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Hard-braking events as indicators of road segment crash risk

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Re: Hard-braking events as indicators of road segment crash risk

#211

Post by ryandrake »

dghlsakjg wrote: post #99
munificent wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does one not already know that they had a hard braking event? Surely the jamming their foot on the brake pedal and the rapid deceleration would send an even more obvious signal than playing a chime?

A lot of people don’t realize that what they consider normal driving is actually aggressive driving by other metrics

I know way too many drivers who have exactly two modes: Full brakes and full accelerator. Like, they'll see someone in front of them, slam the gas pedal, and then when they get too close, slam the brakes to slow down. No in between. And they don't even know they're terrible drivers since they've always driven this way.

Re: Hard-braking events as indicators of road segment crash risk

#212

Post by [deleted] »

presidentender wrote: post #20

I got one of those dongles from my insurance company that plugged into the ODB2 port and reported my driving habits. I was a bad driver. It would frequently beep at me to let me know that I had braked too hard. I was mystified. "What should I have done differently," I'd think, as I raged at the objective machine that judged me so. The next time my brother came to visit, he called mom. "Oh, and presidentender is a goo…

[deleted]

Re: Hard-braking events as indicators of road segment crash risk

#213

Post by Sohcahtoa82 »

mountain_peak wrote: post #46
presidentender wrote: post #20

I got one of those dongles from my insurance company that plugged into the ODB2 port and reported my driving habits. I was a bad driver. It would frequently beep at me to let me know that I had braked too hard. I was mystified. "What should I have done differently," I'd think, as I raged at the objective machine that judged me so. The next time my brother came to visit, he called mom. "Oh, and presidentender is a goo…

Maintaining a safe following distance is incredibly challenging on busy freeways where hard braking is often 'required'. Most people have likely found themselves in this situation: vehicle changes lanes in front of you; you slow down to maintain a safe following distance, another car sees a gap and changes lanes in front of you. Repeat for your entire commute. Incredibly frustrating, and I've driven all over North Am…

> vehicle changes lanes in front of you;

I will never understand why this is so rage-inducing for people.

Changing lanes is a necessary part of navigating, even during busy traffic. People on an on-ramp will need to get in front of somebody. People needing to move back to the right because their exist is coming up will need to get in front of somebody.

Your lane is not a birth right. Let people merge.

> you slow down to maintain a safe following distance, another car sees a gap and changes lanes in front of you. Repeat for your entire commute.

This happens because literally everyone is tailgating each other so hard that the gap in front of you is the only gap that exists for people to change lanes to either get on or off the highway.

Re: Hard-braking events as indicators of road segment crash risk

#214

Post by streetfighter64 »

MostlyStable wrote: post #174
kube-system wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you think people are going to cut in front of you, provide a safety cushion large enough to account for that. Aggressive drivers almost universally will consume the forward part of the space cushion you leave. At most you will simply need to lift the accelerator to maintain space. The only time someone cutting in front of you should require hard braking is if they also brake hard. It does require patience to do th…

I'm not sure it's that negligible. Mythbusters found that weaving in and out of traffic could save between 5 and twenty-five percent. Now A) Mythbusters did an experiment with an N of like 4 or something, along a single commute in the Bay Area, so it's basically anecdote and I'd love a better source if one existed, but it is at the very least proof-by-existence that larger impacts on travel time _can_ happen. And the…

25% of time saved corresponds to increasing your average speed by 1/(1-0.25)=33%, for example from 45 to 60.

Re: Hard-braking events as indicators of road segment crash risk

#215

Post by duncangh »

its_magic wrote: post #202
cucumber3732842 wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I was never honked at, even by the crazy semi truck drivers. Because you were towing a camper and "slow and in the right lane" fits people's mental model of how recreational/nonprofessional heavy traffic or otherwise "handicapped" vehicles ought to behave. When you have problems is when you behave to a standard beneath what other people expect from whatever kind of traffic you are.

In the Atlanta area I've experienced a few times people FLYING up on me in the right hand lane while I'm cruising along at a conservative, gas sipping 55 MPH in my old truck, blaring their horn at me like I'm some kind of maniac. I don't want to live on this planet anymore.

Driving and living in Atlanta after living in Charleston and Raleigh felt like transitioning from a modern cooperative society to an island of cannibals. The amount of aggression needed to change lanes largely regardless of attempts to signal good faith and politeness is baffling. Driving is a fascinating ritual with vastly differing norms across regions. It would be interesting to learn if anthropologists have studied this

Re: Hard-braking events as indicators of road segment crash risk

#216

Post by olyjohn »

cucumber3732842 wrote: post #186
kube-system wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you think people are going to cut in front of you, provide a safety cushion large enough to account for that. Aggressive drivers almost universally will consume the forward part of the space cushion you leave. At most you will simply need to lift the accelerator to maintain space. The only time someone cutting in front of you should require hard braking is if they also brake hard. It does require patience to do th…

Letting a large fraction of the freeway cut in front of you will turn normal drivers behind you aggressive, or at least aggressive enough to go around you. There's a balance to be struck.

Oh no! Cars will go around you!

Re: Hard-braking events as indicators of road segment crash risk

#217

Post by cloudfudge »

mlyle wrote: post #147
appreciatorBus wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. If people are constantly moving into your appropriate head way this is doubtless annoying but the correct response is allow yourself to decelerate slowly to re-open that space again, repeat as many times as necessary, even if it means a bunch of agros end up in front of you. Better for them to be in front where you can see them, than behind or to the side, were you can't.

Yah. There's something that feels unjust about it -- the perception that the people cutting are getting something over on you -- that causes us to want to behave badly. But even if 2 dozen people go around you and creep into that following space, you've been cost like 45 seconds at worst. Better not to play the game.

Also, it really doesn't happen that often. I'm that guy following at 3 or 4 car lengths in rush hour traffic and people aren't constantly funneling in front of me. It's a hypothetical "problem" that is bigger in your head than in reality.

Sometimes I think it's just people's reflexive scarcity mindset that tells them "that spot must not be that desirable or someone would be in it."

Regarding the broader topic of hitting your brakes, I find that I can commute 20 miles in stop and go traffic and only tap my brakes a couple of times. Helps to pace yourself behind the car 3 cars ahead of you instead of the guy right in front of you.

Re: Hard-braking events as indicators of road segment crash risk

#218

Post by loeg »

Sohcahtoa82 wrote: post #213
mountain_peak wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maintaining a safe following distance is incredibly challenging on busy freeways where hard braking is often 'required'. Most people have likely found themselves in this situation: vehicle changes lanes in front of you; you slow down to maintain a safe following distance, another car sees a gap and changes lanes in front of you. Repeat for your entire commute. Incredibly frustrating, and I've driven all over North Am…

> vehicle changes lanes in front of you; I will never understand why this is so rage-inducing for people. Changing lanes is a necessary part of navigating, even during busy traffic. People on an on-ramp will need to get in front of somebody . People needing to move back to the right because their exist is coming up will need to get in front of somebody . Your lane is not a birth right. Let people merge. > you slow do…

It's frustrating when it eats into your safe following distance. The driver merging in ahead of you is being dangerous and not leaving a safe following distance for themselves (or you).

Re: Hard-braking events as indicators of road segment crash risk

#219

Post by maerF0x0 »

Sohcahtoa82 wrote: post #213
mountain_peak wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maintaining a safe following distance is incredibly challenging on busy freeways where hard braking is often 'required'. Most people have likely found themselves in this situation: vehicle changes lanes in front of you; you slow down to maintain a safe following distance, another car sees a gap and changes lanes in front of you. Repeat for your entire commute. Incredibly frustrating, and I've driven all over North Am…

> vehicle changes lanes in front of you; I will never understand why this is so rage-inducing for people. Changing lanes is a necessary part of navigating, even during busy traffic. People on an on-ramp will need to get in front of somebody . People needing to move back to the right because their exist is coming up will need to get in front of somebody . Your lane is not a birth right. Let people merge. > you slow do…

It's frustrating because someone is taking your safety buffer as their opportunity to travel faster. And it results in you having to travel slower and slower to maintain the gap that is constantly consumed, tragedy of the commons style, by opportunists.

Re: Hard-braking events as indicators of road segment crash risk

#220

Post by rconti »

tadfisher wrote: post #178
rconti wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even that can be tricky, with the indecisive behavior people use when merging.

That one's easy: leave space in front of you for those merging onto the highway. So much of road etiquette boils down to leaving adequate space so others can maneuver around you. Trying to optimize your travel by destroying any gaps as soon as they appear actually has the opposite effect.

It's really not. I drive at an upper-percentile pace, so I am rarely dawdling along in the right lane.

However, on the rare occasion I've found myself going slowly in the right lane, it's stunning how incompetent most people are at merging. It's like they don't even consider looking for an opening in traffic, matching the freeway speed, etc. They just lumber in front of you at 43mph, and maybe, if you're lucky, look in their mirrors after they've already caused you to slow for them.

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