German road network, suggestions to improve

1. Ban tractors between 0600-0830 and 1700-1900-sod the crops.

2. Ban all Merc diesel drivers over the age of 60.

3. Lorries, they have a right to the road because they are working, but ban the sods who won't overtake and stick right up the rear of the lorry. LEAVE A GAP! so we don't have to overtake 2 vehicles at a time.

4. Ban all Hollanders who don't know that cars now have 5 or 6 forward gears, not just 2. 50 kph is not compulsory on all roads.

5. Motorway repair teams should work 24/7 and not bugger off at 12:00 Friday lunch time.

6. Ban the school run or make them take more than 1 kid in each car, don't park in the main drag because it is 20m closer to the school gate.

7. Police who flash me on a straight empty road, out of town doing 110kph - Get a life!

Any other suggestions?

Work from home?!

I sympathize with all your points. I travel about 65km to and from work from our place "out-in-the-sticks", when I get stuck behind a tractor because of the endless trucks coming the other way...

Don't travel anywhere on the A2/A7 around Hannover at the moment...
Last night the dozy workers pulled up a gas pipe, just in time for the rush-hour!

- Execution at the roadside for anybody driving down the motorway in the middle or left lane when they clearly will not be overtaking anything within the next several km's.

I never have any problems it takes me 20 minutes door to door from my place in Frankfurt to Bad Homburg!

Removal of family jewels of anyone trying to turn right to leave the autobahn by the following method:

A line of nose-to-tail traffic is indicating to turn right to exit and has a lot of space behind the last car for another driver to also join the queue to leave the autobahn. Jürgen, however decides that the right thing to do is to come tanking down the left side and squeeze into a non-existent slot rather than lose a millisecond and join the back of the queue in an orderly (and safe) manner.

1. The council cutting grass on the central reservation in the rush hour.
2. Mittelspurfahrer
3. Pulling straight out into the fast lane from the Autobahn entrance.
4. Cutting across all lanes of the Autobahn from the fast lane to exit
5. Pedestrians walking in the middle of the road
6. Geisterfahrer

Just ban everything and everyone except myself. This would make my trip to work much more pleasant.

and I forgot my pet hate:- traffic lights. Why is it that they are so slow in adopting the good old roundabout.

Cos with roundabouts you have to think for yourself more, whereas with a traffic light, you just obey orders.

Forgot to add:

Don't "rubberneck" accidents on the other side of the autobahn, it causes major tailbacks, worse than on the bloody accident side.

Ban my mother-in-law. She is truly dangerous, she drives up to a junction at 60 or 70 kph, takes it out of gear, rolls up to the junction and brakes at the last second!

Ban ALL holidaymakers from HSK area in winter who are too stupid to understand the principle of why we use winter reifen

A very very good point, shoot Jurgen between the legs, twice.

Connect the left hand indicator of all Mercedes/BMWs/Audis to a small explosive charge beneath the drivers seat set to go off if the indicator is on for more than 5 minutes in the laft hand lane. Could also be used in the case of multiple flashing at a distance of 5m from the car in front.

Must agree with you all. MB, BMW and AUDI's get on my buttocks too.
Last week I thought I would have a little fun with a Merc though ...
Driving through Stuttgart doing about 65 KmH ( 60 limit ): Behind me was a new e-class trying to fix my exhaust whilst driving along. I couldn't pull over, as I would have had to have braked. He tailgated me for about 5-6 KM.
I know where you can have your picture taken in Stuttgart, that will cost alot more than at the photographers and it is in Black & White ... So I slowed down before the spot, and pulled into the right lane ( I had to slow down for this )
The Mercedes put his foot down, and 5 seconds later - voila - he had a nice Photo taken to remind him of his journey to work that day. We met up again at the next traffic lights, so he had gained absolutely nothing. I just smiled at him, and waited for the lights to turn green again. He didn't look very happy ...

naughty - I know ... but a good laugh !!!

Are you all afraid of upsetting Slackmack - if so I'll say it:

Lorries which decide to overtake at 50Kph just as you arrive - then you're sat there for the next 10 minutes as they inch (sorry centimetre) forward. (& actually they are frequently the Hollanders). Then Jurgen turns up behind you & waits with his indicator going (of course) inches from your rear.

When you turn to glare at the lorry driver after he finally overtakes after 2Ks (no jestures allowed of course), he steadfastly keeps his gaze directly ahead

(Sorry Slack :$ )

Don't know what you aer talking about, the indicator of my BMW never seems to work properly... at least I think thats what everyone keeps trying to tell me.

Well the one thing that I did to reduce my weekly driving stress by about 99% as I go home for the weekend is to get a Bahncard 50 and travel by rail. It costs (with the Bahncard) about half as much and I only drive a little SEAT and I can sleep without bouncing off the central reservation.

But Busses & Trains are the most crappy things about to get to and from work. :excl:
(unless you live by the station, and work is directly @ another station and you don't have to change ) very unlikely though.

I suppose the german trains are 1000000 times better than the UK ones, but time still means money ...

I would have to change 4 times to get to work. I would take me 1hr 30 mins . In the car it takes me 35 mins ...

Public transport - no way. It was more stressfull for me having to run for my connections. Car is the winner from the "time" point of view, and cost : well, you gotta have one hobby ...

But public transport helps keep you fit. If you have to run for connections.. Better than getting fat sitting in a trafic jam (and inhaling everyone elses exhaust fumes). And you can take your bike on a train and so can cycle as well. I mean at either end, not on the train :-)

OK maybe for the daily back and forth it would be a bugger especially if you're stuck with Regional trains but I have a 400km+ journey home and it's so much better to annoy all the other ICE passengers with my snoring and dribbling and occasionally wandering down to the onboard restaurant than to spend at least the same amount of time getting stressed out on the Autobahn.

But you are not allowed to take your bike on the S-Bahn here in Stuttgart during the "Rush Hour". - And you have to pay for it !!!

I get Fat sitting in the S-Bahn too. OK I may have to run to get my connection, but I could also run down the stairs to my car - same thing innit ??...

"You inhale all of the exhaust fumes" - no I don't - I have got an air & pollen filter in my car. But on the Train I do get to inhale all of the bugs and germs that other people spread around. I also get to wipe the bogeys off my trousers that other people spread all over the seats before I sat down there . No one sneezes in the back of my neck, or even in may face... I get to listen to the Music I want to without having to turn up the volume to overpower that kids mp3 player with mega Earphones sitting next to me...

So all in all - a definate NO to public transport.

Fair enough - long journeys I will agree on that. But getting to and from work daily on Busses and Trains is a nightmare !!!

The Deutsche Bahn's current price structure and tariffs simply begger belief !
Last week I wanted to book a ticket from Hagen to München, the regular price
without a reservation is 230€ :excl: ...a standard plane ticket from Köln to München
with Lufthansa or Deutche BA cost 180€ ...and if I went with one of the cheap airlines
it comes down to 112€ ...no wonder der Bahn isn't making any profits

...and to add insult to injury the Bahn boss Hartmut Mehdorn sheepishly admitted
he usually travels by plane instead of using his trains, ...speaks for it's self really

@ Neil if you like I travel regular long distances then a Bahncard does pay for itself (in my case within about 2 months) and the journeys are then cheaper than car. So long as you avoid over packed regional trains then it is a lot less stress. I also have the advantage of very flexible working hours that allow for the occasional missed connection and lots of seats on ICEs have sockets for laptops allowing me to work too (if I absolutely have to).

I thought about a bahn card but I only travel a couple of times a year by train max. so it didn't really seem worth it

just an observation but there seem to be lot of people ( ok men ) with very noisy cars and motorbikes, like they've done something to the exhaust to make them sound more harsh and loud because they think's it's clever. It fucks me off!! It seems mental when so many people are packed into the cities living in flats that they have to put up with this noise all the time and yet this country has laws that say people can't cut the grass or do the hoovering at certain times.. total contradiction. Are cars exempt from the noise by-laws. ? you can tell I've been thinking about this one!! Old fogey rant over!

Annoys the hell out of me too! I had to pay good money to make sure my car didn't sound loud.
People kept pointing out that my exhaust was loud, when it just started making slightly above average noise, don't they have better things to worry about like those bloody noisy mopeds that sound like they dont have an exhaust pipe at all.

so is it actually illegal then? apart from all the Harley Davidsons ( which I can almost understand ) the main culprits seem to be sports model porsche and mercs. I'm not talking about kids here but usually middle aged men with very expensive cars. I hate all this men using cars as toys shit, if they act like 10 year olds they should be treated as such!

Must say find travelling in Germany absolute bliss in comparison to UK. Being travelling Düsseldorf to Duisburg 4 a year and never need more than 25 minutes. Also find that there is very little congestion in comparison to UK.

it's not toys, they're actually a substitute ...you'll find the most of the culprits have very small willies :doh:
i.e. the smaller the Pimmel the Louder/bigger/dafter (select the most suiting) the car

makes sense, I used to have a fiat 500

Should try the A7 and A2 on fridays and mondays

well I don't drive and to be honest being a passenger in car over here scares the living daylights out of me. I now know why Schumacher drives and expects everyone else to move out of the way - they all do it!

I think public transport over here is great, and a bahn card pays for itself in no time.

As for getting to work, 10 minutes walk door to door via the bakery although the way home can take several hours depending on the number of cocktails.

Public transport for me would involve (assuming NO waiting time, and if everything else goes like clockwork):

Bike to the nearest bus-stop (10 mins)
Bus to the station (25 mins)
Train (35 mins)
Tram (25 mins)
Bus (10 mins)
Walk (5 mins)

Including waiting, it would be more like at least 2 hours!

If everything works on the roads, not that often at the moment, I can do the trip in about 50 minutes (at the relevant speed-limit! - usually the slowest part is on the autobahn!)

So I have plenty of time to look at all the lads in their cars with lovely dark 'tatooed' windows, loud exhausts, throbbing hi-fis and those crappy red or blue neon lights (like some knight rider or automan pillock).
I've got a little Runrig 30th year anniversary sticker on my car, does that count too?!

OK breakdown for me Fassberg to Bonn:

Car to Bhf 15min
Train to Bonn 4 hours max (mostly spent in deep sleep or restaurant)
Tram to doorstep (nearly) 10min float through the door smiling to be greeted by my GF and so starts a blissful weekend relaxed and at peace with the world.

Car alone: anything between 4 and 12 hours of nail biting, stop go, chaos, arrive stressed out (GF sees my face and avoids eye contact ) and collapse into bed.

Give me the train every time

gotta love that one!

the make work projects that abound on the autobahn, I refer to when 2 weeks after finishing months of road works they shut every down and rip it all up and redo it all. They did it on the A3 near Würzberg ( where they put up those sound barriers) They finally opened both sides only to 2 weeks later shut down the west bound side and rip up all the freshly laid asphalt

Ever experienced Germans tackling a roundabout? Traffic lights are safer.