Are You "Defensive" About Your Prius?

You may not like the Sequoia but I am still enjoying my 2000 Tundra when I need to haul something.

 

Perhaps it's a regional thing.

I would invite Bisco to weigh in, but I just don't see that in the Boston area.

Of course most of us drive "differently" around here. Not sure if it has been codified into law but it is generally accepted that using turn signals is not recommended in the commonwealth, for example.

That just gives the other guy an unfair/unsafe advantage when merging.

Bisco is no doubt he exception.

In any event, I have not experienced any difference with drivers around me when driving a Prius in this area.

Where do you drive?

 

@bisco share some experiences, here.

 

i'm sure most of my experience is derived by my driving style, (slow acceleration and keep to the speed limit) but there is no question that people ride my bumper more than when i'm in the dakota. they also pass me as soon as possible, sometimes weaving back and forth behind me to let me know i'm holding them up. i've even been passed on a 2 lane road with double yellow line while going the speed limit. i think i've been passed in a parking lot.
between here and florida, and out in cali, i don't find the drivers much different though. aggression rules the day on our roads, and off them as well.
i was just commenting to my wife, a lot of lights are timed, so that if you gun it and speed, you can make the next one. but if you accelerate normally and go the speed limit, you will hit every light. so the people behind me know what is going to happen, and it makes them crazy.

 

^ Maybe email the powers that be on that; it's in everyone's best interest (whether they know or not) to time the lights per your driving style, ie: moderate acceleration, abiding by speed limits.

Regarding being passed: I've been passed while making a left turn, on the left, by the left turner behind me.

 

Some places do that to slow down the impatient traffic.

 

i've always been a moderate driver. 'always' meaning since i started toting my kids around 37 years ago, or maybe when i met my wife 41 years ago. i did enjoy my miata for a few years in the early 90's, but not so i could drive like a madman in traffic, but out in the country on windy roads. unfortunately, most of those are clogged with traffic too. the joy went out of it very quickly.

when i see them advertise high powered cars on tv, (dodge, vdub, infinity, etc.) on beautiful empty roads with all kinds of fun turns, all i can think is, 'not around here'.

 

I drive my 2016 Prius just like drove my 2006 Saab 93.

Perhaps it is selective memory, but I think the Prius handles better and feels quicker off the line.

The car does not tell me what to do, I tell the car what to do -- and it responds beautifully.

 

Which country are you in - "80 to 90 on the interstate" - is meaningless unless we know if it's km/hr or that old scale?

I don't think my driving has changed between cars, except that I use DRCC in traffic, so it keeps to the speed of the car in front.

One thing which is a problem here is very high powered cars - like AMG Merc 6.3 or our local GM Holdens with Corvette engines. They've got so much power that they can get into a space which doesn't really exist, and be gone again, cutting across lanes so quickly that the reaction everyone has taken causes a ripple effect of chaos.

 

Cyberspace. Warp 80 or 90.

 

the 'powers that be' all drive 50 in a 30 zone. we had a policeman reprimanded for ticketing someone for speeding in a school zone. turned out the speeder knew one of the 'powers that be'.

 

Sounds like Jack Lemon, in "Irma La Deuce".

 

my neighbor down the street, who is a selectwoman, almost ran me over one day, when i was sweeping up the winter salt and sand in front of my house. the limit is 30, and there's an elementary school across the street. she was doing 60, if she was doing 10. we've never brought it up in company, not sure she even saw me.

 

A good question...does buying a Prius change your driving style. It has mine because I know that there is not always enough power to outrun someone who is going uphill and trying to pull in front of me, etc., so I have to leave more space and back off without the power my older cars had. And it is a factor of aging. I don't feel the need to drive as fast as I did at age 20. And I know that my reflexes and vision are not as good as they were thirty years ago. Plus as we age we have seen more horrendous wrecks over time. We should be learning from those accidents. As we have children/grandchildren, we slow down, especially in parking lots and residential neighborhoods...because we ESPECIALLY value their lives. So maturity has a lot to do with it. And many of us do care about the environment and prefer not to burn a lot of gas/petrol, especially when it is not necessary.

They say that seniors pay lower insurance rates in general because they are more cautious drivers in general and have fewer bad wrecks. I would guess that younger drivers slow down a bit after buying a Prius and having children. It is hard to separate the many causes of the slow down and use of more caution, but I am glad that cars are becoming safer each year.

As road congestion increases, this also causes slower driving. When I started driving at 14 in West Texas, most accidents involved one car because there were so few cars on the road relative to today. Today it often is difficult to find a road uncongested enough with cars to allow one too speed much.