YOU'RE DOING IT WRONG! Part 3a: Intersections

I haven't written a YOU'RE DOING IT WRONG in quite some time now, and most of this whole time I've been getting pissed at more bad driving habits...and some of the same old ones.

One topic that I've been thinking about quite a bit is intersections. As a driver and as a pedestrian. They're just another thing that it seems like the driving community can't figure out.

So part 1 of intersections is the pedestrian perspective.

I tend to cross the road 2 or 3 times a day, due to the retarded parking situation at RIT, and I HATE doing this when there are cars on the road. Not that I worry about getting hit or anything like that, I HATE the way other drivers react to pedestrian intersections.
We're all taught pedestrians have the right of way. Unfortunately this combines with the modern driving tendency of relentlessly giving up the right of way when they shouldn't be (in the name of COURTESY) and you have people in command of ~5,000 lbs vehicles wearing their break pads and wasting energy (read: GAS) to stop their cars in intersections they could have CROSSED before a pedestrian got to it.

So this whole wasteful habit comes from an overdone forced politeness that society is too fond of today. But it's actually very rude.
Because you stopped your car before I even got NEAR the intersection, because you were so scared of my pedestrian ass feeling offended at you blasting your car past me now I need to hurry up and jog past you so I don't make YOU wait.

You would get pissed off at a driver who stopped at a green light because there was another car 40 feet up the road.

I'm pissed at you stopping at a crosswalk when I'm still 10 feet from the road. Seriously. If you can make it through before I get there...or HEY if your passing would make me wait a whole 3 seconds...do it. It's easier for me to stop 260 lbs than it is for you to stop 6,400 lbs.

Learn to judge distance, if I'm 10 feet away I'm NOT in trouble. LOOK OUT for pedestrians, but stop this overly polite bullshit and drive your damn car.


This installment of YOU'RE DOING IT WRONG is brought to you by Sudafed.

--PXA