Some Maltese people drive in a similar fashion to how I play darts:
Poorly, and usually after a couple of beers.
Malta has too many cars. It comes in at fourth in the EU in terms of car ownership per person, and for such a small island with narrow roads, this is all to evident. You will see a lot of expensive motors cruising around the place; 4×4’s are a popular option although extremely unsuitable for the driving conditions. (Driving is on the left here, by the way, as per the British way of doing things). Malta also features a notably high proportion of young guys blasting along the roads in pimped up cars with modified engines roaring in competition with the music blaring through their sound systems.
Apart from the fact that the roads are just too narrow to deal with this volume of traffic, you must take into the account the fact that potholes are a common obstacle on Maltese streets and that some of the driving you will encounter is pretty, (*ahem*), cavalier. And by ‘cavalier’, I mean ‘Very Bad’. It’s the school of thought where driving fast without actually killing/maiming anybody en route to your destination qualifies as good driving. Maybe the British style road-markings emphasizes the heedless fashion in which people bomb around the place, cutting corners at speed and then belting down the road. From talking to Maltese people, I am told that the culture of drink-driving here has not diminished to the extent that it has in many other European countries. People seem happier to take their chances after a few beers, given the relatively short car journeys required. A final problem for the driver is trying to find a parking space in the built up towns like Sliema – patience is most definitely a requirement, although a surprisingly high number of motorists opt to just stop in the middle of the (narrow) street while they pop into the shop for a carton of milk, heedless of the line of cars which will soon form behind them.
On the other side of the coin, the bus system here is somewhat erratic, so having your own car offers you a lot of freedom. You can also get to the less touristed parts of the island and find that isolated stretch of coastline to call your own. It’s not too expensive to hire a car for a day – €25 should do it – and despite the occasional problem as outlined above, will enable you to see more in a lot less time.
*(A litre of unleaded petrol costs less than €1.50 in Malta as of January 2015).
Note: photo of car in tree comes from the Cambodiaherald.com, not Malta. I just thought it looked good.
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The Maltese don’t drive on the left or the right side of the road. They drive in the shade.
Frankly driving in Malta is survival of the fittest. You give way to the bloke with the bigger vehicle. Or the bus. Or the quarry lorry…
After reading many articles on the terrible driving practices in Malta, no one has yet mentioned the discriminatory behaviour of the traffic wardens which is common knowledge on the island. Beware if you rent a car, they are identifiable by the registration number and are targeted in the form of parking tickets, as they are easy money for the local authorities, they are guaranteed funds as the rental companies have to charge your credit card. After receiving a ticket myself on a road with no, no parking signs, no street lights and no road markings, they seemed to be able to class it as a traffic island for the purpose of a ticket. I have a photograph of 5 cars all parked on double yellow lines and only the rental car being ticketed. On an island that depends heavily on tourism this is no way to treat their visitors. Especially when the locals have no regard at all for fellow road users, they drive anywhere, stop anywhere and park anywhere but it is the tourists that are paying parking fines.
Most visitors to Malta will only hire a car once as they will never want to experience driving on this island again. The Maltese must be up there with the worst drivers in Europe and for visitors it is a most frightening experience to take the wheel. The Maltese drivers show an inherent lack of road courtesy and a total disregard for the highway code. It is hardly surprising that a great many tourists now refuse to make a second visit to the island. As Malta’s economy is highly dependent on tourism one would think that the law enforcement agency would make it a priority to rid the island its sickness ………………. bad driving.