Flashing the peace: happy Japanese "paper drivers" celebrate their driving school graduation, never to drive again.

This is the third in a series of studies, inspired by Peter Hessler’s November 26 article in The New Yorker (“Wheels of Fortune”), in which the DLA research staff examines driving instruction and licensing procedures in other countries as a hopeful window into Boston driving behavior. The first entry, “Learning to Drive #1: China vs. Massachusetts” concluded that drivers in China were being taught to drive like ass, unlike Boston where current research points to an innate behavioral component of ass-like driving. In the second installment, “Learning to Drive #2: Poland vs. Massachusetts”, based upon that country’s prehistoric driving and roadway conditions, we established that you can truly drive like ass only if you have no reason, and Poland has plenty of reasons to drive like ass.

Undeterred, the DLA research team pressed on to Japan.

I have traveled to Japan dozens of times over the past 20 years. In general, I can say that the Japanese are not ass-like drivers, although I have to qualify that by saying that, in all those visits, I only twice drove with someone who was not a taxi or bus driver. Still, neither of those drivers struck me as particularly ass-like, although one was admonished by his wife throughout the drive for his “hebe unten”, or “snake driving:” weaving in traffic.

Japan has lots of people and lots of cars in very little space so driving is something of a challenge. There are about 564 cars per thousand people in Japan. That’s a bit less than in the U.S (769). But all those cars are packed into a land space less than 5% of that of the US yielding a auto density rate of 192 cars per square kilometer, or about 9 times that of the U.S.! Gas is almost $5 per gallon. And forget about finding parking. They have really decent public transportation and at almost any time of the day driving somewhere is sure to take longer than hopping on the subway.

As a result, many people don’t even bother driving. But, bother or not, you never know when one might come in handy so most Japanese want to have a license. And each year millions of 18 year old Japanese endure a grueling licensing process…and never drive again. This means there is a vast army of what the Japanese call pêpâ doraibâ, or “paper driver,” a wasei eigo (“English made in Japan”) expression meaning just that: a driver on paper only.

If only it were like that in Boston.

In Japan, all would-be drivers must take a written driving “knowledge” examination (which they must take at the prefecture test center) and a driving “skills” test (which can be taken at the prefecture’s test center or at a driving school.) Most applicants get past the written exam without breaking a sweat: 100 multiple choice, more-or-less common sense questions. But the skills test is the killer. Taking the skills test at the official center means being prepared to fail at least three or four times: almost no one passes the first time.

The skills tests—the actual driving tests—are held on set, private courses resembling large go-kart tracks. The maps and layouts of driving course are available on many websites devoted to helping the hopeful driver; many of these maps are annotated with comments and warnings relative to special conditions, etc. There are also numerous websites for the baffled gaijin (non-Japanese) who also allege all sorts of discrimination including testing the Japanese applicants first, refusal to administer driving tests in English, closing the window that accepts applications from international license holder at 10 AM.

Map of Ehime Prefecture driving course courtesy of www.supermelf.com

Besides the usual “major” violations, which result in immediate cessation of the skills test (hitting a pole while parking, not stopping for at least three seconds at stop signs), there are all manner of “minor” violations that, in the aggregate, will result in failure, including:

• Not checking under and behind your car for animals or small children prior to getting in
• Not adjusting your seat, seatbelt, and mirrors before starting the car
• Not putting the emergency break on when you finish the course
• Not leaving enough room on the side of the road for bikes to pass you
• Touching the curb when parking

…not to mention all manner of less common sense things such as:

• Failing to check mirrors in the “correct” order
• Not responding with a polite "hai" (“yes” or “OK”) after the officer gives you instructions
• Poor posture
• Wearing open-toed shoes
• Wearing a skirt
• Not wearing a skirt
• Chewing gum

And there is always the unknown, for which the Japanese license examiners are legendary. On woman complained that her examiner said she did everything correctly but flunked her anyway because she didn't seem “confident.” Now that’s harsh!

However, aspiring drivers who receive a diploma from an approved driving school need only take the written test at the official center to become licensed: they are allowed to take the driving test in the relative pressure-free environment of the driving school. As a result, most applicants opt for a driving school because, even in a country where the custom and ritual interpersonal behavior are as strict in the quickie mart as in the board room, the idiosyncrasies of the driving skill examination are such that it is almost impossible to navigate this morass without professional guidance. This means that getting a license also means being prepared to shell out lots of money for a driving school. (See below…note the “Aptitude Test Fee” Again, if only it were like that in Boston!)

Source: Koyama Driving School, /www.koyama.co.jp

Still, for many, the entire process is so stressful that the only way to get through it is by attending a menkyo gassuku, which roughly translates as “driving license camp.” Menkyo gassuku offer classroom and practical instruction in addition to meals, rooms, recreation, and spa facilities for somewhere between 200,000 and 300,000 yen (US$1,800-$2,800) per week. Many campers go for at least two weeks. Web sites for menkyo gassuku are plastered with pictures of happy campers on field trips, the camp’s fleets of BMWs, dorm facilities, the prerequisite pictures of the food, and pictures of happy campers flashing the equally prerequisite “peace” sign while brandishing their diplomas. Campers return refreshed, relaxed, and licensed to drive. Well, almost: they still have to take the written exam. But that’s breeze and soon they join the legions of fully licensed pêpâ doraibâ.

Learning to drive the mekyo gassuku way

So, what did the DLA staff conclude from all this? Well, to tell the truth we were stumped. Unlike our research in Poland and China, the data did not lead us to insights or revelations, obvious or otherwise. Still, stumped or not, we knew there was something ………we were not about to let the lack of compelling data prevent us from proposing at least one hypothesis which would lead to some profound conclusion.

When all else fails, DLA falls back on the data: at last, in a brilliant flash of perspicacity, one of our veteran DLA researchers drew our attention to driver data comparisons.

In Massachusetts, 71% of the state’s population has a license, not too much more than Japan’s 62%. But in Massachusetts, there are 838 cars for every 1,000 people, whereas the same ratio in Japan is almost half of that: 438 cars for every 1,000 people. Looked at another way, every licensed driver in Massachusetts gets to choose from 1.2 cars; in Japan, licensed drivers have to share: there is less than one (0.9) car for every licensed driver.

Our researcher pointed that this means on any given day, it is possible for every single ass-like driver in Massachusetts to be behind the wheel—and still have cars to spare! In Japan, on average, the car-driver ratio means that only 90% of the country’s ass-like drivers can take to the road. This observation inspired us to make a decidedly specious leap and advance the “Auto Surfeit Correlate” which can be described by the following:

Where:

P_DLA = Ass-Like Driving Proclivity

x= Car density per licensed driver
a = cultural influence driving factor (too complex to be described in available space)

The Auto Surfeit Correlate posits that ass-like driving behavior shows a positive correlation to “auto density” or the availability of cars to the motoring public, and to a vague, poorly understood variable, the cultural influence driving factor. Graphing the country's studied in this series results in the graph below.  

While it is not fully understood, DLA researchers believe that:

1) Greater "auto density" gives a population a greater opportunity to acquire ass-like driving skills;

2) Greater "auto density" is, in general,  a characteristic of developed countries meaning that the population has had a longer time to develop ass-like driving skills.