3 ms·
I’m not comfortable at all claiming that you’re a bad driver in general, like the GP proposes, and maybe I’m taking your unit of measurement too literally, but
by DiggyJohnson 4y ago
I’m not comfortable at all claiming that you’re a bad driver in general, like the GP proposes, and maybe I’m taking your unit of measurement too literally, but I don’t think 1-2 car lengths is a reasonable follow distance in almost any circumstances above 45mph, two lengths is kinda the minimum to not bother the person in front of you. Again, I’m making a very general statement, that might not apply to the situations you’re describing.
And I’m a young guy that is working on being a more conservative driver myself - so I’m chuckling to myself just at the idea of me taking this side of the discussion.
- branon 4y agoThis is an interesting point. The Subaru's adaptive cruise control system treats a "car length" as a fairly large unit of measurement. One car length seems to be the literal length of the vehicle, plus some reasonable amount of buffer on both ends. Probably twice as large as the vehicle itself. And the faster you're going, the larger a single car length becomes. Infinite nuance :P But in general, very good commentary on systems that provide useful feedback for the human operator versus ones that don't. ACC makes it clear what a car length should be, and if you're paying attention you can gauge how much more space it leaves when you're moving fast. So that's what I go by.
- indymike 4y agoThe Subaru uses two seconds per tick mark on the adaptive cruise display, so the distance changes as you go faster. At slow speeds, it's roughly exact car lengths, and at 65MPH it's considerably further.
- DiggyJohnson 4y agoFwiw, it’s interesting to me that the unit of a “car length” would not refer to a literal car length (14-17 ft or so).