Inconsiderate drivers and tractor operators, bad mix...

[Smokeydog]

Road traveling with farm equipment , animals and hay were big factors in downsizing. Like many I’ve had some serious close calls by careless drivers and angry people. City and development has encroached. Farmland can grow houses more profitable than crops or livestock. People and kids use to wave, be courteous and respectful. Maybe I’ve gotten old and too scary looking? I use to know about everyone passing on the road. Now almost no one. Maybe I’m part of the problem?

 

[5030]

I could be too but I am bigger (size of equipment wise) than they are. I have to say that 95% of the time when I'm driving to and from fields in one of the tractors, I am armerd I usually have my Mini14 Ranch rifle behind the seat and often am carrying a 45 automatic as well.

I have put a few in the ditch before, always someone in a big hurry to get nowhere and usually under the age of 40.

Lots of times I'm pulling an implement wider than a normal travel lane and they cannot wait a few seconds for me to find a wide spot to pull off and let them by. Last spring I put some kid in the ditch, big hurry to go nowhere. He tried to get around my planter, didn't make it, went in the ditch. I stopped, got out on the step. looked back at him cussing me out and got back in a drove away. I did call the State Police and tell them there was some young punk in the ditch at a certain address.

When I came back that way, he and his car were gone.

Most farmers I know when yield when they have room to.

What I find interesting though is how fast people drive on dirt roads. Guess they don't care about the sandblasting their vehicle chassis is getting and how that dirt is getting inside all the suspension joints. I'd never buy a used vehicle from anyone out here, thay are all junk.

 

[3Ts]

I think part of the problem is the entitlement mentality - they've been told they are entitled to do what ever they want - and that they've never been held accountable for any of their actions.

 

[RandyT]

Same here. About four years back in no passing zone had a guy who moved here about three years before pass me. He could not see for we were topping a hill. I was making left turn with signal on. Officer charged me for improper turn. Total disregarded what I had to say. Attorney friend of mine said if you ask for jury trial you will win. I decided to pay the fine and forget it for the guy who hit me was a loud mouth person from big city up North. About two years later as I was pulling up to stop sign on major US road a pickup turned off the road too fast. Hit me in my lane. Turned out the same officer responded and told me the other driver confessed he made wide turn and was in the wrong. I took the opportunity to tell the office I was in the right in the tractor ticket he gave me two years earlier. Had to like the excuse he gave me for not remembering it, he went to a lot of tractor accidents...really?

Similar issue years ago in Indiana involving a car and a utility bucket truck.. Bucket truck making left turn and car tried passing and T boned the bucket service truck turning it on its side. Utility worker got the ticket for failure to yield when turning left. this was on flat open ground in a legal passing zone.

 

[Thomas]

There some driver just don't show common sense they think they can stop on dime or it won't happen to them,and some I feel are influenced by tv ads etc. also some parents are at fault maybe because they don't know any better.

 

[ptsg]

The worst part if that if these idiots will actually hit you tractor with their stupid driving, you're facing expensive repairs on the tractor or implement. It's not that hard to break an axle, bend rims and loaders if someone hits you.

 

[5030]

One thing I constantly worry about is coming home in the evening pulling an implement and having someone rear end me. I'm 100% legal with flashing lights facing rear and even a rotating amber beacon on the tractor plus the required (by law) SMV reflective triangles on everything, but what a surprise it would be (unpleasant) for them to rear end an implement. Most of my implements weigh as much as my tractors and hitting one with an 18 gauge steel coffin could be real bad, for them and I don't want a death on my conscience either.

I always try to stay on less traveled roads when going from field to home in the evening and I try to farm through the week, not on weekends when the drinkers are out and about.

Holiday weekends (like this one) are also a no no. Our normally quiet dirt toad is a superhighway today and everyone is going to a fire....

I own more than one tractor but I use them all so the loss of one could be bad.

 

[5030]

Similar issue years ago in Indiana involving a car and a utility bucket truck.. Bucket truck making left turn and car tried passing and T boned the bucket service truck turning it on its side. Utility worker got the ticket for failure to yield when turning left. this was on flat open ground in a legal passing zone.

I don't get that, especially if the truck driver was signalling his intent well in advance of his turn.

 

[Diggin It]

Yeah, I don't either. Left of center is always more responsible for whatever might go wrong. If you're turning left, you're looking in front for oncoming traffic, not in your mirror for somebody on the wrong side of the road.

 

[Hay Dude]

Hah, too funny I had an incident today. I was transporting a 6 star Tedder from one field to another with my Kubota M126X. I have to run about 1 mile on a typical divided 4 lane highway. I was in right lane, doing 24MPH. Rotary beacon on, 4 ways on, Tedder blinking lights on, SMV emblems. This clown in a Tesla passes me, not in the left (passing) lane, but on the shoulder of the highway.
This douche bag also honked and flipped me the universal friendship sign. All Im trying to do is make a living, following every safety protocol I know of.
City people.....cant stand em. They move into my area to get away from people like themselves and end up causing trouble, raising taxes with their walking trail pet projects and generally making asses of themselves trying to show all us country people “how to live”.

F-em.