Tips for Yanks
Here are a few helpful hints for any 'Merkins who wish to drive within the
confines of the UK, and not recieve fines.
- We drive on the left side of the road, remember.
- In the UK, a red traffic light means stop, and nothing else. You
are not allowed to go through a red light, or an amber light (although
you won't be fined for the latter). Many traffic lights have cameras to
photograph you if you go through on red.
- Pedestrians get priority, especially if they are on a Zebra Crossing (white
stripes across the road).
- Our cars are predominantly manual transmission ('stick shift'). This is
because we are not as lazy as you lot, we prefer more control, and because we
don't have long, flat, straight roads.
- Owing to the fact that most of our cities are older than 100 years, we
don't have boring grid systems for our roads. Instead, we have an exciting maze
where the roads follow contours, old field boundaries, or the meandering path
taken by a drunk one night in 1734. Make sure you know
exactly where you are going, since this maze is compounded by a network
of one-way restrictions (due to the roads being narrow, as they were planned
that way a couple of hundred years back).
- It is considered Bad Form amongst the Limeys to hit a pedestrian, even when
not on a crossing. Indeed, many law enforcement officers will get very irate
about it -- but luckily, our police are not armed, and so you can feel much
safer over here than you would in the US.
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Tips for Limeys
And now, some helpful hints for people of a UK persuasion who want to drive
in the madhouse they call the USA .
- They drive on the right. Simple one to start with.
- You are allowed to treat a red light as a 'Give Way' ('Yield') sign if you
are turning right! You don't even have to give way to pedestrians! However,
some states don't have this rule, so check first.
- If a bus ahead of you starts flashing amber lights, stop.
Apparently it is illegal to overtake a school bus when it is stationary... this
was only passed on to me when I was in the process of doing precisely this.
- The yanks have a habit of changing the speed limit for any reason at a
moments notice. Through the town, between states, for different times of day
even. Try and keep track of it.
- There is a wonderful invention out there, the 'no-one has priority'
crossroads. Sometimes with a flashing amber light over it. All four roads
reach the crossroads, and it works sort of like a game of chicken.
- All of their cars seem to be automatics, probably due to the amazing level
of laziness out there. Most hire companies won't have a manual car.
- The handbrake tends not to be in the middle, like with our cars. It is on
a lever up under the dashboard, on your left. And it is released by a pedal
where the clutch should be (at least, it was in the Buick I drove). The gear
level may well be on the steering column where the indicator lever should be...
- In many states, the US driving test involves the difficult task of driving
an automatic car around the block without crashing. And nothing else. Seeing
the quality of driving out there, I am amazed that so many of them managed to
pass this test. Assume that they are all maniacs (especially on the freeways
(motorways) and you will (probably) survive.
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