When I was a wee lad, my mom always told me to step to the right when meeting someone. By that, I mean that if you are alking down a hallway, aisle, sidewalk, whatever, and come upon a fellow traveller going the opposite way, a polite gentleman moves to the right, allowing the other person to pass. If the other person does the same, both people can mumble pleasantries as they pass unmolested.
Now, it is well known that the British drive their cars on the left side of the road. Does this fact translate to walking? If I am strolling in Nottinghamshire, should I move left when approaching an oncoming pedestrian?
You see, next time I can’t get past someone, I need to know how I should react. Should I welcome the visiting Brit to our wonderful Texas or should I curse the lout’s illmannered upbringing?
BTW, isn’t it great to have a forum such as this for such utterly pointless, yet oddly maddening questions? I have taken great comfort in knowing that I am not the only one who muses about such trivial things.
I can confirm that there is no such pedestrian etiquette in Britain. You are, however, required by law to sneer superciliously at any backpack-bearing brethren from our former colonies.
As an American living in Britain, I wondered the same thing. Although not quite universally true, I have found that walking patterns on streets and in stairwells do often mirror the drive-on-the-left format.
I think this is reinforced in places like the Underground, where traffic to and from transfer lines are controlled by signs which channel pedestrian flow via the left side.
However, since American films and TV shows are so pervasive, I have never encountered a Brit who got very “confused” by the traffic thing while Stateside; however, it’s very easy to forget for Americans while in the UK since most of the rest of Europe also drives on the right.
In short, the whole awkward how-do-I-get-around-him-do-I-turn-left-or-right? thing happens as often here as in the States when you’re dealing with a lot of foot traffic.
Where exactly do you live? My girlfriend lives in London, so I use the underground quite often. I’ve never seen such signs. There is, however, evidence to the contrary. The escalators all have signs saying “Stand Right, Walk Left”, or words to that effect.
I also remember reading about a study that went into walking behaviour in countries where traffic drives on the left. I think the conclusion was that humans have a natural tendency to keep right. I’ll try and look up a link…
Hmmm. Not really to the point, but this does explain how driving on the left originated, and why we (well, not all of us :D) switched to the right.
Sorry, no luck on that natural tendency to keep right. Anyone else?
i don’t know if it’s connected in any way, but in the military, it’s formal to walk on the left of your superior if walking together, mostly i think because it’s the superior officer that salutes oncoming superior officers, and we salute with our right hands. my thoughts on the connections were the superior officer/nco/enlisted on the right, stepping to the right. anyone?
I’m not a Brit, but we Kiwis also drive on the left and pedestrian flow tends to follow the same pattern.
I found on my first trip to the US that I kept trying to push open doors that pulled and vice versa… until I got used to the difference – I was automatically heading for the “exit” doors that pushed open from the other side.
My friend (also a Kiwi) and I got very odd looks from hotel staff as they watched us struggle to push the revolving door around the “wrong” way.
I recall the etiquette also used to require that a man walking with a lady/woman along the pavement (sidewalk) should walk on the outer (road) side. That was related to the idea that in ye olde days, people threw water (before plumbing) and other unmentionable’s out of upper floors of houses into the street but, in doing so, trying to arc it over the pavement.
Seems, if the thrower threw a little short, it was better if this landed on the ‘gentleman’ rather than the ‘lady’.
I’m rusty on this but don’t ships pass on the right - think it’s true for boats on the Thames.
We’re referring to two different things. Sure enough, escalator protocol dictates that standers are on the right, passers on the left. (Actually, Coldfire, how is that “evidence to the contrary”? That’s also promoting left-side traffic)
However, what I was referring to were the long tunnels that connect transfer lines within stations; these tunnels are divided by free-standing handrails, and there are signs above the passage entryways that say “No Entry” on the right (thus encouraging walking on the left). During London rush hour, this funnelling of traffic is essential. Also, in many of the busier Underground stations, the entryways down into the stations themselves are also divided by a handrail with the same “No Entry” sign on the right (though I’ll admit these are more commonly ignored).
I also ran into this problem in England–certainly a more visible way of looking like you don’t really belong there (though admittedly not as fatal as being mowed down by a double-decker coach because you looked the wrong way)
I think I agree with Coldfire that “stand right, walk left” on an escalator promotes right-side traffic, not left.
I always saw it as analogous to a “fast lane” (the walkers) and a “slow lane” (the standers), since they’re all actually moving (and facing) in the same direction. Since it seems customary for the slow lanes on a freeway to be on the outside, the pattern strikes me as being very similar to that of right-side driving. People used to driving on the right are also used to “passing on the left.”
On every moving sidewalk (usually in airports) that I can remember being on in the US, there were signs and/or recorded voices urging “stand right, walk left.” It felt totally natural to me, and in keeping with the general “feel” of right-side driving.
ArchiveGuy: what brad-d said. I think of it as a motorway situation, and then you’re actually “overtaking” on the left, because people are standing on the right.
I’ll pay more attention to the dividers you mention though. Come to think of it, I do recall some of those dividers on a few entry and exit staircases to a couple of underground stations. I guess you’re right.
FWIW, I try to keep left on London sidewalks since this seems the logical thing to do. However, in Notting Hill (where my girlfriend lives) there are so many tourists from all over that there really isn’t a proper side to keep to. It’s a mess! DAMN Hugh Grant, and DAMN Julia Roberts straight to hell
OK, I understand what you mean–though I don’t know if the Brits necessarily see it that way (analagous to right-side traffic) since the escalator is by definition one-way anyway (as are a lot of the streets in smaller towns).
But the other left-side traffic stuff in the Undeground still holds true, and in fact, when there’s congestion in the single-direction left lane, you’ll see those in a rush duck under the handrail and rush ahead in the “wrong” direction, which is analagous to their driving pattern of passing on the right.
Come to think of it, the left-side pattern is also true of the Underground turnstyles, since if you’ve got, say, ten in a row, the far left ones will be the ones you can access from your direction and the ones on the right are for opposing traffic. Actually, most of the public transit buses have an expanded doorway that is also divided by a post and two sets of steps–so those getting on to pay the driver (on the left) aren’t in the way of those exiting on the right…
I don’t know–was it better before the movie came out? Portabello Road was already a bit of a tourist magnet (it’s usually mentioned in most travel books for shopping) and I’m sure all those relatively inexpensive hotels in the area didn’t pop up in the last year.
As for What-the-hell? tourist traffic, the whole Strand-Trafalgar-Leicester-Piccadilly route I find to be more chaotic, both with the tourists and just the volume of people in general.
Those of you pondering this area of human behaviour might want to consider this. Supposedly a lot of human behaviour descended to us from eras when everyone went armed. I was reading about the Balkans where, in many areas, you will see a couple walking to town to go to the market and the woman is burdened down like a mule while the man walks empty handed. This tradition is because the man must constantly be ready to defend against attack. We shake hands with the right hand to prove we are unarmed. Spiral staircases are designed so the defending party upmost on the stairs has a fighting advantage. When approaching somebody, passing them on the right is less threatening because your weapon hand is away from them.
Oddly enough, many of our larger stores on Long Island (Supermarkets, discounters, etc.) have you enter the double doors on the left. What I mean is when there are clearly marked Entrance and Exit doors, the Entrance is often to the left of the Exit door. At first I thought this had to do with circulation patterns to/from the checkout counters, but there are quite a few instances where this does not seem to apply. Examples that come to my mind include Target, Pathmark, and K-mart stores in a number of areas.
I come to call it Kiwi style, since I visited New Zealand last year and found Apollyon’s statement to be mostly true (and yes, I did keep left on the hiking paths). Have no reason for it, though.
Thanks for all the responses. If I follow correctly, it sounds like if I’m ever in England, New Zealand, etc., I need to step left when approaching an oncoming pedestrian. Now I can rest at ease.
Thinking of large stores (WalMart, Target, etc.), the exit doors seem to be the ones closest to the checkstands. That way, the exiting traffic doesn’t cross the incoming traffic. Sometimes, that does lead to the traffic bearing left, but if the door is on the right-hand side of the building (from the outside), the entry doors will be on the right.
Driving on the wrong/right side of road
Here’s a little summary of an ‘experiment’ I ran while on my first visit to London…
*Hypothesis *
Here in Canada, where cars are driven on the right side of the road, I’ve noticed that pedestrians on busy sidewalks also follow this rule. I figured that maybe in the UK, people would favour the left side of the sidewalks, arising as a force of habit from their own driving standards.
*The Test *
I just did a simple count of 100 pedestrians each at four different busy sidewalks in downtown London, checking which side of the sidewalk they favoured, and noting how a ‘split’ would occur if paths were on a collision course (Ok, not much methodology here , this isn’t for a research paper or anything like that --shouldave been a double-blind study, etc…, but who would finance this kind of whimsical stuff???)
Results
Turns out pedestrians there also favour the right side, just like in Canada (or the U.S. and most of the world, for that matter). Additional evidence: signs in subway corridors and stairways advise people to keep to the right!
*Conclusion *
People in the UK are driving on the wrong side of the road! :eek:
I’m an ardent pedestrian lefty. Given that we drive on the left side of the road, it makes perfect sense to me to walk on the left of the pavement. This allows the person facing the oncoming traffic to judge if they can step into the road, if their shopping is sticking out too much, etc…
However, my fellow Brits largely seem to ignore this. In fact, assuming that they’ve consciously decided to walk on a specific side (which is by no means guaranteed), they seem to walk on the right more often than not.
Regarding tubes, there are times when you’ll be instructed to walk on the right (although left does seem to be the more frequent instruction).
I always thought that passing on escalators was to the left to enable the stationary people (especially those a bit wobbly on their feet) to hang on with their right and (9 times out of 10) stronger hand.
It’s so quiet where I live that I generally have the entire pavement to mself; the only time the issue arises is when I pass someone walking in the opposite direction; if the person in question is a lady or child, I will generally try to pass them on the side nearest the traffic (lest a horse should bolt and cause injury, or a passing carriage, lost in the fog, mount the pavement or splash water from the cobbles), if the person is a gentleman, then I will pass on whatever side seems convenient, perhaps pausing to offer him a little snuff and discuss the news of the day. In either case, I always make sure to raise my hat.
