In Finland you need to wave your hand for the bus to stop and pick you up.
I waved, and I waved, and I waved, but the bus driver just didn’t turn the blinker on.But, the bus stopped anyway.
So, me: “Hello! Is your own private car a BMW, perhaps?”
The bus driver, visibly proud that someone could recognize that from her outlook alone: “Yes, indeed!”
“Next time maybe use the blinker.”
(The bus driver looked much less proud)It’s not just BMW drivers though! Here in Germany, the majority of motorists are using it wrong: they indicate as they merge/turn or a second before (at best), making it entirely useless IMO.
Plenty common in the US too. Brake lights are a more reliable indicator that someone is planning to turn soon
Don’t You use the same light for turning and braking?
A lot of US cars use the same physical light for turn signals and brake signals, but I’m saying noticing the car in front of you is slowing down because the brake lights are on can be a more reliable way to know someone is about to turn because no one uses turn signals properly
Not universally. And even for cars that do, it is still easily noticeable when someone has their signal on. There are at least 3 brake lights, so if one of them is flashing instead of solid, that one is the turn signal.
I find more cars these days tend to have dedicated front and rear turn signals that are separate from the brake lights, though.
It still flashes. It’s dumb that we don’t charge it, but it’s still pretty noticable in all but the quickest stops.
I swear people intentionally wait for the last moment to make sure nobody has time to react.
Absolutely! I’ve been trying to understand why.
The closest idea I’ve gotten so far is: They are worried their “request” to merge will be denied so they just do it as fast as possible without giving others a chance to influence it.
These are often also the same people that attempt to block other cars from merging during traffic jams.
I’m not in Germany, but I was taught (in mandated driving school) that when switching lanes, first check it’s safe (which means you cannot cause another car needing to brake for you), then signal, then change lane. You shouldn’t “request to” change lanes forcing another to need to react. Not sure if it can explain the behaviour.
But this is only for changing lanes, not for zipper merging, or just turning a corner etc.
That doesn’t seem like a great idea to me. You’re signaling to let other drivers know you’re intending to do something so they can be ready to react if needed. You could miss a car in your blindspot even after checking and only signaling right before you start changing lanes wouldn’t give that car much warning.
Obviously signaling doesn’t magically give you the right of way to merge, but IMO it’s better to let others know you’re doing something as soon as possible
Exactly this. Indicate to communicate with others.
If you indicate in advance of your manoeuvre, it gives others time to react by reducing (or increasing) their speed to make room for you instead of always having to slam their brakes in order to avoid a collision.
Indicating is much safer, fuel efficient and way less frustrating for everybody, even pedestrians.
The counterpoint is that if you indicate at a point when it’s unsafe to change lanes to communicate your intention to, for example change lane after a car passes, then the other car might think you missed them and therefore might take potentially risky corrective actions.
Personally I indicate when it’s safe, but don’t aggressively change lanes right away, waiting a few seconds. Seems like a good approach to me.
And then you get the other extreme, those who turn on their indicators 3 streets before their actual turn. They will turn …at some point.
I have a 2025 BMW EV. It strongly refuses to switch lanes unless you engage the turn signal. BMW engineers literally had to software code a fix for the average BMW driver.
Maybe that explains the crazy phenomenon I saw the other day. A BMW driver near me actually used their turn signal and I was super impressed. They they cut off another driver and almost caused a huge accident.
It takes time to learn new behaviours, I guess
well it won’t fix the huge blind spots on modern cars
Personally I find that most BMW drivers have become Tesla drivers.
Tesla drivers just don’t actually know how to drive. They’re like Prius drivers but worse. It’s because a lot of them are infantilized tech workers who have no real life skills and then buy their first car as a Tesla as jewelry, as status. So they’re dumb, incredibly pretentious and think they’re better than you, don’t give a shit about other people, and don’t give a shit about driving or even learning the laws or culture. It’s literally antisocial.
With bmw drivers, at least they also like driving because that’s the whole bmw brand image.
First time I ever saw a Tesla on the road, I had just gotten my driver’s license and was exiting a small town where I had bought my first ever car. It was 60 km/h road, about 5-10 km before the town ends. I was driving by the limit, taking in the possible “meter error.” I stopped at lights, and my buddy noticed a Tesla behind us. When the lights turned green, the Tesla passed me in the intersection area and drove away at over 100 km/h. It was gone very fast. Sadly there was not a police car patrolling or cameras… Later experiences with Teslas have not been any different.
Congrats Tesla driver, you were faster than a 2000 WV Golf! What a driver you are/were!
No matter how hard i push in or pull out this stick, nothing ever happens.
That doesn’t look like a BMW stick tho.
wta do you mean? there is no such stick on a bmw XD
Hah, that would complete the joke, can’t wait for fully self driving cars
Yeah looks like a ford
As a pedestrian, drivers not signalling on roundabouts does my fucking nut in.
As a driver, other drivers completely failing to understand any roundabout indicating rules does my fucking nut in.
It isnt that hard, there are literally like 3 rules to know indicating during a roundabout:
- indicate if taking first exit.
- If its a standard 4-exit round about and you are going straight, you only have to indcate as you exit.
- Indicate in direction of roundabout if you are passing more than one exit, then after passing the penultimate exit before you plan to leave the round about, change from indicating with the roundabout to indicating your going to exit the roundabout.
Every single driver in Florida
This guy Tampas.
Not quite. Western NC is overrun with Floridians who are complete ass at driving
I have a BMW. I feel like “BMW driver” is often more of a state of mind than the car you actually drive. I’m more of a Toyota driver who happens to own a BMW lol
It’s not that they don’t know about the blinker, it’s that they know every blinker has a limited number of blinks, and dealership charge an arm and a leg to change the blinker fluid.
Knowing BMW, charging to use the indicator sounds like a very real thing to happen.
I drove a bmw once. Their blinker sticks suck ass. Actually bad design. You had to like tap it to turn it on and then tap it again to turn it off or something dumb.
It takes a little time to get used to but it’s ultimately the superior design. Light tap for three blinks, hard press to turn signal on, another tap in the same direction to disengage. You never accidentally click too far that other way.
That doesn’t sound better at all. What’s wrong with the normal function. Push to turn on, and it turns off when you turn the wheel, or you pull it? If this is how BMW signals work, I don’t blame people for not using them (as much).
It does automatically turn off after a turn, the only difference is really the second push in the same direction to turn it off. It just prevents the stalk from being pushed too far in the other direction.
It used to just be BMW drivers but now it’s literally everyone.
Depends on the country.
In the UK there’s a very good chance the -non audi, BMW, tesla, range rover- driver will indicate.In Finland then, yeah. I’ve only been here a week but it definitely seems there is slightly more of a chance they will not indicate.
As one of the few BMW drivers that keeps his blinkerfluid topped up I upvoted this. So annoying if people don’t use a blinker, especially when they leave roundabouts and keep the traffic that wants to enter waiting for nothing. It takes zero effort to use a blinker, people who refuse to use them are just lazy selfish pieces of shit.
BMW drivers: So left or right? I can’t turn both!
It looks familiar…
