Walter S

If you honk to alert the cyclist of your presence then realize that in spite of your intention, your honk will probably not be heard that way. Use the horn for emergencies. A lot of us have been victimized by drivers who honk and then quickly pass too close. The meaning of the honk was "watch out for me and shame on you if you don't allow me room". If you think your honks vs theirs are quickly distinguished by the cyclist you're WRONG.

I-Like-To-Bike

Given your multiple posts of sincerity, good wishes and good intentions to everybody, I recommend that you apply your noise making good wishes for some useful purpose:

CliffordK

I had a log truck honk, maybe 1/4 mile behind me. Just a light tap on the horn. Plenty of time for me to turn around and see what was coming down the road... and make sure I was safely as far over on the shoulder as I could go.

Sorry, I'm not one to insist on riding down the middle of the lane when 50 tons of steel and trees are coming up behind me.

bmthom.gis

For the pro-honkers...maybe it's time you landlubbers adopt a standard! Of course, in any setting where there is more than a car or two, think of the cacophony!

justadude

I agree, I-Like-To-Bike, and I wish you a nice day too!!

Darth Lefty 

Way back in driver's ed they showed us a video intended for delivery drivers - I don't know why. It featured the drivers giving a friendly toot-toot in almost every situation. As I recall it cracked us the hell up.

Darth Lefty 

Semaphoric humor

San Pedro

Honking etiquette is really good here in Japan. I have only heard a long loud honk a few times in 7 years. Most times people will give a short toot to wake drivers up or let the other driver aware of their presence.

canadian deacon

+1. I leave the house at 5 am and get to work around 6 am. I leave work around 3:30 pm. I asked to have my work hours adjusted because of the increased traffic volumes after 4 pm and the present management complied.

mcours2006

Time of day definitely makes a difference. I leave home at 6AM, the latest. Traffic is very sparse, especially on the secondary roads that I take. I haven't heard any kind of honking in weeks.

Leaving work at 3:30 and using the same route, there is at least 2x or 3x more traffic, but still no honking. My feeling is that if you look like you know what you're doing motorists tend to trust that this is the right thing to be doing if you're on a bike. I mean, would you honk at a pedestrian crossing at a green light? At a motorist who actually stops at a stop sign instead of rolling through?

PatrickGSR94

Same here. It is exceedingly rare for me to have anyone honking at me on my 31 mile RT commute.

BobbyG

Careful or you'll be "flagged" as inappropriate. Don't o-pun that door! (best one I've seen in months!)

ItsJustMe

Not give a excrement. That's what I do.

bmthom.gis

Wonder what ever happened to the OP here. Despite all his rage, is he still just a rat in a cage?

brianinc-ville

I've got the same problem. I live in the South; people are armed here; I'm worried that some day, if I knock on somebody's window after they piss me off, I'll be rewarded with a shotgun blast to the face. So, I'm doing my best to chill out.

The big thing: work on lowering the stress levels in the rest of your life. Something is putting you on a hair trigger. Figure out what it is and modify it. Something not going right with your spouse/s.o.? Talk it out. Unhappy at work? Take some steps toward changing your job. None of this stuff is easy, but it might save your life.

Meanwhile, little strategies can help. I glued a pebble to my handlebars, which is supposed to be my reminder to chill out and let the bad vibes roll off. I think, by daily repetition, it's starting to work. And I'm seriously thinking about hanging an 11 x 16" portrait of Jeff Bridges as the Dude over the spot where I park my bike, just to give me some good vibes. Abide, my friend.

Darth Lefty 

In the banned users thread, sometimes you see people ejected for "accumulated points," but there's nothing in the terms of use suggesting puns are against the rules.

Tundra_Man 

There's a reason it's called punishment.

noglider 

@brianinc-ville, how common is it for someone to shoot another on the road? It sure is an awful way to die, but perhaps fearing it is out of proportion to the risk?

brianinc-ville

Probably true -- but surely it's still a good idea to avoid angry conflicts in any case?

TransitBiker

I take comfort in the knowledge that the other drivers think these people are idiots too.

- Andy

wphamilton

It almost always is, in some way. I don't mean you specifically, but any of us. I picked this post out because it seems to me to be the right answer to "having no patience with imbeciles."

Given the wrong circumstances we all act like "imbeciles" compared to someone, disturbing as that may be. And those who are frequently upset, or even constantly "shaking my head" at others, are often just missing something. Again, I don't mean OP but it's human nature. The more often we get upset or think that everyone else is acting stupidly, the more likely it is that we are overlooking something critical, or simply don't know as much as we think we do about it. So noglider's policy is a wise one: our very first reaction should be to objectively analyze the event, before making any judgement or any reaction.

noglider 

Yup. Everyone is a jerk, sometimes. I am, sometimes, and so are you, sometimes (for all values of "I" and "you").

Daniel4

Two surveys to note: 1) 2012 consumer report top driver gripes; 2) 2015 Expedia Road Rage report. Do a search on the word "bicycle". You'll find that amongst motorists they have a lot more to worry about than just bicycles.

Maelochs

What's bad is the sort of ill-defined and unnecessary honking you describe.

If I hear a horn, I assume there is an impending problem. I then have to look around to see what I missed ... and if what I "missed" was a car I heard coming several seconds ago (as you do when you ride) then what happens is I am looking everywhere except back at the approaching car, trying to find the hazard of which he was warning me--and thus increasing risk for all parties.

Use your horn to warn of hazards, please. If your approaching me is not hazardous, please don't use your horn. It is like walking into a theater, seeing a friend, and shouting "Fire!!" Rarely brings good results.

As a cyclist, you know how easy it is to detect cars, and how unnecessary it is to be honked at just because a car is coming. Imagine if Everybody who passed a cyclist honked?

Anyway ... it seems to me that because you ride, you are making an extra effort to be cyclist-friendly, which I thoroughly applaud. Obviously, however, you are being misunderstood. Now that the misunderstanding has been cleared up, no more honking, right? Because the last thing you had ever wanted to do was make things harder on fellow cyclists--Just the opposite.

As for the OP---it has taken me a while, but now my immediate response to being shouted at by ignorant drivers is to smile and forget them.

Oh ,,, and thanks for the entertainment.

bfuser284953024

I think a "honk" and a "toot" (lol) are very different. A honk indicates a hazard. A toot is a heads-up.

That said, I think there's a lot of great suggestions in this thread! Travel at different times, find an alternative route with less traffic, take an anger management class. My father, recovering addict with loads of anger issues, always suggests reading The Angry Book. Its very cheap on Amazon. He had me read it years ago. I didn't even realize I had anger issues!

Though, I will say, the one thing that happens on my commute that drives me absolutely bonkers is morning joggers running in my bike lane. Pisses me off, and forces me to merge with traffic to avoid them. I got "bumped" a few weeks ago, when I merged, and a car pushed my bike tire since they didn't slow fast enough. All because a lady jogging with her baby in a giant stroller.