Driving in Thailand - perception versus reality...

[wilcopops]

reality

 

 

 

"Reality" - "seeing is believing" - ???  rubbish! If you think this image makes a point about driving in Thailand then you really need to think again. I can get an image like this from every country on the planet.

all this shows is how naive people are about "reality" - especially in the form of imagery and visuals......this is a photo of a truck on its side in a ditch....asny inferences or conclusions are NOT reality, they are purely perception and usually speculation.

 

 

 

Edited March 3, 2014 by wilcopops

[wilcopops]

after the first paragraph i scrolled to the end;

Been driving in Thailand Cars and Motorcycles for almost 30 years,

 

no more dangerous than anywhere else as long as u dive offensiely

and

1, turn signals on don't mean there turning

2, your side can be the other persons side as well going with you or against you

 

 

Then you wouldn't be in a position to comment?

[WarpSpeed]

Individuals driving private vehicles is a phenomenon the human species can't really afford anymore now more of us are going to be able to afford it.

Cultures that make this danger immediately obvious are doing us a favour, encouraging us to seek alternatives, design our lifestyle so cars become unnecessary.

Embrace the future now!

Die first.. Not afraid of others stupidity, we can afford it and it helps weed out the wheat from that chafe, the stupid from the intelligent so it's a necessary evil like disease, illness and predators, which for us is only other humans on a larger scale..

[WarpSpeed]

 

reality

 

 

 

"Reality" - "seeing is believing" - ???  rubbish! If you think this image makes a point about driving in Thailand then you really need to think again. I can get an image like this from every country on the planet.

all this shows is how naive people are about "reality" - especially in the form of imagery and visuals......this is a photo of a truck on its side in a ditch....asny inferences or conclusions are NOT reality, they are purely perception and usually speculation.

 

 

 

 

Looks like he just drove it in too far while trying to give it a wash.. 

[Ace of Pop]

Just pulled over to chat with the Kobelco Man.

[connda]

Its not neccesarily other drivers either, its the damn roads themselves.
You can be hurtling down a carriageway at 70kph and for no apparent reason the road changes from flat blacktop or concrete to an area of pot holes broken road humps bumps etc right out of nowhere, absolutely lethal ! And if that happens after dark, you got no chance because most are not lit either.

 

Yeah, there is a lot to be said about 'knowing your road'.  Once I'm outside of my normal driving area, I go into 'caution mode', cause like you indicated, the roads can go from really good to really bad in a heartbeat. 
 

[connda]

I'm old now...when I was young I enjoyed driving ...now I dread it...

Basicly...Thailand is no problem ...but you have to take "Defensive Driving" to the max.....BE AWARE ...and to always be aware is stressful...but that's what needed in Thailand....

 

All my life I have loved to drive.  But driving in Thailand over the last 7 years has driven a stake through the heart of that love affair.  My impression of driving in Thailand is like driving in a POV (point of view) driving arcade game.  You never know what is going to come at you from what direction, and their is always some craziness happen around you.  Nowadays, I really dislike driving.  There is always someone on the road with you who is willing to kill themselves and you.  It could change, but obviously the PTB including insurance companies don't give a rip.  Think of it this way: what's a life worth?  50K baht.  100K baht.  Peanuts.  Oh, and the idiot that successfully kill your family member on the road shows up at their funeral to do a lot of waiing, like that makes things OK. 
This is a cultural problem.  This is the way things have been and this is the way things will stay until someone with sufficient amounts of power and brains finally comes along and begins to enforce moving violations of the law as is in done in Western countries.  And this entire country would benefit by having an East/West and North/South series of limited access highways.  And then a fleet of Highway Patrol to enforce driving laws (no it's not ok to drive down the center line of two lanes of a highway.  That should get you a pulled over, a field sobriety test, and a hefty enough fine to make sure your pretty unwilling to get stopped again).  Cultural reeducation via law enforcement and fines that are large enough to deter you in the future.  And a point system so that if you think because your HiSo and can afford to break the laws all the time, then the police either jail you or confiscate your vehicle or both.  It is a solvable problem. 
 

Edited July 5, 2014 by connda

[connda]

 

 

I can tell you that most statistics are way under estimated if it is likely to be a negative for the Country.

 

 

And you imagine that somehow Thailand is unique that way? Apart from the U.S. there's not a country on that list whose figures I'd take at face value.

 

We could debate all day where Thailand ranks on the list but the fact is, just like with air safety, people will tend to judge road safety not by looking into the statistics but by subjective and anecdotal experience. So a fresh arrival from the West is likely to think the driving here is homicidal. Someone who has driven here for 20 or 30 years will probably think, well, it's not so bad. And someone who's been here that long AND has driven a lot in other countries in the region might well think, actually it's pretty good. The reality lies somewhere in between all those.
 

 

 

Fair assessment.  Add to that the fact that many of the foreigners in Thailand are older and set in their ways and you'll understand the predominantly negative sentiments on these boards. 
 

 

.....many of the foreigners in Thailand are older and set in their ways..... 

 

Because missionary was the first sex position I experienced means that now I only have sex missionary style because I'm 'set in my ways'?  Really? Jingdee?

Hope the analogy didn't go over your head there junior.  That's actually one of the funnier posts I read today.  no offense even taken.  You young'un crack me up.  That's as good as "grandma and grandad are too old to have sex anymore" - well - until you stumble across their video collection -- Lol> 

 

[connda]

 

 

Driving in thailand is a ckusterfrack.

Roads are terrible. Drivers are generally uneducated and self absorbed. Another huge problem is the lack of a quality extensive rail shipping network in Thailand whose lack forces far too high a number of heavy vehicles onto poorly built and maintained Thai roads.

Main roads in Thailand are good. The duel carriageways between Cities are as good as the UK. Some of the back roads between villages are
not very good.

Thai drivers are not always uneducated however most are rubbish drivers.

 

I'm not sure what is meant by "good" as I suppose it's a relative statement. I have seen no consistently "good" roads here. I have seen portions of roads that are nice (perhaps recently maintenanced) but which suddenly

become potholed,

road lane demarcation lines missing,

absolutely abhorrent signage that is inconsistent, improperly sized (usually too small) or hiding behind trees, shrubs or tall grasses or which is simply entirely absent - like warnings that a 6 lane highway that will shortly become 2 lanes,

road surfaces that completely change in material (asphalt to concrete and visa versa),

lanes which are not wide enough to accommodate the heavy vehicles seen in high number, u-turn points on high speed expressways,

roads in known flood prone areas but which flood entirely too easily during even reasonably light raining.

So, there's a great deal more to safe transport than a couple of kilometers of road being up to minimum standard. Traffic engineering, infrastructure AND the pisspoor drivers here make the entire system a clusterfrak

 

 

I'm still under the impression that in Thailand, road lane demarcation lines are in fact, road lane decoration lines: Pretty to look at, sorta like road graffiti, but otherwise totally devoid of meaning. 

 

[connda]

I've just changed my mind.  I just saw a video on the local Thai News where a California cop beats the living crap out of some homeless, vagrant looking guy walking down a limited access highway in Los Angles.  From the video, it looks like the poor sot was guilty of trying to walk away from a cop, and the cop punches the dude out, and then starts to "Ground and Pound" him like something out of a Mixed Martial Arts match that the referee allows to go on way too long.  It looked like MMA's Dan Henderson taking on the character that Tom Hanks played in "Cast Away" after Tom's character was starved half to death.  The cop just brutalized this dude. 
Now, I clearly remember why I moved to Thailand.  Driving here ain't all that bad after all.  Ignore my previous posts.  Heck, I even like the BiB.  Nice guys.

 

That was easy.  I just needed the correct perspective.  Carry on!

 

Edited July 5, 2014 by connda

[connda]

I've just changed my mind.  I just saw a video on the local Thai News where a California cop beats the living crap out of some homeless, vagrant looking guy walking down a limited access highway in Los Angles.  From the video, it looks like the poor sot was guilty of trying to walk away from a cop, and the cop punches the dude out, and then starts to "Ground and Pound" him like something out of a Mixed Martial Arts match that the referee allows to go on way too long.  It looked like MMA's Dan Henderson taking on the character that Tom Hanks played in "Cast Away" after Tom's character was starved half to death.  The cop just brutalized this dude. 
Now, I clearly remember why I moved to Thailand.  Driving here ain't all that bad after all.  Ignore my previous posts.  Heck, I even like the BiB.  Nice guys.

 

That was easy.  I just needed the correct perspective.  Carry on!

 

 

Wife just informed me.  It was a woman guilty of walking down a limited access highway.  I'm sort of speechless at the moment, although not surprised. 

 

[tifino]

Driving tutorial numba wun:

 

check out bad Russian driving examples on Youtube...

 

... and then double the fright-factor for Thailands' cummin'-at-ya-out-of-nowhere syndrome

[wilcopops]

 

like the op says - there are multiple reasons for the situation on the roads in Thailand and driving ior drivers are simply one factor....the other factors were so neglected in Thailand that even with the best drivers in the world the figures would be sad reading.

[JDGRUEN]

A good friend of mine said to me ... "Just imagine that Thai drivers believe it is a video game and EVERYONE HAS TO WIN!

 

Recently on a border run to Malaysia via a rented car... I was forced off the road to a dead stop by a double decker bus passing a car - the bus headed directly towards me in my lane - the bus driver did not yield for a second -- I was a millimeter from going into a deep ditch... Later on the return trip north of Trang a big pickup truck (apparently pissed that I was in the right inside lane going more than the speed limit) came around me and cut in only a few centimeters off my left fender in front of me ... just to show revenge ...  North of Trang in a construction area - a Huge sand/gravel truck - on coming - forced me to hit a big orange traffic cone ... otherwise the car I was driving would have been sideswiped by the huge truck... ... This is THAILAND FOLKS ... learn to deal with it or DO NOT DRIVE or even ride. 

[Kwasaki]

This indeed is Thailand and they don't drive the same as other countries, well what a surprise but in a lot of ways better than many other countries.

 

As said before many times you have to learn to drive here the same as in other countries, I knew to give way to oncoming buses and large lorries also trucks in some cases very quickly, it's something they do.

[NanLaew]

A good friend of mine said to me ... "Just imagine that Thai drivers believe it is a video game and EVERYONE HAS TO WIN!

 

Recently on a border run to Malaysia via a rented car... I was forced off the road to a dead stop by a double decker bus passing a car - the bus headed directly towards me in my lane - the bus driver did not yield for a second -- I was a millimeter from going into a deep ditch... Later on the return trip north of Trang a big pickup truck (apparently pissed that I was in the right inside lane going more than the speed limit) came around me and cut in only a few centimeters off my left fender in front of me ... just to show revenge ...  North of Trang in a construction area - a Huge sand/gravel truck - on coming - forced me to hit a big orange traffic cone ... otherwise the car I was driving would have been sideswiped by the huge truck... ... This is THAILAND FOLKS ... learn to deal with it or DO NOT DRIVE or even ride. 

 

Like anything else in Thailand where staying in some sort of order or sequence is involved (like queuing at 7-eleven or Post Office), driving here is predicated by the First Law of Thailand. That law is Me First. It's a game to the locals.

 

If you are forced into a ditch by oncoming traffic, you just lost at 'me first'.

 

If you swerved and hit a traffic cone because of oncoming traffic, you just lost again at 'me first'.

 

At any given time (and apart from the ones parked waiting for fares), all minibuses are competing in a nationwide 'me first' contest.

 

The trick is not to play their game at all. I know, I know it's very hard, especially after you have lived here for a while. It's also the reason I have a broken drivers-side wing mirror and a crease on the passenger side front fender... because I lost at 'me first'. However, the busted airdam below the front bumper is because a suicidal old Japanese guy on a Honda Click lost at 'me first'.

 

For the novice driver in Thailand, I would gather that the likelihood of having a prang would be less due to being much more cautious with the caveat of expecting the local driver to behave like they would back in the home country. The novice driver may suddenly find himself unwittingly sucked into a game of 'me first' because he assumed that he had right of way. Never assume. Never!

 

I have done enough miles driving here to know that winning 'me first' isn't really worth much, particularly on the major highways where the consequences of losing can be much more serious. 

 

BTW, the above mentioned dings are the result of low-speed, city-driving fender-benders and momentarily thinking that the other bugger was not really playing to win.

[stevenl]

 

<snip>Think of it this way: what's a life worth?  50K baht.  100K baht.  Peanuts.  Oh, and the idiot that successfully kill your family member on the road shows up at their funeral to do a lot of waiing, like that makes things OK. 

This is a cultural problem.  <snip>

 

And who are you or we to decide that a life is worth more? That waiing does not make things ok?

 

You're right, it is a cultural problem.

 

[thaibeachlovers]

Its not neccesarily other drivers either, its the damn roads themselves.
You can be hurtling down a carriageway at 70kph and for no apparent reason the road changes from flat blacktop or concrete to an area of pot holes broken road humps bumps etc right out of nowhere, absolutely lethal ! And if that happens after dark, you got no chance because most are not lit either.

South of Lamphun going to Lampang there is a U turn in the concrete barrier WITHOUT a dedicated turning lane either side, so if you are in the inside lane, there is traffic in the outside lane and a truck is turning, you'd better not be going too fast or you are dead. Insanity!

[WarpSpeed]

This indeed is Thailand and they don't drive the same as other countries, well what a surprise but in a lot of ways better than many other countries.

 

As said before many times you have to learn to drive here the same as in other countries, I knew to give way to oncoming buses and large lorries also trucks in some cases very quickly, it's something they do.

Yes indeed,on many levels for me, I found it quite liberating, when in Rome and all that....

[WarpSpeed]

................ Rats tush, duplicate post. 

 

Edited July 6, 2014 by WarpSpeed

[wilcopops]

 

Its not neccesarily other drivers either, its the damn roads themselves.
You can be hurtling down a carriageway at 70kph and for no apparent reason the road changes from flat blacktop or concrete to an area of pot holes broken road humps bumps etc right out of nowhere, absolutely lethal ! And if that happens after dark, you got no chance because most are not lit either.

South of Lamphun going to Lampang there is a U turn in the concrete barrier WITHOUT a dedicated turning lane either side, so if you are in the inside lane, there is traffic in the outside lane and a truck is turning, you'd better not be going too fast or you are dead. Insanity!

 

 

 

...and this is an example of which "E"?

[Histavia]

 

quite surprising how many people simply blame others' driving for the state of the roads in Thai, as if it is some genetic predisposition amongst people born here.

until they learn to see the whole picture, I can't see that they will be safe themselves let alone all the others they endanger.