My thoughts:

1- Pay attention always! 2- Learn from your close calls and mistakes 3- Defensive driving: always give a "cushion" for mistakes by others or yourself. Look out for risky situations. 4- If you are stressed, tired, or feeling angry at other drivers, give yourself a chance to rest or cool down.

I consider myself within the lower end of the safe driver spectrum. There is always more to learn, always things to get better at.

(18m) I am nearly finished with my learners permit but whenever my mom is with me in the car it is so irritatting and stresses me out. If I make the smallest mistakes or if I accelerate a tiny bit too fast she gets flustered and in hand causes me to get annoyed. She has this passive aggressive tone for some reason. I told her once that I don't want to drive back home becuase I just felt stressed at that time and did not want to cause an accident. She insisted I still drive which made me even more annoyed. Whenever I drive with my dad or instructor not only do I drive better, I find myself calm and relaxed and drive perfectly fine. Thankfully my driving test is coming up soon so I wont have to have other people in the car. (Just confused as to why this happens with my mom because we have a perfectly good realationship outside of driving and we never get annoyed at eachother)

I passed my license test 2 days ago, but the problem is I am scared to drive because my mom's always like "well you need to practice more with your sister, take someone with you", I get that but I'm 21 now and when am I ever going to be able to do things alone when she always wants me to do everything with someone , my mom doesn't even have a license and she started driving at 25 alone so why is it that she can drive with no license but she won't allow me ? I'm only scared to drive because she's making me feel less confident.

I almost missed a right turn on a 3 lane road, and I was on the furthest lane. I stopped at the turn (in the middle of the road) waited until the other 2 lanes were clear and cut all the way through. People were honking (because i stopped traffic) and giving me weird looks (obviously, what i did was very much illegal.)

Looking back on it now, I dont know why i didnt just keep driving and let my gps reroute. I made such a reckless decision. At least its safe to say i wont ever do that again.

Because they are looking at their phone instead of the road and their surroundings. That's 70% of the reason. Any time I see someone doing something stupid, I look over and usually see them on the phone.

• Inconsistent speeds? Eyes on the phone, foot off the throttle; Eyes off the phone, foot on the throttle. Repeat
• Left lane hogs? Why look in the mirror and see the line of cars waiting to pass when you can look at the phone
• 20 mph under? Why even look at surroundings?! This text is more important.
• No blinker? They'd have to put down the phone to use it

Coming from the college (The street in the first picture) and you want to turn left, when the light is green is it an unprotected left turn you must yield to?
https://gyazo.com/25f33d53ea23b4cd8270cb23ff309d6c
https://gyazo.com/a5a6097f275fcff93a3379a702e29901
(sorry for the lack of visibility, google maps doesn't help much. let me know if more pictures are needed)

Hi, I'm 23 and wanted finally to get my license, but I wanted to train on my parents car first before going to auto-school, so I asked my dad if he can coach me, we went to a quite empty space with few cars going, and began to learn the basics, once I took a grasp of the basic swapping maneuvers, we went on a quick tour, and I tried to do a U-turn but the angle wasn't big enough so I was going right to a side walk, my dad told me to brake, I pressed full gas, he scare-jumped and screamed to brake, I re-gased, we went all the way through the side walk, we would've hit a car parked in the other side if I re advanced, that's when I took my feet off the pedals, few seconds of chock, I went out of the car and dad replaced the car, he didn't act scared so he doesn't freak me out, but me, my whole body was shaking out of fear. after couple turns, I noticed that puppies came to the same spot a jammed the car into, few minutes before.

While I know that its just a quick fear that will go away, I dread that it grows into a trauma that I might kill someone while driving.

I was the first car stopped at a temporary traffic light with a police car behind me. My friend was sat beside me and we were in active conversation. I stupidly got a mind blank and crossed the red light but as I was doing this I realised what I had done! I immediately pulled up to the left, even before the police turned on their lights to gesture to me (they didn't put on sirens as I was compliant straight away and wasn't going at any speed at all!) A young officer (probs mid-late 20s?) came to my window and said "that was clearly a red" to which I apologised profusely, acknowledged my wrongdoing and stated that I don't know why I just did that. The officer seemed confused with my action and repeated "but that was clearly a red". I repeated my applogies again and he nodded and just walked back to his car. I drove off and he drove off the same.

He didn't ask any details from me- my name, license, any suggestion of a penalty, anything. I was in a state of shock of what I had just done, so didn't question him about what would happen next either.

Now, I'm wondering whether I'm going to get a fine in the post within 14 days or points on my license. Has anyone had an experience like this?? I'm now googling and the unknown is scaring me! Advice pls!

I don't get people that NEED to be in front of you. This has happened to all of us. Let's say the speed limit is 50 miles per hour you are speeding going 65 so the distance between you and the car behind you is probably 5 or 6 car lengths away or more yet a person that needs to get into your lane will DELIBERATELY speed up and go faster then you to get in front of you. There is plenty of room behind you. Yet they seem to need to get in front of you. Why do people even do this? I live in Albuquerque and this crap happens a lot here.

I recently got my permit & want my license/car so I can increase my income but I am in a dilemma of how to even get my license. I don’t know anybody where I live or have anyone I could ask with a DL who can be in the vehicle with me per my permit instructions but I also wanna avoid paying hundreds just to borrow a companies car for a couple hours to take the DL test.

Please let me know if there’ll be any other option or if I must pay a driver school to borrow their car in order to get my DL, thank you!

This happened to me yesterday. The guy just parked for a lone time and finally I went when it wasn’t my turn. I was never to go but don’t understand why people do go when it their turn and hold everyone else up. It’s super annoying. It’s also dangerous because if he parks somebody else will go and if he finally decided to go at the same time there could be a crash.

Good evening all, I live in a small town in New England, and I was driving around with my friend as there isn't much else to do here. Anyway, we go down a narrow gravel road coveredd in ice which is a bad idea to begin with and then it goes DOWNHILL. We get to the bottom and try to turn around, but halfway up the hill, my traction control flashes and we start sliding backward. Terrified, I didn't know what to do, so I just said "fuck it" and floored it trying to just use straight momentum over the hill. It (somehow) worked and we made it out but the adrenaline is still surging through me. Anyone have a similar experience?

Turns out not only am I not good at parallel parking, but I suck with reversing and using my ORVMs in general.

So I have some questions regarding that and if I am unable to make myself clear in English (as it's my second language, so I apologise if you have trouble understanding what I am writing), you can use the photos as reference even through the photos look like they were made by a 4 year old :)

1. When reversing into a cramped parking lot where when you try to reverse into a spot you have to be mindful of the cars in front as well, how do you judge distances using your ORVMs, like how do you know that your rear bumper is aligned to the bumper of the car which is occupying the parking lot next to where you want to turn to. Here's a photo, in this how do we know that the rear left of the blue car is aligned with the front left of the car number 2 using ORVM? I can't gauge distances using ORVM so any idea?
2. So when you are reversing into the parking lot, there is a chance that you haven't done it right and the rear mid (or the rear left or the rear right) of your car is about to hit the parked car, how do we judge that distance provided we don't have a camera and the hood of the parked car is not visible through the IRVM and the rear windshied.. Here's a photo, in this how do we know that rear mid, rear left, or the rear right of the car is about to hit the parked car, that is, how do we know whether it's about to hit the parked car 1?
3. Even when we have cameras and when we're reversing how do we know whether the corner of the car is going to scrape through the parked car where we're reversing and how do we actually gauge that distance through the ORVM? Here's a photo, how do even with camera we realise that it's not going to hit the car parked 1, like how do we realise that how far away the blue car is from the car 1 when it's parked using the ORVM?

These are some of my questions, sorry to put you through these absolutely atrocious and childish drawings but this is how I could've actually explained what I was trying to as I am not a native speaker, as you've seen a lot of my questions are about judging how much is the distance between the rear of the car and the object using ORVM but no matter how much I practice when I look into the ORVM, I have no idea how far the car actually is, it's like mirror somehow removed depth, I can't judge the distances as I could when I look from the ORVM.

I would be grateful if somebody could take the time to answer this, it has been really bugging me, I genuinely appreciate any and all advices that you guys have to give.

Edit: Guys this is the kind of parking lot I am talking about. And also, as I talked about earlier how do I gauge the distances using ORVM?

Edit2: People have suggested here to make an angle before starting to reverse first, my question is at what point do I know that I should go for an angle such that when I reverse the car, the car ends up in between the two cars, how do I judge that?

Why does it seem to be so difficult for some to make a left turn from a multi lane road to a multi lane road and stay in their lane?

Whatever lane you're in before you make the left turn. Stay in that same lane after you make the left turn. Simple as that.

If you know that after you make the left turn you need to be in a certain lane. Then get in that lane BEFORE you make the left turn.

i’m a beginner driver and today I needed to merge into the lane on my right. I checked my mirrors and I was sure I had enough space, but the person on my right honked at me as soon as I merged. am i stupid for still feeling bad? she looked like an old woman

M16 probably not relevant but I just got my license so i went on a night drive with my boys of course and I won’t lie I think i cut off some ram truck driver with lifts on a right on red and i was scared as fuck so i tried to drive away and he caught up to me and this dude just flashed his high beams at me then pulled to the other lane cursed me out and flicked me off, i’ve never felt so emasculated in my life and i’ve been wondering what I was suppose to do since, I had a fake gun should I have waved it at him? should I have asked him to pull to the side and fight? the issue is that he would probably beat my ass so I didn’t know what to do and i just took the humiliation and moved on, if you were in my shoes what would you have done?

I'm young and broke, I bought a car last year but unfortunately haven't had the money to insure it. Stupid, I know, I promise I've learned my lesson. Not gonna happen again.

Anyways, my fiance has been using my car to drive to and from work as well as pick me up from work as well. Today, it was incredibly slick and as my fiance was exiting a parking garage he slid and bumped into a parked car going maybe 5 mph. Decent sized dent. We waited for the owners to talk to them, explained we didn't have insurence and waited around while they called the police.

Well, even though it wasn't me driving I got the ticket. $150 fine, and 2 points on my license.

My question is- does anyone know if this is gonna cause me issues when I try to get my license later on? I'm not sure what comes after this!

There are so many people who drive without their headlights on.

I see so many people driving with only their daytime running lights (or no lights at all) on either in the pitch dark, fog, or other low-visibility situations and it enrages me.

People also drive with their parking lights on at night which illuminates their DRL’s, taillights, and side marker lights; no low beams. Like, can’t you not see the fuckin’ road? I have a slight struggle to see the road sometimes with regular low beams on due to an astigmatism which causes light sensitivity and if I had just the parking lights on I’d be completely blind.

Someone I knew had a Kia, and the low beam indicator and the high beam indicator were the same symbol on the dash, but the high beam was blue and the low beam was green. The parking light indicator (small circle with 2 flares coming out of the sides) is also used for the low beam indicator in some vehicles. This person had his parking lights on which he believed were his low beams and I saw him driving, told him only his parking lights were on, and he believed that the low beams were the high beams.

But, did he not ever use the high beams? Did he know they were there? Maybe he thought the real high beams were super high beams? Anyway, he thanked me for telling him why he couldn’t see shit at night.

I drive a lot of rental cars and I always make sure the lights are on when they’re supposed to be. I also rarely use automatic headlights because sometimes they don’t come on when I want them to and constantly am checking them in lower-visibility situations where I think headlights are appropriate where some people or the car will not deem them necessary; think a Florida pouring down sunshower where there’s sun but not much visibility plus the law is to have lights on in the rain. If I’m going to have anxiety about it not doing what I want it to do, I’d rather just take care of it myself. It’s also like a mental checklist I go through when I get in a car. For example: Is it dark out? Okay, lights on. My seatbelt is on. Is it hot out? A/C is on. It’s raining so I’ll make sure the windows are up, and the list goes on.

TLDR; people are fuckin stupid for not driving with proper lights on. Emphasis on “people are fuckin stupid”.

Rant over. Thanks for reading!

Why?????!!!!!! Just pull into a spot. There is an entire area right there full of spots specifically to allow you to be stopped without blocking traffic. Use them!

Hi guys, not sure if this is the right place to post this, but I saw a video go around in the past few months and I just can’t find it at all.

It was dashcam footage and the car in front changes lanes at the very last second revealing an obstacle in front of them and there is a truck to the right and it was a close call. The front driver should have indicated and not changed lanes so late to let the driver behind have more time to see the obstacle. I could be wrong but please help.

I just pulled up to a walmart parking lot. Two different cars, the second worse than the first but still! Both cars just pulled right up trying to not stop at the stop signs, the second guy came right after the first and just tried to straight up hit me! Egregious and just don’t care at all.

That is not even the first terrible thing that happened today either. Idk what it is, whether people are desperate or insane but they truly do not want me to drive literally anywhere and I don’t know what makes it so appealing to constantly try and crash into me but that is what it seems like because it is entirely too frequent. I cannot even log every attempt because it happens so freaking often.

A dash cam is not very convenient but the one thing it does is make them run away and hide. I swear these people are just real brazen insurance scammers.

I got got. I received a speeding enforcement ticket in the mail a few days ago. Whether nor not I was speeding isn’t exactly my issue but what put me off was a penalty that was added to said speeding ticket. It said I received my first one from NOVEMBER 2024 (almost 3 months ago now) and didn’t respond by December and so an extra $20 was added on. I can say with almost 99% confidence that I never received any speeding ticket in November, I would’ve seen it and responded immediately to it and I wasn’t out of town or anything so there’s no way I missed it. This is my first speeding ticket btw and I think the system of sending only one ticket and then giving someone a month to respond and then sending another a month later with a penalty added is such a broken system. I’m sure they’re hoping people don’t receive the first just so they immediately then have to pay more, like they need more money 🙄. Anyways I wasn’t going to make a big deal out of it or dispute it. I’m more than willing to pay if they caught me speeding because I know that’s a bad thing and they have to enforce the law but I just wanna know if this exact thing has happened to anyone else and what you did going forward. Or what I should do. Thanks all!

Side note: I did call the speeding enforcement number on the ticket twice, once was on a weekday in the evening, almost immediately when I got home from work and saw it in the mail and they said the office was closed. I called again this morning at 9 am and it said the office was closed. I guess it’s closed on the weekend so I’ll try one more time Monday, but it’s no surprise that their hours to respond suck.

I’m 16 and just started learning to drive for reference

So, I can drive. I’ve been driving for a while but haven’t in months due to chaos. I had abusive parents who didn’t allow me to get my license, a job, nothing. If I didn’t run for my life, they would’ve made sure I never got anywhere ever in my life and force me to be content with it. I did get out however, but I am working toward getting a car as soon as possible, which thank goodness will be soon but I live in a small town. I can order groceries thank God and get to a few places. I need a car desperately to get important places. I am petrified though. I’m petrified I won’t pass. I live in the US, what do I need to know to pass the driving test besides of course knowing how to drive? I thought about getting a private instructor because here the they can pass us after teaching us for a few days and give us our license. But that’s a lot of money. I don’t know what to do.

I’m about 4 months away from getting my license and I used to practice driving almost everyday but recently Ive had no motivation to go driving. When I finally went on a drive i kept making mistakes and even ran a stop sign being absent minded. I felt really dissapointed in myself because I thought I had got the fundamentals down but after a break it all just slipped away from me 🥲

How do i motivate myself to practice so this does not happen?

When our son got his permit we bought a set of the Student Driver magnets. We were careful to put them on the car when he was driving and remove them otherwise.

I no longer believe those magnets and we almost never used them with our daughter. Basically they are meaningless to me on anything but a vehicle from a driving school.

I have since learned that many people leave them on whether they have a student driving or not. I have seen many vehicles where it is obvious it is not a student behind the wheel.

For example, driving 75 in a 75 on a highway just now we were passed by someone with one of those magnets. No way that was a student or even inexperienced driver.

Seriously?

When making a right turn, can you briefly go into the bike lane before merging into the street? Would that be under the definition of entering/exiting a road? Wife got flagged on her test for making right turns too wide, I know you can enter 200ft before making a right, but a little confused if its a issue turning right into one.

Hi guys basically ive been looking at cars for my first car and my dads said i get 200 a month for finance. ive been looking at a bmw grand coup 1.5 sport. insurance is 2.6k a year with a black box. i can pay for that. i feel like the shitboxes cost a lot more. but i was thinking ablut damages and stuff. if it will cost a lot.

So in this particular scenario, it’s a green light with 2 cars coming from opposite directions and both arrive at the same time. There’s no turn arrows and both are turning towards the same direction. Which car gets the right of way, the person turning Right, or the person turning Left?