Driving needs to be taken more seriously

A van driver ran a stop sign at 7 AM where children were waiting for a school bus. The van was struck by a pickup truck with such force that the van was knocked onto the sidewalk where the children were standing. The van struck two children injuring them both.

A witness was so enraged at this van’s driver that he began beating the driver with a pipe. I say good for him for inflicting punishment on this van driver that the court system does not have the balls to.

I am not an advocate of this type of violence but the frustration that this guy showed that drove him to this violence is felt nationwide at the carelessness of our fellow drivers.

There are several things wrong with this picture, every one of them are preventable and should be paid a hell of a lot more attention than what we do.

Drive the speed limit. These speeds are posted with safety in mind., not to punish you for being late.

Obey stop signs. Where is the confusion here? You see the sign. Stop!! Look around for anything and everything before proceeding.

Pay attention!! You cannot predict anything! You don’t know when someone or something is going appear in your path. Now, because you are speeding you have complicated matters because there is an even less of a chance of stopping in time. Do not divert your attention to anything that takes your mind off of the road. Things outside of your control happen way too fast when you are watching and anticipating, you cut down your response time even more by not watching.

When children are around, slow down!!! You cannot predict what they are going to do. What does it matter if you are late, or what does it matter that you piss off the guy behind you for driving slower than they want to. You could actually save a life by slowing down. Which is more important to you?

Drive defensively!! We first heard this advice before we ever started driving and again when we first picked up a drivers manual. For most people it is probably the only time they ever picked one up. why do people have to be so damned aggressive on the road? Forget the car commercials that tell you how fast your car can go. Safety and arriving alive is the only thing that matters.

Never, never, never be in a hurry behind the wheel of any automobile!! You really do not save time by driving faster. There are always traffic lights and there is always traffic to slow you down. They all want to get to where they are going and you are only compounding the problem of driving safely by being an object they have to focus on due to your carelessness. You are not in a race with anyone.

Every one of these things I have mentioned here are just plain good common sense and yet every one of them becomes secondary when most people get behind the wheel. Why???

Why are we so convinced that nothing is ever going to happen to us? We see it on the news every day that someone was involved in a car accident. Do you suppose they thought nothing was every going to happen to them? Do you think the victim of that car crash was convinced that since they are such good drivers they will never be in an accident?

Not enough attention is being focused on drivers habits. These vehicles are not toys. Yet too many people are too careless behind the wheel. They think they don’t have to obey traffic laws. Too many people use their vehicles to intimidate others to get out of their way. Too many people change their demeanor once they get behind the wheel. They think they are invulnerable and that everyone else is in their way.

Why is there such a shortage of common sense?

We are all intelligent enough to know that we cannot predict what someone else is going to do yet I have seen a driver speed up when someone in front of them is going to turn with the anticipation that by the time they get there that vehicle will be already turned and out of the way.

We make foolish assumptions like this all the time. Why??

I’ll bet when this guy got into his van this morning, being involved in an accident was the farthest thing from his mind. He obviously choose to think about something else besides the most dangerous activity he was to be involved in that day, that being driving a vehicle.

Yes, it is the most dangerous thing we do everyday. Safety should be the first thing we think about. We are stepping into a vehicle weighing anywhere from 2,000 to 5,000 pounds that can easily kill and we think it will never happen to me. We allow ourselves to be lulled into a false sense of security in the fact that since I know I won’t be the cause of an accident then it cannot possibly happen to me.

Fools who choose to impair themselves and then get behind the wheel are on the road daily. This is a proven fact. You have to watch out for them. People do foolish, careless things all the time, you have to watch out for them.

Driving is not a sport. It can be dangerous and you never know when your full attention will be required to prevent an accident, so give it, 100%, all the time.

We can help keep gas prices low

Gas prices are going up, no surprise. We all complain about having to pay more at the pump, but how many of us are actually doing something to cut down on our gas consumption?

Do you know how much gas your car uses when accelerating from standing still? If you accelerate slowly you will use far less than if you accelerate quickly.
When you drive at 80 miles an hour you are using more gas per mile than if you drive at 70 miles per hour.

If we teach ourselves to cut back a little on gas consumption then we won’t have to buy gas as often. Then we could at least eliminate this as the reason for high gas prices.

Whenever I see someone practicing bad driving habits resulting in higher gas consumption I see a person who is taking more than their fair share of gasoline. If we all conserve we all will have gasoline for a longer period of time. To those people: are you really so selfish that you can use up more than your share of gasoline to get someplace a little bit faster?

Try this experiment. Time yourself in getting from one place to another using your usual driving habits and then travel the same route following all posted speed limit signs. How much time do you really save? Now do this same experiment starting with a full tank of gas for each driving habit and see how much less gas you use by driving the speed limit. I am certain everyone would be amazed at the difference.
We can all help each other and still help ourselves. If we cut back on gas consumption then gas stations will feel the pinch and begin lowering prices in order to get us into the gas pumps.

There has been talk of boycotting certain gas stations or boycotting at certain times (mostly only when prices take a huge jump), but more conservative driving practices would be the ultimate boycott, by not using as much. Lets all give it a try.

Some people will say that their change in habits will not have an effect but let me tell you, there are so many people driving that if everyone saved a little it will have a tremendous effect. Think about this, if there are 150 million drivers (with the U.S. population, this is a conservative estimate) and every one of those drivers saved one gallon of gas a month that would be 150 million gallons of gas that the oil companies would not sell. Do you think they would take notice in this drop in sales? Of course they would. And if it happened every month, do you think they might decide to lower prices to try to encourage people to buy more? Yes they would. Then we would see how they truly care about gas conservation.