I'm not to sure. yesterday, Benly Ben asked, if you're left handed and you're pushing a bike, which side would you push from ?
We let him help out in the workshop and he must have felt akward at some time being on the wrong side as I do when I have no option when moving a bike.
Talking to a mate in the pub that night, I told him that I had bought a Honda in the States. Joking, he asked if it was left hand drive.
Knowing a little about bikes, he asked about the side stands on bikes. He asked are the side stands in left hand drive countries on the right ?
I told him that as far as I know, all bikes have side stands to the left and imediately figured out where he was coming from.
In a drive on the left country, you pull up at the side of the road, put down the sidestand and get off the bike into the path of on coming traffic, how safe is that.
Perhaps the Japanese have an excuse and are trying to get rid of you Americans for messing them about
Read this.
Japan is one of the few countries outside the Commonwealth of Nations to drive on the left. An informal practice of left-hand passage dates at least to the Edo period. Samurai wore their swords on their left side, and by also passing to that side they avoided knocking swords. (If they had knocked swords, samurai were obliged to duel.) During the late 1800s, Japan built its first railways with British technical assistance, and double-tracked railways adopted the British practice of running on the left. Stage Coach Order issued in 1870 and the revision in 1872 said mutually approaching horses had to avoid each other by shifting to the left.[46] An order issued in 1881 said mutually approaching horses and vehicles had to avoid each other by shifting to the left. An order issued in 1885 stated that general horses and vehicles had to avoid to the left, but they also had to avoid to the right when they met army troops, until the double standard was legally resolved in 1924.[47]
After the defeat of Japan during World War II, Okinawa was under control of the United States and made to drive on the right. Okinawa was returned to Japanese control in 1972 and changed back to driving on the left six years later, at 06:00 on 30 July 1978. (See 730 (transport).) It is one of very few places to have changed from right- to left- traffic in the late twentieth century.
In Japan, foreign cars sold locally have traditionally been LHD, which is regarded as exotic or a status symbol. This aspect had been unknowingly illustrated in the beginning of Japanese film Spirited Away, where the protagonist's wealthy father drives a LHD Audi. This even applies to British brands (although cars for the British market have the steering wheel on the right), in part because many have been imported via the U.S., but many other European countries have made RHD models for the Japanese market. Many tollbooths in Japan have a special lane for LHD vehicles. However, some U.S. manufacturers have made RHD models for the Japanese market (e.g., the Jeep Cherokee (XJ), Ford Probe, Ford Taurus, Saturn S-Series and Chevrolet Cavalier), albeit with limited success.
Sam.
