[OT]:: Traffic Experiences. :: <-- Re: [TECH] Led light too "cold"

> I did the same thing Russell did, except it was in Guangzhou during
> the 1980s.
> That is .... cross a one-way street with thousands of cars, scooters ,
> bikes , etc. parting around us.

Studied disregard is an art form in Chinese driving.
It varies with geography.
But, looking at someone shows you know they are there and begins a
dominance game. Not looking at them at all (apparently) means you
aren't taking any notice of them and will thus proceed as if they
don't exist. When everyone does it it's impressive and, surprisingly
to 'western' brains, seems to work.

I have photos of people on a pedestrian crossing at an intersection
with cars either side which are in both cases travelling on the
"wrong" side of the road past each other and around the pedestrians.
This was by no means uncommon but I didn't get many photos of it
happening. Having vehicles travel for various distances against
traffic flow was common - especially when entering busy traffic from a
hotel etc. Small vehicles (motorcycles, bicycles, 3 wheeled
miscellanea) might travel for indefinite distances near the curb and
against the main flow.

I have seen cars edging onto crossings with numerous people on them,
with the driver vigorously blowing their horn to chase the miscreants
away, even though the road beyond the crossing is blocked enough that
they will not be able to go far at all once they get over the
crossing. (One such incident, which I have on video, was outside the
Shanghai tower, so its not just a small town thing).

I rode around Beijing for 2 days on a bicycle (one handed mostly,
camera in right hand, photos on the fly). You get a very good feel for
the traffic 'laws' very quickly that way :-) - or else.

The use of the horn varies very considerably with area. In eg Qingdao
it announces continually that you are death incarnate and are going to
take every piece of road available and unavailable. In Beijing it was
usually more a loud but almost polite warning that death loomed if you
chose to turn in an unwise direction and that you really really
shouldn't, In Shanghai I can't remember an overall character but sat
on a bus as a (lady) bus driver using force of will and sheer
continual brain shattering acoustic power drove, over several minutes,
in great fury, a small streetful of cars backwards some tens of metres
so that the bus could make it's presumably rightful way up a street
against their prior flow. In Guilin our driver used the horn
continually but in short polite almost apologetic bursts to warn, very
reasonably, every pedestrian cyclist, trishaw driver, dog, goat,
chicken, and water buffalo that we were about to enter their environs
and that they should not stray from their path while we passed. None
did. In Qingdao I was involved, as a passenger, in one minor vehicle
accident where I think the other driver ran a very red light, but who
can be sure, and people argued loudly for many minutes over who was in
the right.

All that said, the Chinese traffic system is far more efficient at
handling cars than eg here in New Zealand, or even than in Hong Kong.
I'd estimate that they can almost double road throughput compared to
ours. And the accident rate seems reasonable considering the sheer
volume.

Interestingly, just across the border in Hong Kong (one country, two
systems, they tell you) the traffic, road rules and behaviour are
almost indistinguishable from in NZ. Here, unlike in China proper, you
drive (as in the UK and Singapore and Australia and NZ)(the sun never
sets on the British Empire) on the left, and very largely can expect a
pedestrian crossing or red or green traffic light, stop sign, yellow
lines, or no parking sign to function as the formal rules suggest, do
not meet a stream of traffic driving for variable distances against
the flow on the "other side" of the road, hear horns only seldom, and
see almost zero vehicles with 3 wheels (powered or pedal). Utterly
unlike China proper and even less than NZ HK has very few bicycles and
even has surprisingly few motorcycles. Macau, an hour by Ferry down
the bay, and soon enough to be 40 minutes away by 50 kilometre ocean
bridge (!), once proudly Portugese still redolent with almost as many
signs in that language as HK has in English, and also a two systems
one country enclave, has a traffic system somewhere between HK's and
the mainland's.


=A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 Russell

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