A tweet about driving in Michigan

[neonvincent]

My welcome to Michigan after moving from California was someone passing me on the right while driving 15 mph over the speed limit. That was my first experience with the joyless lead-foots of the Great Lakes State.

Comments

[dewline]

Based on that description, Michigan's drivers put me in mind of the reputation of the drivers of Montréal.

[neonvincent]

I've read about them in "The Nine Nations of North America." Unfortunately, I can't find the passage describing their driving. The difference is that I think they take more pleasure in their speeding.

[dewline]

On one visit to Montréal years ago, I nearly learned first-hand the hard way about the reputation of car-drivers there.

[neonvincent]

Sounds like their reputation is well-deserved.

[captainsblog]

I vaguely remember a story from a longago news segment, which I distinctly remember being datelined from somewhere in Michigan. A cadre of state troopers decided to experiment with a new form of speed enforcement. Rather than playing the usual cat-and-mouse with drivers at speed traps, they simply sent out two cop cars on a two-lane interstate and had them drive 55 next to each other.

It took all of a day, with death threats and driving on shoulders and medians to get around clearly marked cop cars, for them to decide it was too unsafe a policy.

[neonvincent]

I never heard of that in Michigan. When I read something like that, it was the California Highway Patrol doing that on I-15 between San Bernardino and the state line on the way to Las Vegas. That written, I can believe the reaction from my fellow Great Lakes Staters. They will drive on shoulders and medians to get around traffic jams. Death threats I haven't seen, but I can believe that, too.