Interesting Maps

Don’t think I’ve ever seen a red light from a lighthouse. Need to get out more…..

What side of the road cars drive on . As you can see, the only places that drive on the right in general, are where the brits were.

Left hand drive is red

Oh and Japan, but in general most of the world drive on the left.

British Empire also abided by this law. This is why countries such as India, Australia, and the former British colonies in Africa keep left as well. But why does Japan keep to the left?

That article is mixing up its right and left

That would work fine 🙂

Best explanation I ever heard was this: The Romans drove the chariots on the left, so as to shake hands and show they were not holding a weapon. Fair enough.

In the late Middle Ages the French developed large carts which were pulled by a team of 6-8 oxen, sometimes more. These were efficteively the trucks or artics of their day and were responsible for a lot of trade.

They were driven by a man sitting on the back left ox (the oxen were in pairs). They sat on the back left as most of them were right handed and it was easier to control the reins like this.

If they ever met each other on the road then they passed on the right. This was, due to them sitting on the left they could see a lot better if they were going to touch carts or not. So they typically stayed on the right and smaller, faster carts and horses took to passing on the left.

Napoleon standardised this to make it easier for his armies and to avoid confusion.

No idea how true it is, but it made sense to me when I heard it.