Since moving to the coastside I’ve noticed a really unpleasant trend of aggressive drivers. Mainly on Highway 1, but also on the neighborhood streets here in Montara. Sure there are jerks everywhere, but out here it seems to be acceptable and commonplace…

I was coming home this afternoon and, once again, I had a yahoo behind me on Hwy 1 who was making end runs at my rear bumper and waving his arms in “hurry up” gestures. This continued until the second lane opens up in El Granada, where he pulled beside me and continued with a few other choice gestures before speeding up and cutting off the car ahead of me. I could understand if I (and the car ahead of me) were going slow, but we were doing the speed limit and (dare I say it) at times we were a bit above. If I’d had to use my brakes, he would have rear-ended me.

This wasn’t an isolated experience. It happens more frequently than I care to think about, and yet far less frequently when I’m driving in the city or in neighborhoods over the hill… So what gives? What is it about the coastside community that lends itself to road rage? And how hard is it to understand a speed limit?

I agree Maureen - and to my view Montara is the worst.  I was returning home today around 3pm when someone in a truck passed me on the left on 3rd avenue going easily above 30mph!  Between the lack of sidewalks and the multitude of cars parked halfway in the street, there was barely enough room for the two of us, much less the car approaching from the other side.  Add to that the fact that Farallone View School is in the area, we are just a tragedy waiting to happen.  I know there are a number of very active neighborhood watch groups trying to self-monitor the situation, but it only seems to be getting worse.

Hi Cheri,

I agree that this is a tragedy waiting to happen. It’s also completely avoidable and unnecessary. Besides the fact that we seem to be in need of greater traffic enforcement, I’m wondering why it is that this small coastal community should attract so many aggressive drivers? You’d think that members of a smaller community like this would show more concern for each other’s safety, not less. And more common courtesy, for that matter. What gives?

We find Pacifica to be the worst, the absolute WORST….on the coast, at least. When driving the Peninsula, it is Redwood City and S.S.F.  Maybe it’s the “too many rats in a cage” syndrome, though we notice that some people just didn’t study their drivers manuals.  In any event, common courtesy may be not be so common, after all.

There is no legal place to pass on Highway 1 from Pacifica all the way to Half Moon Bay Airport. There is only one (very short and dangerous) legal place to pass on Highway 92 heading west. That combined with the fact that there are many slow drivers who refuse to pull out even when they have a line of 20 cars stacked up behind them are what contribute to road rage. The roads are wholly inadequate and poorly designed—so I lay the culpability for drivers’ frustrations squarely at our elected officials feet for failing year after year to do anything to mitigate traffic. The San Mateo Board of Supervisors continues to allow house after house be crammed on every square inch of open dirt but does nothing to improve infrastructure. The fact that we continue to elect these same do-nothings means the blame collectively belongs to all of us.

It isn’t just in Montara, or even on the Peninsula. It’s a dangerous trend that has been creeping into our culture as those people, who feel their needs are more important than anyone else’s, keep pushing the envelope of common courtesy in order to satify their own self absorption.

The “Rules of the Road” have been around for centuries, both on land and sea, with their roots going back at least as far as the Magna Carta. But somehow, after over a century of practice within an automotive setting, these self absorbed drivers of late have found reasons to forego the conventions of many generations, all to get to Starbucks a mere 5 minutes earlier and not be late for work. 

People are under much more stress these days for a whole host of reasons, and they aren’t handling it too well. Back east , in some areas (not so much in the cities, anymore), you can still get a ticket for passing on the right and for driving in the left hand lane when not passing someone. Think about it. Both of these infractions are designed to keep faster moving vehicles, whether legal or not, away from the slower traffic normally accessing and egressing the highway. But out here, common sense and courtesy have been thrown by the wayside; so much so that the legislature here has apparently given up trying to deal with compliance and has caved in, making it legal now to pass on the right on a four lane divided highway.

The flip side of the aggressive driver is the self absorbed lollygagger who doesn’t believe anyone needs to go faster than he/she is. These are people like the California drivers I noticed back east taking their sweet time rubbernecking in the passing lane, ten mph underspeed, not giving a moment’s thought about why half a dozen other drivers, not wanting to pass on the right, were riding so close behing them that they couldn’t read the license plate. Totally clueless.

Here in California, you can drive a car with defective brakes that could wind up killing someone, yet in my home state, if your vehicle didn’t pass an annual 22 point inspection, you had 2 weeks before your butt was handed to the DMV. California is so far behind many other areas of the country, and the majority of that is in the driver education area.

No matter how you look at it, though, impatiently passing someone in a residential area, just because the rear driver is in a hurry, that’s just unsafe. What if there were children by the side of the road?

I’m always amused when one of the many problems driven (yuk) by overpopulation is ascribed to anything but. The enlarged infrastructure “answer” is particularly laughable because it says, essentially, “Let’s take a problem and make it a bigger problem.”

Carl May

Not having a legal/safe place to pass for what I believe is over 8 miles would be a problem for any size population—the roads are inadequate for the existing population. I see this repeated argument to keep infrastructure poor to discourage growth as spurious. Surely we can avoid punishing those already living here without opening the flood gates. But the bottom line is our government is doing the latter even without doing anything in the former. It’s nothing but a dereliction of duty and why these folks haven’t been thrown out of office long ago I don’t understand—I certainly have been voting against the status quo at every opportunity.

A lot of what another poster said about “The Rules of the Road” really resonated with me—if more drivers observed those , life would be a lot better.

The problem with widening the roads goes beyond encouraging growth and to the character of the community.  I was reminded this again when did some business at Pacifica Pet Hospital on Highway 1. That stretch of Pacifica is particularly miserable because of the four lanes of high-speed traffic pulsing through the town. My five-year-old accompanied me to take our cat to the vet. The first thing she did when I opened the car door was put her hands over her ears. Who wants to live near that?

Hwy 1 in Montara and Moss Beach is no country road, but it’s a lot better than the same highway in Pacifica.

I don’t think there’s any question that people are driving inappropriately for the local roads.  Widening the roads to accommodate the thugs is not the right approach. I had a scary encounter recently on the 4-lane portion of Hwy 92 with a knucklehead in a pickup.

Even more legal places to pass and turnouts would be of immense help. An overall widening of the road is not necessary for this particular problem. No place to legally/safely pass all the way from Pacifica to HMB Airport is just unreasonable. It is hardly surprising that drivers get frustrated.

There are those who think that keeping two lane constraints on the roadways will keep development in check and, as long as things remain that way, residents might stay furious enough to keep voting against developmental issues. Then we have the problem of what happens when the roads ARE widened, as Barry has indicated, where the improvements have only invited more people into thinking that the problem was solved and that it was now OK for EVERYONE to pile onto the same stretch of roadway; thus we have Pacifica. And while all this is happening, don’t think for one moment that developers aren’t poised and at the ready, waiting to push local and county officials into maximizing that newly upgraded infrastructure.

That fact that some people resign themselves to the notion that “growth” just happens wherever you go doesn’t address the need for long term planning. Sadly, I think much of todays problems here began a hundred years ago when developmental interests, driven more by money than common sense, felt it necessary to lay out postage stamp lots across countless acres of rolling open farmland. It seems not much has changed with time.

Ummm… the decision whether or not to widen Hwy 1 and/or add more lanes should not be based on providing convenient road amenities for speeders and aggressive drivers. The guy on Devil’s Slide who tried to pass two vehicles and came into my lane head-on (but managed to swerve back in time) does not need a multi-million dollar highway widening in his honor. That’s just ludicrous. By the same logic, we could remove the stop signs and speed limits here in Montara to placate the drivers who are “frustrated” by our pesky concerns for kids and pedestrians… Yup, that would take care of everything. (this is the part where I roll my eyes)

There is no reason why every artery needs to be a freeway. If you’ve chosen to drive on 1 or 92 (or 84 or 35, etc.) you’ve chosen a route that isn’t suitable for 75 mph, or weaving between lanes, and you’ve chosen a route you’ll need to share with other drivers, some of whom may pull over to let you pass if they can’t go the limit, but none of whom are required to speed or get off “your” road. You’ve also chosen a route that requires allowing a bit of extra time in case of accidents or slow-downs. Small price to pay for avoiding the ugliness that has befallen communities that went with the freeway model.

Like I said, I know this isn’t restricted to the coast, but I notice it a whole lot more here than I do in Menlo Park, San Fran, etc.  Maybe I’ve just had bad luck, but imx there’s a real nasty (?) streak that I didn’t expect. We’re blessed with beaches, trails, Montara Mountain, gorgeous sunsets… and we’re running each other off the road???

P.S. re: lollygagging, I’ve lived in a tourist town and believe me I know from lollygaggers. They’re a whole different breed of hazard. It’s not (just) that they’re going too slow, it’s that they’re often not watching the road. A pox on them all.

“Choosing” to drive on 1 or 92? As opposed to using my personal helicopter? Those two roads are the only reasonable means of access to the area (although I’ve been wondering if El Granada Blvd might continue over the mountains somehow ;->)—and single lane access for miles is just ludicrous for any number of reasons. I really get tired of the argument that if we choose to live in this area we should lie down and accept the bad infrastructure as a necessary price of living here. It doesn’t have to be this way—and we don’t have to “pave paradise” and make super freeways everywhere to make it reasonable either. Many including myself have to commute out of the area to afford to live here—and I shouldn’t have to drive for 8 miles behind someone going much slower than the speed limit. The guy passing on Devil’s Slide is a moron—no question—but I have to say the temptation has certainly crossed my mind more than once.

There aren’t too many of us in discussion here, but I think we are all on the same page. I think we have all been victims of rubbernecking tourists and self absorbed commuters. I think we just have different ways of stacking the pertinent issues and priorities. When Barry posted that wonderful video of the Coastside from 1980, the roots of so many of today’s problems were discussed with alarming clarity.

Any developer who thinks about adding more houses out here, WITHOUT addressing 92 and alternative parallel access up and down the coast (like Foothill Blvd.), is living in a dream world if they don’t think their “contributions” are going to negatively impact the community. Instead, the developmental mindset has been to pack as much in here before enough people wise up and shut down the gravy train. And as the video documentary that Barry had posted had put it, well, read for yourself ........

At 32:55     “.... In the past many of the newcomers have been known to be politically apathetic, but they do expect local government to preserve their lifestyle. On the other hand, they are unorganized politically, precisely because of their lifestyle.”

At 33:24   “.... Their social and professional lives are carried on “over the hill”; when they come over here, they just don’t participate in anything.”

At 47:16     “.... The irony is compounded because, as the newcomers moved into the old farming community, they ended up destroying the very rural environment that attracted them in the first place.”

If there had been ANY reasonable attempt in the distant past to lay out the original lots according to the available infrastructure technologies available even at that time, AND there had been some attempt to look at the evacuation and alternative access issues, I’d say that development would have been more readily welcomed and certainly much harder to argue against ........ and we wouldn’t be here talking about it. I would even argue that the Coastside population might be double what it is and we’d still be far less stressed over it than we are now.

Sorry to get off track here, but all the traffic problems we are discussing are directly related to, as I see it, at least three things; one, some really stupid decisions that were made in the past that have been continually compounded by more stupid decisions; two, the build-out rate did not sufficiently factor in the declining ratio of commercial real estate to the residential population; and three, this absolutely inane compulsion to embrace tourism in lieu of addressing the Coastside’s unique long term sustainability issues.

One local concern as far as congestion goes is the new hotel in Princeton.  The road through Princeton in that section is but one narrow lane each way, already clogged during peak hours.  Of course you can’t speed through that area, but going through it at ALL once those hotel rooms are filled will be another matter.  We are already strategizing our drive to & from work every day, to avoid that gauntlet.

Just to throw another “aggresive driver” comment into the mix, there’s a disturbing trend in using the requirement to pull over for emergency vehicles as an opportunity to stomp on the gas and pull back on the road, using the re-entry as a passing opportunity.  Without exception recently, I have had to swerve back off the road to avoid being hit by a vehicle that was behind me before the emergency vehicle passed.  I may wait a second or two to be sure the first EV isn’t followed by a second, but I usually pull back on with minimal hesitation.  I’ve seen these fools actually pull back on the road in front of the second EV.  Now I feel I have to wait even longer to be sure I’m not going to be hit, which just exacerbates the problem.  Does anyone have any suggestions about what I might do to help alleviate this problem?

The ‘cheating’ by some drivers after the passing of an emergency vehicle may be one more example of a resident feeling like they’ve lost some of their emotional investment in the Coastside to forces who see no problem paving everything in sight. It’s sad, really. I don’t agree that somehow ‘getting ahead” of fellow drivers is the answer, but it might explain at least part of the frustration. And I will add that some of the ‘self absorbed’ drivers who haven’t been paying attention to their rear view mirror to realize that there ARE NO MORE emergency vehicle following often sit and wait for an engraved invitation before pulling off the shoulder.

Back east, as the EVs came, there was an seemless, almost religious swerving to the right, and a corresponding swerve to the left after the EVs passage. If a second EV followed, but perhaps a mile behind, it would be another seemless execution. Out here, though, it’s a free-for-all, mostly because, as mentioned in earlier posts, people just aren’t paying attention. Most people just pile into their four-wheeled mobile living room and they just tune out everything that doesn’t immediately concern them. I think most people don’t realize how easy it is to kill someone with a vehicle until after they do something stupid and something dreadful happens. They’re just not paying attention.

It’s interesting to me that the local solution to a problem with aggressive drivers and road rage would (apparently) be to provide more lanes and wider roads, alternate routes, etc. for them to be aggressive and rage around on…

You’ll note that the topic of this thread was not Down With Infrastructure! or I Love Traffic Jams! So let me be very clear… I do not propose that the coastside’s infrastructure issues or almost non-existent past planning are adequate or acceptable. Actually, you haven’t even heard what I think about those issues - mainly because I didn’t start a thread about that. :) I do not argue that slowpokes or inattentive drivers are a blessing unto us, any more than the “thugs” (as Barry called them) are a boon to this community. And I certainly haven’t stated that people who live here should “lie down” and put up with our problems in perpetuity, forever and ever amen. (Do I smell a strawman a-burnin’ ?) :)

Let me break this down:

a) I’ve noticed a problem out here (and I’m not one to lollygag, if that’s your assumption - I learned to drive in a “move it or lose it” city)

b) yes, we are choosing to live in an area with roads that are heavily used single lane (often winding) routes, which are just naturally and logically not the speediest ways to get around as they are designed right now, so I don’t know why any of us would suddenly and inexplicably be outraged that we can’t do 70 all the way to work (was someone given that impression when they bought a house here? and if you run enough people off the road, will an autobahn magically appear?)

c) IMX the entitlement issues attendant with an “eff you, everyone get out of my way” attitude are not magically cured with road expansion, they simply switch to “eff you, everyone stop passing in my passing lane and stop doing less than 80 in my 65 zone!”

d) I’m wondering if anyone else has noticed an elevated amount of road rudery out here, or if I’ve just had amazingly bad luck when driving here and amazingly good luck in other neighborhoods - or maybe it’s a rural Dukes of Hazzard thing

e) this was not presented as an issue exclusive to Highway 1 or 92, it’s a problem I’m seeing on our residential streets... so is it the same “solution” for, say, 4th Street in Montara? let me guess - drivers are forced to run stop signs and speed past “slowpoke” children because the residential concept is an undue burden upon motorists who need to get to the post office in two seconds flat (I’m rolling my eyes again)

f) my husband loves the helicopter idea - if you’re up for a heli-share to San Jose, please let us know ;)

It took me a couple of hours to type my previous reply (in between doorbells, phone calls and a big fist-fight with my fax machine, etc.) so I missed a few of the preceding posts. Let me just add that I think Frank is on to something in his comment re: the way people pull over for emergency vehicles back east, versus the “free for all” technique here. The way people pull over in many other areas is almost balletic - everyone to the right, everyone back to the left, everyone over to the right again. There’s common understanding between the drivers. The same way a four-way stop means stop and wait your turn, not slow down briefly and then gun it ahead of everyone else… Or a sudden white-out from fog means everyone turns on their headlights and slows down… as opposed to turning off your headlights and cutting in and around all the other (barely visible) cars.

So maybe that’s what I find missing out here -  a sense of common interest. Unfortunate. Guess I’ll buy a Dukes of Hazzard bumper sticker and join the fray… I’ll be the one doing donuts around you while you’re trying to park at Safeway. ;)

Maureen, I think much of the problem that you originally stated (about the aggressive drivers, I mean) has to do with a multitude of frustrations, and not just with one impatient yahoo in Montara.

Years ago, I had wondered why there was so much departure from normal driving practices out here (at least with respect to other parts of the country). A few things came to mind. One, that there’s a real oddball practice of lane signage here. For instance, in most states, if your travelling on the freeway in the low speed lane, you could often go from from one state to another, possibly even into a third ......... and still be in same lane. When an exit lanes come up, those lanes are built OFF OF the low speed lane. Here, the low speed lane often becomes the exit lane and if you are casually trying to just go down the highway, you wind going down some god forsaken exit ramp in the middle of nowhere or rush hour traffic ....... and trying to avoid that constant inconvenience might be one major reason why so many drivers either, one, have to perform otherwise needless lane changes just to stay on the highway, or two, it’s just such a pain in the ass trying to travel in the low speed lane that they just drive in the center lanes. Isn’t there some prerequisite for DOT “engineers” to actually have to graduate in some civil engineering curriculum? California road design is like reinventing the wheel with corners on it.

Also, the general rule is that an overtaking vehicle assumes the burden of responsibility when overtaking another vehicle. Since the passing vehicle is supposed to be on the left, this means that, almost in contradiction, a vehicle going down the highway would have to yield to another which is on the entrance ramp. But that is not so. Technically, the driver on an entrance ramp is not yet on the freeway and is only just approaching the highway. While the entrance ramp is technically part of an intersection, if someone is already in the intersection (i.e. a driver in the low speed lane), that driver has the right of way, whether they are on the left or the right. And if a driver entering the freeway from a ramp chooses, for his own convenience or impatience, to shoehorn himself into someone else’s safety zone (a foreign concept out here), THAT driver has created an unsafe driving condition. Somewhere in that argument, one would hope that there is enough common sense and common courtesy to let other drivers onto the roadway, but I think you can see my point.

When people hop in their cars, they are consumed with deadlines and bills and appointments. There are enough issues causing people to be irritable these days; we don’t need a lack of driver education, an almost total lack of meaningful enforcement, and neanderthal road signage and design to make a trip to the grocery store seem like the demolition derby. As Maureen has apparently also realized, driving can be “seemless”; they just haven’t figured out how to do that out here.

Brian Dantes - 21 August 2007 12:42 AM

Even more legal places to pass and turnouts would be of immense help. An overall widening of the road is not necessary for this particular problem. No place to legally/safely pass all the way from Pacifica to HMB Airport is just unreasonable. It is hardly surprising that drivers get frustrated.

I agree.

I definitely think that there need to be some safe passing lanes, while keeping SR 1 to 2 lanes.  However, they have to be done correctly—the 2 uphill turnouts on westbound 92 are model cases of the wrong way to do it. 

As was written in another post, slow drivers don’t move over.  Therefore, turnouts don’t work and are the wrong approach.  The design has to be that the main traffic lane stays on the right and the passing lane gets added on the left.  The passing lanes way south of HMB, say around Pigeon Point, are closer to being done correctly.

I grew up in Southern California, which has very few 2 lane roads (other than neighborhood residential).  I recall that if you were driving slow on one of the two lane mountain roads and didn’t use the turnouts when cars were stacked up behind, you risked getting pushed over the side of the mountain.  So drivers there use the turnouts.  And not in the selfish way that they’re usually used on SR 92, where vehicles may move to the turnout but they maintain speed so that only a few other vehicles can pass.  In So Cal, you wait in the turnout for all the faster vehicles to get past, and then you resume.  So, oddly enough, in that regard, Southern California drivers are actually more courteous than those here.

My appreciation goes to the truck drivers on WB SR 92 who move to the “turnout” and slow down in order to maximize the number of vehicles which can pass.  Too bad there are so few of that type of driver.

Maureen Anderson - 24 August 2007 07:46 PM

Let me just add that I think Frank is on to something in his comment re: the way people pull over for emergency vehicles back east, versus the “free for all” technique here. The way people pull over in many other areas is almost balletic - everyone to the right, everyone back to the left, everyone over to the right again. There’s common understanding between the drivers.[...] So maybe that’s what I find missing out here -  a sense of common interest. Unfortunate.

I’ve only been here for 13 years, but it seems to me that in years past, the “ballet” technique was the norm on SR 1.  As overdevelopment continues, roads get more crowded, travel times increase, drivers get more aggressive and selfish.

Ever been on SR 92 in slow traffic when an emergency vehicle has to come through?  I’ve only been in that situation a couple of times, but it’s something to see—the parting of the Red Sea—as everyone moves to the edge so that the EV can squeeze through down the center.  Then everyone does the ballet back into position.  Why is there no jumping ahead on SR 92?  Because there isn’t enough room to do so.  Maybe bigger roads aren’t the solution?

It’s funny… When I’m in my truck, the aggressive drivers seem to be few and far between.  When I’m in my wife’s Jetta, they seem to come out the woodwork!  Strange.  I would just add that, as a frequent traveler of 92, 1, and 4th St in Montara (and a resident on the street), the problem of agressiveness/speeding is much worse in town than on the freeways.  I guess 25 MPH is to prohibitive for some people. 
And for the record, the aggressive drivers I’ve experienced on 1 and 92 weren’t behind big-rigs going 40… They were folks who just weren’t happy with 55 MPH and were eager to open that throttle up!

Mike McCall

I’ve only been here for 13 years, but it seems to me that in years past, the “ballet” technique was the norm on SR 1.

Yes, I remember the wonderful EV ballet.  Last time I tried it, I found myself either passing people who pulled off and stopped or practically creaming those poor folks who couldn’t figure out which to do and kept weaving on and off the roadway.  So, I’ve become another roadside wallflower instead of dancing.  Maybe a nice Public Service announcement (remember those?), reminding drivers how it’s supposed to be done?

Speaking of “public service announcements”, when I was back east 25 years ago, I had proposed that one of the local TV stations do a 30 second spot on “Traffic Trivia”; i.e. reminding people daily about the responsibilities and courtesies that are inherent in sharing the road.  Those who were more testosterone driven or otherwise feeling “self-entitled” were a danger to themselves as well as others.

At the time, owing to design flaws in traffic circles (or “rotaries”, as we called them), approaching traffic was allowed to blast into a rotary faster than the traffic that was already turning within the middle of the circle. Ultimnately, the slower traffic had the right of way, but many people still felt that the speed of their vehicle was the determining factor in pecking status, so the rotary became a hornets’ nest of testy drivers whenever the traffic increased. One of my proposals was to provide sharp turns on the rotary access points and straighter egress points. Well, not surprisingly, nothing changed (sigh). But the logic still holds true out here for other aspects of traffic.

I don’t mind doing the balletic maneuvre one bit, it’s a functional necessity, but it sure is annoying when someone pulls over to the shoulder out of sequence with everyone around them (usually far earlier than need be, and they resume speed too late. Makes me wonder if they check their astrolgy chart before leaving their driveway. The ballet works great when people are paying attention.

Been following this topic with interest.  Couple of points I’d like to add.  I’ve been on the Coast for well over 30yrs.  I chose to live here with full knowledge of the road conditions.  I had a “choice” between freeways and two lane roads. I’m glad I made this one.  I think complaining about the roads is like buying a house next to an airport and complaining about the noise the airplanes make. Duh!
In the “old” days 1 and 92 had all the passing areas anyone could ask for and still had very aggressive drivers.  The only difference is speeds were faster. Widening roads and providing passing areas doesn’t help!
I actually think it’s a little more relaxing now ‘cause speeds are down and I just get in line, fire up the books on tape and enjoy the ride.
The problem in neighborhoods is another matter.  I’m all for chucking a 2x4 through the windshield of the next car that speeds down my street.  We’ve been promised speed bumps for well over a year and have yet to see any action.  A bit frustrating.

The issue is this: you should be able to drive as slow as you want on Hwy 1 and Hwy 92 - BUT PULL OVER AND LET OTHERS PASS!!!
If you drive under the speed limit, pls. don’t complain about aggressive drivers - it is you who are causing problems.
To repeat: many of us don’t have the leisure to loose time for slow drivers. Pls. pull over and let others pass!