What do I need to know about driving in the USA.

[erkpod]

The very first move I made on a public road in the US was actually on the left hand side of the road. Leaving the car park of the rental firm at LAX, there was a car carrier blocking the right hand side of the road while loading/unloading. So I had to drive on the left hand side of the road.


The hardest time for me early in the trip was going to the right hand side of the car at the start of the day.

Portland OR (and presumably the rest of the state of Oregon) has a strange rule (as it was explained to me by a local in 2009). If there's a pedestrian near a road & there's even a remote chance that they want to cross the road, you must give way to them. On my recent trip in 2013, I was jaywalking at a set of traffic lights. I got halfway across & the lights changed. So I gave the female driver a signal to say that she should go with the green light & that I'd stay where I was. She wound down her window & said to me "I have to give way to you. It's the law. It's illegal for me not to give way to you." So in Portland at least, jaywalking Australian pedestrians seem to have right of way.

 

[Skyring]

Going to the wrong side of the car to get in - whether as passenger or driver. The funniest one I heard about was a chap who was picked up by a friend at the airport after the usual insanely long flight, promptly fell asleep and woke suddenly some time later to find himself speeding down a freeway, on the right side of the car, and no steering wheel in front of him!

Drifting right. The Aussie driver gets into the rental car, puts all his effort into driving on the right side of the road, but positions himself within the lane on what feels normal - the right side, forgetting that half the car is sticking over into the next lane. Or off the road entirely. As a passenger I've looked at a lot of signposts, bridge railings, parked cars whipping by me a half-inch away.

Turning the wrong way at carpark or service station exits. No lanes marked, and without traffic it looks just like home.

Pulling to the left on narrow country roads. This is a real killer. You get off the Interstate, you're looking for your mate's farmhouse, a lonely battlefield, the bridges of Madison County, the road has no lanes marked and suddenly you crest a hill and there's a car coming straight at you. Naturally you pull to the left, at the same time as the other driver is naturally pulling to the right.

Roundabouts. They are rare in America, not so much in Europe, but the tendency is to go around them in a clockwise fashion. Don't.

Four way stop signs. Pulling up to an intersection, you spot the STOP sign and give way to all traffic. After a while you realise that everyone has a STOP sign. WTF? The answer is that drivers take turns, but it took me a long time before I realised this, with the puzzled but pleased Americans in front of me slowly outweighed by the puzzled and most displeased Americans behind!

Right turn on red after stopping. This is America's contribution to global happiness. It is allowed everywhere unless specifically prohibited. So if you are turning right, yeah, you can go through the red light if it's clear.

The controls. Geez, the battles I've had over handbrakes. Or going to change gears and banging my hand on the inside of the door. Reaching to wind the window down and your hand is suddenly wandering around in your passenger's lap.

And, possibly my favorite, although not really a driving on the wrong side thing. More a rental car thing. Driving into a service station to fill up and you suddenly realise that you don't have the foggiest idea where the fuel cap is. Or how to open it. One answer is that the petrol gauge on the dashboard has a little image of a petrol pump and an arrow on one side or another. But whether you thump the filler flap, pull a hidden lever in the footwell, or try to prise the bloody thing open with the key, who knows?

 

[cove]

I hired a car where I could not find the fuel cap release lever/button.
Yes it had been put in the passenger glovebox and yes it was an American made car.

 

[jukebox333]

I hired a car where I could not find the fuel cap release lever/button.
Yes it had been put in the passenger glovebox and yes it was an American made car.

Yep. Had exactly the same problem a few years back - the guys filling up next to me with an SUV and boat/trailer spent what felt like ages helping me look, as they couldn't work it out either - but we found it in the end (I felt like an utter dick asking, but as there aren't too many Aussie tourists in Rapid City, South Dakota, they were stoked to help!)

 

[harvyk]

With the what speed should you do thing, well I'll either go with the flow (so if the flow is 90mph but the limit is 65, I'll still do 90), or if I'm the only one I'll stick to the speed limit.

My first time driving in LA, I stuck to my nice legal 65, and was consistently been overtaken. I figured that just going with the flow was probably ok when I saw a copper go past me at about 100, but not really in a hurry (eg didn't make any effort to go around cars also doing ~90ish and not pulling people over for speeding).

The other thing is to ignore that little voice in your head when driving along country roads. I still remember having my brain scream at me that I was about to have a head-on when driving along a little country road and I saw an oncoming car. It took a bit of mental power to not cross to the left hand side.

The other thing was at intersections, turning right despite seeing an oncoming car was interesting, it was basically an attempt to undo years of driving experience over here, and to ignore the little voice that says what you are suppose to do in certain circumstances.

One of the things I did notice when I got back to AU, was my driving style here had changed a little, with the biggest thing which Mrs Harvyk also noticed, I was hugging the kerbs a bit more, and I was sitting a little bit more to the left of the lane than I used to.

In any case, driving over there is certainly easy enough, plus it's a bit of fun to drive a LHD car if your not used to it.

 

[TheRealTMA]

I knew a French woman who was driving on the motorway in the UK and attempted to change to 6th gear at 85mph and was a little shocked that instead she put the window down

 

[Skyring]

In any case, driving over there is certainly easy enough, plus it's a bit of fun to drive a LHD car if your not used to it.

I dunno about fun, if you are just off a long flight, it's your first time, and you are straight onto LA freeways...

My first time was in France, in a little manual (all I could afford), in the narrow Norman streets of a strange town, with plenty of other traffic. I hadn't driven a manual for many years, so I had a whole bunch of firsts hitting me all at once. Not to mention my very rusty schoolboy French!

But yeah, I love American roadtrips. The whole country is set up for cars, pretty much. GPS, satellite radio, drive through everything, Interstates, generous carparks, plentiful cupholders, few speed cameras, junk food in bucketloads...

 

[MEL_Traveller]

someone explained the easiest way for the left/right thing is just to 'follow your heart'... your heart should always be in the middle of the road/next to the centre-line.... if it's not you're on the wrong side!

 

[harvyk]

I dunno about fun, if you are just off a long flight, it's your first time, and you are straight onto LA freeways...

Yeah that's pretty much my first experience of driving in the USA.

 

[openseat]

My sometimes hard learned lessons from two years in the US:

* be very careful at four-way stops, and even if you're the first to arrive there could be another car that thinks he has the right of way (had a bingle in DC with that)
* watch your speed in Delaware on I-95. It's not a long stretch, but they do raise an awful lot of revenue and the cops are not friendly.
* driving on ice is terrifying - just remember to sound the horn as you spin helplessly out of control (a lesson learnt on 16th Street in DC, followed up by a slide and spin at 60mph on a bridge on the Penn. turnpike later that winter).
* be careful on the road out of Death Valley - we saw an SUV invert itself trying to recover from a swerve to miss coyotes. Made for a worrying time helping the people in the SUV as the coyotes started to take more than a passing interest in us.
* be careful driving after lunch on a long drive, it's when you can start to stray onto the wrong side of the road with postprandial doziness (lesson learned at Mont St Michel many years ago!).

 

[drron]

And talking of different laws in different states Washington state has a good one.If you have 5 or more cars in line behind you you are required to pull over and let them pass.They make it easy with turnouts on minor roads.

 

[Skyring]

* driving on ice is terrifying - just remember to sound the horn as you spin helplessly out of control (a lesson learnt on 16th Street in DC, followed up by a slide and spin at 60mph on a bridge on the Penn. turnpike later that winter).
* be careful driving after lunch on a long drive, it's when you can start to stray onto the wrong side of the road with postprandial doziness (lesson learned at Mont St Michel many years ago!).

One of the more incomprehensible things I saw in the US was a sign - on I-95 - somewhere in North Carolina saying "Bridge Freezes Before Road". I knew they were English words, I just couldn't work them into anything that made sense! Eventually my mate, who refused to let me drive after I'd exclaimed over the range of speeds allowed (1 - 95), took pity and explained the physics of ice on roads.



Then there was Robert Hughes, had a head-on with a couple of drongos after a couple of beers.

And, speaking of laws, one that makes sense is to move out of the slow lane when passing a stationary vehicle in the breakdown lane. Some states, it's just emergency vehicles, in others it's anyone.

 

[chrisb]

Well I've survived 2 days travelling, including interstates, car parks, 4 way stop signs, and even backwards round abouts. (Or maybe it's around abooot)

Righty tighty has become the catch cry in the car. Today I've run more red lights than I ever had. It really took a while for my brain to let me go through a red to turn right.

I did accidentally clip a curb on the right once while turning due to there being more car on the right side of me compared to normal.

I'm not sure if its just because its Niagara Falls but this area has LOTS of keep right signs which is nice.