New York City is home to some of the rudest and pushiest drivers imaginable. On one hand, yes, driving here teaches you to be more aggressive, defensive and careful overall. But other times, I just wish drivers here were a tad more considerate and logical.
Take, for example, the zipper-merge. The zipper-merge is genius in its simplicity and smoothness. The only thing you need in the zipper-merge is thoughtfulness, cooperation and the foresight that this will be good for everyone. There will always be a lane blocked in the city for various reasons, so merging traffic from two lanes into one is very typical.
In a perfect world, everyone abides by the zipper-merge. Alternating cars from the two lanes. It’s how you avoid a pile-up in the blocked lane. Cars continue to move smoothly, albeit a little more slowly, and tempers stay in check.
This is not what happens, usually. Usually, you have all the assholes in the open lane refusing to let in their closed lane brethren because they are in that much of a rush to get three car lengths ahead. It’s maddening and I hate it. So, if you’re the unlucky one, caught in the closed lane, you sit there with your blinker on and slowly force your way into the open lane until you’ve physically stuck so much of your car into it that the other drivers just have to let you in and they despise you for it. It’s really not healthy.
I actually have many more examples besides idiots refusing to zipper-merge, but I’ve already worked myself up into a rage so I won’t go into them and will instead let you vent.
What example of driving etiquette or law do you wish people followed more?