Today's Pet Peeve: No Reason Honking

Okay, here's another new rule for city life that Ask Gothamist would like to see instituted immediately.

If you are in a car, about five or six cars back from the intersection and the traffic is not moving, DON'T HONK. Instead of leaning on the horn, take a deep breath and remind yourself that if the cars in front of you could move they would. The only person who has the right to honk, in Ask Gothamist's opinion, is the person immediately behind the first person at the intersection. That person probably has the best view of what's going on and is in the best position to decide if a gentle tap on the horn will wake up the driver in front of him.

Actually, New York already has rules against honking in non-emergency situations in plenty of neighborhoods. Alas, they are virtually unenforceable and the only illegal tooting anyone gets busted for usually involves marijuana. Whatever happened to the idea of a citizen's arrest? When Gothamist is sleeping in or trying to watch TV, there is nothing we'd like to do more than run downstairs and issue citations to all the jerks blasting No Reason Honks.

When your car is stopped halfway down the block, and you are unable to see what's going on, honking does little to speed up whatever is holding up traffic ahead. All you wind up doing is disturbing the people in the apartments on that block. Gothamist was just in London where we realized that such a honk-free utopia is achievable. Fight the power!