Yes, apart from correcting our tendencies of becoming hordes of hungry, time-conscious zombies rushing in and out of trains and buses, we need help when it comes to giving way to ambulances (+ other vehicles responding to emergency situations). Seriously, it hurts to see drivers taking their own sweet time to give way to ambulances blaring their sirens along Singapore’s expressways. I don’t understand how some drivers can have the heart to wait till the ambulance is right on their tail before giving way. What if the person in the ambulance is their own loved ones, will those said drivers react the same way they do normally?
Illustration | BIG_MOUSE | Typical situation: An ambulance stuck in peak-hour traffic
A video released by the Singapore Civil Defence Force, the government agency in Singapore that, in addition to various other services, provides fire-fighting, rescue and emergency ambulance services.
The common reason (or excuse) given is that they are unable to give way because of slow-moving peak-hour traffic. Well, I think we drivers can and should learn from the give-way-to-emergency-vehicles behaviour in other countries. Instead of forcing everyone to bring their vehicles to a complete stop by the sides of the road (video showing how other drivers in other countries do it), we could adapt it and make it so-singaporean.
Illustration | BIG_MOUSE | A 'new' approach
This ‘new’ approach may work if all three lanes of cars on a typical expressway can be squeezed into two lanes to allow the siren-blaring ambulance to pass. This, to me, is a more efficient method as compared to getting drives to pull over to the sides (the method employed in other countries) or motivating drivers to filter away from the first lane (Singapore’s current method).
