# Thai Drivers - Good or Baaaaaad ?



## King Silk (Feb 25, 2009)

If I had been asked this question a few days ago I would have said very baaaad!

But, I have changed my incredible mind. Yes, I do that at times......

Been watching them closely whilst driving around Pattaya, and I can honestly say, I think they are mostly gooooood! Yes I do.

But sadly the exceptions are there for all to see. Young lads on Motorbikes driving too fast, coming out of side turnings without looking to see if anything is coming, and suicidally driving at you on the wrong side of the road etc. 
But to be fair, most motorcyclists are skilful, careful, and obey the rules (don't laugh) of the road. If somewhat impatiently........

Car Drivers are mostly good too. Except when drunk. Which is all to often I fear after 9pm, and the guys who take construction workers to the site, are sometimes dangerous in their haste to get the lads to work on time, with clouds of smoke ensuing from aged exhausts. I hate that!

So anyway, as I said, all round, not bad at all, although the accident stats may seem to say otherwise.


----------



## Acid_Crow (May 11, 2009)

I'd say that most of them know how to handle a car or a motorbike, its just that they have a hard time following rules and speedlimits. I've seen 4 cars wide on a 2-lane road doing atleast 60km/h. Try that in northern Europe and it will be frontpage news.


----------



## King Silk (Feb 25, 2009)

Acid_Crow said:


> I'd say that most of them know how to handle a car or a motorbike, its just that they have a hard time following rules and speedlimits. I've seen 4 cars wide on a 2-lane road doing atleast 60km/h. Try that in northern Europe and it will be frontpage news.


True AC. But you cannot tar all Thai drivers with the same brush because you saw that foolish behaviour, can you?


----------



## Guest (May 24, 2009)

As you say yourself KS, the stats suggest that there is a major problem. A general lack of respect for the rules (lack of helmet, overcrowded vehicles, alcohol abuse, speeding, etc) contribute to annual death and accident figures that per capita are way above those in Europe or the US. And that's not taking into account the fact that many accidents go unreported.


----------



## King Silk (Feb 25, 2009)

frogblogger said:


> As you say yourself KS, the stats suggest that there is a major problem. A general lack of respect for the rules (lack of helmet, overcrowded vehicles, alcohol abuse, speeding, etc) *contribute to annual death and accident figures that per capita are way above those in Europe or the US. *And that's not taking into account the fact that many accidents go unreported.


Got some MORE imaginary stats have you Froggy?


----------



## Guest (May 24, 2009)

Glad to see you living up to your sig, as usual, Mr. Silk! You wrote:


> _"all round, not bad at all, although the accident stats may seem to say otherwise"_


 ... or did I imagine that? Make your mind up!

Anyway, for those who are actually interested in facts rather than fiction, there are studies here:

Asian Institute of Technology study

Global Road Safety Partnership

The latter hinting that there is a certain amount of under-reporting in the official stats.


----------



## King Silk (Feb 25, 2009)

frogblogger said:


> Glad to see you living up to your sig, as usual, Mr. Silk! You wrote: ... or did I imagine that? Make your mind up!
> 
> Anyway, for those who are actually interested in facts rather than fiction, there are studies here:
> 
> ...


You stated that the accident rate was higher in LOS than in the US or the UK.
I see no proof of that in your stats for Thailand.

I assumed that the Thai stats would show a lot of Accidents here. That's what the word 'MAY' was put there for. Understand now do we?


----------



## Guest (May 24, 2009)

Actually someone on TV had done the comparison, taking the stats from the two urls listed plus a couple of others:



> Here are some comparative statistics for the US and THailand:
> 
> - Basic indicators for 10 HMCs (1996)
> 
> ...


----------



## King Silk (Feb 25, 2009)

frogblogger said:


> Actually someone on TV had done the comparison, taking the stats from the two urls listed plus a couple of others:


*"There are three kinds of lies. ...Lies,Damn Lies and Statistics".
Benjamin Disraeli.*


----------



## flemmie (Jan 16, 2009)

Hi all,

I am leaving Russia for Thailand later in the month, but could not help indicating their stats here :

Russia Car Crash Accidents.
Each year at least 35,000 people were killed along with 215,000 were injuries in 184,000 traffic accidents in Russia. This road death rate, is about 24.6 deaths per 100,000 population, compared to 14.7 in the US, 10 in France and 6 in Sweden. Economic damages are about 6 billion US dollars. According to a report the high car accident rate is at poor driving skills, and lack of adequate licensing-- until the Putin era it had been widespread practice to pay bribes to instructors in order to skip driving school to obtain drivers' licenses.

I think traffic here in Russia is much more disorganized and rules are there to be broken (and to provide some hard cash to traffic cops).

There are always less traffic accidents if the roads are completely clogged with cars, such as is the case in Moscow and Bangkok. I found the Moscow traffic worse are no one oberves the rules, except perhaps when the rains flood Sukumvit (that's why I will live in Sathorn).


----------



## JustChris (Jun 4, 2009)

No worse than New Jersey or Philadelphia I would suggest.


----------



## Guest (Jun 10, 2009)

JustChris said:


> No worse than New Jersey or Philadelphia I would suggest.


Hmm, well if accident statistics are anything to go by, it would seem that Thailand wins the bad driving race hands down.


----------



## JustChris (Jun 4, 2009)

I find Thai drivers to be slow and in being slow a bit to cautious thus it takes them 5 minutes to park a car and they do unexpected things like come from the left lane all the way over to the right lane to U turn but they use the signal and go very slowly so you do see them coming. But as I said in my other post they are no worse than anywhere else really once you get used to the motorcycles which are another story. Also driving changes region to region Chiang Mai is very laid back and not bad while Bangkok is insane. Nan wow they don't bother to follow any traffic rules they tend to follow the yellow line down the center of the road so they don't get lost and the figure if you can't pass them you can't hit them.


----------

