Running Over Children and Road Rage

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(quixotequest @ Aug 10 2007, 01:30 PM) [snapback]493624[/snapback]</div>

I look at this as common day Darwinism.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(quixotequest @ Aug 10 2007, 01:30 PM) [snapback]493624[/snapback]</div>

I think they're just jealous!! :lol: Seriously, I think it brings out the patience in all of us owners, and the worst in other drivers.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(quixotequest @ Aug 10 2007, 10:30 AM) [snapback]493624[/snapback]</div>

It's possible to add an outside warning; including one that says (in either English or Spanish), "This car is backing up!"

I saw one at the Toyota dealer that looked VERY simple to install. It's a tiny box with a beeper that will work when a strong light is shown on the back side. This side has sticky tape and would go over the white lens in he back. When you back up the light hits the sensor and it starts beeping.

 

For less than $10.00 and a little work you can install your own back up beeper. But don't expect people to pay any more attention to it. I have one and have watched people in parking lots completely ignore it. They'll look at my car backing up and still ignore it. [attachmentid=10523]

 

Hi Quixotequest,


I have never been to Utah. So, I do not know how fast they accellerate, but here, when I have 7 bars or more on the SOC, I drive the car so that most of the cars do not keep up with my accellerations. They all tend to pass me once I am up to speed, however. And then I pass em right back at the next light.

The main rule for urban fuel econmy is stay above 5 bars, so you can pulse an glide nicely. The AC will run down the SOC allot quicker, especially if your in a pulse-and-glide traffic regime. When that happens, I will accellerate similarly to the other cars around here, which does not drain the battery after the initial burst. Then nearing the speed I want to go, accellerate more slowly, and get some battery charging. Then if the traffic will bear less than 40 mph, I lift trottle and drop it into glide. This is after the warmup routine the car does. If the engine/cats are warm enough I can glide sometime during warmup. But then they cool down, and it wont let you glide, so just run the engine at low level to get them rewarmed. It will take awhile to get familar with the car's warm up cycles on your commute.

Also, during the initial on-period, you have like 57 seconds I think it is, before the engine is permitted to be used at its full capacity. If during that time you do allot of accellerating, you will drain the battery allot, and then have to battle to get it back up. Doing slow accellerating during that time will help the whole trip.

Another thing you might do, is to honk back at anybody who was rude who is the only one in your way at the green light when you get there. I will usually accept one rudeness, but the second one - slowing me down at a green light, is not acceptable. They had faulty judgement, and now its causing a traffic jam. Seems reasonable to me to honk at them. If I had left my blinker on on the freeway, I would want somebody to honk to point that out to me.

One thing about the Prius is that its quick in the 10 to 30 mph range with the engine on. Its like driving a performance car in that respect. Its best to hang back to keep from rear ending a slower car in this speed range. The near instant 5 car lengths you put on a tail gater when traffic opens up is always satisfying, too. I never realized why Corvette commuters did this until driving the Prius.

To help the more near sighted tail-gater ( or red-light racer) is to steer to the right edge of the lane. This is better for mileage, as the left tires will be near the crown in the lane, which will result in less rolling friction. But, it allows the other driver to see ahead of your car. Which is dangerous for them to do if they are tail gating, as they may loose ranging to your car. But if they do, they may end up realizing that the road is bigger than you and him/her and act accordingly. Allot of this is brought on by the requirement to conciously changes ones focus range and the mind's point of concentration. I think it was a driving school that pointed out that many racers were not scanning enough, and concentrating only on the imediate lead car to be effective in collision avoidance and also missing passing oportunities in traffic on the race course.

Being "family friendly" can bring out more zenophobia. So, It does not suprize me at all that you get this attitude from so-aclaimed conservative Utah driving enviorment. People will feel irrationaly more responsible to be at a family gathering a few minutes sooner, than to be responsible to the family of one's fellow community members. In their short-sighted eyes, you are the odd one, and because you are not part of their immediate family, they feel free to treat you in a less human manner. If the Prius is rare where you drive, this comes to the surface more readily. This dehumization rationalization is more common in "City on the Hill" cultures. I read an article once that this explained some of the viscious actions WWII solders, away from the familar customs of their home land, felt the people they committed the acts against were sub-human, because they did not confirm to their norms of behavior. If you are in area where people do not see allot of Prius', it may take some time before people learn to treat you like any other driver. Chicagoland seems to have become accustomed to the Prius, but the first year out here in the western suburbs was a little lonely for Spaceship Prius. I had some harrowing driving experiences early on from female driven Suburbans trying to teach me a lesson that was un-American of them to try to teach. Lucikily no accidents.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(quixotequest @ Aug 10 2007, 10:30 AM) [snapback]493624[/snapback]</div>

Watching the backup camera and tapping the horn works for me. I've never felt any need to apologize for having a quiet car.

And a 4 y/o will run in front of anything regardless of how noisy. Your Prius could be a Harley, it would still be a danger.

 

I drove through Utah quite a bit, drove through Wyoming a lot, through Arizona, Nevada, Cali, Montana, Colorado, Idaho, never encontered "road rage" of any kind, though I was the slowest driver (doing the speed limit most of the time). Seems no one nowadays does the speed limit. Everyone HAS to speed, even if it's a couple of miles over the limit...
So people just passed me and that was that. I'm sure most of them just accepted the fact that the Prius is a "slow car" and felt sorry for me haha
It's true though, I'm sure many people believe the Prius is a very slow car, since they see them on the right lane barely doing the limit or driving under the limit all the time.
Except this one Mustang driver got really surprised I was able to keep up with him going up a VERY steep hill in Utah. Then Oops, I had drained my battery completely (1 purple bar left), so my speed fell from 95 to 65 in a couple of seconds, but I proved my point and the Mustang dude, I'm sure was very surprised to see it run up the hill. So anyway, I kept on doing 65 and within minutes my battery was recharged and haven't had any issues at all. I wouldn't have had the problem had I not driven for a LONG time with 1 purple bar left. I just felt compelled to race that Californian Mustang guy for some reason and was passing cars and doing 90 to 105 uphills for quite some time. But I promise, that's the first and last time I abuse my precious baby like that! It hurt my heart to see my MPG fall to under 40 during the 30 minute "race"! 37 MPG to be exact. NEVER AGAIN! I proved my point and can now move on...

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(PriusTouring07 @ Aug 11 2007, 02:50 AM) [snapback]493912[/snapback]</div>

This has been in the back of my mind for some time. Perhaps we are doing more harm than good by hypermiling in the slow lane. If we promote the image of the Prius as a slow, weak, or otherwise testosterone-challenged vehicle, we could be helping to keep more SUV Drivers from making the switch, and thus actually doing a disservice to the environment.

Perhaps if we were a bit less "cheap" with our MPG bars we would be better ambasidors for the future of automotive technology... and help make Joe Public see what this technology has to offer.

Your thaughts?

 

Hi Greenkeeper,

I am hardly hypermiling. And my mileage tells, I am at 59.2 mpg on this tank. If I was hypermiling, I would be up in the 70's mpg at least. I am using those techniques, however, but I am keeping up with traffic. What is going on is people see a Prius, and cannot believe it does what is claimed without some out-of-the-ordinary slow driving. I do pass some cars and trucks that are doing out-of-the-ordinary slow driving. There may be a large gap between me and the cars ahead at times, too, but I glide into the light before or as it turns green. I glide into stop signs with 2 or three cars still waiting to clear ahead of me. The faulty judgement is by those who see a Prius, and pass it, assuming the Prius is going slower that traffic can go, just because there is no car in imediately in front of it. Passing somebody at a stop light, in a clear lane as the light just went green has as much positive impact, as the negative impact you suggest.

This is hardly new to me, or Prius-centric. My brother and his best man took off for the his wedding in a Porshe down a road with allot of lights. I followed in another car (this was like 1980). I had allot of experience in these type of roads from driving to summer jobs during college (recession years jobs were far away unfortunately). By the time we got out of town, I was 2 miles ahead of them, having hit many of the green lights. When the best man had sprinted to and got caught by nearly every red light.

The problem is that the modern driving culture is twisted. They see a gap, they see a Prius, they assume that that guy is slowing them down. Then apply an adolescent judgement of "me first", the community be damned.

That is not to say that there are some bad Prius drivers. Around here there is this X22 black Prius with a guy fevershly texting (or even nodding off in traffic one day) around here. He is weaving all over, and up and down in speed without any careful thought. I have been caught behind him trying to pulse and glide in perfect pulse and glide traffic, and it was impossible! This is giving Prius a bad name.

On the Highway is another matter. I like to cruise at 62 (which is the slow lane speed most of the time), and the speed limit is 55 mph. But, traffic rarely lets me do that for my whole highway portion of my commute, due to congestion down into the 10 to 20 mph range. Speeding (72 or greater is the norm considered here) between the congestion zones like many drivers do is counter productive, unless one is exiting on a ramp one knows ahead of time is not jammed. This is not the case on any of the ramps off the road I drive, at the time I drive it. Besides, it gives one less time to consider the traffic pattern ahead, and how its effected by the specific vehicle types in each lane. Many people get trapped in a stopped lane for this reason.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Greenkeeper @ Aug 11 2007, 03:36 AM) [snapback]493920[/snapback]</div>

When a car is going slower than 65 in the right line, nobody thinks that it is anything other than a slow driver (or a crippled car). If you are doing the speed limit, basically 90% of all traffic is blowing by, including other Pri'i.

Very entertainingly, the Prius gets an unusual amount of bad press from very vocal sources. This causes the average Joe to bring up the subject with a Prius Driver sooner or later. (What do you do when the battery wears out after 2 years.... and creates an environmental problem afterwards?) It is VERY hard to talk to an owner of a Prius and not come away realizing that the bad press was propaganda.

I would have never thought this, but the bad press has done what no amount of advertising could accomplish.......making the larger public aware of the coming change in automobiles. For example, it was GM destroying the EV1 that made me aware of how good an electric car could be.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(donee @ Aug 11 2007, 07:50 AM) [snapback]493945[/snapback]</div>

Funny, I came to that same cruising speed too, as being the perfect one. It appears 62 is the magic number to get the most of your MPG without slowing traffic much. 65 sucks too much gas, 55 is too slow, so I was playing with the speed on my long trip this past week and came to the conclusion that 62 is the perfect speed. I'm glad to see someone else who independently came to that conclusion too.