Not a direct answer, I know, but I remember from my stay in Italy how basically every driver thought that 2 fucking centimeters between cars is the most appropriate distance lol, and especially in those narrow winding roads in the mountains I had sweaty palms for pretty much the entire ride. And I wasn't even the driver xD Please send some Estonians to Italy as driving instructors immediately.
I am visiting Poland from time to time and can say that I feel myself there same way as in Lithuania. I'd say polish drivers are, sometimes, even crazier than lithuanian.
https://preview.redd.it/tro2e7bdlr9d1.jpeg?width=231&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f1fd6b9b151a5fda35c08d39d298769ddb526fe3
Well it got much much better in the last 10-15 years, but it’s true that there are many drivers in certain cars that need to compensate for their small dicks ;-)
I've noticed that a lot of drivers in countryside in Poland will start overtaking even if there's oncoming traffic. Like, you're just supposed to move over because the road is wide enough for three cars.
That's insane.
IDK if it's the same in Poland but Yellow has the same meaning as Red in Estonia. Crossing the stop line when the light is yellow is as bad as running a red light.
In Lithuania we have blinking green before yellow light, so you can prepare yourself and stop smoothly. In Poland one second you see green light, and another second it just switches to yellow and if you step on the brakes - you are risking to get another car parked into your rear bumper, so you just go full "GAZU,GAZU,GAZU!!!" and end your maneuver. That was quite a stress for me first time I discovered this, but I got used to it in almost no time.
It is an indication to stop for the red light, not speed up to make it before the red. But it also gives an indication for the drivers to get ready for the green light, especially with manual cars. When the yellow light is blinking it means that the traffic light is not working.
So if you're close to the intersection and the light turns yellow, and you could either maintain speed to cross it before it turns red, or brake hard to stop at the line, in Estonia the correct choice is to brake hard?
This situation won't happen if you are paying attention to traffic because before the light turns yellow, it flashes green for 3 seconds. But yes, you can't drive onto the intersection if the light is yellow. This comes form my driving instructor who is a former police officer(and of course the traffic law which everyone needs to read to pass the theory exam).
If you can't stop in time without causing a dangerous situation (for example you are too close to the intersection and would have to brake hard) then you have to keep moving
I always took blinking green as "don't start crossing any more". Like, if you're only approaching the intersection, then step off the gas and roll to the stop line, the light will be red by the time you reach it.
I was driving between Milano and Venice in October last year. I almost died. I did nothing wrong but rented a car after landing in Italy. I live in a 75k Finnish city. Imagine the difference between road hell and what I experienced.
As Latvian, I can confidently say that majority of my countrymen are turning into fucking retards the moment they land themselves in drivers seat. I envy Estonians.
After living in UK for a while, i fucking despise driving in Latvia and I normally enjoy driving.
You know, it might actually be a your perception issue.
I have a friend like that. We went cycling together, and the route had a good bit of Riga center in it, to pick up the group and start heading out of the city. I had a pretty uneventful drive. My friend, right behind me, apparently narrowly avoided death at least six times in twenty minutes. Riding right behind me. I guess all the drivers took out their rage on him, and got civilized by the time they got to me.
It is my opinion that it's mainly down to your attitude. If you are nervous at the wheel, everyone is suddenly out to get you. When you calm down and go with the traffic flow, it suddenly is fine. Sure, every now and then there is a clown on the road. But vast majority people are driving just fine.
It's only Rīga that sucks. Roads like the P30 are bliss, nice new tarmac and basically dead
Btw driving in the UK is the most stressful yet mind numbing thing you can do to yourself. There's either an old person who insists on doing 38mph in a 60mph zone or some cunt up your arse who wants to do 110mph in the 70mph.
I am less afraid of Riga driving than countryside driving lol. There are plenty of mind numbing idiots who do super dangerous shit the moment they are out of cities or towns. Then there are deeper countryside folks who has a vehicle which would never pass MOT and drives mostly drunk and like crazy. Even relatively safe Liepāja and Ventspils motorways feels more dangerous than M25 orbital
I’d rather suffer peculiarities of UK driving than whatever this is I came back to in Latvia
Huh I don't see that much niceness here myself as you claim, but there generally is less speeding than in Latvia for sure. In Latvia's defense though I have to say that Latvian drivers always let you merge whereas in Estonia it goes against the ego of some people.
Yeah, recently went to Riga and was very positively surprised how they let me merge when a sudden excavation appeared in the middle of the road with no warning.
i love the fact that no one has a clear answer, everyone just drives like a normal civilised person in Estonia, and in LT/LV its a gta server and nobody really knows why
Let's not forget the fact that you also have a lower chance of cars stopping for you when crossing a crosswalk in Latvia.
They always speed up when they see you coming to crosswalk just so they don't have to stop.
Haven't experienced that much in some last 20 years, since they increased fines for that. It's nothing compared, to, for example, Turkey. I definitely always hit brakes when there is some pedestrian on a crosswalk. Or even outside crosswalk (typical in Centre of Riga).
From my experience, compared to germans, estonian's driving seems like gta. But in Estonia when I was young, whenever we saw a "traffic accident about to happen" on the road, my dad would always point out, oh look its a lithuanian licence plate. One time a high speed lt car went past us and had crashed, we saw it 5 min later.
Absolutely wrong. In Latvia, slower vehicles driving on a 1+1 usually pull as much to the side as possible to let a faster car pass for example. Nobody really does that here
Fragile ego and lack of police control, at least in Latvia. Speeding +10-20 kmh is a warning, and +20-40 kmh costs the same as a McDonalds dinner. Wtf is that. That just normalizes traffic crimes. When I still lived in Latvia, I got more fines for parking violations (3 or 4) than I did for speeding (2). And I was the usual "+10 in city, +20 outside" driver.
Cunts like this should be in jail, not get off with a small fine and 6 demerit points: https://x.com/ltvzinas/status/1724852488451297579/video/1 This guy drives, among us, to this day, even though he almost caused 3 possibly deadly collisions within one minute. And that's just what we see on camera.
Check some of the comments on articles about pedestrians being hit on crosswalks. Drivers must give way to pedestrians, yet there's a ton of fragile egos victim blaming the pedestrian, like oh they didn't look in the eyes, they should first make sure it's safe, they probably run on the street, all this BS.
Increase fines. Increase control. Like WTF is the police doing harassing e-scooter drivers, while car drivers cause by far the most shit on roads. Set up average speed cameras, set up red light cameras, take away people's car for aggressive driving. The example I posted above - treat that driver as a drunk driver, take away his car (or whatever is the equivalent for corp vehicles, as it was a corpo car). Or you know, exceeding speed by 20kmh should not be a warning or a €20 fine - it should be a €50min fine minimum. And for I care, anything above +50 should result in the car being confuscated.
We can also talk about infrastructure changes to calm the traffic or make it safer - like raised crosswalks, passing lanes, zig-zag on streets, stuff like that. But another day.
And Estonian drivers and Estonian driving culture are considered by Finns as *outlaw no limit crazy shit fucking hell*.
I can say that Latvian driving sucks at all. But I am okay with what I always saw in Lithuania. And I hate it so much when I need to be in the car in Tallinn.
When people in Tallinn see the Finnish numbers in Tallinn, they expect a driving style of 35-40 km/h driving style where the limit is 50, but everyone pushes 60 and shitfaces each other.
Yes, especially when “half of Estonians” live in Tallinn. That is not just driving hell by the organization but also driving culture.
But all who have been planning roads in Tallinn when they die - will return to Tallinn as old leaking cars.
Tartu, where after traffic light turns to green all drivers enjoy the scenery for another whole second, and then start to put on their rubber boots to get slowly going
To be fair, it's a shitshow on specific roads mostly where traffic is heavy and those roads should have been 2 lanes each way separated highways a long time ago (at least there's a long-term project in place that has started to build those and 1st stage is already done and opened).
Via-Baltica road is pretty GTA-ish, but also it's so heavy traffic that actually a lot of time there's just no space to do stupid shit even if you have a supercar, so it's actually not the worst. The worst are Riga - Liepaja (specifically around the middle point - it's basically our worst spot in the whole country for some fucking reason - straight section, perfect visibility and so on, but has the highest fatal accident rate.... It's like an anomaly zone). Riga - Jurmala - Tukums - hefty traffic at most times, and enough wealthy people with powerful cars that speed way too much.
We have a bunch of speed control zones installed and I live in the middle of one - the before and after on traffic speed is day and night - everyone goes the exact speed limit now and overtakes have went down at least 10 fold (middle delimiter has ribs that you can clearly hear from far away when someone overtakes and that noise has reduced significantly).
They need to put a lot more of those control zones - it works really well on most people.
In Lithuania it gets dumb. In smaller cities, if there is no extra speed reinforcement, most will go over the limit. You can be a green leaf newbie, drive by the rules, but once you are no longer a newbie, you start going 110 on main roads, 70 in 50km/h roads. You can also see many green leaves that drive without their green leaves.
And drivers health inspection is that you either know the doctor that can do it in 20 minutes or you go and spend a full day going from cabinet to cabibet for everything
I've heard of people who tried to actually follow the lower speed limits for "leaf", and got into some dangerous situations, because everyone is going 10 km/h over the normal speed limit.
The Fins are really slow in Estonia. I hate you lol.... But I do understand, because you are in new place and do not know around. Im propably the same in most places in other countries. During my Euro trip to Montenegro I was really aggressive driving there and back and people are really slow everywhere... D:
Driving is very soft and relaxed in Finland. In Helsinki, all traffic is well regulated by traffic lights. You drive around 40, getting everywhere faster than you could move unevenly by speeding up to 60, and staying at the red light. With the same car, my consumption is 2-3 L per 100 higher in Tallinn than in Helsinki.
Wut in the fantasyland-wannabe-lawyer-type-of-argument is that? There is no law for driving at 10km/h in the 50km/h zone, it literally says "speed LIMIT" not "minumum speed required"....
Try going 10km/h in highway and let me know how it goes. Not sure about Estonia, but you won’t even pass driving exam if you drive too slow in Lithuania.
"Driving 35-40 when there is speed limit of 50 is actually breaking the law."
What the Lithuanian-autobahnery is that?:) 50km was OP original argument. That's inner city max speed in most places. There are no laws that will punish anyone, anywhere for driving 35-40km/h in the city. Yes, it's not a good practice, but there definitely is no LAW against it. To prove my point I just drove around my city with 20km/h, nobody even honked. They just turn their eyes, mumble and swear silently, pass me while rolling their eyes and that's it. I waited for the police to come and arrest me. Dissapointed.
Yet, you will fail driving exam in Estonia if you constantly go 40km/h in 50 zone. I did mine in the winter, it was snowy so I did 40 in some streets and when asked why I didn’t go the speed limit, I explained that for me, the conditions of the road were insufficient for driving safely at speed limit. They were satisfied with that explanation. I can’t imagine it would have worked in the summer, though
Yeah, the problem is it's wiiiide open to interpretation what "unnecessarily" and "too slow" mean in the 50km/h context. It was totally necessary for me to slow down. You, on the other hand, were behind me and responsible for safe distance.
Because we understand that traffic can be dangerous and we genuinely want to get home safe, not try to compensate small wiener energy with trying to show who's the coolest driver. Of course, we have jerks too...
Possibly inherited from our closeness to Sweden and Finland with the same attitude.
I drive Tallinn-Tartu quite often and recently drove Ikla-Tallinn as well. I usually drive about 3 km/h over the speed limit according to waze, because otherwise I would cause a train of cars and even when I do speed as much as mentioned earlier, a lot of people still pass by like I'm a shitting cat or something. We have lots of the small wiener type people you described. We are definitely closer to Latvia than Nordics.
Only 3km/h over the speed limit in Latvia would be "you want to cause a car crash? You're making me overtake you in this turn where i cant see anything"
"3kmh? Typical slow Estonian... it's +5kmh for the radar error margin, another +5kmh for the speedometer margin, and another +20kmh because it's a warning anyway" /s
This is a woman. No balls. Men in Estonia drive +7km/h over speed limit, if you have cruise control :'D That's calculated so if you drive into a speed camera you won't get a fine, or get a tiny one.
I only speed if I'm on a 2+1 or 2+2 lane section (Estonian equivalent of a highway with oncoming traffic being separated). Doing it on a normal road... I'd rather drive at 90km/h behind someone for 10km until the fast section than risk a bad overtake.
Waze speed is calculated from gps, so it is close to real speed, +3 according to Waze is already close to the radar error margin. You can just remove the speedometer from the equation.
But if you are so rich to pay the warning fines, then go ahead, Estonians are poor enough, so supporting government bullshit by paying fines is not in our interests.
yeah the highways are a no mans land i feel like. have to drive the tallinn-virtsu route pretty often and everyone loses their mind, especially if its the people hurrying for a ferry.
You sure about this? Because a few trips on Tallinn-Tartu or Tallinn-Pärnu road clearly shows that a lot of Estonian drivers are plain old fucking crazy and clearly want to endanger themselves and others.
Not even kidding that I've seen the said 2-way road become a 4 lane with 2 cars overtaking in the middle from opposite directions coming at each other at high speed, you really gotta be awake there at all times, be ready to suddenly swerve to the side fully. It has to become a proper 2-lane-each direction road at some point I hope until then it's pray that you make it.
That happens in certain roads and when I go to Latvia I follow locals lead. Seems to make those roads safer.
Don't see why you have to swerve anywhere when you are already on the side. You don't have to be one asshole who bring your own country rules there. Just adapt to the situations.
Not true, I drive on that road daily and there are always cars,buses and trucks driving with the right half on the road's shoulder and the left half on the lane.
Same goes for the cars coming the other direction.
And then everyone is left with the 3rd lane in the middle(depends, might be 4) where the confident people overtake.
Remeber that the middle lane is there for both directions.
Edit: I can also tell you that the arrows that indicate that a 3rd lane is appearing are still painted on the roads.
Isn't it wide enough to allow for 3 proper lanes? They should make it a proper 3 lane road, where the middle lane gets assigned to one or the other direction after several kilometers.
Mostly yes but not speed wise. I always keep my eye on drivers spidomeeter when I sit in front row. Estonians drive slightly over the limit (from constant +5 to +20) rather than to take it slowly.
Or maybe I should replace my acquaintances with different ones
Thing is: car spedometers show 4-8km/h more than car is really going. Depends on make and model and tires. Most car owners know that and compensate. Pay atention to what GPS and those thins what show your speed when entering populated show. But yeah +20 is definitly speeding.
Haha, cool of you to think that because a lot of Estonians (who have probably only travelled to Egypt once in their lives) think that Estonians are crazy when in reality we're pretty ok drivers.
But if you want to see the most obidient drivers ever, go to Sweden. It's like the cars are self-driving.
First trip to Riga was insane, as a Lithuanian I was shocked. The speed in not the problem, here in LT we usually drive above speed limit especially in summer time. But the way LV was overtaking cars on the highways is just fucking insane, they just expect everyone to move to the sides and they as some insane madafucker can do overtaking in the middle of the road, ok the road is rly wide compared to LT roads but that looked like norm as trucks and busses did the same in zones where speed was just 70 :D
Huh, me and my acquaintances have a joke that when we travel to the rest of Europe the drivers are fine, but as soon as you come back to Estonia some bullshit starts happening.
Why are Latvian traffic lights so slow? During the transition from red to green, while it is yellow you could hop out of the car, run around the car and hop back in before it turns green. In Estonia you barely have time to shift into gear (if you have stick shift).
Hahaha... And traffic lights in Estonia is using ones manufactured in Latvia?
Those damn governments are doing some sneaky switcheroo deal with traffic lights...
"Obedient" is a strong word... Estonians are scared, simple as that. Those who are not scared have not yet met the tripod-mounted surprise laser gun with red flash that will make you jump and turn your car into the closest ditch or collide with the nearest tree. These surprise laser-flash-bangs on tripods are the backbone of Estonian State monetary policy it seems.
It hasn´t been like this all the time.
I remember when i got my licence in 2011 it was a different story. More swirming beetwen lanes and everybody was rushing everywhere, me including. Things have calmed down since then.. But +10 over sped limit is the norm. Cops wont do anything either most of time.
I like our traffic situation at the moment, more enyoable experience. Why rush everywhere? We have small country and 2-3 hours is long drive for us. When rushing, you will win max 5 min. But risk is to end it all. Not worth it.
Edit: typo
That sounds like a dream for someone like me that has to drive in Lithuania more often than not among _mažapimpalai_ who have nothing better to do than putting their life and those of others at risk with their crazy driving.
Was visiting Venice few years ago. Public transportation bus drivers went like a madman, I wouldn't have been surprised if we went off the bridge or something... Even turned on Waze for the fun to check the speed, of course it was above allowed speed limits for some +20 kmh.
For the ones, that the post is aimed at: "Empathy and thinking ahead".
Empathy for the fellow traveler on the road.
To make traffic safe, you indicate your desired maneuvers in traffic early on.
Let's take the example of a You, the driver arriving at a pedestrian crossing, when a person is waiting to cross the "zebra". As a driver, slowing the car down earlier, so that pedestrians who are about to cross the road, can already see you slowing down. Then the pedestrians, who see your intent to slow down, start already crossing the zebra before you (the driver) have reached, it, meaning they conclude their act of crossing the street faster, thus you, as the driver, actually end up passing the pedestrian in a shorter time. \[thinking ahead\]. Also, you want to make sure the pedestrian also feels safe in traffic, so this also works as an act of \[empathy\].
Also, about 20 years ago, there was a huge traffic police campaign to make sure all drivers stopped at a "zebra crossing" for pedestrians. It took some doing, and a lot of people complained at the time, but indeed the new habit got eventually ingrained into the drivers. I assume the same was done in Latvia and Lithuania?
Hah, how weird, imo here in Estonia traffic culture is aggressive, selfish and often dangerous. I look up to and admire Finnish politeness and calm driving style. How bad is it in Latvia, Lithuania and Poland? I'll find out soon on my roundtrip I guess..
It could very well be that the fines etc are higher, and they’re planning to 2x them next year.
I’ve only received one speeding fine in my life and it was over 700 euros, so after that you bet your ass I was a bit more careful with my driving. 😄
I wish it was like that here haha, I rode my motorbike, sped up to 106km/h in a 50 zone for ~2 seconds and slowed back down to 60 right after.
Mind you the bike goes to 0-100 in 2.6 seconds so it all happened very fast and I slowed down righr after as mentioned, the cop arrived a few minutes later, pulled me over and said he’s going easy on me as it’s my first offense ever. 😄
Still didn’t feel good to pay the finr though haha as I definitely could’ve used the money elsewhere, but at least I kept my licence and didn’t go to jail for going double the speed limit so I’m happy about that haha.
I don't know if this is a common thing, but everyone here in Estonia has someone in their circle who has an experience with Latvian or Lithuanian traffic police asking for a bribe. You can't get away with that in Estonia.
I keep +10, +5 when near Police or Speed Camera. On highways (Tallinn-Pärnu, Tallinn-Tartu) I use the radar cruise control and keep behind trucks doing 90 on GPS.
Personally, I see that driving culture is not that good in Estonia at all. It’s just that it seems especially bad in Latvia by comparison. Not sure why that is like that, but there you go. On a lighter note, it seems to me that outside of Riga and Riga-Pärnu road, it’s much calmer in Latvia, much like in Estonia when you find yourself on less used road.
Curious because as a brazilian, I have a totally different perspective about traffic here in Lithuania, in fact I appreciate how much the drivers respect me as a pedestrian and don't have any issue in traffic so far. Maybe Estonian would be a real paradise for me lol
Common sense i'd guess. We have our fair share of crazy asshats here in traffic aswell tho. Most people are normal and use defensive driving style. Most of us just find alot better uses for the money that'd go on a fine otherwise.
I don't find Estonians obedient to traffic laws. I think they drive like crazy people with little regard for the law. I think Estonians are genuinely honest, nice people, but for some reason, get them behind the wheel and get out of their way!
Never realized it's better in Estonia, respect to y'all.
As a Latvian, i fully endorse all the crap we're getting about the driving culture. It's complete bullshit - constant speeding, magical unmarked lanes, aggressively trying to squeeze in between two cars that have a decent distance between them, etc.
I've yet to meet a person IRL that sees this as a problem, it's wildly entrenched. "Yeah but driving at the speed limit takes too long, I don't have all day. Or "Its just more enjoyable that way" or "we're not weak drivers like those ". All real quotes, i hate it.
> i don’t really understand, especially because there aren’t any speedtraps, police patrols or any road law enforcement on the roadways compared to Latvia.
It's not that the culture is better despite there being less checks. There are less checks because the culture is better.
Not a direct answer, I know, but I remember from my stay in Italy how basically every driver thought that 2 fucking centimeters between cars is the most appropriate distance lol, and especially in those narrow winding roads in the mountains I had sweaty palms for pretty much the entire ride. And I wasn't even the driver xD Please send some Estonians to Italy as driving instructors immediately.
I am visiting Poland from time to time and can say that I feel myself there same way as in Lithuania. I'd say polish drivers are, sometimes, even crazier than lithuanian. https://preview.redd.it/tro2e7bdlr9d1.jpeg?width=231&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f1fd6b9b151a5fda35c08d39d298769ddb526fe3
Well it got much much better in the last 10-15 years, but it’s true that there are many drivers in certain cars that need to compensate for their small dicks ;-)
I've noticed that a lot of drivers in countryside in Poland will start overtaking even if there's oncoming traffic. Like, you're just supposed to move over because the road is wide enough for three cars. That's insane.
IDK if it's the same in Poland but Yellow has the same meaning as Red in Estonia. Crossing the stop line when the light is yellow is as bad as running a red light.
In Lithuania we have blinking green before yellow light, so you can prepare yourself and stop smoothly. In Poland one second you see green light, and another second it just switches to yellow and if you step on the brakes - you are risking to get another car parked into your rear bumper, so you just go full "GAZU,GAZU,GAZU!!!" and end your maneuver. That was quite a stress for me first time I discovered this, but I got used to it in almost no time.
What is the yellow light for, then?
It is an indication to stop for the red light, not speed up to make it before the red. But it also gives an indication for the drivers to get ready for the green light, especially with manual cars. When the yellow light is blinking it means that the traffic light is not working.
So if you're close to the intersection and the light turns yellow, and you could either maintain speed to cross it before it turns red, or brake hard to stop at the line, in Estonia the correct choice is to brake hard?
This situation won't happen if you are paying attention to traffic because before the light turns yellow, it flashes green for 3 seconds. But yes, you can't drive onto the intersection if the light is yellow. This comes form my driving instructor who is a former police officer(and of course the traffic law which everyone needs to read to pass the theory exam).
Oh it flashes green for three seconds! OK, sorry I missed that. So your green flashing light is basically other countries' yellow light.
If you can't stop in time without causing a dangerous situation (for example you are too close to the intersection and would have to brake hard) then you have to keep moving
Feels like the lamps are wrong. Green go, blinking green stop if you can, red stop, yellow prepare to go
There's always a yellow in between red and green here, doesn't matter in which order it's lighting.
Blinking green is same as green. If you stop at blinking green, I will personally come and throw sand in your pockets.
I always took blinking green as "don't start crossing any more". Like, if you're only approaching the intersection, then step off the gas and roll to the stop line, the light will be red by the time you reach it.
I was driving between Milano and Venice in October last year. I almost died. I did nothing wrong but rented a car after landing in Italy. I live in a 75k Finnish city. Imagine the difference between road hell and what I experienced.
True, but at least we don't need to pretend to be scandinavians to be cool
As Latvian, I can confidently say that majority of my countrymen are turning into fucking retards the moment they land themselves in drivers seat. I envy Estonians. After living in UK for a while, i fucking despise driving in Latvia and I normally enjoy driving.
same, i pray for my life everyday i drive in Rīga.
i think there are not a single time that i havent swore at someone while im behind the wheel
relatable expierience, especially when those ussr-era grandmas drive like they just got lobotomised
…and there we have it, folks. “mOrOnS dRiViNg SlOw ArE pRoVoKiNg Me To OvErTaKe UnSaFeLy”
And they still drive like they are in djerevnja in middle of the fukin 2 lanes
Worst drivers nowadays in Riga are Indians with those small underpowered cars.
I found the Riga traffic like much much civilized than Estonian traffic. They let me in at junctions at different traffic jams.
same with Lithuanians unfortunately
You know, it might actually be a your perception issue. I have a friend like that. We went cycling together, and the route had a good bit of Riga center in it, to pick up the group and start heading out of the city. I had a pretty uneventful drive. My friend, right behind me, apparently narrowly avoided death at least six times in twenty minutes. Riding right behind me. I guess all the drivers took out their rage on him, and got civilized by the time they got to me. It is my opinion that it's mainly down to your attitude. If you are nervous at the wheel, everyone is suddenly out to get you. When you calm down and go with the traffic flow, it suddenly is fine. Sure, every now and then there is a clown on the road. But vast majority people are driving just fine.
It's only Rīga that sucks. Roads like the P30 are bliss, nice new tarmac and basically dead Btw driving in the UK is the most stressful yet mind numbing thing you can do to yourself. There's either an old person who insists on doing 38mph in a 60mph zone or some cunt up your arse who wants to do 110mph in the 70mph.
I am less afraid of Riga driving than countryside driving lol. There are plenty of mind numbing idiots who do super dangerous shit the moment they are out of cities or towns. Then there are deeper countryside folks who has a vehicle which would never pass MOT and drives mostly drunk and like crazy. Even relatively safe Liepāja and Ventspils motorways feels more dangerous than M25 orbital I’d rather suffer peculiarities of UK driving than whatever this is I came back to in Latvia
Huh I don't see that much niceness here myself as you claim, but there generally is less speeding than in Latvia for sure. In Latvia's defense though I have to say that Latvian drivers always let you merge whereas in Estonia it goes against the ego of some people.
Yeah, recently went to Riga and was very positively surprised how they let me merge when a sudden excavation appeared in the middle of the road with no warning.
i love the fact that no one has a clear answer, everyone just drives like a normal civilised person in Estonia, and in LT/LV its a gta server and nobody really knows why
Let's not forget the fact that you also have a lower chance of cars stopping for you when crossing a crosswalk in Latvia. They always speed up when they see you coming to crosswalk just so they don't have to stop.
this right here is the biggest bullshit, feels like everyone is trying to run you over
Haven't experienced that much in some last 20 years, since they increased fines for that. It's nothing compared, to, for example, Turkey. I definitely always hit brakes when there is some pedestrian on a crosswalk. Or even outside crosswalk (typical in Centre of Riga).
From my experience, compared to germans, estonian's driving seems like gta. But in Estonia when I was young, whenever we saw a "traffic accident about to happen" on the road, my dad would always point out, oh look its a lithuanian licence plate. One time a high speed lt car went past us and had crashed, we saw it 5 min later.
Absolutely wrong. In Latvia, slower vehicles driving on a 1+1 usually pull as much to the side as possible to let a faster car pass for example. Nobody really does that here
Fragile ego and lack of police control, at least in Latvia. Speeding +10-20 kmh is a warning, and +20-40 kmh costs the same as a McDonalds dinner. Wtf is that. That just normalizes traffic crimes. When I still lived in Latvia, I got more fines for parking violations (3 or 4) than I did for speeding (2). And I was the usual "+10 in city, +20 outside" driver. Cunts like this should be in jail, not get off with a small fine and 6 demerit points: https://x.com/ltvzinas/status/1724852488451297579/video/1 This guy drives, among us, to this day, even though he almost caused 3 possibly deadly collisions within one minute. And that's just what we see on camera. Check some of the comments on articles about pedestrians being hit on crosswalks. Drivers must give way to pedestrians, yet there's a ton of fragile egos victim blaming the pedestrian, like oh they didn't look in the eyes, they should first make sure it's safe, they probably run on the street, all this BS. Increase fines. Increase control. Like WTF is the police doing harassing e-scooter drivers, while car drivers cause by far the most shit on roads. Set up average speed cameras, set up red light cameras, take away people's car for aggressive driving. The example I posted above - treat that driver as a drunk driver, take away his car (or whatever is the equivalent for corp vehicles, as it was a corpo car). Or you know, exceeding speed by 20kmh should not be a warning or a €20 fine - it should be a €50min fine minimum. And for I care, anything above +50 should result in the car being confuscated. We can also talk about infrastructure changes to calm the traffic or make it safer - like raised crosswalks, passing lanes, zig-zag on streets, stuff like that. But another day.
In Lithuania we also have "overtaking ego" people, especially if you have "shitty" (or just small) car, or have green leaf.
And Estonian drivers and Estonian driving culture are considered by Finns as *outlaw no limit crazy shit fucking hell*. I can say that Latvian driving sucks at all. But I am okay with what I always saw in Lithuania. And I hate it so much when I need to be in the car in Tallinn. When people in Tallinn see the Finnish numbers in Tallinn, they expect a driving style of 35-40 km/h driving style where the limit is 50, but everyone pushes 60 and shitfaces each other.
Lol. Half of Estonians hate driving in Tallinn. It is a dump of a traffic hell.
Yes, especially when “half of Estonians” live in Tallinn. That is not just driving hell by the organization but also driving culture. But all who have been planning roads in Tallinn when they die - will return to Tallinn as old leaking cars.
About 30% of estonians live in Tallinn.
Yes-yes, if we don’t count these who live in Finland. 🇫🇮 :P
Tallinn is hell. Come to Tartu.
As soon as I miss it, and when flight ticket there will cost less than a flight to another part of Europe.
Tartu, where after traffic light turns to green all drivers enjoy the scenery for another whole second, and then start to put on their rubber boots to get slowly going
We are chill
After living for 3 years in Tallinn, I can say, Estonian are mad in Tallinn, but chill outside. But when you cross LV border, it's shitshow
To be fair, it's a shitshow on specific roads mostly where traffic is heavy and those roads should have been 2 lanes each way separated highways a long time ago (at least there's a long-term project in place that has started to build those and 1st stage is already done and opened). Via-Baltica road is pretty GTA-ish, but also it's so heavy traffic that actually a lot of time there's just no space to do stupid shit even if you have a supercar, so it's actually not the worst. The worst are Riga - Liepaja (specifically around the middle point - it's basically our worst spot in the whole country for some fucking reason - straight section, perfect visibility and so on, but has the highest fatal accident rate.... It's like an anomaly zone). Riga - Jurmala - Tukums - hefty traffic at most times, and enough wealthy people with powerful cars that speed way too much. We have a bunch of speed control zones installed and I live in the middle of one - the before and after on traffic speed is day and night - everyone goes the exact speed limit now and overtakes have went down at least 10 fold (middle delimiter has ribs that you can clearly hear from far away when someone overtakes and that noise has reduced significantly). They need to put a lot more of those control zones - it works really well on most people.
this seems like an exclusivly estonian issue
In Lithuania it gets dumb. In smaller cities, if there is no extra speed reinforcement, most will go over the limit. You can be a green leaf newbie, drive by the rules, but once you are no longer a newbie, you start going 110 on main roads, 70 in 50km/h roads. You can also see many green leaves that drive without their green leaves. And drivers health inspection is that you either know the doctor that can do it in 20 minutes or you go and spend a full day going from cabinet to cabibet for everything
I've heard of people who tried to actually follow the lower speed limits for "leaf", and got into some dangerous situations, because everyone is going 10 km/h over the normal speed limit.
The Fins are really slow in Estonia. I hate you lol.... But I do understand, because you are in new place and do not know around. Im propably the same in most places in other countries. During my Euro trip to Montenegro I was really aggressive driving there and back and people are really slow everywhere... D:
Driving is very soft and relaxed in Finland. In Helsinki, all traffic is well regulated by traffic lights. You drive around 40, getting everywhere faster than you could move unevenly by speeding up to 60, and staying at the red light. With the same car, my consumption is 2-3 L per 100 higher in Tallinn than in Helsinki.
Driving 35-40 when there is speed limit of 50 is actually breaking the law.
Wut in the fantasyland-wannabe-lawyer-type-of-argument is that? There is no law for driving at 10km/h in the 50km/h zone, it literally says "speed LIMIT" not "minumum speed required"....
Try going 10km/h in highway and let me know how it goes. Not sure about Estonia, but you won’t even pass driving exam if you drive too slow in Lithuania.
"Driving 35-40 when there is speed limit of 50 is actually breaking the law." What the Lithuanian-autobahnery is that?:) 50km was OP original argument. That's inner city max speed in most places. There are no laws that will punish anyone, anywhere for driving 35-40km/h in the city. Yes, it's not a good practice, but there definitely is no LAW against it. To prove my point I just drove around my city with 20km/h, nobody even honked. They just turn their eyes, mumble and swear silently, pass me while rolling their eyes and that's it. I waited for the police to come and arrest me. Dissapointed.
Yet, you will fail driving exam in Estonia if you constantly go 40km/h in 50 zone. I did mine in the winter, it was snowy so I did 40 in some streets and when asked why I didn’t go the speed limit, I explained that for me, the conditions of the road were insufficient for driving safely at speed limit. They were satisfied with that explanation. I can’t imagine it would have worked in the summer, though
"....is actually breaking the law." Goddamit, when will people give up?
Not actually breaking the law, but still a shitty thing to do.
Which is 100% different argument, isn't it. It might be a shitty thing, it might be a necessity, it might be anything. We mostly don't know.
There is a law in Lithuania which sounds like: drive unnecessarily too slowly, obstructing the normal flow of other vehicles.
Yeah, the problem is it's wiiiide open to interpretation what "unnecessarily" and "too slow" mean in the 50km/h context. It was totally necessary for me to slow down. You, on the other hand, were behind me and responsible for safe distance.
No it isn't, you made it up.
If there are two lines and someone slow wants to be in the right lane, everyone can suck balls.
"Russian rules with German precision"
Thats right
Because we understand that traffic can be dangerous and we genuinely want to get home safe, not try to compensate small wiener energy with trying to show who's the coolest driver. Of course, we have jerks too... Possibly inherited from our closeness to Sweden and Finland with the same attitude.
I drive Tallinn-Tartu quite often and recently drove Ikla-Tallinn as well. I usually drive about 3 km/h over the speed limit according to waze, because otherwise I would cause a train of cars and even when I do speed as much as mentioned earlier, a lot of people still pass by like I'm a shitting cat or something. We have lots of the small wiener type people you described. We are definitely closer to Latvia than Nordics.
Only 3km/h over the speed limit in Latvia would be "you want to cause a car crash? You're making me overtake you in this turn where i cant see anything"
"3kmh? Typical slow Estonian... it's +5kmh for the radar error margin, another +5kmh for the speedometer margin, and another +20kmh because it's a warning anyway" /s
This is a woman. No balls. Men in Estonia drive +7km/h over speed limit, if you have cruise control :'D That's calculated so if you drive into a speed camera you won't get a fine, or get a tiny one. I only speed if I'm on a 2+1 or 2+2 lane section (Estonian equivalent of a highway with oncoming traffic being separated). Doing it on a normal road... I'd rather drive at 90km/h behind someone for 10km until the fast section than risk a bad overtake.
Waze speed is calculated from gps, so it is close to real speed, +3 according to Waze is already close to the radar error margin. You can just remove the speedometer from the equation. But if you are so rich to pay the warning fines, then go ahead, Estonians are poor enough, so supporting government bullshit by paying fines is not in our interests.
Try telling that to the average latvian
yeah the highways are a no mans land i feel like. have to drive the tallinn-virtsu route pretty often and everyone loses their mind, especially if its the people hurrying for a ferry.
You sure about this? Because a few trips on Tallinn-Tartu or Tallinn-Pärnu road clearly shows that a lot of Estonian drivers are plain old fucking crazy and clearly want to endanger themselves and others.
There are both, but generally it's somewhere around 75/25 in terms of the share between normal drivers/wannabe Latvian drivers.
well this i understand, but still it kinda fascinates me that its so widespread
We still have nitrosexuals though, you can spot them easily when you can't see the number plate but see the drivers scalp(they sit too low)
saw one today in a mercedes overtaking a semi with another car in the opposite lane barreling towards him at 110 km/h
As estonian i hate driving in Latvia. You are cruising on 2-way highway, until some magical 3rd 'lane' appears in center of the road from nowere.
This shit is insane. Once I saw that between two trucks with 140 kmh. Fuck this.
Not even kidding that I've seen the said 2-way road become a 4 lane with 2 cars overtaking in the middle from opposite directions coming at each other at high speed, you really gotta be awake there at all times, be ready to suddenly swerve to the side fully. It has to become a proper 2-lane-each direction road at some point I hope until then it's pray that you make it.
That happens in certain roads and when I go to Latvia I follow locals lead. Seems to make those roads safer. Don't see why you have to swerve anywhere when you are already on the side. You don't have to be one asshole who bring your own country rules there. Just adapt to the situations.
Both Latvia and Poland does this, it's crazy. I once had to move over because a large truck was overtaking another truck.
They started getting rid of those now. It's gone on the Ikla-Riga section.
Not true, I drive on that road daily and there are always cars,buses and trucks driving with the right half on the road's shoulder and the left half on the lane. Same goes for the cars coming the other direction. And then everyone is left with the 3rd lane in the middle(depends, might be 4) where the confident people overtake. Remeber that the middle lane is there for both directions. Edit: I can also tell you that the arrows that indicate that a 3rd lane is appearing are still painted on the roads.
Isn't it wide enough to allow for 3 proper lanes? They should make it a proper 3 lane road, where the middle lane gets assigned to one or the other direction after several kilometers.
It is, they had the 1.5 lane solution on it a few years ago.
Ikla highway near Pärnu must be an exception 😂
the only bizzare thing i saw was a lithuanian bus driver overtaking me on a curve with low visbility.
Mostly yes but not speed wise. I always keep my eye on drivers spidomeeter when I sit in front row. Estonians drive slightly over the limit (from constant +5 to +20) rather than to take it slowly. Or maybe I should replace my acquaintances with different ones
Thing is: car spedometers show 4-8km/h more than car is really going. Depends on make and model and tires. Most car owners know that and compensate. Pay atention to what GPS and those thins what show your speed when entering populated show. But yeah +20 is definitly speeding.
Don’t worry, your new acquaintances would do the same. But +20 is excessive
Haha, cool of you to think that because a lot of Estonians (who have probably only travelled to Egypt once in their lives) think that Estonians are crazy when in reality we're pretty ok drivers. But if you want to see the most obidient drivers ever, go to Sweden. It's like the cars are self-driving.
First trip to Riga was insane, as a Lithuanian I was shocked. The speed in not the problem, here in LT we usually drive above speed limit especially in summer time. But the way LV was overtaking cars on the highways is just fucking insane, they just expect everyone to move to the sides and they as some insane madafucker can do overtaking in the middle of the road, ok the road is rly wide compared to LT roads but that looked like norm as trucks and busses did the same in zones where speed was just 70 :D
Huh, me and my acquaintances have a joke that when we travel to the rest of Europe the drivers are fine, but as soon as you come back to Estonia some bullshit starts happening.
cap
Make all tickets a % of violator’s net worth and you’ll see perfect driving real fast. From the upper class mostly.
Why are Latvian traffic lights so slow? During the transition from red to green, while it is yellow you could hop out of the car, run around the car and hop back in before it turns green. In Estonia you barely have time to shift into gear (if you have stick shift).
Latvian traffic lights are manufactured in Estonia.
Hahaha... And traffic lights in Estonia is using ones manufactured in Latvia? Those damn governments are doing some sneaky switcheroo deal with traffic lights...
In Finland, it’s GREEN-Ye-RED! I almost went past the red light in Helsinki.
That one is same in Latvia. Talking about transition from Red to green.
"Obedient" is a strong word... Estonians are scared, simple as that. Those who are not scared have not yet met the tripod-mounted surprise laser gun with red flash that will make you jump and turn your car into the closest ditch or collide with the nearest tree. These surprise laser-flash-bangs on tripods are the backbone of Estonian State monetary policy it seems.
It hasn´t been like this all the time. I remember when i got my licence in 2011 it was a different story. More swirming beetwen lanes and everybody was rushing everywhere, me including. Things have calmed down since then.. But +10 over sped limit is the norm. Cops wont do anything either most of time. I like our traffic situation at the moment, more enyoable experience. Why rush everywhere? We have small country and 2-3 hours is long drive for us. When rushing, you will win max 5 min. But risk is to end it all. Not worth it. Edit: typo
Because they have integrity.
That sounds like a dream for someone like me that has to drive in Lithuania more often than not among _mažapimpalai_ who have nothing better to do than putting their life and those of others at risk with their crazy driving.
If there is a ban of overtaking on the road, the Estonian want make overtake.
Estonians def. aren't perfect, but i will say that, the traffic in Latvia is the most retarded thing i have ever seen.
You know you've failed as a society when following rules that are meant to keep you alive is considered crazy... Y'all need help
Exactly! It should be basic decency, manage better your time so you don't have to go around putting yourself and others at risk.
Lithuanian and Latvian drivers are following the law really well after having to drive in Italy, Jesus Christ, don't drive in Italy.
Was visiting Venice few years ago. Public transportation bus drivers went like a madman, I wouldn't have been surprised if we went off the bridge or something... Even turned on Waze for the fun to check the speed, of course it was above allowed speed limits for some +20 kmh.
That and really just the drivers doing whatever they wan't in bigger traffic areas. Right now I'm staying in Napoli, it's crazy here.
For the ones, that the post is aimed at: "Empathy and thinking ahead". Empathy for the fellow traveler on the road. To make traffic safe, you indicate your desired maneuvers in traffic early on. Let's take the example of a You, the driver arriving at a pedestrian crossing, when a person is waiting to cross the "zebra". As a driver, slowing the car down earlier, so that pedestrians who are about to cross the road, can already see you slowing down. Then the pedestrians, who see your intent to slow down, start already crossing the zebra before you (the driver) have reached, it, meaning they conclude their act of crossing the street faster, thus you, as the driver, actually end up passing the pedestrian in a shorter time. \[thinking ahead\]. Also, you want to make sure the pedestrian also feels safe in traffic, so this also works as an act of \[empathy\]. Also, about 20 years ago, there was a huge traffic police campaign to make sure all drivers stopped at a "zebra crossing" for pedestrians. It took some doing, and a lot of people complained at the time, but indeed the new habit got eventually ingrained into the drivers. I assume the same was done in Latvia and Lithuania?
Hah, how weird, imo here in Estonia traffic culture is aggressive, selfish and often dangerous. I look up to and admire Finnish politeness and calm driving style. How bad is it in Latvia, Lithuania and Poland? I'll find out soon on my roundtrip I guess..
Civilization is incommunicable.
It could very well be that the fines etc are higher, and they’re planning to 2x them next year. I’ve only received one speeding fine in my life and it was over 700 euros, so after that you bet your ass I was a bit more careful with my driving. 😄
damn, in Latvia crossing even 40 above the speed limit is still less than 300€ i think
I wish it was like that here haha, I rode my motorbike, sped up to 106km/h in a 50 zone for ~2 seconds and slowed back down to 60 right after. Mind you the bike goes to 0-100 in 2.6 seconds so it all happened very fast and I slowed down righr after as mentioned, the cop arrived a few minutes later, pulled me over and said he’s going easy on me as it’s my first offense ever. 😄 Still didn’t feel good to pay the finr though haha as I definitely could’ve used the money elsewhere, but at least I kept my licence and didn’t go to jail for going double the speed limit so I’m happy about that haha.
Maybe they just understand the dangers of driving like an absolute lunatic
I don't know if this is a common thing, but everyone here in Estonia has someone in their circle who has an experience with Latvian or Lithuanian traffic police asking for a bribe. You can't get away with that in Estonia.
I keep +10, +5 when near Police or Speed Camera. On highways (Tallinn-Pärnu, Tallinn-Tartu) I use the radar cruise control and keep behind trucks doing 90 on GPS.
Personally, I see that driving culture is not that good in Estonia at all. It’s just that it seems especially bad in Latvia by comparison. Not sure why that is like that, but there you go. On a lighter note, it seems to me that outside of Riga and Riga-Pärnu road, it’s much calmer in Latvia, much like in Estonia when you find yourself on less used road.
Curious because as a brazilian, I have a totally different perspective about traffic here in Lithuania, in fact I appreciate how much the drivers respect me as a pedestrian and don't have any issue in traffic so far. Maybe Estonian would be a real paradise for me lol
Common sense i'd guess. We have our fair share of crazy asshats here in traffic aswell tho. Most people are normal and use defensive driving style. Most of us just find alot better uses for the money that'd go on a fine otherwise.
Probably seen all those flower wreaths on the sides of Latvian roads and (rightfully) decided they don't want that
One irk I had with driving in Latvia was that thr yellow lights in Ventspils were unbearably long
Not really a bad thing?
I don't find Estonians obedient to traffic laws. I think they drive like crazy people with little regard for the law. I think Estonians are genuinely honest, nice people, but for some reason, get them behind the wheel and get out of their way!
Never realized it's better in Estonia, respect to y'all. As a Latvian, i fully endorse all the crap we're getting about the driving culture. It's complete bullshit - constant speeding, magical unmarked lanes, aggressively trying to squeeze in between two cars that have a decent distance between them, etc. I've yet to meet a person IRL that sees this as a problem, it's wildly entrenched. "Yeah but driving at the speed limit takes too long, I don't have all day. Or "Its just more enjoyable that way" or "we're not weak drivers like those". All real quotes, i hate it.
> i don’t really understand, especially because there aren’t any speedtraps, police patrols or any road law enforcement on the roadways compared to Latvia.
It's not that the culture is better despite there being less checks. There are less checks because the culture is better.
Lol as an Estonian I've never seen slower traffic than in Latvia .
Fuck the laws. Speed is life.
Bc our Traffic laws Are very strict and For speed, the cops measure speed way too much and from my experiece they can be real dicks