Clash Of The Titans

I was on the bus with the little chick and I saw something that I'm sure must be rather common, but it's the first time I came across it. It was a bus driver chewing out a taxi driver.

Now the traffic laws in Geneva are, shall we say, sporadically enforced. But things happen in degrees.

Pedestrians don't follow any rules. In a lot of ways, this makes sense, since the whole traffic flow is based around them. They pretty much walk where they want, when they want, and it's not unusual to see people just walking out to cross a busy 4 or even 6-lane street, expecting that everyone will stop for them, because people do.

Bikes are only slightly better than pedestrians. Red lights mean nothing to them... when they get to an intersection, they tend to just take a look around and keep right on going. As a pedestrian, I can tell you they're tricky - since they don't obey red lights and you can't hear them coming, they can be tough to avoid, even when you're walking with a green light.

Scooters kind of obey lights. If they are going to get around them, they don't usually just run them - they will go up on the sidewalk at a red light, go across the pedestrian crossing, and continue from the sidewalk on the other side. They don't like lanes, but when I am driving, I'm usually quite content to have them zip through... at least that means it's one less car waiting at a 3-second green light in front of me.

Buses are a nightmare. They generally disregard the rules and just assume they have the right of way. If they're signaling, they don't wait for much of a break before pulling out. Even at pedestrian crossings, if I don't step out and walk in front of them, they will never stop, even though I have the right of way. And when I do step out, they often appear rather pissed off. Probably because they had to slam on the brakes to stop, probably because they were not planning on obeying the law and I surprised them. So I'm not a big fan of buses.

Taxis... well, taxis all over the world are the same, I think. They have this idea that, since they drive a lot, the rules that apply to everyone else shouldn't really apply to them. They will drive in the turning lane to force their way at the last moment into the one going straight, rather than sitting in line with everyone else. And I remember taxi drivers in Calgary one time protesting that they should have different fines for traffic violations since they're always on the road and their livelihood depends on them being able to keep their license and pay their insurance (which, there, goes up as you collect infractions). Kind of like lowering the penalties for bank robberies for people who work in a bank. I mean, around all that money every day, who can expect them not to slip up once in a while? Except that when a bank employee decides to rob the bank, people aren't quite as likely to die as when taxi decides to run a red.

And then there are the regular cars, who, for the most part, drive pretty well. Certainly, there are more cars on the road than anything else, but the vast majority of the problems are caused by other people.

So it was pretty interesting to see a bus, signaling and then pulling out even though there wasn't space for him, being honked at by a taxi who was half in the lane of the oncoming traffic, to be honked back at by the bus who then proceeded to see how close he could get to the taxi's rear bumper until he pulled beside him at a light, rolled down his window, and started to explain to him how things are supposed to work.

Only problem was, I couldn't tell who I should be rooting for. Tough call, that.