By Jen Dunnaway

Editor

Awhile back I asked what boneheaded habits you hate the most when committed by other drivers, and you piped up with everything from tailgating to left-lane hogging to cell-phone yakking. It seems like our roads are getting more dangerous, and yes, it’s both easy and gratifying to point the finger at all those idiot drivers out there. But wait! Is there a chance that we’re contributing to the problem? Come on, fess up. Study after study has shown that virtually everyone considers themselves to be a better-than-average driver, but if that were true, the very concept of “average” would be meaningless. So you must have at least a bad habit or two that’s bugging you, or that’s gotten you in trouble before, or even caused you to wreck. And the more aware of our own bad habits we are, the more we can do to counteract them and keep from becoming a hazard on the road–and putting our rides in jeopardy.

My own bad habit is not looking far enough down the road. In defensive driving, we’re always taught to be far-sighted, scanning the road all the way to the horizon and anticipating slowdowns and trouble spots before we end up in the thick of them. But sometimes I’ll instead catch myself fixating on things in my immediate vicinity that are in danger of running into me. While that’s important, get too short-sighted on the road and you may very well, as they say in NASCAR, get caught up in someone else’s wreck. I have to consciously train myself to look further down the road than I’m naturally inclined to.

How about you? What bad driving habit of your own would you like to change?

By Jen Dunnaway

Editor

Let’s all forget for a moment that we’re probably not nearly as good behind the wheel as we all think we are, and focus unashamed on other people’s failings. For my part, I’m constantly monitoring the cars around me on the road for what I call “lane selection fail”–the idea on the part of some drivers that those dotted white lines somehow don’t apply to them. It seems that the number of drivers who blitheringly attempt to merge into my ride on a daily basis has been compounded by the growing percentage of people who are twiddling on their cell phones while simultaneously attempting to drive. So I consider it a necessity to remain ultra-vigilant against lane-wanderers, though it still bugs me every time I see people who are apparently too distracted or too important to stay in their own lane and not cause a wreck. I mean, how difficult is it, really?

How about you? What’s your biggest traffic pet peeve, or the habit that bugs you most when you see it in other drivers?

By Stephanie Porteus

HotRodHoney

From the state which took the title back from New Jersey last year for America’s worst drivers, (everyone loves New York!), here’s a look at the most common traffic laws that I see people simply ignore everyday. Read on…

Continue reading "Driving School 101: New York Edition" »

By John Naderi

StreetFire.net

See this van? Epic, eh? It was built as a rolling promotional tool for NationofGO.com. We tried something like this to promote StreetFire but our budget only allowed for a clapped-out ice cream truck, which oddly enough, gave off more of a chester vibe. To this day I don’t understand why it didn’t work; we even gave out free candy. Enough of our misconstrued marketing attempts, this post is about the Nation of GO. You might be wondering who exactly is the Nation of GO. Well… you are. Hit that jump to read more. And don’t worry we won’t be offering candy this time.

Continue reading "Won't You Make a GO Nation?" »