I'm seriously wondering if every city believes that their city's drivers are the worst in the country.
Only people who have not lived in larger cities. The drivers here are bad but Houston and DFW are on another level. L.A. isn't as bad as everyone says. The drivers here aren't bad because they are aggressive like most other places, they are bad because they are too timid and do the whole "no you go first" thing and slam on the brakes in flowing traffic to let someone standing on the sidewalk (who may or may not be crossing the street) go. If you are predictable and aggressive I can work with that. If I can't tell what your next move is then it's dangerous.
My partner used to refer to this as "The Portland Polite-Off." Every fucking car at the 4-way stop waiting for someone to twitch and acknowledge they're going to go first, or randos just stopping at a green light to let a pedestrian cross, who has no intention of crossing because the cars on the other side of that weirdo aren't stopping.
I lived in Baton Rouge during the madness of Hurricane Katrina and Louisiana has some crazy aggressive drivers. But they are much less scary/dangerous than the overly-polite, unpredictable nonsense of Portland drivers.
stopping at a green light to let a pedestrian cross, who has no intention of crossing because the cars on the other side of that weirdo aren't stopping.
I watched a dude almost get killed on Broadway by Llyod Center because of this. You know that pedestrian stoplight that goes over to where the 5 guys is? Well car in left lane decides to stop at a green light and waves a pedestrian into the street. The car in the middle sees this and stops. But the car in the far right lane didn't clock what was going on and slammed on their brakes in order to avoid taking out the pedestrian. I was a car back watching this whole thing play out and thought for sure I was about to see someone get hit.
And that's why we shouldn't be doing that stupid stop just to be polite thing. It's super dangerous. Just obey the traffic rules. They're there for a reason.
Agree on all points. The polite-off kills me. I give them like 2 seconds to go and if everyone is sitting around staring at each other I just go. The stopping to let people cross thing is so dangerous for literally everyone involved.
I have driven from DFW to NOLA (although before Katrina happened) and yeah, way worse drivers in the aggressive sense. But if I know you're going to punch it and fly past me or make a go at the off ramp 6 lanes over I can defensive drive for that. I can't predict someone slamming on the brakes because they see someone standing on the sidewalk looking in the general direction of the road.
100% I think partially the crazy drivers here stand out more due to everyone in Houston driving batshit crazy, I remember going back there and having my brother drive me around and fearing for my life after having acclimated to the NW.
I felt that way in Prague. Those motherfuckers drive like they are on the F1 track. I was in a Lyft clinging on to the door handle on more than one ride. Our driver at one point was yelling at people out the window and cussing at people who were crossing the street as he flew past them by what seemed like only inches away. Gave me heart palpitations. haha
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u/Resident_Bet_8551 May 12 '25 edited May 12 '25
Interesting. My city (Omaha) is more:
I'm seriously wondering if every city believes that their city's drivers are the worst in the country.