It has been my experience that no matter how chaotic and crazy traffic seems – there is always some under lying order that makes things work, well mostly!
Before coming to Europe I was told by friends and family that driving in Italy was , well “interesting”.
I have driven in Vancouver, LA, New York, Miami and London England, I can drive as aggressively as any other, or I thought…….. I was almost prepared for Italy.
Our first experience with real Italian driving was when we reached Lake Como on a Friday afternoon at 5 PM. Multiple lanes of traffic squeezing into traffic circles where anything goes, when traffic did thin out it was at high speed with inches to spare.
Driving on the Auto-strata has also been an interesting experience, It would appear that the focus on driving is secondary to many drivers, such as texting, reading newspapers, catching up with work on the laptop, talking on the phone, talking to your passenger Italian style, (with both hands), personal grooming. All these actives were witnessed on the auto strata while travelling at speed! The posted speed limit is 130 km/h.
Texting and driving is very prevalent …. we have observed many instances of drivers of scooters negotiating traffic in town which means 2 or 3 lanes, merging on and off roundabouts, while texting at the same time. I am not sure if they deserve an award for extreme multitasking or the Darwin Award? We have seen a couple of Vespas implanted into car grills, makes one wonder which driver was texting?
Parking is also an interesting process. To put things into perspective Italy has 61 million people who own 45 million cars ( this does not include the hordes of tourists, motor cycles or scooters). All these cars are crammed into a country 1/ 3 the size of the province of British Columbia. The infrastructure which predates Christopher Columbus certainly was not designed with 45 million automobiles in mind. Parking in Italy appears to be about abandoning your vehicle wherever there is space. Watch out at the Cafe / Bar approx. 9AM. we have seen cars triple parked while their owners get their caffeine jolt for the morning. In some instances we have seen entire roads blocked with parked cars (good thing they had their four way flashers on).
For me as a visitor to this fascinating country is the puzzle of the lines on the roads. I still have not figured out why they are placed there in the first place. They don’t appear to hold much influence and would seem to be regarded as mild suggestions at best.
One thing I do like about driving in Italy is the live and let live attitude, for all the craziness I have not observed the abundance of road rage one might expect. This laissez faire attitude is witness on the Auto-strata. Back home in North America there is this attitude that if I am doing the speed limit in the left lane then tough. It is almost a moral imperative to prevent any other driver who wishes to drive faster than the posted speed limit (God forbid!) . In Italy you use the left lane to pass slower traffic then pull (or casually drift) into the right lane. If some body in a Ferrari wants to travel at 160 km/h – fill your boots. However if you don’t pull over when you are in the left lane you may have some one 2 inches from your bumper at 130 km/h flashing his high beams and attempted to squeeze by on the shoulder (this does help dis-pell the moral imperative to slow other drivers down).
Driving in Italy certainly is not boring or for the faint of heart. It will drive you to distraction or at least a fine glass or two of Italian Chianti when you reached your destination.
Remember alls well that ends well, Ciao!
http://youtu.be/z-sZTOoqfKM
