With all due respect, try actually reading my posts before you pile on them.

Having said that, of course, you're correct that even a Prius jock can get carried away once in a while.

 

won't deny that, but neither of us were there so we don't know the full circumstances

 

Bottom line is you made a statement about human vision in the dark that wasn't accurate. We don't have to have been there to know that.

 

The 10 is extremely dangerous (as are most SoCal roads) because you have the millions of people stuck in traffic who aren't paying attention, and trying to take every last second off their commute trying to make it shorter on top of it. Another thing I couldn't believe when I lived there was how narrow the roads are. I get that there's just no room, but still. Literally, in DTLA on the 110 there is a stretch through the THICK of DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES where it is THREE lanes across, that's it. Three lanes, for our nation's second largest city. The 10 from what I remember is 3 lanes, with some spots of 4 at most. I still remember being fairly shocked on how narrow the interstates were there. I was expecting Atlanta-like, 16 lane interstates. The 101 I lived by was 4 lanes with barely any shoulder room. A car pulled over would hold up traffic not from people watching, but from literally blocking traffic.

Driving and traffic there is no joke. While it sucks, I can 100000% understand why our rates doubled when we moved out there. My husband was rear ended three separate times in the two years we lived there (just minor fender benders), and once a guy backed into me in a grocery store parking lot.

 

i just said it's easier to see lights when the surrounding environment is dark, nothing about depth perception

 

L.A.'s famous smog probably doesn't help things at night, either.

 

Actually, the smog wasn't really that bad out there. 2014-15 are all I have to go on, but smog really wasn't an issue. We lived in the base of the Hollywood Hills and could see DTLA; it was usually clear. The lights and haze (be it from smog, smoke, etc.), though you could get lost in. One thing I do miss are those views. Air quality isn't great here, either, but I couldn't tell a difference.

That stretch of I-10 is a nightmare, though. Too narrow and not enough lanes and/or shoulders. I feel my blood pressure rising just thinking about driving around that city.

 

In reflection, watching a little more of that, I also don't understand why they couldn't move the disabled vehicles over to the right.

Around the 4:20 mark where it shows the disabled Prius and old 3 series (which isn't tricked out btw, it was just going too fast), that's exactly what I mean about having no shoulder space out there. Get over to the right, (where even there space is limited), or this pileup WILL HAPPEN. Pretty much a sure thing in the dark for the reasons you've all mentioned.

 

I've mentioned before in other posts, we no longer have the "famous" smog. L.A. has really cleaned up their act, thank goodness.

 

I always thought the Zero-emissions busses were pretty cool when I would take walks, etc. Also the parking spots for electric vehicles. Don't miss paying to park everywhere, though. Lol.

 

But for the purposes of what's happening here's that's meaningless. Your point was to try and say that it should have been easier to judge what was going on at night and that was completely wrong. Being able to physically see lights doesn't do you any good when we're talking about judging distance and velocity of those lights at night.

 

could be classic target fixation, basically you steer where you are looking at on a subconcious level. So if this person paniced and focused on the other car under stress then they will steer towards and into it.

 

I read it. When you start off by saying "not all are like that", and then go on to say that the same can be said about any make, it gives me the impression that you agree with the underlying proposition that most drivers of that particular make are jerks, but not all of them, instead of the proposition that it's unfair to smear one make because of a few bad apples. No one posts videos on the internet of drivers that chug along obeying traffic rules...

 

When it's dark, the iris widens and the pupil dilates, or gets bigger, to allow as much light as possible to enter the eye. The opposite occurs during the day. When the Sun is shining bright, the iris narrows and the pupil constricts, or gets smaller.
Anyone who knows photography also knows how it affects your Depth of Field. It reduces when the pupil is dilated (bigger) and objects are not perceived as sharp as they are during the daytime leading to blurry vision.
Add on to this the fact that most cars now have a navigation screen, which can lead to drivers having to switch quickly between a bright screen at short distant to a dark screen at long distance. Focus suffers or rather the speed at which focus adjusts suffers.

 

Also, add in the fact that all these cars driving down the highway aren't stopping because they don't see brake lights in front of them, just tail lights. You just don't expect a parked car sitting on the left lane on the highway.