Strategies for Driving on a Busy Highway
Local roadways aren’t the only places where traffic can develop. In fact, even the highways experience this on a larger and more dangerous scale. With more drivers on the road, moving at faster than standard speeds, the likelihood of an accident rises faster than most tend to thing. As such, it’s crucial that you embrace a few strategies for driving on a busy highway to keep yourself safe.
Enter and Exit with Caution
When there’s heavy traffic present, two of the most dangerous times to drive are when you’re entering or exiting the highway. It’s during this time that your vehicle is moving around the most and runs the highest risk of encountering other drivers. As such, it’s essential you continuously look for oncoming traffic in the merge lane and match their speed to change lanes safely.
Ensure Optimal Visibility
It’s also key that you maximize the visibility that you have in the driver’s seat to ensure you can see when there are oncoming vehicles. This is why you need to properly adjust your mirrors to reduce the size of your blind spots. If you’re driving a larger vehicle with bigger blind spots, such as a semi-truck, you may also want to consider investing in wide-angle mirror lenses to increase your visibility.
Keep Right for Short Drives
Changing lanes can be difficult on a busy highway. As such, it’s often best to stay as far right as possible when you’re only going a short distance. Though the rightmost lanes are slower than the others, staying close to the exits ensures that you don’t need to change lanes last-minute. This increases your level of safety by providing you with more time to look before you switch lanes.
Move at the Pace of Traffic
When managing your speed on the highway, it’s important you take the speed limit, the flow of traffic, and the road conditions all into account. For instance, while you need to obey the speed limit, it’s also not safe to drive slower than traffic, as this can make you vulnerable. Be sure to find a healthy balance of speed that provides you safe opportunities to change lanes while not going faster than the speed limit.