Driving in Manila for Foreigners - Tip # 5: Forget the concept of having "the right of way".

In most countries, there are existing rules of the road and driving etiquette. For the most part, drivers follow the rules and maintain some semblance of order. This includes the notion of having "the right of way" in certain driving situation when interacting with other drivers on the road. Now, the concept of having "the right of way" is a simple one. For example, at an intersection where there are cars trying to cross, generally the right of way belongs to the vehicle that arrived at the intersection first. Once that car traverses the intersection the right of way then transfers to the car that arrived at the intersection after the first car. Simple, fair and effective.

However, this is Manila; where nothing is simple, fair nor effective. To drive the streets of Manila successfully you'll need to completely throw out the notion of someone having the right of way. There is no right of way here. If you assume that you have the right of way in a given situation where you would have the right of way in a different country, you'll be quickly testing the strength of the bumpers, fenders, or other body panels of your car.

Here in Manila, you make your own right of way. I like to refer to it as imparting your will on other drivers through the calculated use of your vehicle. You don't wait for other people to let you in or allow you to go. You make it so they almost have no choice but to allow you to proceed. How do I mean that? Say you're on a smaller cross street that intersects a larger street and you need to make a left across traffic onto that larger street. If you wait for an opening, or for another driver to let you in you'll be waiting for a long, LONG time. No one here is just going to let you in on their own accord. So, what do you do? Basically, you'll inch your car forward little by little as cars pass until the point where the oncoming car has no choice but to stop and let you go or they risk a collision. Once they stop to let you in, you'll have to do the same to any other lanes of traffic that you need to cross or merge into.

Sounds crazy, right? Well, that's how other people will drive here and this is how you must drive here as well to survive. And despite the perceived chaos and insanity here there actually IS some semblance of order or a "way" that people drive here. Take this exact instance as a good example of this "order" as well. After you "make your right of way" in the above example, the other drivers that have been forced to stop will typically wait and let the cars that may be behind you to go for a bit as well as a kind of "courtesy" instead of bullying back in once you have gone. See, driver's in Manila aren't that cutthroat.

So like I said...do away with the notion of "right of way". Here you have to grab the bull by the horns and make it your right of way. Just remember that other drivers will be trying to do this as well. As long as you keep some balance between your aggressiveness and defensiveness like I mentioned in my previous post, you should be perfectly fine.

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Driving in Manila for Foreigners - Tip #4: Driving in Manila requires BALANCE.

The previous posts in this series have dealt mainly with some pre-requisite information needed to drive here. But now it's time to get down to the nitty gritty of info you'll need to successfully navigate an automobile around the streets of Manila. The first piece of nitty gritty advice I can give you is that successfully driving here requires a delicate balance of driving with extreme offense and extreme defense. The BALANCE is the important part here. Excessive defensiveness and it'll likely take you forever to get anywhere (remember from the first post in this series that my definition of a "successful" drive includes a "minimal amount of time" factor). Excessive offensiveness and you'll likely end up in a test of bumpers with a Passenger Jeepney, or worse...one of the excessive number of huge buses whose drivers wield their people-carrying behemoths as if they were whipping around the city in a small Toyota Vios. Trust me, that is one test that you will fail.

So balance is the key word. With time and experience in Manila you'll learn how to pick and choose your battles. You'll learn when to push and when to back down. You'll learn what you can and can't do. Much of my own personal "education" about driving in Manila came from the first few months after we moved here. During that time, we only had one car so our hired driver would have to drive me to and from work in Makati; about a 30 minute to 1 hour drive each way depending on traffic. Whenever he drove me around, I paid close attention to how he drove and how other people drove to get a feel for what was and wasn't "acceptable" here. To get a feel for what to expect from other drivers, and what other drivers would expect from me.  

In hindsight, our driver at the time was pretty skilled. Unfortunately, he didn't really grasp the idea of balance though. He leaned a little more on the offensive/aggressive side and that eventually resulted in a fender bender with a Mitsubishi Montero Sport. So the moral of the story here is that balance is definitely key. If you can find the happy balance between offensive and defensive driving you'll be well on your way to "successfully" driving in Manila.
 

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Driving in Manila for Foreigners - Tip #3: Know your car & it's capabilities.

In the last installment of this series, I talked about the use of horns and the headlight flash on the streets of Manila. That was pre-requisite knowledge to actually driving here. Well, in this post i'll point out what I think is another pre-requisite to driving successfully in Manila; Having intimate knowledge of your car's dimensions and capabilities. Let me explain.

In Tip #1 of this series, I talked about redefining your definition of "personal space". This is mainly due to the fact that other cars can be mere inches away from one another. This minimum amount of space requires you to have a VERY keen sense of the size of your car, it's turning radius, and what it is capable of. Daily, I witness people that don't have a good grasp of their car's size, etc and they are more timid with their turns and with their decision making when driving their car around Manila. Well, I hate to break it to you bud, but Manila is NOT the place to be timid. They're afraid to finish a turn or make a move because they think they're close to hitting another car when in fact they have plenty of room to do so safely. Instead, they stop and wait for things to clear up or even worse, they try to back up to make more room and further block traffic. What's the net result of this lack of knowledge of their car's size and capabilities? Increased travel time as well as increased traffic which affects everyone.

In addition to just the sheer dimensions of your car, I also mentioned it's capabilities. This includes things like it's turning radius. If you know the turning radius of you car well, you'll know if you can safely clear a turn or not...even with a very small margin for error. This allows you to make the snap judgements that are necessary while driving that will help you get through the horrendous Manila traffic quickly and safely.

Aside from just the front turning radius, a big thing to keep in mind is also the turning radius of the REAR tires of your car. This is a necessity in driving pretty much anywhere in the world, but it is even more important in places like Manila with less margin for error. So keep this in mind: that when you turn your car, the rear tires will naturally take a shallower arch than the front tires. Check out the image to the right. The red line is the path taken by the front tires and the green line is the path taken by the rear tires. It's just the physics of a car that steers from the front wheels. This is also more pronounced the bigger and longer the wheelbase of the car. So, while your front may clear the turn you're trying to make, the rear may not. This is the reason that a lot of people curb their rear wheels when navigating street turns. They are only paying attention to the arch of the front wheels and not the shallower arch that the rear wheels will take. So, this may require you to take a wider, but sharper turn with your front wheels so that the rear clears safely.

So what's the moral of the story here? Know your car and know it WELL. Knowing your car well will go a long way in helping you drive in Manila "successfully". And again, by "successfully" I mean safely, without incident, and in the minimum amount of time possible.

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