Superfight: Virginia Versus Maryland Drivers

Let the debate continue. As a former resident of Maryland and a current resident of Virginia and having had the privledge (good or bad you decide) of living in the DC Metro area means that I've been able to observe drivers from all three areas for most of my life. I admit that I didn't really pay attention to how people drove until I myself started driving on my own over 15 years ago. In that time I've been part of the debate over which state's drivers are the worst and if a recent survey's results are any benchmark then only one place has anything to be proud of and that's Washington D.C. A recent survey by AutoVantage ranked D.C. as the sixth most courteous city in the United States.

Now before the rest of us in Maryland and Northern Virginia begin getting in a tizzy about where our respective states and cities ranked, be happy (or disappointed) in the fact that neither Maryland or Virginia ranked in the list. However, I would note that Baltimore did rank third in the cities with the least amount of Road Rage. So what constitutes road rage? Well for most people it can be any number of things which includes (but is certainly not limited to): cutting people off, changing lanes without turn signals, driving below the speed limit in the passing lane, failing to obey traffic laws and in general, failing to apply common sense when on the road. Maryland and Virginia drivers have always been at odds with one another over their skills (or lack thereof) and having driven in both states for roughly the same number of years, I think I can rightfully say that both drivers have their faults but there is more of a reason behind the sometimes boneheaded things many Virginia drivers do.

The reason I feel more Virginia drivers do boneheaded things as opposed to Maryland drivers has to do with the amount of gridlock you find in Virginia in general. My smoking gun? Take a drive on I-66 (east or west bound) almost any time of day, any day of the week and you will undoubtedly hit traffic. There's typically no reason for it. I can understand if there are delays due to construction or accidents or what-have-you but in most cases the slowdowns are at the usual areas simply because it is expected to be slow in those area. And if you'll notice one thing that I have whenever I've driven around Virginia, no one is willing to let anyone else merge in front of them. What is this ego trip that so many drivers seem to be on? I can't count the number of times I've been driving down the road ready to merge onto the beltway when someone is driving along in the right lane and proceeds to speed up despite the fact that I am attempting to merge into traffic right next to him. Never mind that the lane next to him is open and that he could switch lanes for that brief stretch.

Drivers tend to become territorial for the area immediately surrounding their cars and tend to want to defend that particular spot at that particular time like a lioness protecting a cub. So then we're faced with a split-second decision. Slam on the brakes and get behind the person or test your car's acceleration and try and zoom ahead. All this to do nothing more than merge onto the highway. That's to say nothing of the numerous instances of other road violations people regularly commit while driving around. Virginia drivers will be quick to point out that drivers in Maryland also do the same thing and they do but I do caveat this by saying it's worse in Virginia because of the gridlock described above. I think what happens then is that drivers are so miffed at having taken half an hour to go one mile that when traffic opens up, they don't know how to accelerate and go above the speed limit or they become so defensive that they don't want to let anyone get ahead of them because God forbid anyone who didn't sit in traffic for that same half an hour should get ahead of them.

But whatever your stance in this debate I would say that the debate basically boils down to the fact that we're all very bad drivers in some way, shape or form. We all inherit bad habits from those who came before us and rather than adjusting what we're taught given that cars are changing in their abilities as time has passed, most of the major rules of the road still apply back when the Model-T was the most advanced and popular car on the road. If drivers take their ego out of the equation, even for a little while and became a little more courteous then perhaps the roads around here wouldn't be so replete with angry drivers and then we could all rank higher as far as courteous cities go.