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I just got off of a road trip on I-40, and mostly want to register my dismay at the state of the semi truckers there, related to 3 and especially #4. It is Culture War, because most of the truckers in question are Indian.
Truckers should all go the same speed in the right lane of a two lane highway! They should not be leapfrogging each other, trapping small vehicles between them, as they pass excruciatingly slowly, often on hills and curves! If they cannot manage this, their trucks should be on autopilot the entire time they're on the interstate! It is both unsafe and extremely annoying, drivers often can't even use adaptive cruise control if available, because the truckers will cut them off in the left lane, then go 10mph slower.
Also a bit related to #5, commercial trucks should not be cutting smaller vehicles off, with or without signaling, ever, and I do have a lot of sympathy for people who speed up into their spaces to avoid having stuff flung into their windshield from a poorly secured truck, even hay is pretty annoying, but the gravel trucks have big signs saying "not responsible for cracked windshields," and indeed it's pretty hard to prove to the police. I once had a crowbar fly off a truck and impale my windshield, nearly killing the front passenger.
This is a result of stupid regulation - at least in EU - where truck drivers are subject to constant surveillance where their telemetry is recorded an they have to show it to random inspection at any time. Also they have different speed limits depending on cargo, mostly between 80 to 90 km/h on highways. Additionally they have strict limits when it comes to maximum time they can drive and how much rest they need to have regularly. If you are a truck driver who is stuck behind another truck driving 6 miles per hour slower, in the end this may end up with you not reaching your destination today, meaning being stuck on a highway for extended time and not making it home.
Also I am not the truck driver, but have some respect for them. They make our society work especially in times of Amazon and international trade. I think it distasteful for people to get angry at them, when it is the rules that makes their lives shitty.
Also, a lot of this could be resolved by increasing stupid 70mph speed limit (113km/h) on highways to 80 or 85 as in Europe, so you can catch up if you are inconvenienced for 30 seconds behind a truck or other vehicle.
I'm not sure what the rules are for truck drivers in America, but it was pretty visibly the more established white truck drivers who were hanging out in the right lane, and the new immigrant truck drivers who were passing. If there are laws punishing new drivers who are acting the same as old responsible drivers, then, sure, those are bad laws.
This suggests lack of familiarity with American interstates in multiple ways.
The alternative is to fly, but in the American West not only is it expensive for a full car's worth of people, you still have to rent a car at the destination, and even rent car seats.
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Interesting, my mental model of a trucker is still a fat white guy with a hat.
RE: overtaking, as per google AI summary:
"In Germany, "Elefantenrennen" (elephant racing) refers to the slow overtaking of one truck by another on a highway, often blocking all lanes and causing traffic congestion. It's a common, and often frustrating, phenomenon where trucks with minimal speed differences attempt to pass each other, causing delays. This practice is actually illegal in Germany, according to GermanyinUSA."
Trucks still have legal limit of 45 seconds to overtake each other even in Germany. Which of course can seem like a lifetime for impatient people on the highway.
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There are still a lot of those, and a smaller number of black and hispanic guys, but they mostly stay in their lane, probably on cruise control, and if they get over it's because someone is stuck on the side of the freeway or something. My guess about the leapfrog guys is that they think of themselves as therefore working harder than the cruise control guys. The aggressive Indian drivers seemed to be an I-40 specific phenomenon (there are new truck stops springing up there, serving Indian food as well), it isn't noticeable on N/S highways, and was less of an issue on I-10, it looked like there were more highway patrol enforcing the laws there.
Haha, that's a good term, I hadn't heard it before.
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