Is there any reasoning and/or evidence that drivers in Connecticut are
significantly slower and less aggressive than drivers in Westchester
county NY and its surrounding states?

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Clarification of Question by joeviggiano-ga on 18 Oct 2006 08:33 PDT

I suspect it may be that Westchester County is close to NYC and that
Massachusetts drivers are close to Boston; both of which are known for
their aggressive driving habits.  I am not so sure about Hartford.
I'd still like to know if there are any statistics and other potential reasoning.

It is common for folks, regardless of where they hail from, to claim
that "drivers from X locale are horrible." The X locale is usually a
nearby large town or city or the next state over. Examples are Rhode
Island/Massachusetts, Maryland/Virginia, etc.

When you go to X locale, the indigenous folk admit they are aggressive
(never bad, mind you) drivers but "the nuts from Y are the worst in
the whole country." Y is generally a major city that has a
relationship with X. Examples are Boston/New York, LA/Frisco, San
Diego/LA, New/York/Philly, Philly/DC.

In Y, they know they are tough. They know they have a reputation. They
also know that drivers from Z are so much worse. Z is the country from
which the majority of immigration comes.

New York cabbies from the 1980s were Russian and they were the worst
drivers in the world. Currently the arab drivers are the worst there.
In DC, it is cabbies from various African countries that are the
worst. West coast cities abound with stories of bad Mexican and Asian
drivers.

I've been to a few countries and can tell you Americans are among the
wimpiest drivers anywhere and our dear cousins in England run a close
second. The difference is, the Brits can adapt to the madness of a
Karachi 6-way intersection without signals at rush hour whereas the
American will park their car and take a cab.

I definitely see where you're going with this.  But allow me to clarify.
I am not claiming that CT drivers suck at driving. I've simply noticed
that in many areas of Connecticut, few people take the initiative to
drive aggressively.  It's sort of like the way we stereotype how old
people are needlessly slow and cautious.  It's like Drivers Ed in CT
is taught by old people!  This does not necessarily equate to "bad
driving" or "I drive better than CT drivers"; but it causes problems
with the general flow of traffic.
Some examples of things that seem worse in CT is:
- They wait too long when the light turns green.
- They come to a damn near complete stop when making a turn.
- go 5 MPH above the speed limit in the leftmost lane and think they
belong there (while also riding neck in neck with the person in the
lane over).
- rubberneck like it was a bodily function.
Traffic sluggishness could be avoided if these people would just GO!

Now of course no geographical area is innocent of this.  But this
brings me back to my whole "proximity of a major city" theory.  Where
I lived in NY, we're close to NYC and Mass folks are close to Boston;
so I think the aggressive driving rubs off a bit on those folks. 
There are a few observations I made to somewhat back up that
statement:
- Too many times have I called a driver a ?maniac? and they had a
Massachusetts plate.
- When driving on a highway in CT, I noticed that many folks who are
zigzagging through traffic to get to their destination faster are
out-of-staters.

We have to figure out if CT drivers stereotype New Yorkers as ?insane?
drivers.  If that?s the case, then we can pretty much safely assume
that NYers DO drive more aggressively than CTers; regardless of
whether or not NYers actually ARE insane!

Again, do not include NYC in any of my ?New Yorkers? references.  We
KNOW they?re aggressive.