09-22-2016, 12:04 PM
"I've driven in many places around the world from SE Asia to Europe to South America and the drivers here rank pretty low on basic skills."
Years ago I posted something similar on this forum that the drivers here were some of the worst I had ever encountered. I hadn't moved here yet so didn't understand the reason why. Now that I've been here a few years, I have a theory.
As far as traffic enforcement goes, the police only enforce the speeding laws. There could be somebody driving 25MPH in the left lane on the highway and the cop will go around them instead of pulling them over. Don't use a turn signal? I think they assume the light is out and it will be fixed within the year so they can get a safety sticker, no reason to pull them over. We have these suicide lanes to get onto the highway from the subdivisions and when somebody doesn't use their blinker getting off the highway the person trying to get on has no idea what they are doing. Headlight out? Tail light out? Nobody ever gets pulled over for that because the safety check will take care of it. On the mainland that's how many of the alcohol/drug/impaired driving busts are made. It's "normal" here for 3-4 people to turn left on a red light. In some intersections (Leilani in Hilo for example) it's 5-6 every time. It's not a secret... if they wanted to give 100 tickets a day, there's a place to do it. Instead they pull people over for driving 6 MPH over the speed limit where's safe to do so. As usual, JMHO.
Years ago I posted something similar on this forum that the drivers here were some of the worst I had ever encountered. I hadn't moved here yet so didn't understand the reason why. Now that I've been here a few years, I have a theory.
As far as traffic enforcement goes, the police only enforce the speeding laws. There could be somebody driving 25MPH in the left lane on the highway and the cop will go around them instead of pulling them over. Don't use a turn signal? I think they assume the light is out and it will be fixed within the year so they can get a safety sticker, no reason to pull them over. We have these suicide lanes to get onto the highway from the subdivisions and when somebody doesn't use their blinker getting off the highway the person trying to get on has no idea what they are doing. Headlight out? Tail light out? Nobody ever gets pulled over for that because the safety check will take care of it. On the mainland that's how many of the alcohol/drug/impaired driving busts are made. It's "normal" here for 3-4 people to turn left on a red light. In some intersections (Leilani in Hilo for example) it's 5-6 every time. It's not a secret... if they wanted to give 100 tickets a day, there's a place to do it. Instead they pull people over for driving 6 MPH over the speed limit where's safe to do so. As usual, JMHO.