Where do you have to be THAT badly?

[chainedbarista]

i've never understood the whole 'race to get to the red light' phenomenon myself; the only time i do that is to get around a really slow driver so i'm not stuck behind them any further.

i've found that cruise control (when i can use it) is a truly beautiful thing.

[mikoyan29]

Control your speed with your accelerator as much as you can. This means you have to maintain safe following distance. Braking is a waste of energy. Think about it...you use gas to get up to a certain speed and braking wastes all that momentum. If you leave plenty of room in front, you can maintain safe distance and keep up with traffic using only your accelerator. This is doubly true if you are driving a stick shift.

Tailgaters won't like that, because they are spending too much time with their nose buried up your tailpipe to realize that you are, in fact, going exactly as fast as the traffic in front of you. But screw them. Their mileage will be far worse than yours, as will their stress levels.

(in fact, I've seen studies that suggest that driving this way will help jams from forming in traffic...and may also help break up bottlenecks. )

but it's hard for people to see through that little bubble they've put around themselves. I just love it when there is a nice string of cars ahead of me and then I've got some person behind me right on my ass as if that is somehow going to make the heavens part and traffic go faster so he can get to whatever inane thing he is going to. And what I really love is that when you finally do get out of their way, they dally as they pass by you or they hang out on your rear quarter panel because golly there is a car that was in front of me.....

[RecoveringKinkoid]

I know! I know exactly what you mean! It boggles my freaking mind!