My Right Of Way Is Not Your’s To Dictate
Let me paint the scene. There’s a small shopping strip that has two driveways. The first driveway exits to a four lane road. The second driveway exits to a side street that intersects with said four land road which is controlled by a traffic signal. Often times, there are people wanting to make a left turn from this shopping strip and opt for the first driveway to the four lane road. This presents a problem of accessibility as the aforementioned traffic signal is only a short distance away and causes stopped traffic to block this driveway. The more efficient route would be to exit to the side road and utilize the traffic signal to stop traffic and allow a clear intersection in which to make the left turn.
Understood? Great. Now enters the good samaritan.
Along comes the good samaritan that will wave an exiting driver out on to the main road while they retain further blocking traffic behind them. They understand how difficult it can be to enter traffic on such a busy road and feel obligated to do the Christian thing and yield their own right of way, and consequently everyone else’s behind them, to the other driver. While this may work well in instances where the main road only has two lanes, one in each direction, it creates a great potential for injury and/or death when presented with multi-lane roads.
Today, I was subjected to such a yielding, unbeknownst to me at the time. I was one of those unfortunate souls that was traveling down that extra lane with no knowledge that a minivan was about to appear from nowhere directly in front of me and stop. Imagine my heart rate when I finally came to a stop a mere three inches from impacting the minivan AND the SUV traveling in the opposite direction that I was angling towards from trying to maneuver out of the minivan’s way.
The occupants of the minivan were an elderly couple, which I quickly estimated to be in their late 70s or early 80s, enjoying the fruits of their retirement by going shopping in the afternoon. Now imagine if I hadn’t been paying as close attention as I had and plowed right into them. Given my speed and the potential angle of impact, it’s quite reasonable to assume that one or both of them would have gone to the hospital, or the morgue. Thankfully, there was no one behind me. If I had been bumped from the rear, even in the slightest amount, I would’ve made contact with the minivan.
In the end, we’re possibly looking at severe damage to my car, the minivan, serious injury or death to a number of parties, collateral damage to surrounding vehicles, and all because someone wanted to be a good samaritan. You really want to be a good samaritan? Follow the rules of the road without deviation. If everyone did as is expected of them, we wouldn’t be paying higher insurance premiums.
I’ve been part of three vehicular accidents during my 18 years of driving. All three were not my fault. The first was because an elderly couple decided to stop in the middle of a bridge on the freeway because they took the wrong lane and were trying to figure out how to get back into the right lane. The second was on my way to a concert during a rain storm in which a van didn’t maintain its lane, entered mine and stopped. This was precipitated by another car that began to spin-out after hydroplaning on the wet pavement from excessive speed. The third was a woman in a van when she backed out of her drive without looking. Today, I narrowly missed a fourth.
Now if the cute redhead I met today wasn’t married, this post would’ve been about a different subject altogether.
