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How on earth is always using a turn signal "totally useless and actively harmful"?
It's giving information to the enemy (i.e. other drivers who don't want you in front of them). This can sometimes be used tactically, as when the car you are slightly ahead of in the lane you want to be in has a barely-adequate-to-merge gap in front and behind. Signal, they move forward to block, tap brakes (or just let off acceleration) and slide in before the guy behind him can do anything.
Do you live in LA/surrounding area?
The culture of "we don't let people in, so if you want to change lanes don't signal so you can swerve in an take them by suprise so they don't defend their lane" is one of the most ridiculous cultural own-goals this side of sub-saharan Africa.
Only Americans could design their society around cars and then get mad at each other for having the audacity to... drive cars nearby.
New Jersey. We don't get mad, we get even.
Oh wow I didn't realize it was an east coast phenomenon too.
"Get even" for the great offense of... Driving on the same road you too are driving on?
I really don't understand this, it just seems like you're all making each other more unhappy while driving for no other reason than because you're unhappy while driving? It's a prisoners dilemma situation except there's no payoff for defecting, but you all defect anyway.
There is payoff for "defection", and it's not even prisoner's dilemma payoffs. If you're "nice" and let people in front of you who you could have beaten out, they will typically be slow and sluggish drivers who hold you up. If someone aggressively cuts you off, they will typically want to be going fast and won't hold you up (but not always, the asshole who cuts you off and slows down is prevalent, though his natural territory is Pennsylvania)
The common thread between LA and NJ is there's just too damn much traffic.
If only there were other transportation methods that scaled better.
Indeed, there are not. If you think NJ traffic is bad, NJ Transit brings whole new levels of bad.
Well except subways (or streetcars, or even buses if done well) which you have a great example of across the Hudson. NJ transit doesn't suck because transit is inherently bad (might I introduce you to Europe or Asia, mostly Asia). It sucks because Americans refuse to fund it properly and instead triple down on driving.
And then also hate driving, lmao
Also bike lanes (we're back baby) scale amazingly, they have significantly higher throughput for the area they occupy.
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