Today's article was inspired by what I see numerous times a week at many stop signs, or sometimes even on the road away from a stop sign: people being nice to other drivers and letting them go first. I can hear you saying, but why would that be wrong? Shouldn't drivers be nice to other drivers whenever they can? That's an interesting question, and one I intend to examine here.
Before I start, I want to say of course it's good to be helpful to others when they need it. If someone has broken down, it's great to help them pull the car off the road or give someone a jump when their battery has died. But that's not the helpfulness I'm talking about here. The helpfulness I'm talking about is a kind of helpfulness that on the surface looks good, but in reality it hampers other drivers. Let's look at this a bit more closely.
Imagine yourself at a stop sign. You pull up to a stop sign. There's no one at the intersection except you, and the driver to the right of you. You both arrive at the stop line at the same time, so you, remembering the rules of the road, wait and allow the driver on the right to go first. And you wait...and you wait. Eventually you see the driver on the right waive you by. You waive him by, knowing that he has the right of way. The two of you wait, each looking for the other to make a move, and then it happens, the same all the time: you both go at the same time, and you both slam on your brakes at the same time, (hopefully) avoiding colliding with each other. At this time you are getting a bit angry because you know the other driver had the right of way, so you wait again for him to go, and he does the same thing...waits. So in round two, you guys both take off at the same time again, and again slam on your brakes to avoid hitting each other. This continues until one of you gets annoyed enough to just force the issue and cross the intersection.
I have seen the above happen many times. Sometimes the going at the same time only happens once, and someone asserts themselves and crosses the intersection. At other times I've seen situations where there have been two uber-nice folks at the intersection, and that game of going at the same time, slamming on the brakes, waiting, rinse, wash, repeat goes on ad naseum.
The reason this is so dangerous is because of the anger it generates. Inevitably, one of the two parties gets annoyed, and this can lead to assertive driving or speeding through the intersection. This is also dangerous because there might be pedestrians waiting to cross the intersection, or cars that have to enter traffic from close to the intersection. All of those groups are waiting for the two people at the stop sign to figure out who goes first. I hope you can see why this is so dangerous. Being nice is great, but when niceness leads to someone not knowing what someone else is doing, the chances of a crash are much higher. There are reasons that the traffic laws dictate who goes first at a stop sign. If they are followed without exception, things will go much smoother, and safer, at stop signs.
Another dangerous situation involving kindness appears when someone is trying to enter the road from a parking lot or house. I have seen many people slam on their brakes and stop traffic so that they can let someone in who was waiting to enter traffic. Again, their motives are noble, but I don't think people who do this think about the consequences. What happens if the car behind the car slamming on the brakes has a driver who is in the middle of texting, and isn't paying attention because the last thing they expect is for someone to slam on their brakes in the middle of the street.? What happens if the car behind the car slamming on it's brakes is going much faster then the car that slammed on it's brakes was when it started to brake? Situations like this can lead to bad accidents.
My suggestion is to never slow down or stop to allow cars to enter the road unless the traffic around you is stopped or just moving. If you are in line with a bunch of cars waiting for a stoplight to turn green, there's nothing wrong with you allowing a car to enter traffic in front of you, because the cars behind you already know you're stopped, and you won't surprise them. That, and slow moving traffic, would be the only times I'd suggest allowing cars to enter the road.
Now having said that, it isn't always a bad idea to allow cars to go through a stop sign before you, even if you have the right of way. If you are driving a large vehicle with a large load that you know will accelerate slowly through the intersection, or a car that is going slowly for whatever reason, it's great to allow traffic to go in front of you so you don't hold others up. If someone gets to an intersection at the same time, and they see that you are in a large, slow moving vehicle, and you wave them through ahead of you, most drivers will understand that you are letting them go first because your car is so much slower than theirs is, an they will appreciate it. But that is the only time I'd suggest waving a car to go through a stop sign before you if you have the right of way.
In conclusion, it's great to be kind and look to help others, but be careful how you're doing it if you're doing it on the road. If you have the right of way in a regular car (a car that isn't heavily laden or going slowly), and you wave someone through when you should go first, you will confuse the other driver, and possibly make them angry. If you slam on your brakes to allow a driver to enter traffic from a driveway, you will just endanger others because you risk a rear end collision with traffic behind you. Niceness is a great thing, but make sure you practice it in a way that is safe and is truly looking out for others. Until next time....
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