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Outpouring of ire points to wrong turns by city’s fast motorizing society
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MY last column about traffic mayhem in Shanghai (“No easy cures for Shanghai traffic pains, but more empathy among drivers couldn’t hurt,” December 14) garnered several emotional comments from readers.
I anticipated such feedback, since Shanghai’s traffic is indeed a lightening rod for complaints and criticisms. These comments are also a sad reminder of how bad behaviors among Shanghai’s motorists reflect upon the city’s image.
Ever since I began writing for the opinion page, I have seen a steady stream of letters criticizing local motorists, indicating that the behavior of drivers hasn’t really improved in the intervening years.
A convenient scapegoat for our traffic woes is poor urban planning. While urban planners promise to make the city more pedestrian-friendly, sidewalks are frequently torn up in the name of infrastructure upgrades, only to be narrowed to make way for roadside parking spaces. Such encroachment belies any pedestrian-first rhetoric.
More blame is to be assigned to motorists, many of whom abuse their privilege and terrorize pedestrians with their incessant horn honking and reckless driving.
As someone who prefers quiet, I resent the unrestrained horn use. It often irritates me to see drivers mindlessly honking their horns when they are stuck in traffic, as if honking will make a difference. Instead, all they get is a cacophony of horns and contemptuous glares from pedestrians. The arrival of an automotive society in Shanghai hasn’t brought with it the same sense of courtesy often afforded pedestrians in the West.
Everyday I drive past the narrow Wuyi Road in Changning District. A long line of cars are always parked in the lanes for cyclists, forcing the latter to temporarily stray into the car lanes. This immediately triggers a torrent of horns, until the panicked cyclists are driven off to the side.
At least once I saw a cyclist yelling at a motorist for being honked at during such a situation. Such confrontations are commonplace, but they are not inevitable. What harm would it do — aside from a few seconds’ delay — for a driver to wait patiently for a cyclist to move aside?
All in all, the impatience and rudeness we so often see on our streets results from a lack of empathy. It hurts to read Gail Boizot’s comment that “It would seem wherever you go the majority of Chinese citizens are out for themselves and there is little or no consideration for others’ needs whatsoever.”
Admittedly, it often takes an outsider to tell the unpleasant truth. Many motorists have big, pampered egos. And the more expensive their cars are, the bigger their sense of self-importance. I readily subscribe to a colleague’s view that getting behind the wheel fuels self-aggrandizement. As he rightly pointed out, cocooned in a car, one is cut off from others and feels no emotional bond with those outside. For this reason, most motorists have no qualms about treating cyclists, pedestrians and anyone who gets in their way as “pesky locusts.”
During my sojourn in Germany, a daily comfort was having drivers slow down when they saw me on the curb waiting to cross the street. They would stop at a safe distance and gesture for me to go first. I reciprocated with a nod and smile. They would usually then nod and smile back. Such subtle exchanges of unspoken human feelings were heart-warming, and could offer an antidote to the road-rage which many suffer from.
Show some consideration
Why can’t we in Shanghai put ourselves in the shoes of others, thinking of cyclists and pedestrians as our parents, friends and colleagues? Would we still honk at them? Probably not.
Like my readers, I’m rather skeptical about whether my article will drive any sense of civility into the minds of many petulant motorists. Nonetheless, I do not think the Chinese are a hopelessly selfish people, and the very first step toward moderating selfishness would be to tolerate other road users as we do our parents and children.
To cite a cliched saying, don’t do to others what you wouldn’t want for yourself. We are drivers, but we are pedestrians and cyclists too, and as pedestrians and cyclists we certainly don’t like to be harassed by angry horns and threatening behavior. Empathy is important.
By extension, empathy doesn’t just apply to pedestrians and cyclists, but to all kinds of emergency vehicles, such as fire engines and ambulances. Despite their blaring sirens, it’s not unusual to see ambulances being blocked by a column of vehicles.
While police have been intensifying their crackdown on motorists who fail to yield to pedestrians, it is technically impossible to install a surveillance camera at every intersection just to ensure compliance. What works better than law enforcement is public spiritedness, and that can perhaps be nurtured through a better awareness of empathy.
Shanghai has spent millions of dollars sprucing up its infrastructure and broadcasting its publicity films abroad, but what’s the point of these costly endeavors if the rudeness of local drivers is what people really remember?
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