Splitting Hairs

On our daily travel from home to our usual destinations, we are often witness to mopeds snaking in and out of lanes to get ahead of everyone else.  While our badly outdated traffic laws (approved circa 1973) say nothing about lane splitting, this does not mean that what they are doing is perfectly legal.  In fact, I know of five good reasons why lane splitting should be banned.

First, there’s the side mirror incident.  Every so often, we hear a slight thud and notice that our side mirrors have suddenly angled itself out of position.  And at that same instance, you meet one of the two nitwit brothers.  You either meet the apologetic nitwit, who will smile and profusely apologize for having nipped your side mirror while he was recklessly snaking his way through traffic (and all the while trying desperately to fix your side mirror).  Or you meet the cowardly nitwit.  The one who couldn’t care less at what he’s done and would sprint away knowing that we were too concerned about our side mirrors to jot down or take a pic of the license plate of his moped, if he had any at all.  If scooters and mopeds stayed in line like every other intelligent human being, there wouldn’t be any misaligned or broken side mirrors.

Second, the blind side.  Regardless of make and model, our mirrors cannot cover the full width of either side of our vehicles.  When we change lanes, we glance at our mirrors then proceed to our planned action.  And as we execute this manoeuvre, out of sight a moped would suddenly appear inches beside us and block the lane we initially planned to transfer to.  The more agile of driver would easily be able to manoeuvre and avoid contact.  The unlucky ones end up with rash marks on the side of their vehicles courtesy of these reckless scooter drivers.

Third, oops.  Many times as we are stuck in traffic, we suddenly feel a thud on the back or sides of our vehicles and see one or maybe both of the nitwit brothers having misjudged the gap between vehicles and ended up kissing our bodywork.  And being the nitwits that they are, they will act like everything is fine and we don’t mind them denting a fender or a bumper.  Now, if it were the other way around, I am pretty sure they’d call us reckless for nudging them from behind while traffic is at a standstill.

Fourth, botched starts.  I am sure you’ve been there many times.  You’re sitting behind the solid line at the intersection waiting for the light to turn green when a twit on a scooter snakes his way in front of your vehicle and sits his bike on the pedestrian lane (which is illegal, by the way).  When the light turns green, you shift gears, press on the gas pedal, lift your clutch then, slam on the brake hard.  The reason for the sudden stop, the twit in front managed to bungle his start and killed his engine.  Now, if this twit on two wheels hadn’t been there in front, you’d have been on your merry way.  Sadly, this twit had seen Moto GP earlier today and thought he was one of them.  And sadly, balked.

Fifth, zombie enforcers.  Since our traffic and law enforcers are like brainless zombies since they are so inept at enforcing traffic laws, it is best to lessen the possible scenarios they have to interpret by removing lane splitting entirely.  I have heard one too many times that everytime a traffic collision occurs between a four-wheeled vehicle and a scooter, our enforcers always say that it is the fault of the four-wheeled vehicle because “motor man gud, sir!”  What kind of reasoning is that?  And what road rules and regulations handbook says so?

Unless anyone can come up with, at least, six reasons why we should allow lane splitting, then I strongly suggest that some city legislator pull out our aging traffic ordinance and amend it by making lane splitting illegal.