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September 24, 2000

This thought was inspired by my trip to Vancouver this weekend. We rented a car and had to do a lot of driving through the city over the weekend, and my dad peppered the routes with an endless stream of comments about Vancouver roads and drivers.

As sure as there are different accents, expressions, and customs in cities all over the world, there are distinct driving habits as well. No two cities have alike drivers and I'm fairly certain that tourists are the cause of a disproportionate number of accidents just about everywhere.

Quebec drivers have quite a reputation. Just about every stand-up comedy routine I've seen around here has included a piece about driving in Quebec. We're aggressive. We use our horns and middle fingers excessively and our turn signals sparingly. Right turns on red might be illegal but going through the extreme tail-end of a yellow (that is, a red) is commonplace. We don't stop at crosswalks. Pedestrians, jaywalking is the eleventh commandment around here but if the light is green don't assume it's safe to walk.

Despite all that, I'd much rather be driving around here than most other places. It's what I'm used to. I hate cities where people are overly polite and cautious; to me, that's more dangerous than being aggressive. In Vancouver, people waiting to turn left will sit at an intersection until the 22nd century. Furthermore, the city has no expressways, few one-way streets, and left turns are legal just about everywhere but there's no priority lights. Flashing green doesn't even mean priority out there, it means pedestrian-controlled crosswalk. No-one seems to be in any hurry, even the cab drivers. How could they be? Rush hour exists even at ten at night on a Saturday! Furthermore, they believe in stopping at crosswalks and yielding to pedestrians. I mean, can you imagine?

On the opposite end of the spectrum, New York City has quite a reputation for aggressiveness, even over Quebec. Maybe it's because the taxicabs outnumber the cars two to one there. Or maybe it's just the New Yorkers' impatient temperaments. Either way, the sound of horns honking is like a symphony there. One thing New Yorkers do well, though, is walk. They generally don't jaywalk much.

The only place I'd award aggressiveness points to over New York is Israel. A combination of Israeli impatience, heat, and two-way one-lane streets lined with stone walls makes for a heart-stopping driving experience anywhere in the country. They have traffic lights that turn orange on the way to green there, and if you haven't started going on the orange you'll get honked at immediately.

The award for scariest place to drive has got to go to Florida, though. In all those other places, people generally know what they're doing. Not so in Florida. The Sunshine State is filled with "headless drivers" - little old ladies who can't see over the steering wheel. They drive at 5 miles per hour and they don't have the slightest clue what they're doing. They're mixed in with gang members who will shoot you for cutting them off. And in Florida, it takes a half-hour by car to get anywhere.

I think people should be required to take two driving tests: one to get an overall license and one to get licensed regionally. New Yorkers shouldn't be allowed to drive in Toronto; they'd mow people down. Drivers from Vancouver should need to take an aggressiveness test before driving in Montreal. Oh, and someone needs to teach them how to swear in French while giving someone the middle finger. And if a Quebecker goes to Texas someone will need to teach them not to use the middle finger but the trigger finger. Beep beep!