Posted on 09/16/2015 1:50:45 PM PDT by Cowman
Blame it on modern cars, which have gotten so forgiving that skills like threshold braking and skid recovery have become lost arts. That’s all well and good until the laws of physics intervene; ABS won’t always stop a car before an oak tree will, and tires won’t always generate enough grip for the electro-nannies to keep a car off a guard rail. While very few drivers have enough training to avoid all potential accidents, there’s a definite correlation between the amount of time spent practicing behind the wheel (under trained supervision) and the number of avoidable crashes on one’s driving record.
Time was that driver’s education was a part of high school curriculum, to the extent that many school districts even had a car (or fleet of cars) to be used in training new drivers. By the time I made it to driver’s ed, it was taught by a disinterested phys-ed teacher and consisted of little more than an overview of basic rules of the road and vehicle operation. The on-road training came courtesy of my father and the local driving school, which was enough to meet the requirements for licensing, but not much more. Today, the situation is even bleaker: many schools offer no training at all, leaving it up to parents, relatives, or driving schools.
Assuming we can agree that there’s a problem in training new drivers, how do we fix it? Do we impose a strict training and licensing regimen like Germany, which produces skilled drivers but a cost unattainable to many in the United States? Do we require participation in one (or more) of the street survival schools now offered to young drivers across the United States? Do we mandate that high schools again teach driver’s education, and if so, how do we fund this? Do we continue to bury our heads in the sand, trusting that automakers will improve automotive safety and hoping that autonomous cars will solve all our problems? What’s your solution?
How to drive without your phone up against your head would be a plus as well
You're asking waaaay too much.
You ARE old.
Automate driving.
Young kids are always going to be inexperienced drivers. At least until the matrix plug in brain port arrives.
The best driver training I got was navigating the streets of Istanbul. If you can drive there accident free, you can drive anywhere...
Adopt the Finland means of educating young drivers. They do it better than anyone.
All kids today need to learn to drive on a 1960 Chevy Bel Air. With a 3 on the tree, no power steering, drum brakes that will stop (eventually) in less a mile, no air conditioning or power anything.
A car that corners slightly better than a mobile home and that will reach 60 mph - in a minute or so.
Yep. IF they learn to drive a beast like that - then they can drive anything.
For all four drivers?
Get rid of the foreign drivers. They lower the bar with their incompetence and hostility.
Make them take the bus.
Then get rid of the bostile and incompetent foreigners in the DMV also.
Then it might look like America again.
How about mechanical fuel injection?
The kids will never know what vapor lock is.
training must begin in communist China ...
at least for California’s roads where communist Chinese ‘immigrants’ (or permanent visitors) drive 12 mph (sliding from lane to lane in a whimsical manner without notice to, or notice of, anybody else who may be trying to survive their road trip)
and then the very same drivers speed up to 96mph like rocket ships....once inside the Costco parking lot, all aimed at the one open space by the front door...a Demolition Derby with Kamakazi pilots
150,000, but that’s totally irrelevant.
How to drive without your phone up against your head would be a plus as well
Why should they have to know what a carburetor is when no cars are being made that have those anymore? May as well include a course on the horse and buggy. My driver's training was tough in SoCal and many of us failed the test the first time. I had to parallel park on an incline, go on the freeway, and guess at the speed limits on roads that had no posting. I moved to a small town in the midwest and here they have you simply do a lap around the center of town (1 block). As long as you obey the 25 limit, stop at the signs, and use your turn signal you get a license. It's a complete joke and no surprise there are so many accidents in the area.
Talking on the phone is bad, but the ones that scare me more than talking on phones are those that text while driving. It's crap like that that is forcing insurance companies to consider these wild ideas like installing cams in our vehicles.
I was going to point out the same thing. What carburetor?
Raise the driving age
Take away license for drunk driving at least a year. First iffense
Pay to learn to drive
Better mass transit
Germany does some things right. Saw three accidents in four years of living there. In Texas, got hit 6 -SIX times not moving. At stop signs, in parking spots, at the on ramp. Six times
Big business for med community and emergency community.
Never change
I do not know how people drive in Houston. It reminds me of Riyadh where cars are disposable and no one humbles themselves to learn to drive. Wild. No women either
Step one is to stop having our licenses come out of Cracker Jack boxes. If the driver’s exam to get a license was actually a serious test that required one to actually be able to drive that would dictate the curricula. Everybody I know that went from America to someplace else failed the test at least twice, everybody I know that went the other direction was aghast at how unfailable our test is.
I learned to drive on a 1961 Ford Fairlane convertible.
The first time I used it I alone I had the top down.
It started to pour and I didn’t have a clue how to get the top up.
A nice guy gave me a hand.
.
I’ve been driving the last 2 weeks in Lucca and Florence. There is no wrong way to drive in Italy. Stopping in the acceleration area after paying a toll is encouraged. Especially in front of large rigs hauling rocks.
It’s not S/. Saw it happen.
I’ve been driving the last 2 weeks in Lucca and Florence. There is no wrong way to drive in Italy. Stopping in the acceleration area after paying a toll is encouraged. Especially in front of large rigs hauling rocks.
It’s not S/. Saw it happen.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.