No.
Because: 1- Among pedestrians there will always be children, elderly, handicapped… that should not have to share space with dangerous vehicles. And 2- Among scooter drivers there will always be idiots riding too fast.
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Even with space markings they try to cram two scooters into one spot.
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In the video above posted by membrillo there is scooter parking in the mall at 20nt/hr, practically empty and a large completely free parking lot a minutes walk away which was about 1% full.
Another video shows both parking areas. Parking lot has 1200 parking spots…free. Also shows the near empty 20ntd parking area too.
First lady, as her scooter is being towed, is like you can’t do this, you have to tell us we can’t park here! The guy starts pointing at what I presume to be a sign that probably obviously says no parking. A younger girl is interviewed and says she just followed everyone else parking. Police issued 232 tickets for scooters, 9 tickets for cars.
Amazing what a simple bit of enforcement can do. Bunch of scooters towed and people ticketed.
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Streets operate at a macro-level. Before these can be made orderly locals have to learn a new sensibility of order and layout. Take the two videos for example: the screen is cluttered and peppered with text on all sides, up and down. At a micro level the perception of order, flow and layout does not seem appreciated. of course I have no research to back this up except anecdotes from working on client stuff. 
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‘That girl jumped of the roof so I jumped too’ … splash!
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Clutter layout is a must in Taiwan.
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I remember a client (large, state-owned) insisting on translated text keeping paragraphing unity as the chinese. Translated text (supposed to be instructions) went along the lines of:
- Park your scooters within the yellow box. Pay on the first floor, and if you do not have change you have to get it from the fifth floor. Vehicles exceeding allocated time will be impounded, and can be collected after paying the outstanding fee by 3PM everyday. Make sure you have sufficient change. Ensure your scooter is parked in reverse.
This is one paragraph containing wildly different ideas that should not be in the same conceptual space. At a minimum they need to start teaching their own language differently.
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I drive conservatively, but today there was a pedestrian at night wearing dark clothes that decided to instantly SPRINT out of no where to cross the crosswalk as I was turning, stopped in front of me and pointed at the crossing light. When I was turning, the furthest pedestrian was 10 seconds out - nothing to yield to.
In order for folks to yield, pedestrians must be predictable. Sometimes pedestrians act like bugged NPCs in a video game, not even facing the road, then suddenly 90 degree teleport turn without warning as I’m turning. Ugh.
I’m not defending douchebag drivers, but there are definitely dbag pedestrians, too, they may decide to just suddenly triple their speed mid turn. That’s like if the light turned green, I instantly go from 0 to 60 nascar style the moment it turned.
What’s important for both sides is to be predictable when it comes to traffic safety.
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Yeah. The other day i was going down a road with two lanes in each direction. There was a woman standing on my side, at the edge of the first lane, not quite into the second. I’m in the second lane, close to the middle of the road. Her back was to the middle of the road, I saw her but since she wasn’t moving or even looking like she was going to move I kept going and scanning for other threats. Suddenly, just before I pass her, she does a 180 and starts across the street. If I’d been going a bit slower, I probably would have hit her.
Nowhere near a crosswalk, btw.
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Even my Taiwanese wife agrees that Taiwanese folks suffer from a serious case of tunnelvision; only aware of what’s 60 degrees down at the ground in front of them. Some kind of illusionary concept that if they don’t look, the world is theirs.
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More is better. Have you ever noticed that many news clips and advertisements have the voices sped up? Well, that way you can say more in less time and save money! Brilliant!
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There’s a general lack of traffic safety knowledge among Taiwanese. They tend to behave poorly no matter if they are drivers, bikers, pedestrians or urban planners.
I know it sounds like victim blaming, but staring at the countdown to full gas as soon as it’s green without even looking is stupid. And you can see the same behaviour in pedestrians and probably drivers too (who knows what’s going on behind the black windows). The pole position syndrome, I call it.
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I lean more towards behave poorly than lack of knowledge, but yeah, general lack of safety. The driver of the truck probably knew he should have stopped at the light, and probably knew he should pay enough attention to see it change, and probably knew he should be driving slow enough to stop in time. He probably just didn’t care about these things
The police know people drive like this, I have seen them see it and do nothing. I know the general population who can vote knows this dangerous and illegal driving is ignored by the police. There is something to be said for behavior that is patiently accepting of the faults of other people, and I have read that the roads are better than they used to be
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Oh yes…the pole position. Yesterday, had the guy who swerved in front of me then in front of the car in the left lane so he could ensure his position in the front. But who knew he would have a competitor who simply passed the four cars in front of him using the motorcycle lane to get to the front? Well, they both burned off right before the light changed.
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This has to be a joke.
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Do these people know what a sidewalk looks like?
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Isn’t that the loading/unloading zone? If there are businesses on the ground floor, they can expand out there. Also, we can’t see if there are lines for scooter parking, but looks like a good spot to park
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Further reason we shouldn’t have the turning while crossing rule. Drivers can’t be responsible and neither can pedestrians.
It just creates a mess. Pedestrians yield to cars even though they have right of way, or people sprinting across the street. All kinds of madness’s. Thanks I hate it.
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