basingwerk wrote:
Rigpig wrote:
OK, I reckon we can all summon up a mental image of someone who won't move out of the centre lane. So what do you mean by zig-zagging?
I won’t take that tack if you don’t mind, but that is a good idea, so let's push this mind game a bit further, and we might show something.
Can I take it that the mental image you summon up always has
you as the person behind ? It is
never the mental image of you as the person in front, is it? Could it be that you are perfect and have never done that? Hm.. I doubt that.
Of
course I'm not a perfect driver, and of course on occasions I've held people up by not returning to L1 promptly enough. In all truth there is an element of the trial and error approach in how we deal with this, and how we gain this judgement of what an appropriate sized L1 gap is. In time we become aware that it doesn't "feel right" to cruise past a large gap in L1, in the same way it doesn't "feel right" to constantly zip in and out every 50 yards. This is what I meant by "common sense" - I was using the term as a figurative metaphor, not with your literal meaning of "most popular thinking". Please accept my apologies for not explaining this strange concept of "common sense" earlier.
Regarding the "rule of thumb" thing, the point you seem to have repeatedly been ignoring is that most people are well capable of making the correct judgement, and indeed if asked rationally would do so quite clearly (showng how common common sense is, perhaps?
), but when they take to the motorway they drift off into a state of lazy semi-awareness, as typified by your remarks about "cruising". To my mind a good driver "drives" down the motorway, he doesn't "cruise". It should be an active process, not a passive one.
As regards the "visualisation" thing, surely the important thing is to visualise the
other perspective. When I am passing a vehicle in L2 I visualise being in the car behind and whether he would expect me to move into the next gap, and when I'm in the car behind I visualise being in the car in front, and whether it would feel reasonable for him to return to L1.
As far as this debate goes, I have actually been considering both perspectives. I have visualised how I
drive along the motorway, sometimes overtaking with other vehicles catching behind, at other times catching vehicles in front. It actually seems to me that you are the one not considering both angles, thinking solely in terms of the passive "cruiser" drifting along in L2 with an ever growing tailback. You really need to consider both angles!