Samoans not using left-hand drive training area
Updated
Drivers in Samoa don't seem to be using a special area of the capital, Apia, set aside to help train them for the switch from driving on the right hand side of the road and the Editor of the Samoa Observer, Mataafa Keni Lesa, says it's confusing using the special driving course. In six months, Samoa is changing from driving on the right, as they do in the United States, to the left, to accommodate cars imported from Australia and New Zealand.
Presenter Bruce Hill
Speaker: Editor of the Samoa Observer Mataafa Keni Lesa
- Listen:
- Windows Media
LESA: They've allocated the entire sports complex for what they called practicing, so now they have put up a set of lights and arrows pointing towards the different directions. It takes less than five minutes to get around the whole complex, but if you go in there it is like your driving in Australia and New Zealand and when you come out, you're back in America. I can tell you it's quite confusing. Many times there are hardly any car up there, so I don't think people want to be part of it. They other thing they have done is they have started widening the roads in town, they have started to slow the expansion project. It's been held up by a few legal issues here and there, but preparations are well underway.
HILL: Why do the roads need to be widened, simply for a change of which side of the road you drive on?
LESA: I think one of the reasons behind the switch is the fact that the Government is encouraging more people in New Zealand to send their relatives some cars in Samoa, so we are expecting more vehicles over the next 10-15 years.
HILL: Well, how many cars actually have the proper right hand drive to drive on the left hand side of the road, and how many still have the old left hand drive?
LESA: Ever since the government reintroduced right hand drives, this was last February I think, just over 1,000 cars have arrived from New Zealand and Australia. At the moment, the number of cars on our roads in Samoa number, left hand drive cars, there are about some 17,000 cars. So when the switch over happens on 7th September, we expect at least 17,000 cars to be driving on the wrong side of the road and may be if luck is on our way could be at least 3,000 right hand drive cars.
HILL: So in fact, you'll have almost all the drivers in Samoa will be not on the side of the car that is in the middle of the road, next to where the other cars are, but on the side of the road. So it won't be easy for them to judge how close they are to the oncoming traffic?
LESA: No, it won't be very easy. Just imagine driving on the wrong side in Australia and you will know what it will be like here.
HILL: Have there been any accidents as a result of this here? Have people sort of said I got confused about what side of the road I was supposed to be driving on?
LESA: No, not that we've heard of, but that's one of the fears of course. People are expecting a lot of accidents when the switch over happens. But from the government perspective, this is why they have introduced this practice, so people can get used to it. And they have also started advertising campaign on television where they are starting to screen ads and newspaper advertising about the whole switch, about the simple lessons, about where you should look when you turn.
HILL: So are you expecting any accidents when the switch over happens?
LESA: I'm hoping not, but I am not ruling them out.
HILL: Are you going to be doing anything special around about that time or on that day?
LESA: I think I'll be staying home to be safe. (laughs)
