Creative driving
The government of China says there are about 270 road fatalities per day. The WHO says “600 and injury toll at 45,000 every day”. Either way you cut it, that’s a lot. Frankly, for such a large country, it’s almost amazing that more people are not injured. CNN reports these stats and notes some driving behaviour that might lead to dangerous results:
“The high toll is largely a result of negligence, with drivers commonly switching lanes without looking or signalling, ignoring traffic lights, speeding down the wrong side of the road or even throwing their vehicles into reverse when they have missed a highway exit.”
Yes. Yes. Yes. Seen all of the above.
My favourite was driving along an unlit freeway when suddenly a huge barrier of scaffolding wrapped in dark-blue tarps became visible as drivers made u-turns to go back to the last freeway exit. No signs. No markers. The oncoming headlights signalled something was up, but the unmarked barrier prevented anyone from driving off the freeway overpass that hadn’t been completed. The vision of buffalo being herded off a cliff passed briefly through our minds. Luckily for us, there was nothing strange about our situation, the oxygen mask did not descend from our taxi, and our driver deftly u-turned and navigated to the also-unmarked exit, merged, and proceeded to determine where we were to bring us home.
The article adds something I’ve commonly heard: people are buying cars in record numbers, so there is a huge influx of new drivers on the road.
“The country’s booming economy has translated into millions more people buying and driving cars, buses and trucks.
“More than 2 million new cars were sold in 2004, up 15 percent year-on-year, after sales almost doubled in 2003. Sales in 2005 are expected to have grown some 15 to 20 percent.”
Can you, my Canadian friends, imagine the results if millions of Canadian’s just bought their first car this year? There are a lot of contributing factors here, but what I find fascinating is that the rules are often disregarded and yet there remains a pattern and rhythm to the madness. Most drivers I’ve seen are not super-aggressive here — at least not in the way I experienced in Thailand, or even occasionally in Canadian cities like Vancouver and Toronto. In 2000 I saw a teenager killed instantly when he hit a barrier doing 120 kph in a 50 kph zone in a residential area of Langley; most city driving in Tianjin isn’t so fast paced, but the danger comes from behaviours such as that quoted above.
Most experts say the biggest danger for tourists is driving in foreign countries. It takes time to know what is considered normal and safe. My mom would have closed her eyes watching two trucks come at me from either side while biking to a coffee shop this afternoon, but you could tell they were expecting me to pass. It’s just different. Add it to one of the charms of being here, but one can never forget the risks. Forget the risks at your own peril.
UPDATE: I knew it wouldn’t be long until I found evidence of not-so-calm driving.
January 12th, 2006 at 9:59 am
Well Justin, seeing as I am a Creative Driver myself, and being an expert on this situation, Kamloops is quite the opposite. In Kamloops, as you know, people rarely go above 50km, which forces people like myself to change lanes and drive faster. I believe that those who drive slower that most, cause more accidents. That’s my two cents.