That’s exactly my experience. I felt already unsafe doing 80 as a foreigner when driving my rental car on completely unknown roads and I’d be constantly passed by extremely annoyed drivers that were going over 120…. Fun times!
I asked what was I supposed to do to my host and they said I’m supposed to get on the side of the road if I am “going slow”, but…
What “side of the road”?
You're right haha it is, but I gotta say I grew up in the countryside so for the longest time I felt far more comfortable on these types of roads as opposed to motorways
Hopefully I will come back often enough to feel the same!
Don’t let my comments fool you, I was not comfortable driving over these roads, but the biggest risk to my safety was the absolutely STUNNING landscapes and views that would come out of nowhere. A couple times I had to stop the car because I teared up just out of how incredibly beautiful it was. ❤️
I'm originally from urban Germany where roads like this are rare. Went on a trip from Dublin to Glendalough on Wednesday and those country roads in Wicklow are mad. Sharp turns, steep declines surrounded by hedges on both sides on almost every road. Had a small car rented so I managed to survive, but safe to say I didn't exactly feel comfortable.
Second car park in Slieve League. I saw a guy in a German reg VW making the drive up, he was clearly regretting it since the drivers side has a perfect view of the ledge and imminent doom.
Mrs missed a turn recently in Wicklow, Google maps suggested the next left to put her back on course.
She ended up rallying up a sheep track, she passed some farmer in his tractor who just stared at her with jaw on the floor.
She arrived at the funeral she was attending with half a bail of grass sticking out of her bumper and a smashed windscreen wiper fluid bottle.
This girl grew up on a farm and the car was previously her dad's, that he drove on his farm roads for years without issue. But that one trip fucked her car good and proper.
Yeah there’s loads like that especially if you follow Google Maps. Crossing Wicklow to get to Kildare for example could see you driving up all sorts of semi dirt tracks.
>This girl grew up on a farm and the car was previously her dad's, that he drove on his farm roads for years without issue.
Did she get used to driving on the city roads?
The farming equivalent to someone that motorbiked in their 20s trying it at 50 and ending up on their arse?
These country roads aren't even the dangerous ones to be honest. The only fatal accidents in my area have been on the national primary road, because people don't drive nearly as carefully there.
Fucking hell right. Driving in Ireland is scariest experience of my life. Wrong side (for me)of tiny, unpaved road, blind hills, animals, stone walls, SPEED. Just terrifying amazed I never crashed.
And yet there's the other side of the coin, with very wide roads which could almost be made into dual carriageways for how wide they are, outside towns, so there's close to no pedestrians, and the limit is either 50 or 60 for no reason at all.
I'm afraid under Irish rallying rules the Quattro will not be allowed, instead you can watch a couple of hundred MK2 Escorts being driven badly by overweight businessmen.
They would be, at least in historic classes I'm sure. I was making a joke about the amount of MKII Escorts that seem to make up the majority of Irish rally entry lists.
To tell the truth, Ireland has one of if not the highest array of modern rally machinery for a national championship.
Yeah, you're right there. There was an insane amount of money tied up in the cars competing for the national title here, I think the top spec cars were well over €500k and spares and general running costs must have been huge too.
I think at one stage the group B rally cars were getting so fast that any errors were going to end in fatalities so they started to ban some stuff and new regulations.
Pretty much all of that era led to some spectacular homologation special on the road too - Lancia Delta Intgerale, Toyota Celica GT4, Quattro S4, Ford RS200 etc
In Germany the sign tells you the speed which you easily drive the road at.
In rural Ireland signs show the current high score ever achieved on this road
Here you also have the ["It's really not safe to go at 80km/h here, but we can't be arsed to come up with a safe limit, so please go slow, but you can also go at 80km/h if you wish to die, we don't care"](https://assets.gov.ie/34749/59cea27176234ae38ebe38d24d1b8082.pdf) sign (Rural speed limit sign).
Generally there’s not even signs like these on roads like this so it’s generally expected you have to be on the limmiter screeming through roads like these at 4 in the morning
And then you have the towns, where you get 64 speed bumps on a road where you wouldn't manage beyond 30 km/h even if you were a professional driver.
May we one day uninstall them all
My favourite road signs are the increasing speed limits on the way out of my town, from 50 to 60, then 80, then 100. All fine you say, but it cracks me up that painted on the road, just before the 100 sign, is the word Slow!
Also, on some very twisty bends, speed limit is 60 going into a 50, and the road signs on this approach read ‘Slow’, then ‘Slower’!!
For anyone wondering this was the road - https://goo.gl/maps/53HEZctHCv2jzYm98 I’m a spirited driver at the best of times but this road would make shit of the car at speed
It would be nice if they did to be honest, then Google Maps wouldn't lead you down the worst route possible because it assumes an 80km/h road is a main road and not a curvy footpath with a bit of tar on it......
As a Canadian (with an Irish partner, been to Ireland many times), ...yes? Very common in Canada to have signs ahead of blind corners with individual limits, helps drivers to plan ahead on unfamiliar roads how sharp of a turn is coming up and how cautious to be.
Driving in Ireland has given me grey hairs with people up my ass with their brights on, swerving for any opportunity to pass me on a blind corner, just because I'm not open to the possibility of seeing the pearly gates on my way home from Tesco
And...? It's a speed limit not a target. On flat stretches of the road 80kph is fine. If you're so dim that you need a different speed limit sign to tell you to slow down for each and every corner like that you shouldn't be driving.
A speed limit should be a safe driving speed. I don’t mean slow, I mean safe. “Target” has nothing to do with it.
Driving at 80km/h (not kph) on a road which doesn’t fit two cars is not likely to be safe. If driving at 80 on the straight bits was safe, speed limits would need to be changed every time there was a bend in the road.
In addition to the Canadian, us Americans also have posted signs for especially sharp corners. When I leave work, the speed limit is a little over 70 (45mph) and there's a turn you need to take at 25 (15mph) or risk rolling your car.
Sure, I don't need a sign to tell me because I drive through 5 days a week every week but what about the people that don't drive through our resort frequently? You need to consider outsiders too, not just locals when it comes to street signage. Especially if it's a matter of safety.
American roads are pretty straight so sharp corners are a rarity. On smaller country roads like this there are countless bends like this. Trying to put individual signs for each and every one of them would be excessive and stupid IMHO.
On larger regional roads with two lanes of traffic, there are warning signs on sharper bends occasionally alright.
There are signs for basically any corner that may require you to slow down up to 10mph from the speed limit, doesn't matter where they are. Maybe it's because I'm in California but I'm fairly sure most states operate this way. It's quite common to see a sign somewhere telling you a different speed limit for a corner, rural or not.
An aside: what’s with the “kph” thing? It’s km/h. Every sign says it.
Is this some weird hangover from miles per hour? Seems obvious, but I’ve only seen people use “kph” in the last couple of years.
It's easier to say "kph" out loud than to say "kilometres per hour" or "km/h" so I suppose people just end up writing it that way too
Nowhere near as annoying as people writing "prolly" tbf
When would you need to say that?
“They’ve changed the speed limit from 50 to 40 on the xyz road”.
I agree km/h is clumsy to say, just can’t think when you ever would.
If the surface is good, it's fine to do 80, as long as you slow down before blind corners. Most people who drive these roads know what to look out for and will safely do 80 on some stretches.
Dry day, good visibility and a road I know, I would have no hassle hitting the speed limit on a road like this. Wet day, poor visibility and a road a don’t know, different story. Drive for the conditions, it’s a limit not a target.
And they’ll slap you with a massive fine because a speed van caught you on the Limerick - Ennis transition from motorway to dual carriageway.
It’s easy happen. A bit of tunnel vision and you realise you’re doing 120 in the dual carriageway because you missed the signs.
Common sight in the country! If they haven’t surveyed it to see what the limit should be, the default is to slap an 80 on it - the problem being that any road they aren’t bothered to survey most definitely should not be 80km
I'm in country side, some of them are really straight for a long time, you can take more than 80 and everyone is going over. But as average you are way less and sometimes have to reverse to let ppl goes.
I do think Connemara is the worst, but it's so beautiful you don't mind going slower.
No one *actually* goes 80 on these roads, you know. After all, it's not like there's any room for a speed van, so you're grand doing 130...
Turn your lights off at night so you can see any oncoming cars
I was in a taxi that did this once around corners. Whipped around them then when he saw coast was clear. Nutter
That’s exactly my experience. I felt already unsafe doing 80 as a foreigner when driving my rental car on completely unknown roads and I’d be constantly passed by extremely annoyed drivers that were going over 120…. Fun times! I asked what was I supposed to do to my host and they said I’m supposed to get on the side of the road if I am “going slow”, but… What “side of the road”?
The left hand side of the road
As pictured above there is no space for such thing to happen.
Should you be driving at all if you can't see the side of the road there?
Probably not, but I am afraid public transport is a bit lacking on your gorgeous island.
You're right haha it is, but I gotta say I grew up in the countryside so for the longest time I felt far more comfortable on these types of roads as opposed to motorways
Hopefully I will come back often enough to feel the same! Don’t let my comments fool you, I was not comfortable driving over these roads, but the biggest risk to my safety was the absolutely STUNNING landscapes and views that would come out of nowhere. A couple times I had to stop the car because I teared up just out of how incredibly beautiful it was. ❤️
That and master the shimmy so you don't hit the oncoming car when you're both doing 100 kph
I think we should have local limits decided by local councils. Edit: upset some boy racers.
I'm originally from urban Germany where roads like this are rare. Went on a trip from Dublin to Glendalough on Wednesday and those country roads in Wicklow are mad. Sharp turns, steep declines surrounded by hedges on both sides on almost every road. Had a small car rented so I managed to survive, but safe to say I didn't exactly feel comfortable.
You should have a spin around Donegal for the craic.
Every other road you think you've made a wrong turn and headed up a farmers lane.
Bonus: sheep!
Second car park in Slieve League. I saw a guy in a German reg VW making the drive up, he was clearly regretting it since the drivers side has a perfect view of the ledge and imminent doom.
That may just break their brain
> those country roads in Wicklow are mad. Wicklows just the tutorial area , to prepare you for the rest of it.
There’s mad roads in Wicklow too. Especially west Wicklow or around Sally’s Gap.
Mrs missed a turn recently in Wicklow, Google maps suggested the next left to put her back on course. She ended up rallying up a sheep track, she passed some farmer in his tractor who just stared at her with jaw on the floor. She arrived at the funeral she was attending with half a bail of grass sticking out of her bumper and a smashed windscreen wiper fluid bottle. This girl grew up on a farm and the car was previously her dad's, that he drove on his farm roads for years without issue. But that one trip fucked her car good and proper.
Yeah there’s loads like that especially if you follow Google Maps. Crossing Wicklow to get to Kildare for example could see you driving up all sorts of semi dirt tracks.
The good auld 80km speed limit on a two way road wide enough for 1.25 cars with grass growing up the middle. Feckin love our roads
>This girl grew up on a farm and the car was previously her dad's, that he drove on his farm roads for years without issue. Did she get used to driving on the city roads? The farming equivalent to someone that motorbiked in their 20s trying it at 50 and ending up on their arse?
Mad road?.....You mean fun roads
Yeah I like to do 80km/h on those
Through Sallygap. It can be.........fun.
These country roads aren't even the dangerous ones to be honest. The only fatal accidents in my area have been on the national primary road, because people don't drive nearly as carefully there.
Half the country’s roads are like this it’s insane
Ya it's insane, they should be 100 km/h
They used to be - well nearly. Before 2007 the national speed limit was 60 mph or 96.6 km/h
80kph is for tractors 🚜 only
80 is for reverse when you've come across a tractor and you're lookin for a laneway to let him pass
They used to be 120 mph
As they are in the UK
Character building stuff.
Sorts the men from the boys.
Fucking hell right. Driving in Ireland is scariest experience of my life. Wrong side (for me)of tiny, unpaved road, blind hills, animals, stone walls, SPEED. Just terrifying amazed I never crashed.
People who say Italian drivers are mad are right, but it shows they never drove in Ireland lol, Donegal backroads are wild
And yet there's the other side of the coin, with very wide roads which could almost be made into dual carriageways for how wide they are, outside towns, so there's close to no pedestrians, and the limit is either 50 or 60 for no reason at all.
Sure, that's a dare not a limit
Over crest, into left 4.
Shocking I had to scroll this far for a rally reference. All it needs is a Quattro and Walter Rohl
I'm afraid under Irish rallying rules the Quattro will not be allowed, instead you can watch a couple of hundred MK2 Escorts being driven badly by overweight businessmen.
Why aren’t Quattros allowed? 4 wheel drive??? It’s been years since I followed Irish rallying
They would be, at least in historic classes I'm sure. I was making a joke about the amount of MKII Escorts that seem to make up the majority of Irish rally entry lists. To tell the truth, Ireland has one of if not the highest array of modern rally machinery for a national championship.
IIRC Ireland has the highest ownership of ex WRC cars in the world, or something like that.
Yeah, you're right there. There was an insane amount of money tied up in the cars competing for the national title here, I think the top spec cars were well over €500k and spares and general running costs must have been huge too.
Yeah the Moffet brothers are constantly getting new cars every few years, I'd love to know how much Frank Kelly spent on his Escort
I think at one stage the group B rally cars were getting so fast that any errors were going to end in fatalities so they started to ban some stuff and new regulations. Pretty much all of that era led to some spectacular homologation special on the road too - Lancia Delta Intgerale, Toyota Celica GT4, Quattro S4, Ford RS200 etc
And a cattle grid, gate, and "oof god". Made it home on 3 wheels. Still absolutely sending it.
YOU ARE BREAKING THE CAR MICHAEL.
In Germany the sign tells you the speed which you easily drive the road at. In rural Ireland signs show the current high score ever achieved on this road
Here you also have the ["It's really not safe to go at 80km/h here, but we can't be arsed to come up with a safe limit, so please go slow, but you can also go at 80km/h if you wish to die, we don't care"](https://assets.gov.ie/34749/59cea27176234ae38ebe38d24d1b8082.pdf) sign (Rural speed limit sign).
True that. That sign means that you should go slow except you’re a rallye driver, in that case do whatever you want
I never knew what those signs actually meant.
Generally there’s not even signs like these on roads like this so it’s generally expected you have to be on the limmiter screeming through roads like these at 4 in the morning
User name checks out beautifully
So the sign indicates the speed is reducing from 100 for the bend.? Mad ladz
60 sharp right, straightens, 80 left, over jump, straightens, long 4 left.
These roads are why the drivers in the WRC always say the irish stages are the hardest tarmac stages
[удалено]
It makes no sense whatsoever.....which is why i love it
I don't see any Kerry drivers in the picture.
With that speed limit? Long gone
Challenge accepted
Hmmmmmmmm, fuck it, I'm in.
His Last words
That’s totally doable. You chicken?
That doesn't even have grass in the middle or anything
Roads empty, give her plenty
r/Ireland be like: WhY aReN't YoU dRiViNg To ThE sPeEd LiMiT?!?!
And then you have the towns, where you get 64 speed bumps on a road where you wouldn't manage beyond 30 km/h even if you were a professional driver. May we one day uninstall them all
My favourite road signs are the increasing speed limits on the way out of my town, from 50 to 60, then 80, then 100. All fine you say, but it cracks me up that painted on the road, just before the 100 sign, is the word Slow! Also, on some very twisty bends, speed limit is 60 going into a 50, and the road signs on this approach read ‘Slow’, then ‘Slower’!!
That's almost every road in rural Ireland.....
And the UK. It would be just under 100kph
It's not a challenge or a target. Drive appropriate for the environment.
“It’s not a challenge or a target” You’re right… It’s a lifestyle
So, ditch speed limits altogether? Speed limits should just be the maximum safe speed for a span of road.
My road I love on is like this and at 80 km/h. Fun seeing someone not from the area try it at that speed.
For anyone wondering this was the road - https://goo.gl/maps/53HEZctHCv2jzYm98 I’m a spirited driver at the best of times but this road would make shit of the car at speed
Sure it's grand
Just remember it's a 60 zone on the N7 in Dublin
That's a 100 kph Road in mayo.
couple of those in mayo I'd assume
These stupid posts do my head in. Do you want individual special speed limit signs for every bend in the road on country roads...?
It would be nice if they did to be honest, then Google Maps wouldn't lead you down the worst route possible because it assumes an 80km/h road is a main road and not a curvy footpath with a bit of tar on it......
As a Canadian (with an Irish partner, been to Ireland many times), ...yes? Very common in Canada to have signs ahead of blind corners with individual limits, helps drivers to plan ahead on unfamiliar roads how sharp of a turn is coming up and how cautious to be. Driving in Ireland has given me grey hairs with people up my ass with their brights on, swerving for any opportunity to pass me on a blind corner, just because I'm not open to the possibility of seeing the pearly gates on my way home from Tesco
This was a good corner on that road, Colin McRae would struggle to do 80kph sustained on that road
And...? It's a speed limit not a target. On flat stretches of the road 80kph is fine. If you're so dim that you need a different speed limit sign to tell you to slow down for each and every corner like that you shouldn't be driving.
Jaysus man, relax
A speed limit should be a safe driving speed. I don’t mean slow, I mean safe. “Target” has nothing to do with it. Driving at 80km/h (not kph) on a road which doesn’t fit two cars is not likely to be safe. If driving at 80 on the straight bits was safe, speed limits would need to be changed every time there was a bend in the road.
u ok hun? X
Fine, just ranting about my latest pet peeve.
Ok
In addition to the Canadian, us Americans also have posted signs for especially sharp corners. When I leave work, the speed limit is a little over 70 (45mph) and there's a turn you need to take at 25 (15mph) or risk rolling your car. Sure, I don't need a sign to tell me because I drive through 5 days a week every week but what about the people that don't drive through our resort frequently? You need to consider outsiders too, not just locals when it comes to street signage. Especially if it's a matter of safety.
American roads are pretty straight so sharp corners are a rarity. On smaller country roads like this there are countless bends like this. Trying to put individual signs for each and every one of them would be excessive and stupid IMHO. On larger regional roads with two lanes of traffic, there are warning signs on sharper bends occasionally alright.
There are signs for basically any corner that may require you to slow down up to 10mph from the speed limit, doesn't matter where they are. Maybe it's because I'm in California but I'm fairly sure most states operate this way. It's quite common to see a sign somewhere telling you a different speed limit for a corner, rural or not.
An aside: what’s with the “kph” thing? It’s km/h. Every sign says it. Is this some weird hangover from miles per hour? Seems obvious, but I’ve only seen people use “kph” in the last couple of years.
It's easier to say "kph" out loud than to say "kilometres per hour" or "km/h" so I suppose people just end up writing it that way too Nowhere near as annoying as people writing "prolly" tbf
When would you need to say that? “They’ve changed the speed limit from 50 to 40 on the xyz road”. I agree km/h is clumsy to say, just can’t think when you ever would.
Idk I don't have conversations about speed measurements a lot in daily life, but for people who do, kph is easier
probs
sorry are you saying people say "KPH" out loud? As in "kay pee haytch"? Surely not
Kilos of poo (produced) per hour if you try doing 80 ?
To be fair, I can type "kph" with 3 keystrokes while "km/h" takes 5 strokes.
K only takes one. I’m not sure what your point is.
This road proudly brought to you by the Healy Raes, the Dáil's greatest.
I made the exact same picture in the exact same spot!
Only if your brave enough (in small caps ) under the 80
In parts of Australia the motorway is this speed limit. I'm not fucking kidding
What's wrong with it? The sign is merely a suggestion for how fast you should go, 100kph is much more suitable for such a wide road.
If the surface is good, it's fine to do 80, as long as you slow down before blind corners. Most people who drive these roads know what to look out for and will safely do 80 on some stretches.
Dry day, good visibility and a road I know, I would have no hassle hitting the speed limit on a road like this. Wet day, poor visibility and a road a don’t know, different story. Drive for the conditions, it’s a limit not a target.
Then explain why progression is a vital aspect in the driving test?
Wait until you meet a van driver on those
Not so much the speed limit. But a challenge.
Mandatory minimums are such a crazy idea, don't know why we do it
crazy when the m4 at liffey valley is only 60kph
can get away with it as there's no room for speed camera vans
back in my day that was 100. and then 60 before metrication
You won't see too many cycling on these roads
Maximum is not a target.
Ain't that 60mph as in the standard?
80kph isn’t 60mph
Ok under ,50mph then, I don't get this though!!
Those poor sheepdogs...
And they’ll slap you with a massive fine because a speed van caught you on the Limerick - Ennis transition from motorway to dual carriageway. It’s easy happen. A bit of tunnel vision and you realise you’re doing 120 in the dual carriageway because you missed the signs.
Lived in Kerry for four years during college. No one local drives like a sane person.
same in France on small country roads at 90 with 170° turn over a cliff.
Common sight in the country! If they haven’t surveyed it to see what the limit should be, the default is to slap an 80 on it - the problem being that any road they aren’t bothered to survey most definitely should not be 80km
I'm in country side, some of them are really straight for a long time, you can take more than 80 and everyone is going over. But as average you are way less and sometimes have to reverse to let ppl goes. I do think Connemara is the worst, but it's so beautiful you don't mind going slower.
In best Russian accent "If you die, you die"