My 2 cents: I drove a lot when I was still in Italy. Drove not only in Italy, but extensively in Europe (thanks EU for freedom of movement), then in Japan (Tokyo all the way to Hyogo prefecture via Kansai, Okinawa prefecture and Hokkaido), Hong Kong (where I was living before) and now Taiwan. I always loved driving because I feel free to explore.
The place I hate the most to drive is HK just because there is literally no space, parking is dear, petrol costs like champagne and, in particular on HK Island, if you take the wrong turn, you are screwed, very difficult to navigate. But, besides crazy moron taxi drivers, driving is relatively safe there, people don’t do too stupid things and very few scooters (all of them foodpanda/deliveroo riders basically).
Taiwan is the super close second. I do really hate driving in Taipei. Scooters are just against self-preservation instincts, they are kamikazes! They don’t care about their lives, they just go, it’s unbelievable. Minitrucks (the blue delivery ones) are just dangerous, they are the owners of the road like bus drivers. Then normal drivers, they have absolutely no clue on safety for themselves and absolute no respect or awareness of others. Parking here is my nightmare, I feel always anxious when I need to park since I fear when I need to get out a car or scooter will be parked in such a way I can’t get out. Many times I had to physically move scooters out of the way.
Europe (at least let’s say Western Europe, Eastern Europe is another world) is safer in the cities, people still do a lot of shitty stuff (like parking in Rome or South of Italy is an experience), but I never felt at risk. Here I do every day I drive.
On Highways, I can agree driving on highways here is generally ok-ish, but the amount of traffic is baffling. When there is traffic, it’s so stuck, but besides that and the usual few morons doing crazy stuff, highways are a nice place to drive on. My favourite roads in Taiwan are still the mountain roads, the smaller the better so less cars and no trucks or scooters. I love them, and all in good shape. Roads in Europe (besides Spain, amazing roads) are crumbling, and tolls and more expensive than here (as it is petrol).
The only solution for scooters here is to increase petrol prices, so they will be incentivised to take public transport. Petrol is way too cheap here, ofc people on scooters will take it over transit when is relatively cheaper, faster and more convenient. But knowing how stingy Taiwanese people can be, even a 5NT/L increase would do something, 10 even better. This increase should be a tax going to finance public transit development or (in cities with developed transit already) subsidise it.
Once scooters are reduced, and also many cars out of the road and converted to transit for metropolitan journeys, Taiwan will become a much better place to drive and live.
