Pet Peeves?

Pet Peeves? I've got a few (dozen) and I'm sure you do too...
Top of my list this month relates to driving and aggressive drivers because the world doesn't have enough.

There was a time when we only had red and green lights. I was probably a kid when they added a yellow light to let drivers know the red light was only a few seconds away. The timing on the yellow varies depending on the length of the intersection and it allows drivers ample time to get through safely before the light turns red.

What's worse is the multi-lane left turn where they have an arrow (or arrows) and typically when the lights turn red, on coming traffic has the go-ahead. That doesn't stop 5 or 6 cars from pushing through their left turn on a red light, forcing oncoming traffic to wait.

Please, Department of Transportation, deputize me and set me up at a busy corner with full ticket recording video machines (and a full length bullet proof body suit) to catch offenders at an average of 5 for every 4 minutes it takes for the lights to cycle.

I'll work for commission. Tickets for running a red light are $75 and and 10% seems fair. That calculates to 48 tickets per hour or $360 per hour. I'll show up on rush hour morning and night 5 days a week. That's enough to quit my day job!

I haven't seen a driver's handbook in a few years, but a car approaching an intersection to make a left turn, is to remain stopped until they can safely complete the turn. You can be ticketed for crawling out and stopping diagonally along the median waiting for the other side to clear. While everyone does this, they've been doing it for years as though it's correct. The same thing goes for a right turn on red. They leave out a small detail of AFTER FULL STOP.

U-Turn yield to right turn. I was making a right (with a right turn arrow) and had to brake or a driver making a U-Turn would have hit me. Yeah... the sign (he ignored) was clearly there.
That's probably the same skill-set for the people who make U-Turns on a red light.

The most irritating and dangerous is 'charging the intersection' aka anticipation turns. Back to the 6 lane road with turn lanes and wide median. You're driving along in the outside lane, no one behind you. A driver from oncoming traffic wants to make a U-Turn (or left turn) and starts his turn BEFORE you reach his car. That means he's already 110 degrees into a 180 turn. If someone in front of you shows down and you hit the brakes, the driver making the synchronized U-Turn has a good chance of hitting your rear side.
I was in the middle lane when someone made a wide right turn into my lane at the same time another car was charging the intersection. Anticipation of a disaster, I leaned on the horn and both drivers realizing their stupidity, cut back avoiding a 3-car collision.

That should qualify my pet peeves for the month of December. Stay tuned there could be a cameo later in the month.