Its not.
The root of 99% of problems here are this. If that were fixed we would only have typhoons, earthquakes and landslides to worry bout.
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For what it’s worth, I think a lot of Taiwanese were told not so long ago that they literally don’t need to do that.
I failed my first attempt at the scooter road test due to forgetting to turn my head before proceeding through a crossing, and a bunch of people told me that wasn’t even on the test 5 years ago.
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I remember being told years ago here that I should not turn my head to look (and definitely not shoulder check!), because who knows what could happen in that half-second I looked away from the road in front of me. I heard that often enough that it could well have been the way people were taught to drive 15-20 years ago.
Based on the roads here, I do see a smidgen of logic in the argument: yes, all hell can break loose on the road in front of you in half a second. But to not look into a turn … seems insane.
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When my wife was driving in the US, she hadn’t heard of looking over your shoulder to check your blind spot before changing lanes. I don’t know why that was missing from Taiwanese driver education…
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You guys should rename this topic the TVBS thread.
But seriously. Is this thread even needed? Automobiles crash all the time. It’s misleading to imply that Taiwan is any special in that regard.
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In Taiwan it happens with particular frequency, especially on 2 wheels.
To be fair, the accidents I see in Taiwan are rarely deadly. In the states on the other hand, seems to be deadlier even if it doesn’t happen as often. Might have to do with higher speeds? And in the states when there is an accident the entire road is blocked and the police will make zero attempt to keep traffic flowing. In Taiwan they will.
do you have proof of that?
What were your findings?
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You honestly dont notice any difference in logic and skill behind the wheel between here and Canada? Accidents are everywhere, but we are here and here is incredibly bad based on preventable (egnot looking) circumstances.
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In the west it’s often due to higher speeds, but here because road and traffic condition don’t allow for high speeds so the damage is limited. If road or traffic allowed for 85 mph driving the number of death will be much higher because people still don’t look.
I have to wonder what are the accident rates in china… Where there has to be more space for fast driving.
That’s not what i said.
I dont know, i find taiwan very “special” in that regard. more specifically in how they crash, less so that they crash.
Last week I saw a woman make a U-turn around a divider and run right into the divider. No other cars required. My friend put a cargo box on top of his car for camping. The next week his wife sheared it off going into underground parking.
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Well. Yes. Scooters are different than cars. Is different really all that special? What are the numbers really?
Are we being biased because we’re outsiders in a new country that does things differently?
In Ontario, for those who don’t know, Ontario loves to spread propaganda that our roads are the ‘safest’ in North America and politicians have their heads so far up their asses that the only thing they know how to do as lawmakers is punish people as they have no self awareness to actually improve conditions.
We need to remember our biases as well.
This thread topic is a loaded topic.
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You are right, everyone is bias and w e are looking in from a different realm. But the way taiwanese react to their surroundings is still actually quite special, regardless if foreigners talk about it or not. And many aspects are pretty dangerous. Just cause we are outsiders doesnt mean we should also shut up about something that is cultural (environmentally caused), fixable and needlessly hurts thousands of people.
I am bias. Bias towards not accepting sellfish activity being excusable for harming others. here or abroad. Here, the activity is only thinking of ones self while steaming ahead and not payin attention. Traffic is but only one example of where this behaviour is prevalent. It is a legitimately worrisome trend that would be good to be nipped in the butt
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Can anyone find crash statistics for Taiwan based on number of kilometres driven.
Deaths per thousand are good for comparison but to truly understand the problem we need to look at the number of deaths and injuries compared to kilometres driven. Being a small island the numbers should be higher. Ie shorter distances travelled say compared to Australia or the USA. Deaths per 100,000 people is comparable.
I heard India is quite bad, even though their car ownership per capita is much lower than say the US.
But I find Taiwanese to have very little awareness, especially on scooters. My neighbor often talks about how scooter drivers often don’t care what goes on around them so they get crushed by trucks. Often it’s not the truck driver’s fault, but rather scooter drivers not being aware of blindspots and stuff.
But I hear here they often assume bigger vehicles are always at fault.
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