This is the law in Europe, passing on the inside is called 'undertaking' — in the UK if you get caught undertaking 4x in 3 years you lose your license!
It's a shock initially in the US but actually leads to a more relaxed kind of driving. US driving is more like going for a relaxed walk, in Europe it's more like running on a track.
Driving in Europe is like running on a track with a couple of assholes and a few normal people. Driving in the US is like running on a track with a couple of assholes and a lot of normal people.
The end result in the US is that on highways drivers will settle into social groups of normal people driving along with occasional disruptions from the assholes.
The UK has also now passed laws that criminalise hogging the middle or fast lanes on motorways (UK highways). Unfortunately it's not strongly enforced. It feels like a significant cause of congestion during peak hours.
Yeah. The Highway Code Rule 264: Keep in the left lane unless overtaking.
There are a lot of circumstances where this looks ridiculous though. Tons of cars driving on, say, M25 will cram into the leftmost lane while the other two will be empty. Then you'll deal with cars constantly joining from the left every couple miles. Then sometimes leftmost lane will leave left and the road continue as two lanes for some time. Then overtaking cars will fill the gap in front of you and you'll need to slow down to keep the following distance of two secs.
As a foreigner living in the UK for the last 3 years, I generally like how the driving rules are laid out and how people drive. But this totally misses the point.
It's a shock initially in the US but actually leads to a more relaxed kind of driving. US driving is more like going for a relaxed walk, in Europe it's more like running on a track.