Look Both Ways!

[Conor Dary]

Apparently the problem of not looking both ways is not isolated to London, or a recent phenomenon.

• The British have a history of being unlucky on American shores, and in the winter of 1931, Winston S. Churchill was no exception. Alighting from a cab on Fifth Avenue on the Upper East Side, Churchill, accustomed to his home country’s driving conventions, looked right on the then-two way avenue when he should have looked left.
  
  He was hit, dragged and tossed into the street by a car rushing by.
  
  Churchill spent two weeks in the hospital. But it was not all bad: Instead of continuing on the lecture tour, said his granddaughter, Celia Sandys, he received, to his delight, a prescription for medicinal alcohol. (It was during Prohibition.) He then took a recuperative trip to the Bahamas.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/20/nyreg ... .html?_r=1

[tandfman]

Re: Look Both Ways!

In London, at most intersections, there are big "Look Left" or "Look Right" signs painted in the crosswalk to remind auslanders (mainly USAnians and Continentals) what to do.

Those cautions really are helpful. The closest I've ever come to stepping into traffic by looking the wrong way was in Japan. Very scary.

[Conor Dary]

Re: Look Both Ways!

In London, at most intersections, there are big "Look Left" or "Look Right" signs painted in the crosswalk to remind auslanders (mainly USAnians and Continentals) what to do.

Those cautions really are helpful. The closest I've ever come to stepping into traffic by looking the wrong way was in Japan. Very scary.

While you were hobnobbing during the Olympics in London, we had a discussion on that very same topic!

The article today in the NYTimes reminded me of that thread.

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=47606&p=778995&

[tandfman]

Re: Look Both Ways!

While you were hobnobbing during the Olympics in London . . .

It was a dark and lonely job, but dammit, somebody had to do it.