Which side of the road to drive on?

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Originally Posted by blitz

International shipping rules are right hand side which means to me it would make sense to be the same as that

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Indeed. Need to remember to keep right in the boat. Though i suspect a lot of people forgot that after they got their boat licence - either that or they don't have one.

I read somewhere that we travel on the left so you could use your right hand to draw your sword & then had it in the hand that was on the same side as an attacker may be?
Jonesfam

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Originally Posted by JDNSW

Keeping to the right or left when passing oncoming traffic was not formalised until the eighteenth century (Romans almost certainly had rules about it, but these did not persist after the collapse of the Roman empire).

However, in continental Europe, coaches generally kept right, as horses were controlled by postillion riders on the left hand horses (so their right, whip, hand was over the other horses.

English coaches were usually controlled from a seat on the front of the coach, usually on the right so that the right hand was on the brake, so coaches generally kept to the left. In both cases it was so that the drivers were closest to each other.

The first formalisation of the rules on any national scale was by Napoleon, to smooth the movement of military traffic. And since he at some stage ruled virtually all of continental Europe, the rules were applied throughout Europe, and Napoleon specified keep right, simply on the basis of what was already most common. Britain followed suit, but somewhat later (and after the American colonies became independent). The USA probably adopted keep right in imitation of the French, with whom they had close relations in the early years, and possibly just to be different to Britain.

The rules had little impact on most people until motor traffic became more common early in the twentieth century - at a top speed of perhaps 10kph, dodging the wrong way would have rarely had serious consequences. By this time most of the world had come under the influence of colonial powers, with France, Holland, Germany, Belgium etc and their colonies driving on the right, and Britain and most of their empire driving on the left (Canada probably copied their near neighbour, but the French influence may have been significant). Japan looked to Britain for much of their inspiration in the last quarter of the nineteenth century, probably explaining why they drive on the left, similarly for Thailand, although their proximity to British colonies in Burma and Malaya may also be an influence.

Also worth noting that up until about 1920 it was not accepted as a solid rule that the driver was on the right for keep left and vice versa. In fact, driver on the kerb side of the vehicle was sometimes considered an advantage in some luxury cars, as it enabled the chauffeur to move more quickly to open the kerb side door after stopping. (One example was most Pierce Arrow cars in the USA were RHD until about then)

John

John

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John. Your version has some significant discrepancies with the (reasonably well sourced) version on wikipedia.

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Originally Posted by wikipedia

History

In 1998, archaeologists found a well-preserved track leading to a Roman quarry near Swindon, England. The grooves in the road on the left side (viewed facing down the track away from the quarry) were much deeper than those on the right side. These grooves suggest that the Romans drove on the left, at least in this location, since carts would exit the quarry heavily loaded, and enter it empty.[4]

Some historians, such as C. Northcote Parkinson, believed that ancient travellers on horseback generally rode on the left side of the road. As more people are right-handed, a horseman would thus be able to hold the reins with his left hand and keep his right hand free'to offer in friendship to passing riders or to defend himself with a sword, if necessary.[41]

Traditionally one leads a horse or a horse and cart from the right. This allows the person leading the horse to hold the harness with his/her left and console the horse with the right. It also allows the man to walk on the better drained and less muddy crown of the road. If a wagonner is seated on a wagon and uses a whip, he will hold the whip in the right hand. Driving on the left allows the whip to swing freely and not get snagged in the hedges etc. bordering a road.

The history of the keep-left rule can be tracked back to ancient Greece, Egypt and Rome, and was more widely practised than right-side traffic. Ancient Greeks, Egyptians and Romans adhered to the left side while marching their troops. If two men riding on horseback were to start a fight, each would edge toward the left. Thus, they would be able to draw swords from their right and uphold a defensive position. Eventually, this turned into custom, and later, a law.[42] The keep-left rule was doubtless well-established in ancient Rome because of congestion in the city. In the city of Rome, rules banned wagons and chariots during the day; in other parts of the Empire wheeled traffic was banned during the night, so as not to disturb citizens from sleep.[43] Pilgrims who wished to visit the city were instructed to keep to the left side of the road. By the time the Pope ordered instructions to keep left of the road, this rule was already widely used.[43] The regulation has been practised by some countries ever since.

There is a popular story that Napoleon changed the rule of the road in the European countries he conquered from keep-left to keep-right. Some justifications are symbolic, such as that Napoleon himself was left- (or right-) handed, or that Britain, Napoleon's enemy, kept left. Alternatively, troops passing on the left may have been tempted to raise their right fists against each other. Forcing them to pass on the right reduced conflict. Hence, island nations such as Britain and Japan (using ships to move troops around and having less need to move them overland) continued to drive on the left.[44]

In the late 18th century, the shift from left to right that took place in countries such as the United States was based on teamsters? use of large freight wagons pulled by several pairs of horses. The wagons had no driver's seat, so a postilion sat on the left rear horse and held his whip in his right hand. Seated on the left, the driver preferred that other wagons pass him on the left so that he could be sure to keep clear of the wheels of oncoming wagons.[45] He did that by driving on the right side of the road.[41]

Decisions by countries to drive on the right typically center on regional uniformity. There are historical exceptions, such as postilion riders in France, but such historical advantages do not apply to modern road vehicles.
Change to right-hand traffic
This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (January 2009)
Europe

In the UK, keeping to the left was an ancient custom. The first legal reference in Britain to an order for traffic to keep to the left was in 1756 with regard to London Bridge.[43] The General Highways Act of 1773 contained a recommendation that horse traffic should keep to the left[46] and this was incorporated in the Highway Act 1835.[47][48] The making of a rule was due to the increase in horse traffic by the end of the 18th century. By 1771, the number of coaches rose from 300 in 1639 to 1,000.[43] Countries that became part of the British Empire adopted the British keep-left rule; some have since changed.

In Russia, in 1709, the Danish envoy under Peter I noted the widespread custom for traffic in Russia to pass on the right. On 5 February 1752, Empress Elizabeth issued an edict for traffic to keep to the right in Russian cities.[26]

In Continental Europe, driving on the right is associated with France and Napoleon Bonaparte. During the French Revolution, a decree of 1792 created a uniform traffic law, requiring traffic to keep to the "common" right. A little later, Napoleon consolidated this position by ordering the military to stay on the right side, even when out of the country, so that everyone who met the French army had to concede the way. In the early 19th century, those countries occupied by or allied to Napoleon ? the Netherlands, Switzerland, Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain ? adopted right-hand traffic. Britain, Sweden, Austria-Hungary and Portugal continued or adopted left-hand traffic. In Denmark, the keep-right rule was adopted in Copenhagen in 1758, and the rule was adopted for the rest of Denmark in 1793. In Belgium, before 1899 there was no uniform system, with some places driving on the left and others on the right. On 1 August 1899, Belgium changed to right-hand traffic throughout the country.[49]

There was a movement in the 20th century towards harmonisation of laws in Europe and there has been a gradual shift from driving on the left to the right. Portugal changed to right-hand traffic in 1928, though the change did not apply to all its overseas territories. Those parts of Italy not already driving on the right changed over in the 1920s after Benito Mussolini came to power. In Spain, there was no uniform national rule until the 1930s. Before then, some parts had driving on the right (e.g., Barcelona) while in others it was on the left (e.g., Madrid). On 1 October 1924, Madrid changed to driving on the right. The Austro-Hungarian Empire drove on the left. Successor countries switched to the right separately. Austria did it in stages, beginning from the west: Vorarlberg in 1919, Tirol and western half of Salzburg in 1930, Carinthia and East Tirol in 1935, Upper Austria, Styria, eastern half of Salzburg in 1 June 1938, and Lower Austria in 19 September 1938. Poland's Galicia switched to the right around 1924. Czechoslovakia planned to start driving on the right on 1 May 1939, but the change in Bohemia and Moravia took place under German occupation: Bohemia: 17 March 1939, Prague: 26 March. (See switch to right-hand traffic in Czechoslovakia for details.) Hungary also acted later than planned: the government planned for a change in June 1939, but postponed it and finally introduced it on 6 July 1941 (outside Budapest), and on 9 November 1941 in Budapest. Sweden changed in 1967 and Iceland did the same in 1968. In Europe only four countries still drive on the left: the United Kingdom, Ireland, Malta and Cyprus, as well as the British Crown Dependencies of Jersey, Guernsey and the Isle of Man.

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I'm afraid Wikipedia does not impress me at all, My info comes from professional eye doctors that treated my son's eye problems.
Simple test to see which eye is dominant, if you're right handed shut your right eye and point at an object, open both eyes and the object you're pointing at will stay inline with what you are pointing at. So we do have a dominant eye as well as a dominant hand, regardless of what some dick on Wiki says, regards Frank.

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Originally Posted by isuzurover

Sorry Frank but you are wrong:



Even if what you stated was true, would that mean that left handed people get to drive on the right to avoid discrimination?

This page has a good history of why we have the current situation:
Right- and left-hand traffic - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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Originally Posted by Tank

I'm afraid Wikipedia does not impress me at all, My info comes from professional eye doctors that treated my son's eye problems.
Simple test to see which eye is dominant, if you're right handed shut your right eye and point at an object, open both eyes and the object you're pointing at will stay inline with what you are pointing at. So we do have a dominant eye as well as a dominant hand, regardless of what some dick on Wiki says, regards Frank.

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Sorry but you are still wrong despite what you and some random eye doctor say.

The most current research paper I can find on the topic - which is a meta analysis of all previous research, plus another relevant one from 2013 showing eye preference varies depending on the situation:

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Handedness and Eye-dominance: A Meta-analysis of Their Relationship
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DOI:
10.1080/713754206

D.C. Bourassa

pages 5-34
Publishing models and article dates explained

Published online: 15 Oct 2010

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Abstract

About one in ten people is left-handed and one in three is left-eyed. The extent of the association of handedness and eyedness is unclear, as some eyedness measures are potentially contaminated by measures of handedness. A meta-analysis of hand-eye concordance in 54,087 subjects from 54 populations, found that concordance was 2.69 ? greater in questionnaire rather than performance studies, 1.95 ? greater in studies using unimanual monocular performance measures, and 6.29 ? greater in studies using non-sighting measures of eye-dominance. In the remaining studies, which seemed to show no evidence of bias, the odds-ratio for hand-eye concordance was 2.53 ?; in a population with 9.25% left-handedness and 36.53% left-eyedness, 34.43% of right-handers and 57.14% of left-handers are left-eyed. This pattern of hand-eye association poses problems for genetic models of cerebral lateralisation, which must invoke pleiotropic alleles at a single locus or epistatic interactions between multiple loci. There was no evidence that the incidence of eyedness, or the association between eyedness and handedness, differed between the sexes.

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Cortex
Volume 49, Issue 9, October 2013, Pages 2542-2552
Looking at eye dominance from a different angle: Is sighting strength related to hand preference? (Article)

Carey, D.P.a , Hutchinson, C.V.b

a School of Psychology, Bangor University, Gwynedd LL57 2AS, United Kingdom
b School of Psychology, University of Leicester, Henry Wellcome Building, Leicester, United Kingdom
View references (68)
Abstract

Sighting dominance (the behavioural preference for one eye over the other under monocular viewing conditions) has traditionally been thought of as a robust individual trait. However, Khan and Crawford (2001) have shown that, under certain viewing conditions, eye preference reverses as a function of horizontal gaze angle. Remarkably, the reversal of sighting from one eye to the other depends on which hand is used to reach out and grasp the target. Their procedure provides an ideal way to measure the strength of monocular preference for sighting, which may be related to other indicators of hemispheric specialisation for speech, language and motor function. Therefore, we hypothesised that individuals with consistent side preferences (e.g., right hand, right eye) should have more robust sighting dominance than those with crossed lateral preferences. To test this idea, we compared strength of eye dominance in individuals who are consistently right or left sided for hand and foot preference with those who are not. We also modified their procedure in order to minimise a potential image size confound, suggested by Banks etal. (2004) as an explanation of Khan and Crawford's results. We found that the sighting dominance switch occurred at similar eccentricities when we controlled for effects of hand occlusion and target size differences. We also found that sighting dominance thresholds change predictably with the hand used. However, we found no evidence for relationships between strength of hand preference as assessed by questionnaire or by pegboard performance and strength of sighting dominance. Similarly, participants with consistent hand and foot preferences did not show stronger eye preference as assessed using the Khan and Crawford procedure. These data are discussed in terms of indirect relationships between sighting dominance, hand preference and cerebral specialisation for language and motor control. ? 2013 Elsevier Ltd.

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I am biased to being left handed but I am highly ambidextrous. My dominant eye is my left but I can shoot using either eye. Just goes to show how confused I am.

I have the situation of writing left handed but being more naturally right handed at some things and ambidextrous at others. I can kick a soccer ball with either foot but I can only kick an Aussie rules ball right footed. I could play darts, pool, golf, cricket batting etc with either hand but can only throw a ball right handed. So I don't really have a dominant side. Was great when I did martial arts though.

continuing... bowl,play tennis, write. l.h. Basically anything I use one hand for I am l/h. However I am right handed if I have to use two hands. Tools..either hand which is great for tight spots. I said I was confused. Jim:D:D:D

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Originally Posted by jx2mad

continuing... bowl,play tennis, write. l.h. Basically anything I use one hand for I am l/h. However I am right handed if I have to use two hands. Tools..either hand which is great for tight spots. I said I was confused. Jim:D:D:D

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My SWMBO is the same. She does most common things left handed like writing, ironing etc.

Yet when it comes to sport if she plays table tennis or tennis it is in the left hand. If playing cricket it would be left hand bowling and RH batting.

Golf is also RH.

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Originally Posted by jx2mad

continuing... bowl,play tennis, write. l.h. Basically anything I use one hand for I am l/h. However I am right handed if I have to use two hands. Tools..either hand which is great for tight spots. I said I was confused. Jim:D:D:D

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My SWMBO is the same. She does most common things left handed like writing, ironing etc.

Yet when it comes to sport if she plays table tennis or tennis it is in the left hand. If playing cricket it would be left hand bowling and RH batting.

Golf is also RH.

As a side note. Bad news for you mollydookerers. LH people have a shorter life span than RH people.