dude WTF ...great post. Great language. Ok I see your business is not affected. Good for you, You can take your tourist caravan on other roads. But the people that live along these roads, sell their fruits, their amber etc etc. Its just a shame. They want hipolito back. And dont worry, I wont argue/answer u anymore. Your posts speak for themselves.
- Thread starter steve queen
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worst drivers in the world
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dude WTF ...great post. Great language. Ok I see your business is not affected. Good for you, You can take your tourist caravan on other roads. But the people that live along these roads, sell their fruits, their amber etc etc. Its just a shame. They want hipolito back. And dont worry, I wont argue/answer u anymore. Your posts speak for themselves.
Safer if you drive it, but more dangerous if you live here.
Paya is divided by the road, and people sometimes have to wait 30 minutes to cross. The worst offenders are the gasoline trucks, as I mentioned.
What's worse is there is only one school in Paya, which means that more than half of the school-aged kids have to cross the highway. No one follows the 45 kph speed limit. There is an unofficial crossing guard - a guy with a makeshift big red flag - but some drivers don't stop. People have been to speak to the governor and anyone else who will give them the time of day, but everyone just agrees that it is a bad situation. They finally did learn that there was supposed to be a pedestrian bridge, but the money ran out before it could be built (SURPRISE).
ON THE POSITIVE SIDE: I have been very impressed with how the people of the community are taking a proactive approach in addressing the situation and are going to the governor and other government leaders. The university students are showing some great leadership in pushing for change. It may be a small step, but imo it is a significant step.
This thread is about the DRIVERS on the roads, NOT the economic and social impact of some roads that the gubmint has CHOSEN to neglect.
That is your issue outside of the intent of the thread. Why not start your own thread with that as the subject?
Just bc u asked me....I made 3 post about the driving behaviour here when u wrote this complete nonsense:
"I travel the entire country often. In the last 3 years I have seen emormous improvements in infrastructure, especially roads. And the best news is engineers are actually doing something about roadside drainage to keep the roads in better condition."
Well, Sir, it seems like you were the one that started the road-condition-debate. About your other insights after being here 3 years (Yes I understand u have your tour business and I am sure u want your customer to feel safe but...) I can inform you that driving here 9 years ago was heaven in comparison to today. That said, I am sure that you know where to drive and to keep your clients safe. Ciao. Beach.
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ahhhhh.... none of you guys have seen ANYTHING until you drive in the parking lot of my local WalMart. LOL I'll put any of our "soccer moms" rolling along in their mega-suv's up against your fuel trucks any day. Those ladies drive like they're piloting an Abrams Tank, and half of them can't even see over the steering wheel. Not to mention the fact that they're so damn busy yapping on the cell phones buried in their ears that they wouldn't know it if they rolled right over you. LOL 
Their attitude is "Watch out... here I come!!!"
Their attitude is "Watch out... here I come!!!"
I guess we all need to know our skill level and risk limits. Part of risk assessment is a clear understanding of road conditions and construction. Whereas you may think it's not germaine to the topic of driving in the DR, I do because those conditiond are every bit as important as the drivers are when safety is the concern.
But I do understand your perspective. Some folks just shouldn't drive in the DR at all. It's just too scary...
My recipe for success is having 1 or 2 cold ones before driving into the cities ::cheeky:
Reminds me of the old saying...." I never knew he drank until I saw him sober ! " :ermm:
WW
Come Clean Queen Steve
and tell us about how you tamed that oil truck driver in Cabrera.
No need to be shyaranoid:.... we're all friends here.... these people will understand.
Exactly what speed did you slow down to annoy him?
Were you wearing earplugs to shut our the air horn blasts.:ninja:
You were no Queen in a tutu that day....:lick:
WW
and tell us about how you tamed that oil truck driver in Cabrera.
No need to be shy
aranoid:.... we're all friends here.... these people will understand.Exactly what speed did you slow down to annoy him?
Were you wearing earplugs to shut our the air horn blasts.:ninja:
You were no Queen in a tutu that day....:lick:
WW
After having just driven home in the dark in the rain, I can say that the OP is 110% correct and that this is absolutely the worst place in the world to drive.
And for the record: I say the same thing about my home state of Kentucky when I drive in the rain at night there.
As to the post about the Walmart: Where do you live? Where I come from, no soccer mom driving an SUV yapping on a cell phone would be caught dead at Walmart. Target, the mall, Starbucks, yes, but never Walmart.
And for the record: I say the same thing about my home state of Kentucky when I drive in the rain at night there.
As to the post about the Walmart: Where do you live? Where I come from, no soccer mom driving an SUV yapping on a cell phone would be caught dead at Walmart. Target, the mall, Starbucks, yes, but never Walmart.
The 10 countries with the world's worst drivers
Traffic is an inevitable part of travel. Angry motor scooters in Rome, pileups in Los Angeles and snarls in Cairo conspire to throw our best-laid plans into chaos. Doug Lansky feels your pain. In his upcoming book The Titanic Awards, a compendium of the world's worst travel mishaps, he's compiled the following writeup and list of the top ten worst countries for driving.
When I rented a car in Napoli, the manager at the Hertz office told me "Driving here is like a video game. You just have to relax, stop thinking, and feel it in your stomach." The traffic signals were especially tricky as the red, yellow and green colored lights were obeyed no more than Christmas decorations. Red lights were run as a matter of decent driving.
It's not just Naples -- travelers across the planet have griped about the quality of driving abroad. According to a survey of over 2000 people from 80 different countries, I wasn't the only one who found it challenging. The percentages below are the voting results of our survey of the worst drivers in the world. Disagree with these results? Take the new survey at TitanicAwards.com. For more fun survey results and other "Worsts of Travel" tales, check out the book, The Titanic Awards (Perigee, May 4, 2010).
#1 on list by majority votes: Italy
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India
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China
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Egypt
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France
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Vietnam
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Thailand
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United States
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Indonesia
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Mexico
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Traffic is an inevitable part of travel. Angry motor scooters in Rome, pileups in Los Angeles and snarls in Cairo conspire to throw our best-laid plans into chaos. Doug Lansky feels your pain. In his upcoming book The Titanic Awards, a compendium of the world's worst travel mishaps, he's compiled the following writeup and list of the top ten worst countries for driving.
When I rented a car in Napoli, the manager at the Hertz office told me "Driving here is like a video game. You just have to relax, stop thinking, and feel it in your stomach." The traffic signals were especially tricky as the red, yellow and green colored lights were obeyed no more than Christmas decorations. Red lights were run as a matter of decent driving.
It's not just Naples -- travelers across the planet have griped about the quality of driving abroad. According to a survey of over 2000 people from 80 different countries, I wasn't the only one who found it challenging. The percentages below are the voting results of our survey of the worst drivers in the world. Disagree with these results? Take the new survey at TitanicAwards.com. For more fun survey results and other "Worsts of Travel" tales, check out the book, The Titanic Awards (Perigee, May 4, 2010).
#1 on list by majority votes: Italy
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India
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China
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Egypt
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France
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Vietnam
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Thailand
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United States
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Indonesia
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Mexico
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A corner in Napoli (just one of the safest to cross in the city, let alone in the country!)
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One take elsewhere in Naples:
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Wowwwww those Italian drivers beat all of the others......most disrespectful driver in the world award...........driving against traffic, backing up a huge As$ truck into traffic without regard for the ppl behind him that he could crush, incredible!!!!
Que VIVA the US of A......best country in the world.
I love it when i come back from the DR I feel such peace and order once I hit the road. :cheeky:
Que VIVA the US of A......best country in the world.
I love it when i come back from the DR I feel such peace and order once I hit the road. :cheeky:
ehhhh I dont care about overpasses in the capital or driving on some stupid highway. The carretera turistica was in very good shape, and so was the other mountain roads (exception jarabacoa-constanza...ehh) and much less cars and motorcycles in the big cities and hey no rally-SUV:s. Heaven.
Sir, have fun with the rum and log out from the Internet
I posted this sometime ago in a different thread, here's a copy:
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It amazes me how some people here have not figured this out. Of course Dominicans are more skillful when it comes to driving, that does not mean driving politely. I've been living in the US for 15 years and travel to the DR sometimes 3 times a year and adapt instantaneouly. Proof of this is that no matter how wider, more organized and how much friendlier people drive in the US, they seem to have more accidents. Almost everyday I go to work I see an accident, sometimes more than one in a 20 minute commute in a freeway that has 5 lanes on each side, and sometimes I think what if these people had to drive in the DR, there would be a crash every second.
As someone mentioned here before the best way to drive in the DR is "defensive agressively", and by the way we dominicans drive like this in the DR is because we can get away with it and we choose to do so, proof of this is that the second a Dominican drives in the US he or she obeys every rules just like everybody else.
The reason why "public cars" have so many dents is because they are bought very old to begin with, usually already dented so that they can get it cheaper and when they have an accident they don't carry insurance or "collision coverage i should say". Even if the accident is not their fault they'd rather get the money either from an insurance company or the driver at fault and not fix the dent and of course they have a better chance of having an accident when they drive 10 hours a day as opposed to your average 1 hour a day commute in the US.
Dominicans can drive in any country without difficulty, not the other way around. All that being said, I agree that there's a lot of room for improvement for us to make it easier to people who visit us and want to drive in our country, however people who go to another country have to adapt to that country's way of living and not expect otherwise.
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It amazes me how some people here have not figured this out. Of course Dominicans are more skillful when it comes to driving, that does not mean driving politely. I've been living in the US for 15 years and travel to the DR sometimes 3 times a year and adapt instantaneouly. Proof of this is that no matter how wider, more organized and how much friendlier people drive in the US, they seem to have more accidents. Almost everyday I go to work I see an accident, sometimes more than one in a 20 minute commute in a freeway that has 5 lanes on each side, and sometimes I think what if these people had to drive in the DR, there would be a crash every second.
As someone mentioned here before the best way to drive in the DR is "defensive agressively", and by the way we dominicans drive like this in the DR is because we can get away with it and we choose to do so, proof of this is that the second a Dominican drives in the US he or she obeys every rules just like everybody else.
The reason why "public cars" have so many dents is because they are bought very old to begin with, usually already dented so that they can get it cheaper and when they have an accident they don't carry insurance or "collision coverage i should say". Even if the accident is not their fault they'd rather get the money either from an insurance company or the driver at fault and not fix the dent and of course they have a better chance of having an accident when they drive 10 hours a day as opposed to your average 1 hour a day commute in the US.
Dominicans can drive in any country without difficulty, not the other way around. All that being said, I agree that there's a lot of room for improvement for us to make it easier to people who visit us and want to drive in our country, however people who go to another country have to adapt to that country's way of living and not expect otherwise.
Carros publicos
Carros publicos are the scourge of the devil and must be removed from the face of the earth. (Can you tell I was driving in the capital today?)
As someone who prefers to take public transportation, I can say that one of the reasons public transport drivers are so unpredictable is because so few passengers tell the driver ahead of time when they want to be let off, nor will potential passengers signal until the carro or guagua is right beside them. The driver ends up having to cross through traffic and blocking two lanes.
In truth, carros publicos probably need to all be retired and replaced with buses, as the capital streets can no longer handle the traffic. Unfortunately, it would put many drivers out of work and someone would have to decide what to do with all the junkers.
Carros publicos are the scourge of the devil and must be removed from the face of the earth. (Can you tell I was driving in the capital today?)
As someone who prefers to take public transportation, I can say that one of the reasons public transport drivers are so unpredictable is because so few passengers tell the driver ahead of time when they want to be let off, nor will potential passengers signal until the carro or guagua is right beside them. The driver ends up having to cross through traffic and blocking two lanes.
In truth, carros publicos probably need to all be retired and replaced with buses, as the capital streets can no longer handle the traffic. Unfortunately, it would put many drivers out of work and someone would have to decide what to do with all the junkers.
- Status