is it? That’s the reality of cars and highways. Every time I’m near a source of traffic, I often feel as though every vehicle is assaulting me. I can feel its noise and velocity beating on my chest. It makes me very uneasy. I feel even more uneasy whenever I walk along roads and streets where the traffic is heavy. My urge always is to get away from the noise and commotion as soon as I can. I want peace and quiet.
You need to do this once in a while: Observe traffic from the perspective of the surrounding environment. You can’t experience this from inside a vehicle.
When you begin your driving lessons, there’s something else you might notice as you mix with traffic: the large number of aggressive drivers on the road. These people tend to regard driving as a competition. They always try to get ahead of everyone else. They swerve in and out of lanes. They pass on the right. They rarely signal. They seldom stop at stop signs, and they zip through red lights at every opportunity. Heaven help anybody who cuts them off or blocks their way.
Suddenly, the behavior you see displayed in commercials doesn’t seem so glamorous. Instead, it seems stupid and dangerous. Yet these individuals are not strangers or foreigners. They are people who live all around you. Aggressive driving is a pervasive and nasty national habit.
It’s not confined to crowded highways; aggressive people continue their habits along many side streets or secondary roadways. I once lived in a suburban neighborhood of cul-de-sacs connected by a two-lane road with a 25-mile-an-hour speed limit. As I walked or jogged along that road nearly every morning, I saw very few people obeying the speed limit. It didn’t seem to matter that they were zooming through a neighborhood where people walked, children played and pets and wild creatures roamed.
While I was writing this book, usually early in the morning, I listened to the local traffic and weather reports on the radio. Every day a number of collisions somewhere in the area inevitably stopped traffic and caused misery for their victims. Such incidents almost always involve somebody driving aggressively. Aggression means speed, and speed causes most crashes. Of course, if you add alcohol or drugs, then the situation grows even more frightening and dangerous.
You’ll be hearing a lot about all this in the coming months, possibly from your driver’s ed. instructor, your department of motor vehicles, or from other sources. I won’t belabor the subject, but I would like you to consider just a few things:
—First, as a teenager, you are more likely to die in an automobile than anywhere else, whether you are the driver or a passenger. That’s not to say it will happen. Although the odds are very small—about 13 chances in 100,000 if you’re a male and about 6 in 100,000 if you’re a female—the danger is real.
—Second, if you make it through your first three years as a driver, your survival odds will improve substantially. That’s important to remember. It means you must be extra careful during your early years as a driver, because that’s when you are the most vulnerable to death and injury.
—Third, and this is something you may not have heard before, even if you have acquired very good driving skills, they will not necessarily lower the odds of your having a serious crash during your teen years. It’s a little known fact, but true. Several studies of this phenomenon all have reached the same conclusion. Why? Researchers aren’t certain, but their best guess is that good driving skills don’t prevent crashes unless they are accompanied by good driving behavior.
Teens have a natural tendency to take risks. Driving fast is risky, but it also is an exhilarating experience. Yes, it can be fun.
Here’s where the danger comes in, even for the most skilled drivers: Instead of remaining cautious and tentative, as they should while they’re still learning, many teens use their newfound freedom behind the wheel to test limits. They barrel down highways, whip in and out of lanes, and challenge other drivers, especially other teens. They become instant aggressors, and quite often, alcohol or drugs enter the picture.
You know the rest. You also know this is true. If you’re in high school, you’ve seen it all around you.
You should also know, if you didn’t already, that males are more than twice as likely to cause serious crashes as females. On the other hand, the crash total for males has been declining over the past 20 years, while the total for females has been rising. More and more female drivers are taking to the roads as aggressively as males—and paying a high price for their risky behavior.
That’s why it’s extremely important that you develop the right attitude toward driving along with good skills. Skills will only take you so far. When things go bad on the road, they can go bad very, very quickly. You can find yourself suddenly in a situation you can’t handle. No matter how good you think you are, many driving hazards can overwhelm you. Only the proper attitude will help you avoid those hazards before they arise.
—Fourth, though there are many things in your life that are your business—what you think, how you dress, who you like, the music you listen to—driving is different. Driving is something you do on public roads, sharing space with lots of other people of different ages and viewpoints. What they do affects you, and what you do affects them.
I’m not telling you any of this to discourage you from driving, or to make you feel depressed. I’m not even trying to spoil your fun, but driving doesn’t have to be dangerous to be fun. You can enjoy it just as much by doing it well, by knowing what to do in just about every situation, and by improving the safety of the roadway, not reducing it.
I want to try to raise your consciousness, to give you a heightened awareness about what driving in the United States really means today. I want to give you a healthy, positive approach to being behind the wheel.
So please consider carefully all of the material contained in this book. Be patient and accept the instruction that your parent or guardian will attempt to give you. Take the time to allow your skills to develop into habits.
As long as you are involved in the learning process, stick to the practices I have outlined. Later on, you might decide you want to depart from them. They might seem too tame for you. Or, you may choose other ways of doing things that suit you better.
Let me assure you: What you learn here, if practiced consistently, will never let you down. The techniques are solid. The attitude will help you to travel lightly, safely and enjoyably along the roads and through neighborhoods. Together, they will help you avoid doing harm to yourself or anyone else. That’s a goal worth striving for.
GETTING STARTED
[PARENTS]
The First Question to Ask: Is Your Child Ready?
I’ll say it at the outset. My personal opinion is that few if any teenagers are ready to drive with no restrictions at age 16—let alone 15 or 14. It is a major risk to allow them onto today’s highways.
Furthermore, the statistics are undeniable. Sixteen is the most dangerous age for drivers, followed closely by 17 and 18. Yet year after year, many parents routinely allow their kids to obtain learners’ permits even before they reach 16. They’ll take their teens for their licenses on their birthdays, as if the age automatically qualified them to drive. Granted, many states allow kids to obtain licenses on their 16th birthdays, but that doesn’t make it right.
It is a mistake to assume that state governments know what’s best for your child. On today’s dangerous highways, inexperience and poor judgment frequently make a lethal combination. Driving is a critical area where your parental maturity and concern should prevail. Not state regulations,
