12 ms·

Germany is also the most stressful country to drive in I think. You usually have three or four lanes - 80 kmph truck lane, 140 kmph standard lane, 200 kmph I'm

Germany is also the most stressful country to drive in I think. You usually have three or four lanes - 80 kmph truck lane, 140 kmph standard lane, 200 kmph I'm slightly crazy lane and 250 kmph I'm a loonie lane. When you accelerate from the 80kmph to the 140kmph you better have a good engine or you feel stressed like hell slowing everybody else down. And keeping right all the times just creates a lot of unnecessary dynamics in traffic flow. Don't even get me started on congestions when everybody slams their breaks and hit the warning blinkers. German traffic is for macho wannabe race drivers. I rather have US traffic or the traffic in the Netherlands where everybody just set their cruise control and drive casually. In the Netherlands they also have trajectory speed checks, so you cannot speed anywhere from point A to B, since they clock your total time. Works wonders for getting a nice steady flow on the highway. My 5 cents anyway.

Zak 9y ago
My experience driving in Germany is that it's very rare to see four lanes. Three is common enough, but usually around major cities where there's a speed limit. More typical is two. The highways are also regularly torn up and rebuilt to maintain a glass-smooth surface on which one could safely drive 300 km/h, but it's only possible to maintain that for a minute because then you hit another construction zone or traffic jam caused by inadequate capacity. Despite all the construction, the highways rarely get widened, just resurfaced. I don't think the main problem is that speed differentials are causing poor dynamics, but that the roads don't have enough lanes.
- seszett 9y ago
  > I don't think the main problem is that speed differentials are causing poor dynamics, but that the roads don't have enough lanes. I don't know. I drove throughout Germany a few times last year, and I didn't really understand why there were so many jams and general slowdowns. I usually drive in France where the highways are almost exactly the same as Germany (most often two lanes, frequently three, rarely more, usually in very good state) and traffic is rarely as bad. I got stranded a few times in completely still traffic, for tens of minutes, during a normal working day, while this only ever happens at the worst time of holiday traffic in France. Maybe it's because French highways are paying which probably discourages some drivers, but I also noticed a lot of roadworks in Germany (almost as bad as Belgium during the height of roadworks there last year). Enough, as you said, to never be able to maintain a high speed for long, while you barely ever notice those in France. I don't know how French companies do it, but I'm pretty sure it helps with the traffic. Other than the traffic though, driving in Germany was a pleasure. People are aware of their surroundings and don't drive like the road was theirs.
  - smitherfield 9y ago
    Having driven in both countries, I think that has a lot to do with the extremely steep tolls on French highways, and the much higher gas tax. I believe Germany also has a higher rate of car ownership and the average population density is higher.
  - Zak 9y ago
    In 2015, according to estimates by the World Bank, Germany had 234 people per square kilometer. France had 122. And then there are the tolls. I'm pretty sure Germany is trying to use less road for a lot more cars and everything else is secondary with regard to traffic jams.
  - hvidgaard 9y ago
    Germany Autobahn see more use and needs more maintance. Besides more Germans on the road, a lot of trafic pass through German, a lot more than in France. And the fact that the French highways require payment reduce trafic even more. But they are a joy to drive on. Set the CC and just go.
    - usrusr 9y ago
      And the fact that SNCF has dedicated high speed infrastructure for the TGV, whereas DB runs the ICE mostly on mixed use tracks which makes it more challenging to provide fast, predictable service, all while having to compete with faster best-case speeds on the road.
  - ptaipale 9y ago
    The difference really is that many French motorways are toll roads (that péage sign) and have far fewer cars and lorries than the German autobahns. In Germany, the logistics clearly utilizes the autobahns a lot. You see constant lines of heavy vehicles on the rightmost lane, and sometimes your overtaking them is interrupted by one truck passing another one, very very slowly as they both have a speed limiter, just adjusted slightly differently.
- fludlight 9y ago
  > that the roads don't have enough lanes. Almost every freeway around major American cities is 4 lanes and yet traffic persists. Some freeways in LA are 6 lane parking lots.
  - smitherfield 9y ago
    Yes, and Manhattan has hundred-story apartment buildings, yet living there still costs a fortune.
  - catdog 9y ago
    It's pretty well known that simply building more roads does not fix traffic problems, it basically only generates more traffic.
- lloeki 9y ago
  > on which one could safely drive 300 km/h, but it's only possible to maintain that for a minute because then you hit another construction zone or traffic jam caused by inadequate capacity Anecdote: recently went from Offenburg to Stuttgart and back and could drive a pretty much constant 190~240kph all the way (~1h30) except for a couple sections which were not unlimited. Having to slow down to 190kph isn't quite what I'd call a traffic jam. 300kph is just harder because there's not that many vehicles able to go that fast, so you end up catching up with the "slower" (so to speak) ones, and since vehicles are (supposed to) be electronically limited to 250kph, you're bound to meet some anyway.
  - Zak 9y ago
    vehicles are (supposed to) be electronically limited to 250kph It was my impression that vehicles aren't supposed to be able to go faster than the speed rating of their tires. Since 250 km/h is a common speed rating for tires, and higher ratings tend to get expensive fast, German cars are often limited to 250 km/h. No current Porsches (real ones, not the SUVs) are that slow, and the Porsche tire recommendation guide calls for tires rated for 300 km/h, or "over 300 km/h" (the standardized ratings don't go higher) for all models except the Macan SUV with 18" wheels, for which it recommends 270 km/h. http://files2.porsche.com/filestore/download/usa/none/porscheservice-tire-currentsummertires/default/19cea30a-33d9-11e6-9225-0019999cd470/Summer-tire-overview-current-models.pdf http://files2.porsche.com/filestore/download/usa/none/porsch...
    - lloeki 9y ago
      The index rating on a tire basically reflects the speed limit that a tire can sustain for at least (IIRC) 10 mins before giving up and being destroyed, minus one. So a tire that sustained 10 min of U rating (200kph) speed and suffered drastic damage (typically, tire blows and tread band goes off) right after that mark gets a T rating (190kph). This is oversimplified but that's the gist of it. You can thus see why the index of stock tires always vastly overshoot the top speed of a car, e.g my car gets a Y tyre stock even though its top speed is 245kph, and my ex car has a W rating when the top speed is 210kph. It's not a good idea to go anywhere near the limit of your tire speed index, nor to go cheap and skimp on the index when buying a replacement tire. I bet the Macan that gets 18" and the W index is the one with low enough top speeds (below 230kph, that'd be 2.0L four-pot petrol and 3.0L V6 Diesel ones) EDIT: found a reference again WRT index tests > Speed ratings are based on laboratory tests where the tire is pressed against a large diameter metal drum to reflect its appropriate load, and run at ever increasing speeds (in 6.2 mph steps in 10 minute increments) until the tire's required speed has been met. https://www.tirerack.com/tires/tiretech/techpage.jsp?techid=35 https://www.tirerack.com/tires/tiretech/techpage.jsp?techid=...
- usrusr 9y ago
  > I don't think the main problem is that speed differentials are causing poor dynamics, but that the roads don't have enough lanes. Actually the limited number of lanes is what enables us to survive the speed differentials. Fast/[middle/]slow lanes can easily be enumerated without counting, which makes situational awareness so much easier. And you certainly do need a lot of situational awareness. It's a bit like CPU registers vs. an unconstrained stack. I have only ever seen more than three regular lanes in large metropolitan areas where there is hardly any open road between interchanges and where speed limits are a certainty. I don't know if a single piece of four lane unrestricted driving exists in all of Germany, I would not even be entirely surprised if you could not legally build one.
naravara 9y ago
>Germany is also the most stressful country to drive in I think. I'm guessing you've never been to any developing country. India doesn't even respect traffic lights or the concept of "lanes." You have modern cars sharing the roads with literal ox-drawn carriages and they're all splitting lanes with hundreds of little scooters. Hell, even Italy is a complete clusterfuck. If Germany is stressful to drive in for someone I would question if that person is comfortable behind the wheel of a car at all. In fact, I'll say this is one of the big problems with how lax driving standards are in America. There are lots of people who drive everywhere here who do NOT have the skill, attention span, or reflexes to be behind the wheel of a car. It's too economically essential to be a functioning member of society to make the standards any stricter, but they're so lax that we have a glut of terrible drivers. Terrible drivers lead to overly permissive road design (that winds up being unsafe for anyone not in a car like bikers, cyclists or pedestrians) and that just leads to a bad quality of life overall for everyone.
- djsumdog 9y ago
  Last time I was there, Indians referred to western traffic as "Streamlined." I remember Delhi had the words "Relax" printed on all the stop lights, in English. I'm not sure it really helped.
  - seiferteric 9y ago
    Hmm, on a related thought, how could self driving cars ever work there?
    - naravara 9y ago
      They won't. Firstly because the traffic is insane. Secondly because labor rates are so low that rickshaw and taxi drivers are dirt cheap. The productivity function is way skewed towards labor in India to where expensive robots to drive the cars don't make economic sense.
      - xapata 9y ago
captainmuon 9y ago
It's very subjective. I find driving in Germany to be not very stressful, despite the relatively narrow lanes and high speeds. Now, one has to compare similar situations, not a German Autobahn in a Metropolitan region with a empty desert highway... But comparing a busy Autobahn with a busy freeway (say the interstate into Chicago), I found the freeway to be much more stressful. People are passing on both sides! And there is not much speed differential. I can't just fall back to the right if I want to take it slow. There is often no emergency lane. I feel like I'm being pushed along, and if I can't keep up, I will be ran over. In Germany, people can go faster, but it feels very predictable, clockwork-like. Yes, you have occasional idiots speeding with 250 km/h on the left lane that don't slow down and assume you will move out of the way out of self-preservation. But those are outliers, other than that I rarely have complaints. Maybe it is a cliche, but it seems the drivers' education, and the condition of cars and streets, is really good in Germany.
- chrisper 9y ago
  >Maybe it is a cliche, but it seems the drivers' education, and the condition of cars and streets, is really good in Germany. It is not a cliche. I have lived in the US for the past 5 years and lived for 20 years in Germany before that. Germans roads are like 5000x better than US roads (at least here in California). Road paintings here are a joke, especially at night or when it is raining. The only exception is when a road gets painted freshly. Then it is good for like 2 months.
  - derefr 9y ago
    What do the German road engineers do that make road paintings last for more than 2 months?
    - chrisper 9y ago
      I think it's just the overall road maintenance that is better.
    - dsfyu404ed 9y ago
      Not have to deal with salt, snow plows and residual abrasive material.
venture_lol 9y ago
German autobahn is fine driving. You would just have to make sure your car got that extra kick if you want to go to the left. Driving in Italy, Rome esp, is fine too. There is a reason the red light is so big and so much larger than the green light though :)
- hvidgaard 9y ago
  Driving in Italy, and Spain for that matter, is....exciting. Especially the intersection rules in Spain takes some getting used to. Oh there is green, I can go - but why are trafic still going from the other direction? Oh, the light closest to me is red, so I may not drive...
djsumdog 9y ago
Good thing is you never really have to drive if you don't want to. Most small towns are connected by commuter rails, ICE and PostBus (5 euro rides if you book early). Small towns like Jena of only 100k people have full tram and bus networks.
arwhatever 9y ago
I just returned from a 2 week driving trip through Germany and vastly preferred driving there to driving in the U.S. The "always pass on the left and never on the right" seemed like it led to more systematic and predictable behaviors, and also tremendously reduced the competitiveness of the driving experience as compared to the U.S. It might all be cultural differences though. I noticed drivers seemed more attentive and never used their phones (unless completely stopped in traffic jams), whereas here in the U.S. it is extremely common to have drivers piddling in the left lane and absolutely oblivious to the goings on around them. The only stressor I could see from driving on the autobahn was easily overcome - before passing someone on the left, just be sure to check really, really far back towards the horizon to make sure one one is coming.
- azernik 9y ago
  Theoretically "always pass on the left" is a rule in the US too, it's just a rule that is not consistently observed.
  - DigitalJack 9y ago
    That's because too many people drive in the left lane all the time. In my commute, traffic gets inverted where the left lane becomes clogged with people not going fast enough and to get anywhere requires passing on the right. I can appreciate not wanting to go back and forth between say the middle lane and left lane all the time. I just wish people could figure out they are holding up traffic and get out of the way for a minute or two every now and then.
    - hvidgaard 9y ago
      > I can appreciate not wanting to go back and forth between say the middle lane and left lane all the time. That is about as self centered one can be in trafic. In reality, they are endangering themself and everybody else near them.
      - hutzlibu 9y ago
iagooar 9y ago
I agree that driving on a German highway is a stressful experience. Especially since there is not so many highways with more than 2 lanes, occasionally changing to 3 lanes. On a highway with no speed limit and only 2 lanes, the difference between the right lane and the left lane is just so freaking huge, you are stressed out every time you need to pass a truck or slower car, and almost always see your random Ferrari / Maseratti / Porsche approaching at a fraction of second of the time you spend on the left lane. I would advocate for no speed limit on highways with >= 3 lanes, but would put a limit of 140-150 on those with only 2.
- looperhacks 9y ago
  It depends on where you drive. Where I'm from, most highways have 3 lanes.
chrisper 9y ago
I find the US much more stressful to drive in, because you have to constantly assume that people don't use their turn signals when changing lanes randomly. You obviously also have to do these dangerous lange changes because people drive slowly for no reason whatsoever wherever they want (e.g. most left lane). I have noticed that a lot of people change into the middle lane for no reason at all. This results in you having to pass on the right, especially if there is a slow driver on the left lane. So now you have to change 2 lanes to pass 2 cars.... Fact is, if you learn how to drive well and everyone else does as well, then driving is not at all stressful. You can still use your cruise control in Germany, just not on the left lane (if you are going 80 or whatever).
moojah 9y ago
Having grown up in Germany and living in the US, I feel the opposite. The US traffic is far less predictable. In the US, you have to look, left, right, back and ahead when trying to switch lane, as anyone could appear from anywhere. You never know which lane you should stay on to drive "a little faster". Generally, people just don't pay attention. In Germany it is in one direction only. Left to overtake, right to pull back over. In addition you do have to monitor your back mirror more carefully, which people in the US do not seem to do (though they should). In Germany, virtually no one plays with their phones on highways. Also, traffic deaths are more than half in Germany than in the US, despite higher speeds [0]. I feel like traffic rage in the US is much more prevailent, particularly in the east coast. Having said that, Dutch or Danish traffic is far more relaxing. But also much much slower... [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-related_death_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-r...
- WillyOnWheels 9y ago
  US resident here. On the local freeway, when I signal I wish to make a lane change, other drivers often speed up. I really don't get it. What did I do to their family?
  - u801e 9y ago
    The trick is to follow the mirror, signal, maneuver method. In other words, you don't signal until you know you have a gap to change lanes into. If you signal first without checking for a gap first, then you're treating the signal as a way to ask for permission to change lanes. Other drivers may or may not allow you to do so.
hvidgaard 9y ago
Driving on the German Autobahn is not stressful. 3-4 lanes highway are usually around the bigger cities and they have a speedlimit anyway. Because people know cars can fly past them with more than 200 kmh, they also actually stay to the right and use the left lane to pass and not to cruise. All in all it's a pleasant experience and all a driver really needs to wrap his head around is to keep as much track of the traffic behind and as in the front.
CalRobert 9y ago
A differing five cents: Germany is the best country in the world in which to drive. Drivers are trained well. They look before they turn. THEY DON'T USE THE LEFT LANE AS A CRUISING LANE - they move over, pass, and return to the right lane. They use their turn signal. You can go very, very fast in situations where it's warranted. In situations where it's not, people slow down. As someone who walks, rides a bike, and enjoys not being deafened by road noise in towns, this is good. My experience driving has primarily been California, Ireland, and Germany, and Germany has been _far_ superior to the other two.
icc97 9y ago
Personally after living in the Dutch half of Belgium for 7 years, I find Belgian and Dutch (it's possibly Belgian drivers in Dutch cars) drivers to be the worst drivers I have come across, certainly compared to German and British drivers. I've always wanted to take a dash cam and compare the driving styles when driving to the Eurotunnel in the UK and then driving across Belgium. The ring around Antwerp is an absolute mess of people driving in a dangerous manner. Belgian drivers typically will leave no more than a 1 second gap. In the UK this is repeatedly drummed into you that it should be 3 seconds. Also I find Belgian and Dutch drivers react erractically, they will switch lanes erratically and move very close to the car in front before switching lanes often without indicating. Germans and British seem to leave much more room and perform maneouvres in a much more deliberate manner. Certainly with Belgian drivers, this is back up with statistics, their death rates per 100k population are 2x that in the UK and 1.5x Germany [0] [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-related_death_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-r...
- strictfp 9y ago
  I certainly agree about the Belgians ;)
deepakhj 9y ago
Try India. According to the WHO, traffic fatalities is the #4 health problem there.
- strictfp 9y ago
  Wouldn't even go near India ;) It's read on every death cause map I've ever seen, from traffic incidents to presence of diseases to antibiotic resistance.
  - known 9y ago
    If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you --Oscar

Zak 9y ago

My experience driving in Germany is that it's very rare to see four lanes. Three is common enough, but usually around major cities where there's a speed limit. More typical is two. The highways are also regularly torn up and rebuilt to maintain a glass-smooth surface on which one could safely drive 300 km/h, but it's only possible to maintain that for a minute because then you hit another construction zone or traffic jam caused by inadequate capacity. Despite all the construction, the highways rarely get widened, just resurfaced. I don't think the main problem is that speed differentials are causing poor dynamics, but that the roads don't have enough lanes.

seszett 9y ago
> I don't think the main problem is that speed differentials are causing poor dynamics, but that the roads don't have enough lanes. I don't know. I drove throughout Germany a few times last year, and I didn't really understand why there were so many jams and general slowdowns. I usually drive in France where the highways are almost exactly the same as Germany (most often two lanes, frequently three, rarely more, usually in very good state) and traffic is rarely as bad. I got stranded a few times in completely still traffic, for tens of minutes, during a normal working day, while this only ever happens at the worst time of holiday traffic in France. Maybe it's because French highways are paying which probably discourages some drivers, but I also noticed a lot of roadworks in Germany (almost as bad as Belgium during the height of roadworks there last year). Enough, as you said, to never be able to maintain a high speed for long, while you barely ever notice those in France. I don't know how French companies do it, but I'm pretty sure it helps with the traffic. Other than the traffic though, driving in Germany was a pleasure. People are aware of their surroundings and don't drive like the road was theirs.
- smitherfield 9y ago
  Having driven in both countries, I think that has a lot to do with the extremely steep tolls on French highways, and the much higher gas tax. I believe Germany also has a higher rate of car ownership and the average population density is higher.
- Zak 9y ago
  In 2015, according to estimates by the World Bank, Germany had 234 people per square kilometer. France had 122. And then there are the tolls. I'm pretty sure Germany is trying to use less road for a lot more cars and everything else is secondary with regard to traffic jams.
- hvidgaard 9y ago
  Germany Autobahn see more use and needs more maintance. Besides more Germans on the road, a lot of trafic pass through German, a lot more than in France. And the fact that the French highways require payment reduce trafic even more. But they are a joy to drive on. Set the CC and just go.
  - usrusr 9y ago
    And the fact that SNCF has dedicated high speed infrastructure for the TGV, whereas DB runs the ICE mostly on mixed use tracks which makes it more challenging to provide fast, predictable service, all while having to compete with faster best-case speeds on the road.
- ptaipale 9y ago
  The difference really is that many French motorways are toll roads (that péage sign) and have far fewer cars and lorries than the German autobahns. In Germany, the logistics clearly utilizes the autobahns a lot. You see constant lines of heavy vehicles on the rightmost lane, and sometimes your overtaking them is interrupted by one truck passing another one, very very slowly as they both have a speed limiter, just adjusted slightly differently.
fludlight 9y ago
> that the roads don't have enough lanes. Almost every freeway around major American cities is 4 lanes and yet traffic persists. Some freeways in LA are 6 lane parking lots.
- smitherfield 9y ago
  Yes, and Manhattan has hundred-story apartment buildings, yet living there still costs a fortune.
- catdog 9y ago
  It's pretty well known that simply building more roads does not fix traffic problems, it basically only generates more traffic.
lloeki 9y ago
> on which one could safely drive 300 km/h, but it's only possible to maintain that for a minute because then you hit another construction zone or traffic jam caused by inadequate capacity Anecdote: recently went from Offenburg to Stuttgart and back and could drive a pretty much constant 190~240kph all the way (~1h30) except for a couple sections which were not unlimited. Having to slow down to 190kph isn't quite what I'd call a traffic jam. 300kph is just harder because there's not that many vehicles able to go that fast, so you end up catching up with the "slower" (so to speak) ones, and since vehicles are (supposed to) be electronically limited to 250kph, you're bound to meet some anyway.
- Zak 9y ago
  vehicles are (supposed to) be electronically limited to 250kph It was my impression that vehicles aren't supposed to be able to go faster than the speed rating of their tires. Since 250 km/h is a common speed rating for tires, and higher ratings tend to get expensive fast, German cars are often limited to 250 km/h. No current Porsches (real ones, not the SUVs) are that slow, and the Porsche tire recommendation guide calls for tires rated for 300 km/h, or "over 300 km/h" (the standardized ratings don't go higher) for all models except the Macan SUV with 18" wheels, for which it recommends 270 km/h. http://files2.porsche.com/filestore/download/usa/none/porscheservice-tire-currentsummertires/default/19cea30a-33d9-11e6-9225-0019999cd470/Summer-tire-overview-current-models.pdf http://files2.porsche.com/filestore/download/usa/none/porsch...
  - lloeki 9y ago
    The index rating on a tire basically reflects the speed limit that a tire can sustain for at least (IIRC) 10 mins before giving up and being destroyed, minus one. So a tire that sustained 10 min of U rating (200kph) speed and suffered drastic damage (typically, tire blows and tread band goes off) right after that mark gets a T rating (190kph). This is oversimplified but that's the gist of it. You can thus see why the index of stock tires always vastly overshoot the top speed of a car, e.g my car gets a Y tyre stock even though its top speed is 245kph, and my ex car has a W rating when the top speed is 210kph. It's not a good idea to go anywhere near the limit of your tire speed index, nor to go cheap and skimp on the index when buying a replacement tire. I bet the Macan that gets 18" and the W index is the one with low enough top speeds (below 230kph, that'd be 2.0L four-pot petrol and 3.0L V6 Diesel ones) EDIT: found a reference again WRT index tests > Speed ratings are based on laboratory tests where the tire is pressed against a large diameter metal drum to reflect its appropriate load, and run at ever increasing speeds (in 6.2 mph steps in 10 minute increments) until the tire's required speed has been met. https://www.tirerack.com/tires/tiretech/techpage.jsp?techid=35 https://www.tirerack.com/tires/tiretech/techpage.jsp?techid=...
usrusr 9y ago
> I don't think the main problem is that speed differentials are causing poor dynamics, but that the roads don't have enough lanes. Actually the limited number of lanes is what enables us to survive the speed differentials. Fast/[middle/]slow lanes can easily be enumerated without counting, which makes situational awareness so much easier. And you certainly do need a lot of situational awareness. It's a bit like CPU registers vs. an unconstrained stack. I have only ever seen more than three regular lanes in large metropolitan areas where there is hardly any open road between interchanges and where speed limits are a certainty. I don't know if a single piece of four lane unrestricted driving exists in all of Germany, I would not even be entirely surprised if you could not legally build one.

naravara 9y ago

>Germany is also the most stressful country to drive in I think. I'm guessing you've never been to any developing country. India doesn't even respect traffic lights or the concept of "lanes." You have modern cars sharing the roads with literal ox-drawn carriages and they're all splitting lanes with hundreds of little scooters. Hell, even Italy is a complete clusterfuck. If Germany is stressful to drive in for someone I would question if that person is comfortable behind the wheel of a car at all. In fact, I'll say this is one of the big problems with how lax driving standards are in America. There are lots of people who drive everywhere here who do NOT have the skill, attention span, or reflexes to be behind the wheel of a car. It's too economically essential to be a functioning member of society to make the standards any stricter, but they're so lax that we have a glut of terrible drivers. Terrible drivers lead to overly permissive road design (that winds up being unsafe for anyone not in a car like bikers, cyclists or pedestrians) and that just leads to a bad quality of life overall for everyone.

djsumdog 9y ago
Last time I was there, Indians referred to western traffic as "Streamlined." I remember Delhi had the words "Relax" printed on all the stop lights, in English. I'm not sure it really helped.
- seiferteric 9y ago
  Hmm, on a related thought, how could self driving cars ever work there?
  - naravara 9y ago
    They won't. Firstly because the traffic is insane. Secondly because labor rates are so low that rickshaw and taxi drivers are dirt cheap. The productivity function is way skewed towards labor in India to where expensive robots to drive the cars don't make economic sense.
    - xapata 9y ago

captainmuon 9y ago

It's very subjective. I find driving in Germany to be not very stressful, despite the relatively narrow lanes and high speeds. Now, one has to compare similar situations, not a German Autobahn in a Metropolitan region with a empty desert highway... But comparing a busy Autobahn with a busy freeway (say the interstate into Chicago), I found the freeway to be much more stressful. People are passing on both sides! And there is not much speed differential. I can't just fall back to the right if I want to take it slow. There is often no emergency lane. I feel like I'm being pushed along, and if I can't keep up, I will be ran over. In Germany, people can go faster, but it feels very predictable, clockwork-like. Yes, you have occasional idiots speeding with 250 km/h on the left lane that don't slow down and assume you will move out of the way out of self-preservation. But those are outliers, other than that I rarely have complaints. Maybe it is a cliche, but it seems the drivers' education, and the condition of cars and streets, is really good in Germany.

chrisper 9y ago
>Maybe it is a cliche, but it seems the drivers' education, and the condition of cars and streets, is really good in Germany. It is not a cliche. I have lived in the US for the past 5 years and lived for 20 years in Germany before that. Germans roads are like 5000x better than US roads (at least here in California). Road paintings here are a joke, especially at night or when it is raining. The only exception is when a road gets painted freshly. Then it is good for like 2 months.
- derefr 9y ago
  What do the German road engineers do that make road paintings last for more than 2 months?
  - chrisper 9y ago
    I think it's just the overall road maintenance that is better.
  - dsfyu404ed 9y ago
    Not have to deal with salt, snow plows and residual abrasive material.

venture_lol 9y ago

German autobahn is fine driving. You would just have to make sure your car got that extra kick if you want to go to the left. Driving in Italy, Rome esp, is fine too. There is a reason the red light is so big and so much larger than the green light though :)

hvidgaard 9y ago
Driving in Italy, and Spain for that matter, is....exciting. Especially the intersection rules in Spain takes some getting used to. Oh there is green, I can go - but why are trafic still going from the other direction? Oh, the light closest to me is red, so I may not drive...

djsumdog 9y ago

Good thing is you never really have to drive if you don't want to. Most small towns are connected by commuter rails, ICE and PostBus (5 euro rides if you book early). Small towns like Jena of only 100k people have full tram and bus networks.

arwhatever 9y ago

I just returned from a 2 week driving trip through Germany and vastly preferred driving there to driving in the U.S. The "always pass on the left and never on the right" seemed like it led to more systematic and predictable behaviors, and also tremendously reduced the competitiveness of the driving experience as compared to the U.S. It might all be cultural differences though. I noticed drivers seemed more attentive and never used their phones (unless completely stopped in traffic jams), whereas here in the U.S. it is extremely common to have drivers piddling in the left lane and absolutely oblivious to the goings on around them. The only stressor I could see from driving on the autobahn was easily overcome - before passing someone on the left, just be sure to check really, really far back towards the horizon to make sure one one is coming.

azernik 9y ago
Theoretically "always pass on the left" is a rule in the US too, it's just a rule that is not consistently observed.
- DigitalJack 9y ago
  That's because too many people drive in the left lane all the time. In my commute, traffic gets inverted where the left lane becomes clogged with people not going fast enough and to get anywhere requires passing on the right. I can appreciate not wanting to go back and forth between say the middle lane and left lane all the time. I just wish people could figure out they are holding up traffic and get out of the way for a minute or two every now and then.
  - hvidgaard 9y ago
    > I can appreciate not wanting to go back and forth between say the middle lane and left lane all the time. That is about as self centered one can be in trafic. In reality, they are endangering themself and everybody else near them.
    - hutzlibu 9y ago

iagooar 9y ago

I agree that driving on a German highway is a stressful experience. Especially since there is not so many highways with more than 2 lanes, occasionally changing to 3 lanes. On a highway with no speed limit and only 2 lanes, the difference between the right lane and the left lane is just so freaking huge, you are stressed out every time you need to pass a truck or slower car, and almost always see your random Ferrari / Maseratti / Porsche approaching at a fraction of second of the time you spend on the left lane. I would advocate for no speed limit on highways with >= 3 lanes, but would put a limit of 140-150 on those with only 2.

looperhacks 9y ago
It depends on where you drive. Where I'm from, most highways have 3 lanes.

chrisper 9y ago

I find the US much more stressful to drive in, because you have to constantly assume that people don't use their turn signals when changing lanes randomly. You obviously also have to do these dangerous lange changes because people drive slowly for no reason whatsoever wherever they want (e.g. most left lane). I have noticed that a lot of people change into the middle lane for no reason at all. This results in you having to pass on the right, especially if there is a slow driver on the left lane. So now you have to change 2 lanes to pass 2 cars.... Fact is, if you learn how to drive well and everyone else does as well, then driving is not at all stressful. You can still use your cruise control in Germany, just not on the left lane (if you are going 80 or whatever).

moojah 9y ago

Having grown up in Germany and living in the US, I feel the opposite. The US traffic is far less predictable. In the US, you have to look, left, right, back and ahead when trying to switch lane, as anyone could appear from anywhere. You never know which lane you should stay on to drive "a little faster". Generally, people just don't pay attention. In Germany it is in one direction only. Left to overtake, right to pull back over. In addition you do have to monitor your back mirror more carefully, which people in the US do not seem to do (though they should). In Germany, virtually no one plays with their phones on highways. Also, traffic deaths are more than half in Germany than in the US, despite higher speeds [0]. I feel like traffic rage in the US is much more prevailent, particularly in the east coast. Having said that, Dutch or Danish traffic is far more relaxing. But also much much slower... [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-related_death_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-r...

WillyOnWheels 9y ago
US resident here. On the local freeway, when I signal I wish to make a lane change, other drivers often speed up. I really don't get it. What did I do to their family?
- u801e 9y ago
  The trick is to follow the mirror, signal, maneuver method. In other words, you don't signal until you know you have a gap to change lanes into. If you signal first without checking for a gap first, then you're treating the signal as a way to ask for permission to change lanes. Other drivers may or may not allow you to do so.

hvidgaard 9y ago

Driving on the German Autobahn is not stressful. 3-4 lanes highway are usually around the bigger cities and they have a speedlimit anyway. Because people know cars can fly past them with more than 200 kmh, they also actually stay to the right and use the left lane to pass and not to cruise. All in all it's a pleasant experience and all a driver really needs to wrap his head around is to keep as much track of the traffic behind and as in the front.

CalRobert 9y ago

A differing five cents: Germany is the best country in the world in which to drive. Drivers are trained well. They look before they turn. THEY DON'T USE THE LEFT LANE AS A CRUISING LANE - they move over, pass, and return to the right lane. They use their turn signal. You can go very, very fast in situations where it's warranted. In situations where it's not, people slow down. As someone who walks, rides a bike, and enjoys not being deafened by road noise in towns, this is good. My experience driving has primarily been California, Ireland, and Germany, and Germany has been _far_ superior to the other two.

icc97 9y ago

Personally after living in the Dutch half of Belgium for 7 years, I find Belgian and Dutch (it's possibly Belgian drivers in Dutch cars) drivers to be the worst drivers I have come across, certainly compared to German and British drivers. I've always wanted to take a dash cam and compare the driving styles when driving to the Eurotunnel in the UK and then driving across Belgium. The ring around Antwerp is an absolute mess of people driving in a dangerous manner. Belgian drivers typically will leave no more than a 1 second gap. In the UK this is repeatedly drummed into you that it should be 3 seconds. Also I find Belgian and Dutch drivers react erractically, they will switch lanes erratically and move very close to the car in front before switching lanes often without indicating. Germans and British seem to leave much more room and perform maneouvres in a much more deliberate manner. Certainly with Belgian drivers, this is back up with statistics, their death rates per 100k population are 2x that in the UK and 1.5x Germany [0] [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-related_death_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-r...

strictfp 9y ago
I certainly agree about the Belgians ;)

deepakhj 9y ago

Try India. According to the WHO, traffic fatalities is the #4 health problem there.

strictfp 9y ago
Wouldn't even go near India ;) It's read on every death cause map I've ever seen, from traffic incidents to presence of diseases to antibiotic resistance.
- known 9y ago
  If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you --Oscar