My girlfriend and I are going to America in April next year and we are hiring a car but we have never driven left hookers or driven in America. Any pointers, tips?

I'm trying to find an American Highway code at the moment but I know a few things, can't over take a bus when its unloading, if turning left at a junction you have to stay in the correct lane (right hand side) as left and middle carry on going forwards. Can turn right on a red unless otherwise stated.

Any other tips are gratefully received :D

Darren

Not a lot to it, really, you've got the right turn on red thing already. Generally, everyone on the motorways (freeways and turnpikes) travels at about 5-8mph over the speed limit in all the states I've visited, so stick to that and you'll be fine. The roads are often a lot emptier, so cruise control is actually useful unlike on the M25. And (apart from a couple I found in Washington) they don't seem to have roundabouts.

You've got the basics .... and it's a lot easier as almost all hire cars are autos so no probs, with the gearchange.

The biggest problem I had with the car was driving in the correct part of the lane to start with. You get used to putting your car in the middle of the lane when driving and I found I was driving way off centre the first time in the US. Figured out I was actually positioning ME in the lane - so with a left hand drive car I was putting myself to the right of the lane so the car was over the RH white line .... got it after a couple of hours ...

Oh, and 4-ways. As far as I figured out with these 4-way stop signs is you go in the order you arrived. But us good old Brits never have to do this so it takes a bit of getting used to (and honks from frustrated Yanks!). And STOP means stop , not 'go very slowly' ....

When exiting a garage or something onto a nearly empty road watch which side of the road you start driving on. Sometimes you only realise it's the wrong side when the headlights appear ...

Other than that, enjoy!

Dave

Thanks hades, I forgot about the lack or roundabouts. Also another thing. When passing a school the speed limit drops and is displayed in black and gold??

Darren

They have a roundabout in Boston. I know. I saw the carnage that it caused day in, day out :D

Never, ever, EVER try to brake with your left foot :)

rubbish, Left Foot Braking is a must in a hire car auto. ;)

An easy way to remember which side of the road to drive on is to remember the driver should always be nearest the centre of the road, passenger nearest the kerb.

i toured around north west ca from san fran up to lake tahoe and
back again, scary s##t to start with but soon got the hang of it.
if anything i found the easiest thing to remember is to follow
the speed of other traffic and give as much horn as the next bloke,
just enjoy it!!!!

Echo the point about 4-ways and people proceeding in the order they arrived. It's weird arriving first at a minor road on the 4-way and the people on more major roads waiting for you to move.

Also -- expect the unexpected. Forget the UK driving test where you reverse around a corner into a quiet road. The State of Illinois driving test includes the manoeuvre "Reversing onto a main road".

Doug

The "turning right on red rule" doesn't apply at every junction. Check before you do this. I seem to remember that in most of the parts of suburban Chicago that I drove in it was the rule, but in the City each set of traffic lights had its own rule.

Doug

I've been living in Canada since April and have driven in the USA too, so will add my useless input :D

Turn right on red, unless signed that you cannot, you can, and it's a damn good thing! and yes, I have done the turn left on red thing when back in the UK.

Speed limits. DO stick to them. I drove from Toronto to St Louis and there were some fantastic straight roads, the cliched 'You could see for miles' was so true, but speed limit was 60, now I was a little naughty and did 65, but would not push it, when I was doing 80 odd a squad car did pull out from it's hidey hole and as soon as I did this I did slow down very very quickly and let the squaddie pass me by, I think I was lucky.


Stop signs, you MUST stop at them, you will get a, umm, moving violation if you don't. and this does apply at 3am when all that is on the road is a dead racoon.

4-way stops, urg, anyone say mini roundabout needed? :D first person who is there has right of way, if two arrive at same time, person on right has right of way.

What else, you can undertake, quite happily, and you will be under and over taken by 18 wheelers, and it is worrying at first.

Bottom line, it's not that difficult to drive over here. Just drives me nuts at the silly low KPH speed limits, grrrrr :D

[Edited by Markus - 11/25/2003 9:06:37 PM]

Turning right at at lights!!!
as previosly mentioned, each city has its own rule but, on speeking to a sound bloke whilst over there from LA he said you
can turn right on red as long as it is safe to do so,ie:- no imenent traffic, but i suggest you just keep a eye on what the others do when you are going straight and the geezer to your side needs to turn right,
again "good look and enjoy"

Yep my old man got told off for not coming to a complete standstill at a STOP sign. As we do in the UK he thought it would be fine to slow to a crawl whilst checking for traffic.

They hate jaywalkers too. Me and my bro went to United Airlines Arena in Miami to see Miami Heat play the Nicks. We got pulled by the cops for running across a main (empty) road :D

Simon.

Re: turning right against a red light

Often the right hand lane will be for turning right or going straight on, while the middle lane will be for straight-ahead only. In these cases it's often worth using the middle lane if you want to go straight on, because people wanting to turn right don't want to have to wait for the light to turn green just because you're blocking the right hand lane.

Just back from Orlando, I found this :-
1. The roads are HUGE, so junctions means crossing 6/8 lanes.
this is not so easy in the dark with minimal road markings.
2. Nearly all the roads have central reservations, so when coming out of junctions Always remember to cross all the way to the other side ( I didn't twice- you soon remember when you discover you are looking at the back of traffic lights )
3. Junction signs are generally on the junction. This means TURN OFF NOW not in 200 yards or so. So look ahead to get into the correct (right) lane.

Watch out for "shared" central lanes, mostly found in urban areas. For example 2 lanes in each direction plus a shared central 5th lane which is used when turning right across the traffic. They don't tend to use hatching to show where you should pull into the lane and queue. You should not enter the shared lanes too early as you might find someone coming in the opposite direction to take the right turn between you and your right turn.

Whoever is passenger should help out with the map and tell you whether you need to take the roads heading North, South, East or West. Sometimes they will only have an interstate number on the signpost with direction, and not say which city the road is heading towards. For example, I94 East.

Interstate numbering, even numbers basically mean roads go East/West. Odd numbers mean North/South.

It's pretty straightforward really when other traffic is around. But watch out for driving on the wrong side if the road is empty, I've scared myself silly once before :o

Also watch out for school buses, if the Stop sign is displaying, ie when dropping off or picking up kids, you must stop in BOTH directions (unless there is a central 'median' - then only the traffic following the bus need stop).

In Illinois there was a rule, and probably applied to all states, that if you see an emergency vehicle with blue lights flashing you should pull over to the side of the road and stop, even if it is on the other side of the road. It always seemed strange to see this when the road was 5 lanes wide, almost empty and everybody pulled over.

Going back to the four way stop thing.
What happens in rush hour when there is traffic queuing in all directions.
Do cars go one at in a clockwise/anticlock wise way or is a free for all?

At 4 way stops the theory is the person who arrived first goes first. So you wait in turn- until some nob pulls out when you do of course.

thanks for all the replies everyone :D

Loads to be having a read.

Darren

If you're hiring from Hertz (I'm sure many others do it too) then pay extra for the Neverlost sat nav upgrade. Only about a couple of dollars a day. It's basically a iPaq type PDA mounted in the car with sound through the stereo speakers and is pretty damned useful.

Also, watch out for looking like a complete tool the first time you fill up with juice. Most city gas stations demand that you pay first (or at least leave a deposit) to avoid people doing a runner.

Years ago I pulled into a station with a V6 Toyota Camry hire car. Thought, "hmmm, probably 15 gallons - couple of quid a gallon, that's 45 quid, say 2 dollars to the pound...." so I went to the redneck in the boothe and gave him 2 fifty dollar notes. He just looked at me as if I was the totally clueless dimwit Brit that I was.

Anyway, after brimming the tank and buying a 8ft long hot dog and a gallon of Coke, he gave me back about 85 dollars in change!!

Don't do 20mph over the speed limit on the I90/94 in Wisconsin. My mate was...

The state trooper that pulled him gave him the nicest, politest b*ll*cking I've ever witnessed. Almost apologetic for having to book him.

Our speeding fines don't seem too bad over here by comparison; i forget the exact figure, but it was over $200, plus 6 Wisconsin points (like here, 12's a ban I believe). They can even take the fine on a credit card!

What else did we find?

As mentioned above, turning into the correct lane at junctions is a bit hard work at first - really needed to think about it for the first couple of days.

All drivers are really polite with other drivers. Even in cities, though LA was the only exception we found to this.

As Hades said, not many roundabaouts - we found 2 in 5200 miles.

HTH.

JOhn.

Just a word of caution. When I went to Chicago a few years ago, the state of the road surface on some of the freeways was appalling. I hated the soft spongy suspension of the Yank cars at first, but after hitting some of the monstrous pot-holes, I was quite glad of it.

As others have said, watch your speed. It seems like your going backwards, but on some freeways there's a cop car every couple of miles.