How to spot the most clueless drivers on Long Island (or anywhere else)

There comes a time in every newspaperman’s life when he or she feels compelled to jot down a list of complaints about other drivers on the road.

For me, that time has arrived.

My biggest pet peeve behind the wheel isn’t aggressiveness. Aggressive drivers are jerks, sure, but at least most of them know they’re jerks, usually because anyone who has ever ridden shotgun with them has said so.

Their behavior on the road also tends to reflect their behavior at work, at home and pretty much everywhere else. Some of my best friends are jerks. And, truthfully, some aggressive drivers actually know how to handle a motor vehicle.

No, the people who annoy me most are those who display jerk-like behavior with absolutely no awareness of the cars around them, or of their own jerkiness.

Sure, they stop at red lights and stop signs. They use their headlights and, sometimes, even their blinkers. But that’s where their driving prowess seems to end.

These people are easily recognized, as the list below will show.

Some of you may already be asking yourselves, “Am I one of these clueless drivers?”

If you’re capable of asking the question, the answer is probably no. The drivers I’m talking about possess no ability to reflect on what might be happening inside their own heads or anywhere in their immediate surroundings.

I’m also leaving texting while driving off this list. Texting creates a whole separate universe of problems, including several behaviors mentioned below, and can turn an otherwise competent driver into a terrible one.

Anyway, here are five behaviors commonly displayed by the most clueless drivers on the road.

The dart-out and slow-down

This one always makes me laugh, at least when I’m in a decent mood and not rushing to get anywhere.

I know this person isn’t a timid driver because he just went from 0 to 30 mph in a second to dart out in front of me. Yet now, for reasons known only to him, he’s driving below the speed limit.

And, of course, there was nobody behind me to begin with.

Even a truly aggressive driver would be hard-pressed to anger another motorist so efficiently.

The move is so utterly senseless that you may find yourself grasping for an explanation, perhaps even becoming paranoid that undercover agents are trying to prevent you from reaching your destination because they fear you’re about to foil some nefarious government plot.

It honestly makes more sense than whatever this driver is doing.

The ne’er-move-over

I don’t understand how anyone who has been driving for more than a year can still commit this roadway atrocity, yet it seems to happen every day.

This is the space cadet lumbering along in the right lane of an otherwise empty two-lane road who never thinks to move over as you’re trying to turn or merge onto that same roadway.

Sure, it may only cost you an extra 30 seconds, but it feels like 30 minutes, and there is absolutely no reason for it.

Those wasted seconds add up over a lifetime.

The overconfident SUV

Have you ever noticed that during a snowstorm, many of the vehicles that end up in ditches are SUVs?

Not as many pickups seem to slide off the road, perhaps because pickup drivers happen to be some of the best drivers out there.

Common sense should tell you that whether you have two-wheel drive, four-wheel drive or a vehicle marketed through dramatic commercials involving mountains, your tires can still slip on ice.

So slow down, my Mercedes GLB-driving friends, and stop tailgating the Civics of the world during blizzards.

Nobody is going to speed up, move over and risk an accident just so your “truck” can get by.

The get-around-first

This one is more subtle, and I’ll admit that even good drivers may occasionally do it without realizing.

We’ve all been the first car stuck behind an extremely slow driver or a lumbering dump truck. Naturally, the two or three cars behind you also want to escape the logjam.

But most of them won’t extend you the courtesy of letting you go around first, as though you’re happily cruising behind a truck doing 23 mph.

Instead, one by one, they pull out and pass while you remain trapped.

That’s fine. I don’t expect much from my fellow drivers.

But if you’re attempting to pass both me and the slow vehicle, and you’re not doing it quickly enough, don’t complain when I lose patience and pop into the left lane ahead of you.

Don’t honk. Don’t flail your arms.

At that point, you should understand exactly why you just got cut off.

The unaware tailgater

You’ve probably seen this person’s vehicle filling your entire rearview mirror on your way home from work.

“Wow,” you think as the car inches even closer. “Either this person is an exceptionally skilled and urgent driver who will physically implode if I don’t move out of the way, or somebody is in labor.”

So you wait for an opportunity to move into the next lane and let this car pass.

Then you learn she never had any intention of passing you.

Because now this driver is simply maintaining the exact same speed and driving directly beside you, while still somehow remaining far too close.

You eventually have to slow down just to avoid traveling side by side and blocking everyone else on the road.

This is the most clueless driver of them all.

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Top: GLI file photo from downtown Farmingdale, N.Y. Note: The photo has been edited to obscure license plate numbers.