Traffic in places you've been to - drivers' culture, roads, pedestrians, infrastructures, etc.

[GTV0819]

*If this kind of thread is not allowed, please remove it, moderators. Thanks.

I'm very sure that there's not a single thread here yet that talks about how traffic is in places that you have been, like some areas in your own country or in abroad. Aside from traffic also comes the pedestrians, road conditions, infrastructures, drivers' behavior, modes of transportation and other things that may affect or influence and contribute to a good/bad flow of traffic in those particular places.

Let me start.

Here in the Philippines, a lot of people here buy cars to go to work or in places they would want to go, that is because public transportation here is such a hassle. There are jeepneys, trikes, buses, taxis, express vans and pedicabs that could take you in places not in downtown, meaning in a somewhat isolated area that's not around major streets or highways but you have to make several transfers before you reach your destination though it largely depends on your route and where you currently are since each of them have a few km routine points. And on the way, you'll encounter some bad traffic everyday, which is tiresome if you're a commuter here. The said average time for a person from home to arrive at work is 45 minutes. Traffic is at its peak during rush hours, weekends and long holidays, even in out of town.

There is also metro line here but only in Metro Manila and only has three lines (OMG). The result; the city mainly relies on its land transport and that greatly contributes to traffic we have here right now. Many drivers here can be reckless, especially the smoking jeepneys, trucks and buses then a lot of scooters zip in and out of their lanes to weave their way through traffic, which is a common sight for the motorists. Tricycles also drive on major roads which shouldn't be the case at all. They all change lanes suddenly and with impunity. Most of them don't even follow road signs or rules that don't tolerate them of doing something so they'll be stubborn that they'd still do it, because not all enforcers will flag them down for their violations, which is very frustrating.

When starting to go green in stoplight from standstill, there's some hesitation before the momentum gets going again. Traffic and drivers' behaviors are the two main reasons why there's a lot of frustration, accidents and road rages on the roads. No wonder many vehicles get a lot of dents and become dirty, as well as they tend to break down, too, immediately, showing how many careless drivers are here.

There are lots of cars who are owned by people that don't have any garage in their houses because their cars are just parked on the streets! And then many street vendors and other obstacles like basketball stands, etc. occupy spaces there so often, it's hard to pass by those streets if you're using a large vehicle. The roads here have so many road imperfections, potholes and even littered with trash so it's filthy for many. It causes floods during typhoons, severe thunderstorms or heavy rain falls. That's why many private owned vehicles here are dominated by SUVs or diesel powered vehicles, since they are high and rugged enough to wade through these floods and the fact that crude oil is cheaper than petrol locally.

For pedestrians, many of them don't hurry or don't even look when they cross the roads full of cars and there's so many overpasses/bridges here than underpasses so it's also a hassle to cross wide roads, especially for old folks. Pedestrian lanes do exist on major roads but on a red light, many drivers occupy the said lane so people still have to adjusts while crossing.

Road and infrastructure works also cause traffic here because they don't get finished immediately. As a result, traffic gets much worse since road closures will be implemented and heavy equipment will occupy these roads at the same time.

Then the list goes on! Wherever you go here, you'll encounter traffic, road imperfections, crappy drivers and pedestrians, that's for sure, even outside the capital and on weekends. And it's the most irritating part of living here though we have no choice but to bear it.

This is what I can share about it and I'm sure many will agree with this one if they have been to this country.

Care to share yours? Does it have good/bad traffic in those areas? It would be intriguing to know and it will help others know how it would be there as well.

 

[W3H5]

Between China and Thailand I could write a book on traffic. I’ll start later though because it’s lunch time now.

 

[GTV0819]

Between China and Thailand I could write a book on traffic. I’ll start later though because it’s lunch time now.

Go on, bud. Could be shorter than what I did.

 

[eran0004]

Macedonia
Some of the best roads I have ever seen. Smoothly flowing through the scenic landscape. Great mountain roads as well! The roads are mostly of good standard, one exception was a motorway where the outer lane was heavily worn, presumably due to heavy trucks using that lane. Toll booths are frequent on the motorways, I think it was 80 MKD (roughly €1.3) to pass through them. The cars were a highly diverse mix between old and new, cheap and luxurious. Lots of French and Italian cars (paradise for me as a Peugeot 106 fan). Traffic seemed to be pretty safe, although I saw one or two dangerous overtakes on the mountain roads. The police was often directing traffic in the more busy intersections.

 

[GTV0819]

Hong Kong

I went to this place last year about two times with my family. It was our very first time to go abroad and also the first time to ride a jetliner. When we arrived there, we have seen so many things that aren't in our country yet, like a subway that serves the airport, cable cars, double deck buses and many more. I was totally surprised. Cars there are much more luxurious when compared to our homeland and they use flat-nosed vans for deliveries. Buses there have numbers that are digitally shown in their windscreens and it also indicates their routes. They don't just stop anytime, anywhere, which is a good thing. They always stop at designated bus stops. Taxis also do the same and they're also color-coded. The roads there are also much cleaner, much brighter, no road imperfections and they are wide. There's not much obstacles on the streets so there's no congestion at all. The vehicles also appear to be in good shape and have good emissions.

However, despite these good things that can be seen there, drivers in Hong Kong are generally reckless, too. They also drive too fast and change lanes as if they're racing with someone.

While on our way to the hotel we booked there, we're in a tour bus and the driver was calm but on a toll booth at some point of the trip, somebody just suddenly jaywalked there and he became furious. He yelled and cursed that person for doing his thing.

Then a bus ride downhill from Victoria Peak was scary because the driver accelerates so fast in a tight road with many curves and when there's someone who'll go down at some bus stop there or there's someone who'll ride, man he slams the brake so freaking hard suddenly. After our ride and we got downhill, I even became dizzy.

Another moment is while we're crossing a small street, there's this closed van who turned fast and started accelerating towards our direction after he just came in from another road. I thought this fool was gonna bump us lol. I cursed him through my mind. These drivers don't seem to give a care about pedestrians at all.

No wonder there's some traffic that occurs in Hong Kong because of accidents. It's because the way they drive is like they think they own the roads and they're hot behind the wheel but so far, I had a good impression about it, especially when we saw the trains and subway lines. During our time there, I never saw a traffic that stood standstill for long time. It was moving.

We definitely enjoyed our time there. Definitely better than the situation in our country. Drivers could also have been more educated, though because they don't seem to be disciplined that much.

 

[Joey D]

Utah

For the most part, drivers here are horrendous. Almost everyone runs red lights and those who don't almost always seem to be at risk of getting rear-ended. I was taught to slow down and stop at yellow lights so the idea of running a red is just something I can't fathom.

My favorite move though is something that's eloquently called the "Mormon Swing". Basically, you're in the left lane and then decide you want to turn right. So you cut across several lanes of traffic to make your right turn from the left lane. It's mindbogglingly awful. The same thing happens for people turning left too, they'll just do it from the right lane.

What makes that even more dangerous is that nearly all of our roads are at least four lanes (two in each direction) or more. When the Mormon pioneers setup SLC, they wanted to make it so you could turn a horse and buggy around on any street. It's not because it really makes traffic flow pretty well, but with people being unaware it also makes it a bit of a hazard.

Another thing I can't grasp is the concept of a U-turn at a traffic light (or as locals call them "flipping a 🤬)". In Michigan, U-turns were illegal everywhere so I never really learned how to do them. Even now I'll go out of my way so I don't have to do one.

Finally, most of Utah is a dead and barren wasteland. This means no settlements and the road is mostly just people traveling to civilization or down to Vegas. Because of this, you can set your cruise control at 100 mph and cruise.

Coming out of Grand Junction, Colorado into Green River, Utah, I-70 is essentially an Autobahn. I didn't see one speed limit sign and had people passing me like I was standing still even though I was going along at a good clip. I've been told that until recently the speed limit there was "reasonable and prudent" and that even now if a cop happens to be there they won't even look at you unless you're going over 110.

As for pedestrians, they're just as stupid here as everywhere else. I'm just glad my car automatically stops because people just love to walk out between two parallel parked vans at the last moment when I can't see them.

Also, people on bicycles are the worst kinds of people. They'll either blow red lights and stop signs without looking, or they will pick and choose when to ride on the road or sidewalk. In the canyons, they also just love to stop in the middle of the road on a blind corner to adjust their tight pants or do whatever it is bikers do.

Michigan

Michigan drivers are, for the most part, a bit off kilter. The speed limit on any given road is at least 10mph over what's posted and on the freeway (which is 70 or 75) it's not uncommon for the flow of traffic to be up around 100 mph. If you add in snow, the speed goes down slightly but not that much.

Also speaking of snow, Michigan is the only place I've ever been where people will do 70 mph, bumper-to-bumper, while weaving all over the place, in a blizzard. You can always tell the new drivers and out of towers too since they are typically in a ditch.

The speed is a bit amazing in Michigan too since the roads are absolute crap. Potholes, cracks, and just horrid maintenance plague the state. I damaged more stuff on vehicles there that I can count.

Another thing about Michigan roads that I mentioned above is that U-turns are illegal. Instead, we had things called "Michigan Lefts". This is where you go through a traffic light on a divided road and then do a U-turn at a designated place just past the light. I'm not sure how well it worked, but I rather liked the concept.

Thankfully, pedestrians are at a minimum in Michigan since you have to have a car. There's not really any public transportation to speak of thanks to the auto industry.

 

[MedigoFlame]

Can say quite a few of @Joey D's points are pretty similar to Maine.

It feels like 5 or so years ago, traffic wasn't as bad as it is today. A lot of towns have grown and commercialized a lot of once small towns. Even today, my town is getting more apartments and big box stores. However...the roads haven't grown at all. The infrastructure's terrible and despite the growth in population, they've been shutting down more roads and making intersections smaller. Near my work, there was an extremely busy intersection that was once two lanes, which was changed to three with a HUGE emergency shoulder that people would use as a lane anyways, then finally was changed to four lanes, but not long after that, they made the lanes smaller to fit a median that only invited more panhandlers. Meanwhile in my hometown, they closed off a perfectly function road to make a new one, but added more lights in a short distance, causing people to ALWAYS block the middle of the intersection during rush hour. Of course, the state of the roads have barely improved and every time there's work done, the road ends up worse than what it was.

As with the increasing traffic, I can't help but feel like the stereotype of Massachusetts drivers being overly aggressive and impatient has spread into Maine. I can't go anywhere without being expected to do 10-15mph over the speed limit in town and 20-30mph over the limit on the highway....

People seem to hate you for simply putting your signal on ahead of your turn and will either drive into the oncoming lane to pass you before you even make your turn, or ride your bumper until you're out of their way. I honestly speed up to pull away from people who are behind me so I can give myself more space to turn.

@Joey D's "Mormon Swing" is also a very common thing here with everyone riding the farthest lane possible from their turn just to pass traffic, even if it's one car... Can't count how many times people will attempt to pass one car going at a reasonable speed just so they don't have to be "stuck" behind people.

Most of the highways in my area are just two lanes and it's absolutely infuriating with all the left lane hogs and semi-trucks passing each other by 1MPH. Also, I'm sure it's a thing across the country, but no one ever yields at on-ramps and expects you to move for them.

Maine wasn't this bad when I first got my license... I could actually go out and enjoy a drive, but now it's always stressful.

 

[GTV0819]

Osaka, Japan

There's one word I could use to describe this place; Marvelous! It may not be a capital but this city is much more developed than any of the cities that currently exists in our homeland.

Kei-cars are a common sight in Japan. It may be like that because of the fact that they are small enough to fit in some tight streets and are fuel efficient as well. They even have many hilarious advertisements about them in TV commercials. The good thing in most of their small streets is that they aren't crowded with stupid obstacles and by that, I guess you already know what I mean.

Whenever you'd see a vehicle there, whether it's an old model or a new one, even if it's a truck or bus, you'll notice how much they are in good shape, how clean they are and that even their engines won't be seen billowing out some smoke. Public buses there have hydraulic suspensions and operate whenever they load/offload passengers on bus stops. Drivers turn off the engines during red light to conserve energy and avoid pollution. Meanwhile, taxis are similar to the ones in Hong Kong; they're of the same model more or less and color-coded as well.

You'll also notice some cars there exists as left-hand drive cars! The reason why some of them are LHD is because the car may be an american; I could recall seeing a Silverado there but there's a LHD Mercedes that I saw there as well. Their government allows that and it's also said that the locals consider a LHD car prestigious if they see it running in their roads. A carriage pulled by a man is also common in some tourist spots and you'll be amazed once you see them.

Traffic there is always flowing and becomes almost non-existant during nighttime because the metro line is so freaking good. Go somewhere there by a car in late night and you may find yourself all alone on the road. There aren't that much scooters nor motorcycles running on the roads there so you wouldn't worry at all about those. Drivers don't also just load/unload passengers suddenly anytime and don't park anywhere. They know their proper places in which they'll do that.

The only problem you may encounter is while you're walking on the streets. You'll often see people riding bicycles and just passing you by. They may suddenly dart in behind your direction or out of nowhere and if you're caught unaware, you might be involved in an accident with them. Aside from that though, you shouldn't worry walking those streets at all, even if late in the night. Vending machines are all over in the place if you become thirsty.

Drivers are so much cultured in Japan and have good discipline. They give way to pedestrians. That's what's most lovable about them. If you need help, they will also try to aid you as much as they can, even if they have difficulty understanding you. They're also kind, grateful and regretful, too, if they did something wrong. That's why it's always nice to get back in this lovely place. It has a good smell, good aura and good environment on it.

 

[Obelisk]

As with the increasing traffic, I can't help but feel like the stereotype of Massachusetts drivers being overly aggressive and impatient

I actually think MA aggression has toned down a bit. Your story sounds like something in the inner city.

 

[Liquid]

Some of the more colourful places I've been:

Athens

Traffic lights are as optional as seatbelts and signalling. Crashes are a common occurrance. I used to see them on a regular basis on my walk to work.

Some practicing Orthodox drivers will often do the four-tap sign of the cross thing whilst passing a church and this includes taking their eyes off the road to look at the church whilst they're doing it. I found this monumentally frightening.

Gambia

Try not to hit any wild animals which happen to be wandering over the road which has intruded and divided their open savannah. Drivers will overtake on single carriageway roads irrespective of whether there is an oncoming vehicle or not.

If you stand out, i.e. if you're not black, your vehicle will be swamped if you are stationary in a town.

 

[PzR Slim]

I used to live in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia when I was younger as my dad worked over there. I could write several books on some of the things that happened on the roads. It was absolute madness and carnage!

 

[MedigoFlame]

I actually think MA aggression has toned down a bit. Your story sounds like something in the inner city.

I bet they all moved to Maine... Seriously this week alone I've dealt with some crazy 🤬 drivers. This state is making me want to drive less.