Switching Sides: The Challenge of Changing Driving Habits Overnight

It’s an awesome job getting a nation to change the habits of a lifetime. To switch overnight from the left to driving on the right. This is how it’ll work. Whatever traffic’s on the road at 10 minutes to 5 in the morning must come to a stop. Careful. Check to make sure the road’s clear and swing over to the right hand side. Then all vehicles must remain stationary for 10 minutes. On the stroke of five, away you go, remembering that strict new speed limits are now in force. And in fact, for the first few weeks, the maximum speed allowed anywhere, even on motorways, will be 55 miles an hour. And here to see it all will be hundreds of journalists from all over the world, with observers from Britain and also from Iceland, which switches over in may next year. And when that happens, the stubborn British Isles, along with a few Commonwealth countries and Japan, will be the only people left driving on the left.