"I would be interested to know if anyone else has a problem with the way other drivers use median strips, or if it's just a small-town thing?" writes Tania. "So many times lately I have been following a driver (normally elderly, although not always) who will slowdown and put their indicator on to turn right, but won't move into the median strip until the very last minute, where the stripes run out and the turning bay starts. This manoeuvre sometimes ends up in an awkward, sticking-out position if they have to wait for a car coming from the other direction before they can turn. The diagonal stripes on a median strip are for you to move over so you don't hold the traffic up when you are turning, people! I even checked the Road Code and it says you can drive over the white diagonal lines if you are turning right ... and, see, this illustration shows a car clearly driving over the white lines. So don't hang back, right-turning drivers, traverse the white lines!"
Too few, too dear, too bad
Vicki noticed some joker, a member of Consumer NZ, asked why they hadn't reviewed his car - an Aston Martin Vantage - in the latest report on the most reliable cars in NZ. Apparently they needed 30 samples for the survey. Given the $250k price tag, Consumer was short by 29!
"Oh, the poor darling urban children," declares Howard Jack, referring to the the sight of a dead possum hanging from a trap outside a Napier school upsetting someone's kid. "Imagine the nightmares if they travelled outside their town and saw roadkill. And don't bring them to Aussie, where they'll see all the dead roos etc on the roads. And never take them to a farm, especially sheep farms during lambing in the snow, or watch the news of the same. Why not explain to your children the necessity to trap/kill possums instead of being a big wuss and sheltering them from reality?"
