According to the manual, what following distance should you keep behind a motorcycle in good conditions?
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A.
One car length per ten miles per hour.
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B.
At least two seconds.
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C.
At least four seconds. Correct
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D.
At least two car lengths behind.
The answer is "At least four seconds."
The manual applies the same 4-second following distance to motorcycles that it uses for any other vehicle, and asks you to increase it when road or weather conditions are bad. Test-takers who pick two seconds are recalling the older driver's-ed passenger-car minimum and assuming a smaller, lighter vehicle needs less cushion, when the manual actually holds motorcycles to the same four-second count as any other vehicle.
The traps in the wrong answers
A. One car length per ten miles per hour.
The manual does not use a car-length-per-speed formula for motorcycles; it counts following distance in seconds. This answer substitutes the older one-car-length-per-10-mph highway rule of thumb for the four-second time count the manual applies to motorcycles.
B. At least two seconds.
Two seconds is well short of the 4-second count the manual sets for motorcycles and mopeds. This answer recalls the two-second minimum many drivers learned in driver's ed for passenger cars and assumes a smaller, lighter vehicle needs no more cushion than that.
D. At least two car lengths behind.
The manual counts following distance in seconds, not in a fixed number of car lengths. This answer falls back on a parking-lot spacing rule that stays fixed regardless of speed, when the manual uses a time-based cushion that scales up automatically at highway speed.
This question tests your knowledge of Sharing the Road in Pennsylvania. Source: Pennsylvania Driver Manual, "Sharing the Road With Pedestrians, Bicyclists, and Motorcyclists and Moped Drivers - Motorcyclists and Moped Drivers," p.56..
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