[“Dodge or Die” is a series of reports on the relationship between the pedestrian and the motorist in Georgia by Robert Linkous].
As Stephen Dowling put it in his BBC News article a few years ago, “when it comes to crossing the road, there's no such thing as an international standard. Every country does it differently.” How people drive and cross the road, according to Dowling, is a matter of a country’s cultural values. Is it really?
Bad traffic habits are a grave problem in many cities around the world. Yet, while many have managed to largely solve the problem, in Georgia, the problem remains virulent and it is not even fully appreciated. Observing the traffic dynamics in a couple of main avenues, like Rustaveli or Chavchavadze, is sufficient for a first time visitor to Tbilisi to realize that something is wrong with the Tbilisi traffic system. Yes, that’s right – something is wrong with the system, not culture!
Game Theory, a field of applied mathematics that is used to analyze “strategic interactions” between agents who pursue conflicting goals, can possibly explain what is going on in the streets of Tbilisi. Strategic interaction is just a fancy name for what happens in games, such as chess, or in real life situations such as bargaining over the price of a taxi ride. Luckily, Game Theory also points to a possible policy solution.
The first relevant insight from Game Theory is that the behavior of traffic participants is determined by their expectations about the behavior of other actors. For instance, if pedestrians don’t expect drivers to stop at a zebra crossing, they will hesitate to cross until they are 120% sure that the car approaching them is actually stopping. Given the very steep price for making a judgment mistake, the result is a very stable behavioral pattern. Pedestrians won’t cross. As someone who makes every effort not to do as the Romans do in Rome, I rediscover this time and again whenever I am slowing down before a zebra crossing. It takes intensive hand waving and actual stopping for the pedestrians to understand my intentions and adjust their expectations accordingly.
The same logic applies to the behavior of drivers. Any driver familiar with the Tbilisi rules of the game would not slow down before a zebra crossing because it makes no sense. Pedestrians would in any case not trust his/her intentions and would patiently wait for the car to pass (or stop, in the rare case it is driven by a foreigner like myself). Moreover, it makes sense for a Tbilisi driver to speed up whenever he or she observes a group of pedestrians getting ready to cross the road on a zebra. Why? Because by speeding up s/he sends a clear signal about his/her behavior – hey, I am not going to stop, don’t even try crossing!
The second key insight from Game Theory is that this kind of “uncivilized” outcome (drivers not giving way and pedestrians not even trying to cross on a zebra) is stable. In other words, it does not make sense for drivers and pedestrians to change their “strategy” (behavior) given what they know about the other party’s strategy. The implication is that Tbilisi will be forever stuck with this uncivilized “equilibrium” (another fancy term used by game theorists). Unless someone (the policymaker) bothers to change the rules of the game and reset expectations. More on this later.
By now it should be easy to see the possibility – observed in most European and North American cities – of a situation that is the exact mirror image of the situation in Tbilisi: drivers respecting pedestrians’ rights and pedestrians being quite assertive about exercising them. Not only is this civilized equilibrium possible, it is also quite stable. If drivers expect the pedestrians to cross on a zebra, they will start slowing down well before the first pedestrian sets his/her foot on the road. Expecting this type of behavior, pedestrians will not hesitate to cross. The outcome is stable because it makes no sense for German drivers to start behaving Tbilisi style (they will quickly find themselves behind bars) and there is no point for the German pedestrians to hesitate before crossing.
Two crucial questions are these:
1) How come some countries are stuck in a bad kind of equilibrium while others are able to enjoy the benefits of civilization?
2) Can a country (or city) permanently shift from one type of equilibrium to another?
Before I proceed with a formal “solution”, let me say that the same exactly questions apply to many other areas of strategic interaction among people. For instance – and this is an important hint – it applies to petty corruption, e.g. the interaction among bribe givers and takers. And as we know from Georgia’s recent experience (both good and bad), a determined policy intervention or the breakdown of law and order can swiftly shift a country from one equilibrium to another. Moreover, a determined policy action can lead to a permanent adjustment of expectations, and, yes, a change in culture!
The obvious policy solution is to introduce tougher regulations, higher fines and stricter enforcement concerning both drivers and pedestrians. As far as traffic regulations are concerned, Georgia has already had a positive experience with the introduction of fines for not wearing seatbelts. The policy worked extremely well and led to an instantaneous change in the drivers’ behavior. Ideally, strict rules should be enforced for all kinds of violations including the widespread practice of parking on sidewalks – forcing pedestrians to share their already limited space with cars. An effort should be made to improve the underpasses they are often dirty and insufficiently illuminated, giving incentives to jaywalking. The fines for jaywalking should be increased from their current, ridiculously low level of 3 GEL.
Understandably, enforcement would have to be particularly strict during a relatively short transition period to allow all traffic participants to properly reset their expectations and behavior. Once expectations are reset, however, the intensity of enforcement (and related costs) could go down quite dramatically because the new equilibrium will be able to sustain itself. At least according to insights from Game Theory.
Comments
test test
test
test100
test test
test
test 3
From my personal view, one of the main problems here is awareness. I'm pretty sure that half of the drivers do not know that they have stop at zebra crossing and pedestrians do not know that they have privilege to cross the road there.
Sounds about right
We had a deep look at the situation two years ago an that was the result:
http://finchannel.com/Main_News/Geo/96633_Give_Right_of_Way_to_Pedestrians!/
In Georgia there is no law which makes drivers stop and let pedestrians cross. As there is no law, drivers think there is no need to do it. Unlike in Georgia, in the majority of other countries such an attitude is considered impolite. But in Georgia drivers don’t care about that. They know how difficult it is as regardless of whether you have a car sometimes everyone has to cross the street, but still they don’t care.
Georgians claim they don’t like regulations and limitations. However since the use of seatbelts became mandatory, 98 percent of drivers use them, whereas before the new regulation came in to force only several drivers did. If giving the right of way to pedestrians becomes a law, the vast majority of drivers will do it. But until then they don’t think it necessary to express such politeness.
According to the Georgian Codex (article 27, 32, 33) a car driver has to give a pedestrian or bicycle right of way when the driver is starting to move or is turning left or right and the pedestrian is moving on that roadway. Car drivers have to give right of way to pedestrians when the traffic lights are changing from green but the pedestrian hasn’t finished crossing yet. A car driver has to wait until he/she has crossed the road.
But there is no regulation about giving the right of way to pedestrians and bicycles at places where traffic control signals are not in place or are not in operation.
Unlike cars, the drivers of passenger transport vehicles have to give pedestrians the right of way at unregulated places. However they usually don’t obey the regulation. According to the Codex if a passenger transport vehicle stops to give way to a pedestrian, car drivers can still continue moving. They don’t have to give the right of way (and they generally don’t).
And important: Most of the states of the USA have Right of way regulations. The same in Canada, even in Russia and Ukraine!
(I have neither experienced the traffic in Tbilisi nor in other parts of Georgia, yet. I have learned about the situation on its streets by reading this and related posts on the ISET Economist blog. Therefore, some of the following thoughts may seem naïve to the Georgian pedestrian.)
1. Culture in the form of conventions is context specific. On the streets of Tbilisi the convention among car drivers is to be careless, to drive aggressively, and to frighten naïve pedestrians. Call this convention the bad convention. The context changes when the driver exits the car. Then, the driver turns into the pedestrian. Pedestrians play a different (coordination) game. Here, the convention (coordination equilibrium) is to be caring, friendly, and empathetic to others. Call this convention the good convention.
Could drivers’ behavior be improved if one transports the good convention from the pedestrian context into the car driving context? Consider the following intervention in Tbilisi. On the side of the streets with the most frequent accidents and casualties install big billboard ads. Here are a couple examples:
“This could be your child! You can save his life by stopping.” (A picture shows a frightened child in the middle of a zebra crossing diving away from an approaching car.)
“Show your hospitality! Let pedestrians cross the street.” (An accompanying picture that visualizes the concept of hospitality in regards to giving passage to someone else.)
“A toast to you kindness! Thanks for letting me cross the street safely!” (A picture of a grandmother, or grandfather, or a beautiful women)
The idea here is to make the good convention salient at the time and place where the bad convention usually influences drivers’ behavior. The downside to this intervention is that it may improve driving behavior only in the short run, because car drivers get used to the billboards and start to ignore them. Hence, to retain their influence, the messages should not be shown all the time.
2. JumpStart reports that in 2012 the no. 1 cause of traffic accidents in Georgia was speeding (http://www.feradi.info/en/visualizations/in-a-hurry-to-die?category=all). One could enforce speed limits centrally by installing (more) speeding cameras. Also, speed measurement devices on the side of the road could remind drivers that they are driving too fast.
3. A 3 GEL fine for jaywalking may produce more jaywalking than no fine at all. Without the fine, pedestrians may be intrinsically motivated to comply with the rules. The fine may crowd out this intrinsic motivation. Moreover, it may be regarded not as punishment, but as a price for jaywalking. This idea is described in a paper “A fine is a price.” by Uri Gneezy and Aldo Rusticchini (http://management.ucsd.edu/faculty/directory/gneezy/pub/docs/fine.pdf).
In fact, given the low enforcement probability the expected fine may be much lower than 3 GEL. Without the intrinsic motivation and facing a very low price, one may consider jaywalking as a viable alternative.
4. Why does the government not address this issue? The question is important beyond the traffic problem in Tbilisi. I think that the ISET-PI could contribute to solving Georgia’s problems much more effectively, if it could research and understand government officials’ policy choices. What are policy makers’ incentives? What are their binding constraints?