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Yep, not trying to be disrespectful to fellow South American or African HNers, anyone that thinks driving in Germany is stressful won't ever manage to drive in those countries as well.

Yet people do manage to have some kind of order within chaos, that makes the whole traffic flow.

I'm the original poster and I've driven in central and south america and found it completely fine. I guess I prefer common sense to idiotic speeds and strict rules ;)

> Italy is a complete clusterfuck.

Yes, but only until you understand the trick: do NOT expect perfect adherence to driving code from others. That's it!

For example, when approaching an intersection where you have right of way, expect someone to try and pass anyway: it basically means slowing a bit down and paying attention on the incoming roads. Applying this grain of salt would prevent a good part of the car crashes I see on youtube (namely "driving in Russia", but not only).

And, by the way, expecting bad behaviour from others is not a justification for when I'll be the other.

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.

Hmm, on a related thought, how could self driving cars ever work there?

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.

Won't in the short run, perhaps. Sure, in the long run we're all dead, but somewhere in the middle there will be robots and automobiles in the more complete sense of the word.

I would think they would work even better there?

Highly doubtful. There are way too many variables. If they worked at all, they'd be unable to move or only at a speed of <5kph. It's simply too chaotic and way too many variables.

I see what you are saying, but I still think a computer would do better in an environment like that with less rules than say the US. At least with the goal being not causing accidents. A computer with 360 vision is undoubtedly better at avoiding accidents probably in any condition. It may result in as you say too slow speeds or paralyzation, but many "rules" in the US either arent written down, or often arent followed making that situation more likely than with less rules imo.

If it follows other tech trends(eg: cell phones bypassing land lines), India and other developing countries will see self-driving cars before freeways and owned cars. Well, I'm an optimist.

Maybe. But I'm not sure it's as easy as putting things in a scale from more modern to less modern. The places where India has leapfrogged has been on stuff that needs new infrastructure development since there was never any good old infrastructure to take up resources or incumbent players to choke out new players.

Self driving cars don't need new infrastructure, its functionally an application that runs on existing infrastructure. If you have decent roads it'll work the same way whether you're in India or anywhere else.

Although I guess you could argue that Indians are less prissy about what they're willing to tolerate. A self-driving auto-rickshaw wouldn't fly in America, but it would be just fine for just about any Indian, and it's a much more useful application of self-driving tech than expecting everyone to have their own robo-chauffeured luxury cars.

Cell phones bypassing land lines makes sense because you can cover more customers with less cost. Self-driving cars may eventually be less costly than human driven cars, but for the near future, the costs you add (sensors, software, actuators, etc) are way more expensive than the costs you save (driver's attention, optimistically damage to persons and property reduced through collision avoidance), particularly in developing countries where a person's attention has less monetary value, but the raw materials for the car have similar costs. It's unlikely that you'd get much of the ancillary benefits of usability by unlicensed drivers either -- few people will be able to afford a driverless car to cart their kid around to school or wherever, anyway those people could just hire a driver and a normal car.

> 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.

So should we only allow some of the population to utilize cars? Considering how vital they are to the American lifestyle (the US covers so much land), that seems unreasonable.

Only those who are qualified to operate a vehicle should be allowed to do so. Where is the controversy in that statement?

The way you seem to put it is that only a small portion (sounds like less than 25%) should be allowed to drive.

How is the rest of the population supposed to get around?

Ever heard of public transports?

I have as my girlfriend and I have lived for over a year without a car. We walk/lyft/occasionally use the Seattle lite rail to get to 90% of the places we want to go.

However, despite the amazing hiking/backpacking places we can go here, we have only done that a few times (relying on other people driving).

Should we always rely on other people to go to non-public transportation routes (This has also hampered us from doing lots of other things hence why we got a zipcar membership recently)?

I'm not from the US, but the hearsay is that getting a driver's license is a lot easier than in e.g. in Germany. Here in Germany getting a license costs ~1500 Euro and it's not uncommon for people to flunk their first attempt.

I took a semester long drivers education class and then had to have a 50 hours of driving with my parents (Although I heard of other parents just signing the forms for driving with parents (my parents did not)).

> had to have a 50 hours of driving with my parents

The assumption with this requirement is that the parents are good drivers. That may or may not be the case. It would be better to require that the 50 hours be completed with a certified driving instructor.

Well, at least drivers should be prepared and trained thoroughly. I'm not sure if this is still true but it is my understanding that getting a drivers license is a very casual affair in the US - a quick theoretical and a practical test and you're done. In Germany you have to finish about two dozen practice sessions, in class and on the road, before you can apply for a theory or road test.

And it will cost you - over the whole course it will almost certainly be above € 1000 and generally depend on how well you do, how many sessions/tests you need. With these kind of costs people take this very serious and still fail all the time.

Naturally I'm not a fan of the costs, but I think thorough preparation and training is essential. Operating a car is a huge responsibility that affects not only your safety but that of other drivers, pedestrians, passengers, etc. Getting the license to do so should not be a cakewalk.

On a sidenote: Of course this approach requires valid alternatives to a car, like efficient public transport options, but that's another discussion.

The US covers a lot of land, but the American population does not. And there is no real reason it even needs to occupy as much land as it presently does. It's bad urban planning and dubious tax incentives that makes us sprawl. Most people in or near major metros shouldn't need a car to be a functioning member of society. It's a major policy failure that it is presently so.

I don't know how you just pulled "25%" out of the air. Most people could be trained to drive better, they just never bother learning because the standards for licensing are so lax that there is no downside to doing so. There are lots of areas where you can get a drivers' license without even knowing how to parallel park.