Idiot drivers

[Hank W.]

except for the really big ones with lights like Vihdintie

Bah, that didn't get lights until in the 1990's

[PeterF]

. I think I was born with a psychological right of way

Something to do with your signature...

Y Ddraig Goch ddyry gychwyn

For those not familair with Taffy Lingo...

The Red dragon leads the way...(but not against Ireland last week end!)

[PeterF]

I just always wondered why, in Finland, you always have to try and look around the corner to see if you can spot the BACK of a give way sign on the road to the right. Why couldn't they make them double sided?

Goes back to what Hank was saying, They would need to put a couple of extra people in prison to paint the other side of the signs

The back of a give way sign is quite easy to spot..it is a "Kolmio/Triangle"..
Just a slight deviation...Finnish joke on the subject.."why do women's farts come out much slower and quieter than mens?".. answer.."because they come from behind a kolmio!"

[Ian]

Just to add a bit of common sense to this!! Instead of looking for the absence of a back to front triangle on a right hand junction, why do they not just put a give way sign in front of me? Don't confuse the issue with Hanks big yellow and black square 2 miles up the road!! Just tell me to give way with a sign!!
Easy really!!
Don't get me started on tailgating though!! You have your car, I have mine - Please don't try to park your car in my back set!!

[TobyA]

I find English mini-roundabouts a pain. However, I think the caller who writes that Finns are not good with roundabouts has a point: they are pretty much a novelty here, except for the really big ones with lights like Vihdintie, and on the smaller residential area ones that are now popping up, some people seem to have got the procedure ass-backwards.

My father-in-law stops on the roundabout to give way to cars on the right!!! I think a public info campaign is needed.

Have argued the following with friends: you are approaching a roundabout with four exits (for sake of convenience you are coming from South) You want to go West (3/4 of the way around). I always indicate left to do this, showing drivers coming from North that once I am on the roundabout I will pass in front of them. This is what my driving instructor in the UK taught me and I think it says it in the "Highway Code". But my Finnish friends claim you mustn't indicate at all if you are going west - or not until you are nearly 3/4 of the way around and will indicate right (leaving the roundabout). If I'm sitting at the south entrance to the roundabout, looking at cars at the north - who have no indicators on at all, from a British driving back ground I presume they will just come straight over and exit south, hence I can pull on to the roundabout. But here they might be going south OR they might be going East (3/4 around) meaning they will come infront of me. This has led to some squealing of brakes. Lots of traffic rules are different, but make sense - but with this there doesn't seem to be any reason not to use your indicator, it just complicates things.

[Hank W.]

Well, the thing is, if you have a yield/stop sign, that means you have to give way to *both directions*. And yielding from the right is not both ways is it?

There is another sign though that is used to show funky intersections:
http://www.tieh.fi/liikennemerkit/images/162.gif

[neil]

Riding to work this morning - I come out of a side road, on to a slightly busier main road. There is a pavement on the otherside of the road, but the snowplough has ensured there is a 50 cm high wall of now icy debris seperating it from the road. I ride down the road. After about 200 mtrs there is sudden and long, loud beep of someones horn. Some volvo-driving fat idiot decides to scare the life out of me for having the audacity to use the road for, well, errr, travelling on. He drives past (giving me about 5 cms of clearance) vigourously gesticulating his annoyance. I tried to give him the finger except am wearing goretex over-mitts which makes this difficult, leading to an even more enraged mood as a result. It is lucky he didn't stop because I'm sure I would have hit him.

This isn't 'a foreigner thing' (admittedly, in Britain it is illegal to ride a bike on the pavement, so I have been riding on roads for the last 25 yrs of my life), I think the provision of cycle paths in Helsinki is excellent and I use them a lot - infact of my ride to work I supect that 95 percent of it is on cycle paths. This morning I was on the road for a reason: that I couldn't get onto the cycle path. Is there a law that says that cyclist must use the pavement? If so the law is an ass. I was travelling at about 25 kmph. On my road bike in the summer (where I have also been beeped, although less agressively) I can reach speeds of 50 kmph + downhill and easily do 30 kmph on the flat. Do parents of young kids want people doing 25 kmph riding on the pavement next to little kids who tend not to keep walking in predictable straight lines as adults do? One of my mates was stopped on his bike by the cops and told to get off the pavement because he was going to fast, so it would seem that if there is a law about this the police won't enforce it.

At the time there was no other traffic coming either way, I had lights on despite the sunshine, and I was riding on the edge of the road.

I'm now going to add prejudice against cyclists (as opposed to the average British drivers mere indifference) to my list of prejudices against Finnish drivers, right up there with a complete inability to grasp the concept of a round-about, using indicators, and over-taking on the inside.

Any other cyclists had similar experiences?

I hear you.

I dont cycle here hardly at all. Here is my story: http://www...com/bb/viewtopic.php?t=821

[Slothrop]

I find English mini-roundabouts a pain. However, I think the caller who writes that Finns are not good with roundabouts has a point: they are pretty much a novelty here, except for the really big ones with lights like Vihdintie, and on the smaller residential area ones that are now popping up, some people seem to have got the procedure ass-backwards.

My father-in-law stops on the roundabout to give way to cars on the right!!! I think a public info campaign is needed.

Have argued the following with friends: you are approaching a roundabout with four exits (for sake of convenience you are coming from South) You want to go West (3/4 of the way around). I always indicate left to do this, showing drivers coming from North that once I am on the roundabout I will pass in front of them. This is what my driving instructor in the UK taught me and I think it says it in the "Highway Code". But my Finnish friends claim you mustn't indicate at all if you are going west - or not until you are nearly 3/4 of the way around and will indicate right (leaving the roundabout). If I'm sitting at the south entrance to the roundabout, looking at cars at the north - who have no indicators on at all, from a British driving back ground I presume they will just come straight over and exit south, hence I can pull on to the roundabout. But here they might be going south OR they might be going East (3/4 around) meaning they will come infront of me. This has led to some squealing of brakes. Lots of traffic rules are different, but make sense - but with this there doesn't seem to be any reason not to use your indicator, it just complicates things.

Yup. I agree. At least in principle. The only explanation I can offer is bedded in the bit of your text where you say "presume" and "hence I can". It may be they simply want to keep it so that you CAN'T second-guess the other cars.

To give you a somewhat similar example. Well, I hope it is, but now I come to think about it.. - well ANYWAY...

There's a T-junction I drive past regularly, in which I'm on the main road, and there's a triangle for the cars who are coming out from the minor road to the right. My road goes straight on or turns right into the minor road. This is deep residential Espoo, so most of the traffic is local and knows the area well.

It so happens that most of the traffic travelling in the direction that I am travelling TURNS RIGHT into the minor road. Only about 30% goes straight on. Cars sitting at the junction waiting to come out often tend to "presume" that I will be turning right. Quite often they come out in front of me, leaving me no option but to blast them with my twin Valkyrie horns and wave my fist at them. There is seldom much danger of an accident in these cases, as I'm already prepared to have to stop because it's happened so often. In this case they are second-guessing that I will turn, despite my lack of indicator.

It's got so bad that on another T-junction not far from there, again going straight on or right, I've taken to indicating LEFT (the road veers around to the left in the "straight on" direction), in order to say "Hey, £$€¤%&, NO, I'm not turning right, and NO, you can't come".

I'm not sure what the law would make of this, but if they bust me for frivolous indicating, then the law is an ass.

[Hank W.]

The rule of indicat9ing: the 'channel' you are on goes 'straight'; if you turn 'off' your channel you show an indicator. If you are a taxi you show it with one blink, if you are a bus you show the blink after you turn the wheels and are halfway off the stop, I've noticed.

Showing a blinker on a 'straight' road indicates you are going into a yard, dropping off your granny or doing something else silly.

What comes to the roundabouts, generally the one in the roundabout has a right of way, but I've encountered a few where the ones in the roundabout have triangles and the ones coming in have the right-of way. Damn confusing.

And don't let me start on the naming standards of Intersections. Is it PORI or VIHTI and what the hell is BEMBÖLE if you wish to turn to VANHA TURUNTIE...

[eashton]

The rule of indicat9ing: the 'channel' you are on goes 'straight'; if you turn 'off' your channel you show an indicator. If you are a taxi you show it with one blink, if you are a bus you show the blink after you turn the wheels and are halfway off the stop, I've noticed.

Showing a blinker on a 'straight' road indicates you are going into a yard, dropping off your granny or doing something else silly.

In Boston, the rule of signals/indicators is very simple: only tourists and the weak are so stupid as to give away their game plan when barrelling around a roundabout or intersections or, well, anywhere.

[bohica]

Over the last couple of years I have driven hundreds of thousand Kms all over the world, and without a doubt Finnish drivers are among the most courteous and careful I have come across!

As for the road systems, are they better or worse than those in your home country? or just different? Sure there are things in Finland that drive me nuts, but then roundabouts at just about every junction that will fit one in the UK seems insane to me!

So as has been said in several other threads on this site, if you live in Finland accept that things are different and learn to live with the differences, and STOP BLOODY MOANING!!!!

I haven't been anywhere where people didn't bitch about the way the locals drive. Does such a place exist?

Not sure if people in Finland drive better or worse than in the western U.S. On the one hand people here are very, very good about staying out of the left lane. On the downside, they really, really like to tailgate here. Can anyone explain to me why someone would tailgate in the right lane on a 4-lane highway with no other traffic? I see it all the time. I mean, if you can pass, why tailgate? And why is it that as soon as I'm getting ready to pass a car which is tailgating someone in the right lane on a 4-lane highway, he decides to cut me off and pass the car in front of him right before I would have passed him? Other than those two really weird things (which I've seen a lot), it's pretty good.

CA has a different problem - people are more polite, but they're not paying attention - making phone calls, eating breakfast, etc...

The worst driving I've ever seen is in Turkey. In fact, it sucks so bad that the State Department even has an 8-page warning about what to watch out for there. It's pretty amusing. Check it out at: http://travel.state.gov/turkdrv.html

It'll make you see Finland in a whole new light.

[TobyA]

The worst driving I've ever seen is in Turkey. In fact, it sucks so bad that the State Department even has an 8-page warning about what to watch out for there. It's pretty amusing. Check it out at: http://travel.state.gov/turkdrv.html

It'll make you see Finland in a whole new light.

I'll see your Turkey, and raise you India. Anyone here been to New Delhi and tried to get across Connaught Place? Or even worse than the city - the Delhi to Chandigarh "motorway". Done it twice now, seen lots of crashes with some dead people involved both times - that's enough for this lifetime thanks.

Haven't been to Africa at all, but Indian driving is the worse I've seen in Asia.

[Hank W.]

State Department even has an 8-page warning about what to watch out for there.

Key Motoring Terms
Kismet........................Fate
Allah korusun.................May God protect me (sign on many trucks)

[PeterF]

Haven't been to Africa at all, but Indian driving is the worse I've seen in Asia.

I will see your New Dehli India (been there yes it is crazy) but I raise you Egypt...
Cario Ramasees Square...for square read "round about"..huge...8 road intersection out side the main railway station..gets a bit busy 10000 vehicles an hour....mix of 2 x 4 lane high ways, and several minor roads, plus entry exit to railway station..traffic lights, when they work, are usualy ignored...traffic....mix of cars and taxis which dont seem have breaks only horns..lorries of vintages from New MB and Volvos, to WW 11 vintage 10 toners left behind in desert by Monty/Rommel and resurrected by an arab who is still learning what gears are! Add to the scene several 1000 pedestrians..and a frequent 50 x camel caravan which walks into the middle of this mess.
Into the stage centre trots Ali the Water seller with his donkey cart...just in front of the main intersection wheel falls from cart.
Policeman who has been trying to direct traffic from safety of raised pedestal climbs down and proceeds to kick seven shades of Sh!"¤Te out of Ali as he tries to replace wheel.
Not much going to move today...Scene typical.