Crazy Driving - Act Before its too late..

I agree NM karwa drivers r the worst

I could write this forum every day that I drive here! someone nearly went into the side of me on a roundabout as he decided to cut into the middle lane from the right hand side one....hence straight into me. If I hadn't honked my horn he would still have been in his day dream! psycho!!

Max, to tell you the truth, when it comes to those Karwa morons, I sometimes wish to be Qatari!

Nomerci u r turning in to a Qatari :). Road rage is more nowadays bcuz of companies drivers hired from third world countries who don't have any experience in driving from there country but here they r driving buses and pick ups and making mess of traffic

Roundabouts are only ineffective here because a lot of people don't know the rules to drive round them and are never taught

A wise (European) policeman said on TV today:"People don't obey the rules unless they have to pay a huge fine!"

Guess, even that won't work in the 'Richest Country' of the world.

I wonder what our QLr's would think of my suggestion.We all know that there are CID personnel in plain clothes moving around places to curb all illegal activties and making Qatar safer/ better to live in. Very well done!!! Now how about having the CID in plain clothes and a salon car driving on the roads at the maximum permissible speed limit and try to bait these maniacs into doing what they often do and with no remorse. They could be stopped at the next RA or just have their plate numbers noted down and fined for reckless driving.Once they know they are being monitored they will stop the practice.

Very simple:

-Ban Wasta

-Enforce the law- cameras at intersections would be perfect.

-Get rid of the roundabouts. A perfect example is the traffic light in front of The Mall. It was hell to manage that R/A, now it's so easy and simple to get through.

I almost pulled a Karwa taxi driver out of his cab and smacked him yesterday...THEY are A PEST on the road.

Learning how to use the roundabouts properly might be a start..Oh and indicators,they ain't just pretty flashing lights you know!

"Furthermore, the road layout is mostly wrong", LP I can't say it better. How many "Road Engineers" are in Qatar?

Furthermore, the road layout is mostly wrong. Take the new express way. It has entrances and at the same time exits. It's clear that this leads to accidents. You cannot have an entrance and an exit within a distance of 100 or 200 meters. A "proper" exit would lead over (as a fly-over) an entrance. The acceleration lanes are generally too short! And adding the fear of many drivers to accelerate to 100 km/h will cause hold-ups and dangerous situations. Yes, and the ones who overtake you on the service lane are the drivers who should walk straight into jail.

I am just saying that the trucks and buses that one can see here (tires without profile) would not be allowed to use the roads in Europe.

LP but the trucks drive pretty slowly and I rarely see any accidents involving them but cars - daily.

And of all the trucks I can see in Doha 90% would be taken off the roads instantly in Europe!!

jjj75, the age is included in the "character" of the people. Undoubtedly a younger driver is normally more reckless than an older, more experienced one.

LP in your list you include quality of vehicles, I would say that is high compared to alot of African nations, ditto with most of the major roads - also, hospitals are very close by here compared to say Uganda etc. And I think that if you dug deep into the stats you will find that majority of road deaths involve young men under 30 years of age. They don't call it the epidemic wiping out the young of qatar for nothing.

There are clear differences. While the number of fatalities per 100.000 inhabitants is around 4 to 5 in European countries, it is about 30 to 40 in African and Middle Eastern countries.

There could be several reasons: the quality of the roads, the character of the people, the implementation of traffic rules, the quality of the vehicles, and surely the attitude towards life as a precious thing or the opposite.

Source for the statistics:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-related_death_rate

MM - too simplistic, how can you give way when a speeding car smacks a curb and spins out of control?

2 words solution : Give way.

Yeah, jjj75, it will continue as usual!

Prism - like where? There are only a handful of African countries which have higher road death stats

LP - then expect road deaths to continue. When you have certain sections of society who not only think but know they can drive with impunity then fatal accidents will continue due to careless and criminal driving.

Surprisingly no one pointed out how bad it is in so many other parts of the world or did I post this a bit too early!!!

jjj75, that will never happen. It's against the tribal culture!

UKENG -sorry has to be good for all - repeat after me, NO MORE WASTA

"..My suggestion is for expatriates, or those who want to avoid being harassed by undiscerning drivers, to avoid the left lane at all cost, except when going to turn left at the intersection or exit.."

Nice suggestion, I think this is the only workable solution as of now...

yeah the minimum speed limit should be implemented

jjj75 sssssh, now even I managed to get a few fines with drawn myself..Please NOOOOO..:)

Cherukkan

I think there should be a law only allowing Qataris to buy and drive LC.

When the Wasta system ends these bad driving habits will also go.

Yep right Kiwi.. The slow moving drivers are also a hazard.

In Dubai on the Sheik Zayed Road they have a maximum of 100 and minimum of 60 as speed limits within the city limits.

Super-slow drivers are just as much of a hazard on the roads. There should be a minimum speed-limit...like 80 in a 100 zone?

I think whoever got a LC is thinking themselves as Qataris.

UkEng, all those cars sucks.

Also forgot to mention all American Cars are also great hazard too. Specially the old ones...:P

We need more European cars to help get Europe out of recession. More BMW Mercedes, Aston Martins, SAAD, Peugeot, Renault etc etc..:)

It's about time to remove all cars except Land Cruisers driven by Qataris! The officials should take action now! Lives can be saved.

SMS reporting solution would be a viable one. If you think a driver is a threat to his and others' safety then Send SMS to 1234 showing the number of their license plate in the body of the message. Those with high numbers of reports should be fined and take a 5 hr driving class from 12AM-5AM

I heard its the same in Dubai... but they have traffic police all over... so when a car flashes and honks at you... he may get a fine if the police sees. Seems like a good solution if points come along with it.

Ps: i drive a sunny and i am safe. :)

I want to be a secret agent, a Ferrari is a small car.

My suggestion is for expatriates, or those who want to avoid being harassed by undiscerning drivers, to avoid the left lane at all cost, except when going to turn left at the intersection or exit. People tend to act aggressively when they are in the fast lane, and I've seen that so far here.

Give the fast lane to Qatari's and let them release the urge to drive fast...

i agree, in fact the small cars will be targeted and i noticed the difference when i used a lancer rented car when most of the LCs didn't care about me on the road, but fortunately now i have a big car and rarely someone will flash for me from the back.

In my opinion the action should be taken not only by increasing the number of the speed radars coz it's not an issue of speed only, the solution should be spreading sort of secret agents in the streets with small cars and let them report the number plate of the rude and careless drivers and take action against them accordingly.

This looks as though it might be "The Thread of the Day".

I would put the following car owners as top bad drivers on a whole.

1. LC

2. Little pickups

3. Nissan Tiida's

4. Nissan Sunny

and the list goes on...

which car is 'Nissan Tilda' ? :(

Rizks, I know that it is a problem and contributes to the death-toll substantially in many countries. Especially South-East Asian nations where a drive to the supermarket can be similar to a Formula1 race. Even in New Zealand with a population of only 38 people, there are displays of lunacy (watch out for Steve and Dave).

Perhaps as the authorities seem unable to clamp down on this type of driving, they should give some thought to this idea:

All new drivers (including locals, or especially locals) should be forced to drive a Yaris/Tiida/Alto or some other small car for a year or two after receiving their licence instead of jumping straight into LC/Patrol etc. They may then understand the dangers inherent in what is going on around them with 3 ton 4x4's being driven recklessly, dangerously and aggressively and how scary it can be when you are in a small car and are "bullied" in this manner. It may for a while at least curb their behaviour and enable them to gain some road/traffic experience first . Every day, I worry about my wife driving my kids, as every day she reports some incident or other..........

Yes, I agree with you that we should not associate crazy driving just with Qataris (it is amongst all nationalities).

Only in my case it was a Qatari but it was wrong to generalize on my part....

Raya arabic newspaper placed an article today reflecting the growing complains and concerns of the deteriorating driving behaviors. Especially changing lanes to right side and cutting off others who are already on that lane. I suggest that some public involvement is needed here to report those who misbehave on the road.

We had an experience in Shamal road where we saw a landcruiser flip to its top because it cut from the fast lane to the exit going to landmark... almost 4 lanes. I guess he overturned his wheel and couldnt regain it anymore.

It shouldnt be generalized to a certain nationality only... everyone gets crazy in driving once in a while. But I think if you will get crazy make sure you dont involve others.

but does it happen only in this country or any other countries too ? I mean in any other GCC countries ?

"..Another case of monkey see, monkey do?.."

LoL

You're not joking UkEng. I think I fear these people the most. Mostly laborers, too.

Yes Khanan, after the people in the Landcruiser the next drivers I fear are these in their little pickups or twin cabins.

they dont have patience and later they become one of the patient at HMC....:)

"there is a accident waiting to happen"? Dozens of accident happen every day because of this behaviour. To be fair, I have seen many employed drivers driving in this manner and a few Westerners as well. Only yesterday I saw someone I knew, from Canada (I always thought they were mellow) hard up the rear of a car in the fast lane, tooting. I have to admit, I did laugh. Another case of monkey see, monkey do?

Yes...

Also, I dont know for sure but I feel that these people driving LCs display such behaviour to people driving smaller vehicles etc. but they would not be behaving the same way with other LCs ...

Also, they should realize that even if they come near and flash once the vehicle in front will definitely try to change the lane as and when they get the opportunity, but they dont have patience.

I agree cent per cent with your post except for the Qatari part. Road rage and madness is becoming very common among the exptriates of all nationality too.

I hope and pray that they realize the way they are driving not only kills them but also others !

The sooner they realize the better !