Alberta Transport Banning RHD - Take the survey

[Mista Bob]

No one seemed to have any issue with RHD vehicles when it was basically only rare old European cars.
But now that there are pesky "boy racer" cars all of a sudden people decide they must be unsafe and banned.

Aren't street sweepers and mail delivery trucks RHD as well? Ban them!!!

[thetransporter]

what prince Philip came to visit or mailworkers?
will they ban garbage truck too?
what will happen to peters drive in "right hand" lane?

[Strider]

Originally posted by ercchry
dont make me do an autoCAD drawing... i hate autoCAD, but i will...

damn it...

this is 12' lanes, with s13 spec cars, because... jdm yo

tell me... why is this so unsafe?

Sure, this may apply if you stay parked behind the intersection waiting to turn left on a green light. Your drawing implies that on a road with a 60km/h speed limit, the largest window of time anybody ever has to execute a safe left turn is 2 seconds. 1.5 seconds in an RHD.

But most people creep forward into the intersection, even crossing the center line with a part of their car - which would be much more advantageous to the LHD driver. Of course you wouldn't draw a more realistic situation like that, because it would help your argument.

Originally posted by xnvy
If you can run on the "wrong" side of the car in those countries (the biggest car markets in the world) and not die, I don't see why it would be a problem here.

I don't really have much of an opinion on either side of the subject, but I just can't let shitty arguments like this slide.

If you're gonna make claims like that, then you'd better have some collision / fatality stats to back it up.

Furthermore, have you ever driven in China or India? It's mass chaos, but the reason it "works" is because nobody is ever going more than 25-30km/h in urban centres.

Originally posted by Mista Bob
Aren't street sweepers and mail delivery trucks RHD as well? Ban them!!!

Another shitty argument. But since more than one person has mentioned it, I'll address it.

The ratio of post trucks to civilian vehicles is probably on the order of 1/10,000. When is the last time you were behind one taking a left turn, much less see one passing another vehicle on a two lane highway?

[ercchry]

Originally posted by Strider


Sure, this may apply if you stay parked behind the intersection waiting to turn left on a green light. But most people creep forward into the intersection, even crossing the center line with the left side of their car. Of course you wouldn't illustrate that with your AutoCAD skills, because it wouldn't help to prove your point.

Or perhaps it wasn't shown since it was crudely drawn up only minutes before i left the office, but the point was simple... the more space between you and the object, the better angle of view... here to for drive with that in mind and you are not running the risk of collision in said cars. Its fairly straightforward that even a teenager could do it...

[Strider]

Originally posted by ercchry


Or perhaps it wasn't shown since it was crudely drawn up only minutes before i left the office, but the point was simple... the more space between you and the object, the better angle of view... here to for drive with that in mind and you are not running the risk of collision in said cars. Its fairly straightforward that even a teenager could do it...

And since cars move into the intersection on the green, they get closer to each other and the disadvantage for the RHD driver gets even worse.

At least we agree on that?

[Strider]

Originally posted by ExtremeSi
If I'm turning left at a light and can't see if it's clear or not, I just don't go. Simple. And I can count the number of times that has happened on one hand. Day to day driving has not been an issue at all.

Funny how we can all sit around here bitching about the extra 3 seconds it takes for a car without winter tires to clear an intersection, but it's okay for an RHD to block a left turn for an entire cycle because you can count on one hand how many occasions that happened. Now if we don't restrict the number of RHD vehicles, then let's say 20,000 RHD drivers counting on one hand... That will start to affect the efficiency of our road networks - something I'm sure all enthusiasts are passionate about.

[A790]

I owned a RHD Silvia for over a year without issue. It honestly didn't take long to learn to lean over into the "passenger" seat to gain better perspective of oncoming traffic.

Either way, I don't see enough data that suggests they are as "extremely unsafe" as many of you are suggesting. I think we'd be in a better position making decisions based on reason and logic as opposed to using emotional appeals and judgements. Env, I'm looking at you bro.

Let's conduct some studies and see what the data winds up being. Let's use an impartial third party so there is no vested interest or bias. That's where this should be going.

If the data comes back and overwhelmingly supports the notion that RHD vehicles are unsafe, then "too bad so sad", let's get rid of 'em. However, I don't believe that will be the case. There absolutely differences between RHD and LHD vehicles, but in terms of safety, I doubt it's as substantial as the portrait you're trying to paint is.

I will never own or drive one again, but just because I don't like them doesn't mean that I should take away choice from those that do.

[ercchry]

Originally posted by Strider


And since cars move into the intersection on the green, they get closer to each other and the disadvantage for the RHD driver gets even worse.

At least we agree on that?

Yeah, but the same thing can be said for lhd, thats why its important in a rhd to hang back... hang back to pass or turn and you are golden. i no longer own a rhd nor plan on owning one any time soon, but have had 3 and drove them regularly for a solid 4 years and as long as you do that its all good

[Special_K@85]

Originally posted by Env-Consultant


Haha that's ridiculous. I have trouble seeing across traffic in my lifted truck and my car here - if I was in the passenger seat I'd see piss all - thus wasting the time of everyone behind me, but why would I care? I got a cheap vehicle.

Why are the vehicles sitting at the stop line on a green light in the sketch too? Try turning south on 45th from 17th ave with another vehicle in the eastbound turn lane - you can't see at all, even in a LHD. RHD causes that situation at every single intersection. Just stupid.

Ok wait, you say you have a hard time seeing across traffic turning left as is? Sounds like we should be arguing to get people retested every 10 years for driver ability and eye sight. Again showing it has everything to do with the driver. Just because you're looking through your tinted view of the situation based on your lack of ability doesn't mean everyone else is at your ability. Turning left is stupid easy, you just have to be patient sometimes.

I cross a suicidal 2 lanes of solid traffic every morning trying to merge onto mcknight from deerfoot and make the far left lane to turn left onto aviation blvd. I've also done the same thing in my GTR and it was no problem.

I will concede that passing a semi on a highway with a RHD takes more time but by only 5min at the most. I, like most RHD drivers, use the shoulder and slight bends in the road to see the oncoming lane and pass when it's clear. Actually the extra power most RHD have makes the actual passing part faster and thus safer.

[Mista Bob]

Originally posted by Strider

Another shitty argument. But since more than one person has mentioned it, I'll address it.

The ratio of post trucks to civilian vehicles is probably on the order of 1/10,000. When is the last time you were behind one taking a left turn, much less see one passing another vehicle on a two lane highway?

Oh, sorry. I must have missed your well thought out fact based argument, could you point me out to where that is? Because it isn't in this thread.
Also, you ignored the bit I said before that. Guessing you weren't getting your panties in a wad back when RHD cars being imported were only classic European cars?

Funnily enough I see more post trucks and so on than I do Jay Dee Em vehicles.

Originally posted by Strider

But most people creep forward into the intersection, even crossing the center line with a part of their car - which would be much more advantageous to the LHD driver. Of course you wouldn't draw a more realistic situation like that, because it would help your argument.

I wasn't aware there was anything that forced an individual to pull forward into the intersection to turn left.
But of course, you wouldn't look at the reality of the situation because it wouldn't support your argument.

Originally posted by Strider



I don't really have much of an opinion on either side of the subject, but I just can't let shitty arguments like this slide.

Yeah, uh huh sure....

[Strider]

Originally posted by Mista Bob
Oh, sorry. I must have missed your well thought out fact based argument, could you point me out to where that is? Because it isn't in this thread.

Never had one - like I said, I'm not very invested into this issue. But some of the arguments that the proponents of RHD cars are making are just so absurd it actually goes against their case. I'm just pointing that out.

Originally posted by Mista Bob
Also, you ignored the bit I said before that. Guessing you weren't getting your panties in a wad back when RHD cars being imported were only classic European cars?

Funnily enough I see more post trucks and so on than I do Jay Dee Em vehicles.

If you were clever enough, you'd realize it fits under the same umbrella as post trucks. Classic European cars / antiques aren't driven enough to have a meaningful impact on traffic. With JDM cars becoming more popular as daily drivers due to their affordability, there's enough volume of them to have meaningful impact on traffic.

Originally posted by Mista Bob
I wasn't aware there was anything that forced an individual to pull forward into the intersection to turn left.
But of course, you wouldn't look at the reality of the situation because it wouldn't support your argument.

Sure, so you suggest that the further back they are, the better their sightlines. Now you have cars sitting well behind the intersection just so they can somewhat compensate for their impaired sightlines, and the time it takes for them to accelerate and make a safe left turn is even longer. Again impacting the efficiency.

Originally posted by Mista Bob
Yeah, uh huh sure....

Yup. That's about as intelligent of a response as I'd expect.

[JustinL]

Originally posted by Env-Consultant

I have trouble seeing across traffic in my lifted truck

Perhaps banning of lifted trucks would help more then. Lifted trucks endangering people like, you know, my family members in the city.