When asked whether he prefers right or left, he definitely answers “left.” He says right-hand drive is still okay for automatics, but for manuals, he absolutely wants left-hand drive.
I know a couple of people around me who felt the same way. When the 718 Spyder and 718 Cayman GT4 came out, they heard that only right-hand drive versions would be imported to Japan and decided not to buy them for that reason. (＊Porsche Japan, for highly specialized models like these, even if it means higher costs or longer wait times, please let customers choose right or left, AT or MT. This is not the place to cut corners on efficiency…)
Why does he feel this way? Mainly because:
Also, commonly used switches like SPORT mode and PASM are on the left side, so they’re easier to operate in left-hand drive cars. Sometimes when driving the right-hand drive Panamera, he finds the switches too far away and hard to press.
But of course, there are downsides to left-hand drive too.
There are toll booths with machines for left-hand drive cars, and if not, you can just get out, so personally it doesn’t bother me much. But merging on highways is tricky because of many blind spots. Especially in the Boxster with the top up, visibility is almost hopeless, so he has to lean far to the right to drive carefully.
Other than that, making right turns by angling into the intersection a bit isn’t a problem, and overtaking is fine if you pull slightly to the right first to check.
More importantly, since you’re driving closer to pedestrians, the risk of accidents is lower, and it’s easier to hug the left edge, making it easier to pass through narrow roads, which is a big advantage for him.
Well, these things mostly come down to “getting used to it,” so this is just a comparative discussion. If he were to rank his favorite combinations of position and transmission, it would be:
That’s the end of my reflections from the perspective of owning both left- and right-hand drive AT and MT cars.
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