How often do you check your rear view/side mirrors?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My eyes are constantly darting to my mirrors. But I feel like most people don’t do this.

Same here

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Men - all the time

Women - rarely

Hah! I (DW) am an excellent driver and my DH is a menace on the road. My years of yelling has made him a safer driver and everyone on DC roads actually owe me their thanks.

[Anonymous]

Constantly (woman)

[Anonymous]

We got new cars in the last several years and they come with side assist and rear traffic alerts. However, I am always making sure that I don't completely rely on these in case computers fail or are hacked. So, I do my due diligence every. single. time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:All the time, because I have an old car that doesn’t have the video screen or beeping alerts to tell me that a car is near mine.

People who rely on those alerts are massively shitty drivers. They are NOT a replacement for checking your mirrors every few seconds.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All the time, because I have an old car that doesn’t have the video screen or beeping alerts to tell me that a car is near mine.

People who rely on those alerts are massively shitty drivers. They are NOT a replacement for checking your mirrors every few seconds.

Sure, Boomer


I never worry about side mirrors anymore with blind spot monitoring. That’s the whole point of the feature, grandma. To free up your attention you were previously devoting to checking your side mirrors and let you focus on other things.

[Anonymous]

Non stop.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: I check the back mirror pretty regularly. The side mirrors when I am planning on switching lanes, turning, or passing.

Same here. I need to see if a truck is coming up fast. After watching a trucker pull into a gas station on an early morning in Bakersfield, CA, pour himself a coffee and add a good amount of vodka to it, I decided it was best to stay away from trucks. An accident with a truck usually involves many cars so I stay away from them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All the time, because I have an old car that doesn’t have the video screen or beeping alerts to tell me that a car is near mine.

People who rely on those alerts are massively shitty drivers. They are NOT a replacement for checking your mirrors every few seconds.

Sure, Boomer


I never worry about side mirrors anymore with blind spot monitoring. That’s the whole point of the feature, grandma. To free up your attention you were previously devoting to checking your side mirrors and let you focus on other things.

I'm s millennial. But you're a shitty driver who thinks mirrors are only for blind spots. Where did you learn to drive--Maryland?

[Anonymous]

All the time. That’s how you drive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All the time, because I have an old car that doesn’t have the video screen or beeping alerts to tell me that a car is near mine.

People who rely on those alerts are massively shitty drivers. They are NOT a replacement for checking your mirrors every few seconds.

Sure, Boomer


I never worry about side mirrors anymore with blind spot monitoring. That’s the whole point of the feature, grandma. To free up your attention you were previously devoting to checking your side mirrors and let you focus on other things.

Sigh, dimwitted. I know you don’t have any idea how those features work.
I suppose you will sue if they fail you in some way, but you'll get laughed out of court.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All the time, because I have an old car that doesn’t have the video screen or beeping alerts to tell me that a car is near mine.

People who rely on those alerts are massively shitty drivers. They are NOT a replacement for checking your mirrors every few seconds.

Sure, Boomer


I never worry about side mirrors anymore with blind spot monitoring. That’s the whole point of the feature, grandma. To free up your attention you were previously devoting to checking your side mirrors and let you focus on other things.

If you adjust your side mirrors properly, there are no blind spots.

[Anonymous]

I check mine all the time. We just got a new car that has blind spot warnings, a backup cam, and other tools to alert the driver when they aren't checking mirrors and blindspots and the like, and it's a weird sensation to have those alerts and tools to do something we've always done automatically. We sometimes have to remind each other "you can look in the backup cam too" or get surprised by the blindspot detectors when we are turning to check.

But now I think all cars should have these because it would probably prevent a lot of accidents. So often I see people drifting out of our lane (our new car will apparently tell us if we do this) or changing lanes without apparently looking, and maybe a car that talks to you and says "hey, there's someone over there" would help.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All the time, because I have an old car that doesn’t have the video screen or beeping alerts to tell me that a car is near mine.

People who rely on those alerts are massively shitty drivers. They are NOT a replacement for checking your mirrors every few seconds.

Sure, Boomer


I never worry about side mirrors anymore with blind spot monitoring. That’s the whole point of the feature, grandma. To free up your attention you were previously devoting to checking your side mirrors and let you focus on other things.

If you adjust your side mirrors properly, there are no blind spots.

This is not true for all cars -- some have bigger blind spots than others and depending on the height and length of the vehicle and the height/length of the vehicle in your blindspot, even a perfectly adjusted mirror can miss someone.

I personally am in favor of blind spot detectors AND checking properly adjusted mirrors AND turning to check your blind spot. If I'm going 70 mph down a freeway and changing lanes, I think some redundant systems for making sure I don't swing right into another vehicle are in order. But then, I don't want to die or accidentally kill someone while driving, which apparently is an unusual attitude for drivers these days.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What is "all the time" or "pretty regularly" in terms of seconds or Mississippis? Or for many of you... minutes?

This really depends on my speed, road, other cars. Driving an empty rural road or highway out west, I’d be checking my rear view mirror less often than I’d be checking it driving on I-495. I also check my side mirrors more often in dc where bikes could be on the road as well. Hard to tell without actually driving, cause it’s very context dependent.