Ready Reference Files

Driving -- Right Side of the Road

Why do people in some countries drive on the right side of the road and others on the left? According to RQ, Spring, 1984, two explanations have been offered. Carol Greene, the author of Enchantment of the World: England, stated that the British way of driving on the left side of the road is a carryover from the days when men rode horseback and used swords. In a combat situation, the sword was drawn from the left side and wielded on the right. Apparently, when automobiles were invented, the custom of staying on the left persisted.

Another explanation of this practice derives from the use of horse-drawn vehicles. To pass each other on the narrow roads, the driver positioned his vehicle so that he could see the edges of the vehicles, especially the hubs of the wheels that projected and were most likely to snag each other. Continental practice was to have two or four horse teams driven by postilions, i.e., a rider sitting on the lead horse and controlling it directly with reins. In order to have optimal control, the postilion sat on the left leader, as most people are right-handed and the postilion would have been in control of the other horse on his right. The postilion would therefore have a poor view looking back over his team and any vehicle to his right, but a good view of any vehicle on his left. Therefore Continental (particularly French) practice was for vehicles approaching each other to take the right side of the road. British stagecoach teams, on the other hand, were invariably driven by a man from the top of the vehicle at the front. His position would seem to be less critical, but practice seems always to have been that he sat on the right side and had a good view of the side of his own vehicle if approaching vehicles passed on that side. Hence English practice was to pass on the left, i.e., to take the left side of the road. British practice was invariably followed in empire countries, and still is in India and many other South Asian countries. Canada did not change from left to right rule of the road until the 1920s. Sweden seems to have been the exception to the Continental rule, as it drove to the left until the 1960s or 1970s.

Source: RQ Spring, 1984.

Verified by: GM, 5/98

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