Tag Archives: Offbeat News

Forget About America’s 11ft8 Bridge, Check Out Britain’s Infamously Narrow 7ft Woodmere Avenue

You might know the “11foot8” bridge (which is now 12’ 4” tall, but the name has stuck) in Durham, North Carolina that became viral following a number of accidents with tall trucks. Now, the latest piece of bad road design comes from the U.K.

The Woodmere Avenue width restriction has its own Facebook group with plenty of humorous memes thrown into the mix and a number of YouTube videos dedicated to it and has even become the subject of some political action as a result of the numerous victims it has left in its wake.

Located in Watford, Hertfordshire, near London, the Woodmere Avenue width restriction is a form of traffic control that’s designed to limit the width of vehicles driving through it. Intended as a means of preventing very big vehicles from entering residential areas, it allows only those that are up to 6’6″ (198cm) wide, per the Daily Mail, though a sign seen on Google maps (below) says its 7.0″ (210cm) wide.

Read Also: North Carolina’s Infamous ’11foot8′ Bridge Kills A Caravan’s A/C Units

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U.K. drivers with large SUVs sometimes complain about width restrictions preventing them from driving through. But it’s not just very wide models like the 6’9” wide Land Rover Disovery Sport that are having a hard time passing, videos of the Woodmere Avenue one show it all kinds of vehicles crash as they climb the curb and hit a bollard.

Footage posted to YouTube show a VW Golf popping one wheel in the air as it tries to navigate the width restriction and a small Skoda Roomster becoming stuck in it. In August, meanwhile, the Hertfordshire Mercury reported that a Volvo became so stuck in it that it had to be lifted out with a digger.

What’s your meme on Woodmere Avenue?

Video captured by one resident’s Ring cam showed as many as 12 accidents there in a period of six weeks. Such is the issue that Watford MP Dean Russell raised the issue in Parliament in September, asking for a different kind of width restriction to be installed.

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“This is something that I have been working on for quite some time now, securing an Adjournment Debate in the House of Commons and raising at Ministerial level,” Russell said.

Local resident and former bus driver Barry Felton told the outlet, though, that the solution to the issue is really simple.

“I get fed up with it and the damage it causes,” Felton said. “It’s like a time bomb. All we want is the reinforced posts taken out.”

Each Of These 1/3 Scale Ferrari Engines Built Like The Real Ones Takes Over A Year To Create

The small turbocharged engines in most modern mainstream cars aren’t much different from the electric motors that will replace them in the coming years.

They’re not designed to sound or look good, only to work efficiently. You’ll never feel like lifting the hood on your Hyundai i10 to show your buddies the mighty 99 hp 1.0-liter engine in all its glory, let alone put one on display in your living room.

Old Ferrari engines are different, as these gorgeous one-third scale replicas from Terzo Dalia prove. Based less than 30 minutes drive from Ferrari’s Maranello base, the company has been making exquisite models of Ferrari engines and components for decades, but these aren’t like the Revell kits your dad built as a kid.

Dalia’s engines are built using the same kind of techniques used to create real Ferrari engines. There are no plastic components and no adhesives holding the 200-plus bits together. Instead, having first stripped a real engine down to take measurements, parts are fabricated in wood to check for fit, then cast in aluminum, while other pieces are turned stainless steel.

Related: GTO Engineering’s Perfect Ferrari California Spyder Costs $15M Less Than A ‘Real’ One

More than 500 screws are used in the construction, and while the engines don’t actually run under their own power, they can be turned over. And yes, the firing order exactly matches the original full size engine’s. Factoring in the time to crate the components and assemble them to display standard, the company says each engine can take a year to create, and they’re so beautifully finished, they’ve even been displayed in Ferrari’s own museum.

Terzo Dalia has built limited runs of various Ferrari engines over the past two decades, including the 3.0-liter Colombo V12 fitted to the 250 GTO, the 6.3-liter V12 from the LaFerrari hypercar, and the 180-degree 12-cylinder motor that powered Niki Lauda and Jody Scheckter to world championship glory. It’s even created wire frame outlines of entire cars, again in one-third scale, but many of these pieces have long since sold out.

But if you can’t find what you’re looking for through Terzo Dalia himself, British Ferrari specialist DK Engineering might have what you need. DK currently has at least 11 different Terzo Dalia models for sale, ranging from a 250 GT California Spyder wireframe to the 6.0-liter V12 from the relatively modern 599 GTB.

DK’s site doesn’t list prices, but we’ve seen Terzo Dalia’s engine models for sale elsewhere for between $8,000-15,000 (£5,800-11,000). Which isn’t small change for a living room ornament for ordinary folks, but might seem like beer money compared to the cost of some of the wall art buyers who already own a real 250 GTO or California Spider might be showing off in the same room.

PHOTO GALLERY

more photos…

Drone Target: Police Using UAVs To Catch Bad Drivers And Ticket Them In Poland

When it comes to catching law-breaking drivers, police will use any technology legally and financially available to them. That means as drivers we have to watch out for fixed and mobile cameras, average speed cameras, marked and undercover cars, helicopters and sometimes, as in the case of Missouri state Highway Patrol, even police airplanes timing us over a stretch of road.

Drivers in countries like Poland can add police drones to that already lengthy list. The video sourced below from Polish police shows various cars and motorbikes being filmed crossing a solid white line to overtake slower vehicles, blissfully unaware that their misdemeanors were being tracked from the sky.

Though almost certainly larger than a consumer DJI-style drone, the police drones are sufficiently small and flying high enough to make them hard for drivers focused on passing the cars ahead from spotting them.

Only when a policeman in a high-vis jacket steps into the road much further on to pull them into a side road do they have the first inkling that they’ve been busted, even then they won’t know how.

Also: Police Chopper Stealthily Films Subaru BRZ Driver Potentially Accumulating Over A$10,000 In Speeding Fines

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Poland isn’t the only country employing drone technology to catch drivers. Police forces in the UK first began using drones equipped with high resolution cameras and thermal imaging equipment to target bad driving in 2019, and forces in Australia’s Queensland rolled out their crime-fighting drones this summer to tackle illegal street races, having previously used them to record crime scenes for forensics teams.

In the U.S., police forces are also using drones, though that use varies from state to state and isn’t specifically related to catching speeding drivers. It became possible after a 2016 ruling by the Federal Aviation Authority that opened up airspace to non-hobby flyers, though the regulations insist the done should only be flown in line of sight, despite the fact that the technology allows them to fly much further.

Those drones are often used for surveillance or as virtual first responders, but in 2019 San Diego was considering flying a 12,500 lbs (5670kg) ex-military drone with a 79 ft (24 m) wingspan over the city to catch speeders. Fortunately for Southern Californian hoons, the plans came to nought.

Do you think police forces should be allowed to use drone technology to enforce traffic laws? Leave us a comment and let us know.

Truck Driver Deliberately Rolls Coal And Blocks A Tesla On The Highway

Rolling coal, the practice of flooring a specially modified diesel engine to produce an excessive amount of smoke, is considered illegal in many places. However, that didn’t stop one truck driver to do just that in front of a Tesla, blocking them on the road in the process.

We’ve seen Tesla-hate similar to this before with the recent fad of “ICE-ing,” in which a gas-powered vehicle will block off Tesla charging stations, but it’s not often that we see this type of malicious behavior out on the road.

See Also: Tesla Owner Gets The Last Laugh As Ford Mustang Towed For Blocking Charger

The incident was recorded on what appears to be one of the EV’s built-in cameras. It begins with the Tesla, a Model 3, driving down a highway in the outermost lane. The truck then moves in front of it and rolls coal. The Tesla driver moves to the other lane to avoid it, to which the truck responds by doing the same thing again: blocking and rolling coal. On top of all of that, the lane changes the truck driver was making were very erratic, and they even appeared to brake check the Tesla at one point in the video. It is not clear what provoked this behavior from the truck driver, although even it was a case of road rage, we don’t think it would justify their actions.

To make matters worse, the Tesla driver was said to be a younger woman with a child in the car. She was encouraged to report the incident to the police, although it is not yet clear what, if any, action was taken.

BMW Makes Bizarre Double U-Turn, Crashes Into Focus ST And Drives Away

In the immortal words of Ron White, you can’t fix stupid and one Redditor found that out to their own cost. The driver took to the social media site to give details on the story that started with what appears to be a deeply indecisive BMW driver (that or the worst donut we’ve ever seen) which ended with a three-car collision and the 3-Series allegedly driving off the scene.

User u/AStupidCouch posted photos of the damage that was done to his car in the dedicated Focus ST subreddit yesterday. Although the driver has dashcam footage and managed to get their hands security cam footage from a nearby building, none of that will be necessary in finding the BMW since its license plate fell off and is now safely with the police.

Fortunately, the ST owner didn’t suffer any serious injuries.

“So for everyone asking I was the only driver and walked away with nothing super major, I feel body aches and some pain around mainly my wrist and knees. As for the person who hit me it was a hit and run,” he wrote in a comment.

Read Also: Video Of A Police BMW Doing Donuts With A Passenger Mooning From The Back Was Staged

In a second comment, the user wrote “It wasn’t road rage. My dash cam footage shows he was just being an idiot. Never had an altercation or anything. Also I was going the speed limit.”

Although a separate Redditor who posted the footage described the BMW’s action as a donut, it’s such a bizarre maneuver that it’s hard to know what it was. It may have been the world’s most unsuccessful powerslide or a panicked and equally unsuccessful double u-turn. Whatever the case, the car goes from the lane to the right of the left turn lane, does a 180, goes straight for a split second, and then from the rightmost opposing lane, turns back into the path of the Focus ST, which takes evasive action.

The Focus’s driver, although unfortunate, probably did avoid a more serious head-on accident and so should probably be applauded. Sadly, it wasn’t enough to save the car, which was declared a total loss by his insurance.

Brazilian Trucker Fined For Running Car Off The Road While Drunk

Video has surfaced online showing the moment the driver of a large semi-truck in Brazil runs a car off the road.

The video was filmed by the passenger of the car and starts out by showing the driver of the Volvo semi tailgating the car. Moments later, the truck pulls out from behind as if it is going to overtake, only to hit the car and run it off the road. The passenger continues to film the incident until the car comes to a rest down an embankment on the side of the road.

Local media outlet Globo has confirmed that neither the driver nor passenger of the car were injured, while also providing additional details about the incident.

Read Also: Ford Ends All Car Production In Brazil As It Moves To Restructure Its South American Operations

The publication asserts the driver of the truck fled the scene but was stopped by the military police roughly 30 km away in the city of Cipó. Police tested the man and found that he was driving under the influence of alcohol.

The unnamed 55-year-old was arrested and sent to a local station where he was hit with a fine and had his license revoked for a period of 12 months. Curiously, local media hasn’t made any mention of possible charges the truck driver was hit with in relation to this incident.

Either way, it’s fortunate that the driver and passenger of the car were not injured.

Attempted murder. from r/IdiotsInCars

YouTuber Crashes Mercedes G63 AMG Through Fence Trying To Do Donuts

YouTube channel DailyDrivenExotics (DDE) has done it again with another headline-grabbing car accident, this time in a Mercedes G-Class. In a video featuring a series of off- and on-road shenanigans, the bunch managed to crash the G-Wagen straight through a fence, nearly rolling it over.

The video begins with DDE going through their showroom, which includes their newly-completed, custom windshield-less Lamborghini Huracan, among many other unique vehicles.

They then proceed to take said Huracan out and do donuts in the parking lot, until they have the idea to do the same with the G63 in the dirt lot next to it.

See Also: YouTuber Can’t Wait For Lamborghini To Make A Huracan Evo Speedster, Builds His Own

Despite the fact that it is supposed to be going up for sale soon, they take the G-Wagen onto the dirt lot and begin playing around. They kick up some mud and dirt, and slide around a bit, all accompanied by the G63’s V8 growl. However, after a few minutes of fun, they send the off-roader directly into a metal fence after rolling it over an embankment near the edge of the lot.

We’ve seen lots of Youtubers doing silly things just to garner views, but we guess crashing a G63, and nearly rolling over, most likely doesn’t fit in that category. In spite of the damage done to SUV, as they make their way over to it, they are laughing and smiling as if they didn’t just crash a range-topping Mercedes G-Class.

Read More: Should You Go Get The Old Mercedes G500 4×4² Or Wait For The New One?

Unfortunately for them, the damage was fairly substantial. The crash resulted in scratches all over the roof and hood, and half of a metal pole drove its way through the front bumper, with the other half wedging itself in the frame and needing to be cut out. It should be repairable, but we’re not too sure if the next owner of this car would be happy to hear that a metal rod had previously impaled the front end of his new G-Wagen.

You can watch the whole video, crash included, for yourself below.

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Dealership Employee Filmed Swearing About Customer, Making Him Wait An Hour To Get Car Back

Getting your oil changed is usually pretty simple, but it turned into a nightmare for one customer who took their car to Northside Honda in San Antonio.

In a Facebook post noticed by The Drive, Gabriel Rendon said he took his car in for an oil change and dealership employees also recommend he change is brake and transmission fluid as well as get a new battery.

Rendon allegedly told them he just wanted the oil change and would bring the car back in a couple of weeks to have the rest of the work done. However, the dealership reportedly ignored this and did everything. As a result, they allegedly  asked for $480 instead of the typical $30 or $40 for an oil change.

Also Watch: Dashcam Shows Dealership Employee Learning To Drive Stick On Customer’s Focus RS

Try our entirely online car buying experience! The Northside Express program brings car buying to you!https://www.mynshonda.com/northside-express/

Posted by Northside Honda on Wednesday, April 1, 2020

This, unsurprisingly, led to an argument which was settled when everyone agreed to reinstall the old battery and call it a day. While that’s a reasonable compromise for a bad situation, it appears at least one dealership employee held a grudge.

As you can see in the dashcam video, they drove Rendon’s car back to the service department where the driver had a quick discussion with another employee. During this, one of them says “We gotta let this mother*cker sit an hour, because the guy’s a f*cking a**hole.”

Rendon says that’s exactly what happened as they waited for nearly an hour to get his car back. That’s far longer than it should take to swap out a battery and the lengthy delay prompted Rendon to check the dashcam and discover the dealership purposely punished him for their mistake.

Needless to say, customers should never be treated like that and it’s disappointing that at least two people knew what was happening and neither did anything about it. Now, the dealership is paying the price as the story is getting plenty of attention.

Note: Video contains NSFW language

So went to Honda today to get my oil change and while I was there, they let me know that they recommend I change my transmission and brake fluid and that I needed a new battery.  I told them I had just come in for a oil change and said I would come back in a couple weeks to get the rest done. Well turns out they ended up doing everything and wanted me to pay $480. I told them that I specifically said to only do the oil and after arguing for a while they ended up deciding to take the new battery back and put my old one back in. So they took my car to the back and I ended up waiting for almost an hour for them to put my old battery back and wondered why it took an hour to put my battery back. Well, this is why. I decided to review my dash cam footage and this is what I captured. By the way this was at Northside Honda on San Pedro and 410

Posted by Gabriel Rendon on Saturday, August 22, 2020

Two Canadian Drivers Crash After Close Encounter With Truck; Were They Racing Each Other?

Two drivers have been filmed crashing on a street in Montreal, Canada while appearing to break the speed limit and potentially racing each other.

Local news outlet Journal Demontreal reports the incident happened last week when the driver of a large truck was attempting to make a right-hand turn into a parking lot.

Speaking with the publication, the driver of the truck, Éric Thibault, said he was driving at dawn when he wanted to turn into a parking lot. To make the turn, he drove the truck into the left-most lane before turning across all three lanes of traffic. He claims to have been roughly 250 yards from the nearest intersection at the time and says that red lights should have prevented any motorist from getting anywhere near him.

Read Also: Ford Mustang With “Street Racing Is Not A Crime” Sticker Predictably Crashes

However, just as the trucker begins to turn to the right, a black hatchback (which appears to be a VW Golf), clips the front of the truck and is sent sliding down the sidewalk, taking with it a small tree. A second vehicle, namely a white Honda Civic sedan, then comes at high speed and slams head-on into another, much larger tree.

The speed limit on the road was 60 km/h (37 mph), but the trucker believes the two cars were probably going at least 100 km/h (62 mph).

The City of Montreal Police Service is investigating the crash and has confirmed that none of the motorists suffered any serious injuries.

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Hate Crime Or Overreaction? Mustang Driver In Trouble For Leaving Tire Marks On Pride Crosswalk

June was LGBT Pride Month and the West Vancouver Police Department celebrated the occasion by unveiling a rainbow-colored crosswalk outside the station.

At the time, the department said “While our Pride flag may have come down for the year, the new crosswalk will remain as a statement of our commitment to promote inclusion, diversity, and respect.”

One week after it was unveiled, the crosswalk was reportedly “defaced” by the driver of a fourth-generation Ford Mustang. According to the department, on July 7th staff inside the police station heard “loud and sustained tire squealing” coming from outside.

Also Read: Ford Mustang With “Street Racing Is Not A Crime” Sticker Predictably Crashes

When they went to investigate, they discovered tire marks on the crosswalk. Police went on to say the “suspect vehicle left the area at a high rate of speed and was not located.”

In a statement, Cst. Kevin Goodmurphy claimed the driver of the Mustang chose to “leave a gesture of hate on a crosswalk that stands for the exact opposite.” The department also called for the public’s help locating the pony car.

While it’s unfortunate the crosswalk was damaged, the surveillance video doesn’t exactly scream hate crime. As you can see, the Mustang pulls up to the intersection and makes a complete stop. It then turns right and drives out of view.

There’s no audio and the rear tires are hidden by vegetation, but this doesn’t appear like the aggressive, hate-filled burnout that police are implying. The ‘action’ also lasts for less than eight seconds and that doesn’t seem like it could cause the “sustained tire squealing” claimed by police.

CBC News reports police have identified a suspect, but there’s no word on who it is or what charges they could be facing. However, the department originally noted they were a investigating a case of “mischief to property.”

It’s official! We held a small ceremony today to unveil the new Pride crosswalk outside the police station. While our…

Posted by West Vancouver Police on Tuesday, June 30, 2020