🚀 go-pugleaf

In <35a61eb9.52262784@news.v-wave.com> grimrod@mindless.moc (Brandon
Sommerville) writes:

>>You would have to observe the following distance for some time to
>>figure our who is accelarating relative to whom.  If the following
>>distance ahead of me remains the same, then I am going at the
>>same speed as the next guy.

>Perhaps, so why not close up to a two second differential?

Two seconds is barely safe.  I much prefer three.  I do close to a
three-second distance, but I don't feel obliged to do that by revving up
the engine and screeching my tires.  An in any case, why the following
distance might be longer than three seconds is a very different issue
from your unjustified insistence that any time I am following at 4-5
seconds I must merge to the right.  I think you were confusing between
following at a distance and going slower then the next vehicle.  You
didn't retract your claim, so perhaps you are still confusing the two
issues.  I look way ahead when I drive -- not just at the next vehicle,
but at the next half mile or so.

>>It's an issue to yield the lane for the same reason that when you are
>>standing in line at a grocery store checkout counter, you don't step
>>aside to let everybody behind you get ahead of you.  Let them wait their
>>turn in their queue.

>If I let someone ahead, I now have to wait a little longer to clear
>the register (which I may do if they only have a few items and I have
>a lot), if I'm driving and let someone ahead who is traveling faster
>than me, I don't lose anything at all.

Only if the capacity of the highway is infinite.

My experience is that if I merge to the right to let a tailgater pass, I
incur two penalties: (a) I have to slow down and lose time; (b) I have
to merge into a more-populated lane than mine and incur closer and less
safe following distances.  I really don't want to incur these penalties
for the benefit of some discourteous tailgater with more horsepower than
sense.  If he wants to get ahead, he needs to patiently wait at a decent
following distance for a time when I can merge right safely and without
slowing down.  He is always welcome to merge right himself and slow
down, if he really thinks that's such a wonderful thing.  I'm not
willing to subscribe to the lop-sided double-standard that you seem to
be advocating, under which tailgating gets you more privileges on the
highway and safe drivers get less.
-- 
Rahul Dhesi <dhesi@spams.r.us.com>