Sunday, April 26, 2009
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Today I have found out why England drives on the other side of the road.
In small-is-beautiful England, though, they didn't use monster wagons that required the driver to ride a horse; instead the guy sat on a seat mounted on the wagon. What's more, he usually sat on the right side of the seat so the whip wouldn't hang up on the load behind him when he flogged the horses. (Then, as now, most people did their flogging right-handed.) So the English continued to drive on the left... Keeping left first entered English law in 1756, with the enactment of an ordinance governing traffic on the London Bridge, and ultimately became the rule throughout the British Empire. It extended the rule in 1772 to towns in Scotland. The penalty for disobeying the law was 20 shillings. the UK Government introduced the General Highways Act of 1773, containing a keep left recommendation to regulate horse traffic. This became law as part of the Highways Bill in 1835.
In small-is-beautiful England, though, they didn't use monster wagons that required the driver to ride a horse; instead the guy sat on a seat mounted on the wagon. What's more, he usually sat on the right side of the seat so the whip wouldn't hang up on the load behind him when he flogged the horses. (Then, as now, most people did their flogging right-handed.) So the English continued to drive on the left... Keeping left first entered English law in 1756, with the enactment of an ordinance governing traffic on the London Bridge, and ultimately became the rule throughout the British Empire. It extended the rule in 1772 to towns in Scotland. The penalty for disobeying the law was 20 shillings. the UK Government introduced the General Highways Act of 1773, containing a keep left recommendation to regulate horse traffic. This became law as part of the Highways Bill in 1835.
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