From Love Taps to Crushed Cars – The Dangers of Driving

Whenever licensed teenagers get on the topic of driving, the first question always asked is, “Did you get in an accident yet?”. Because that’s the assumption: new drivers will get into an accident within one year of having their license. I have numerous close friends who have gotten into accidents; one gave another car a love tap at a stop sign, and the other crashed into a pole and got wrapped around it. Both are okay now, but the point still stands.

I am almost one year into having my license and I have not gotten into an accident, (let’s hope I didn’t just jinx myself). However, two major reasons for that are my father, and my driving instructor. They taught me to drive carefully and to always assume that everybody else doesn’t know what they’re doing. My father started me off in the parking lot, and my driving instructor finished my lessons on the roads, where the classroom lessons seem much more important than they did when I was trying to ace my tests.

Memorizing how many feet away from a fire hydrant or a stop sign you can park is tedious, but learning how a four-way stop works, and that immediately after rainfall is the most dangerous time to be driving are things drivers must know, to keep both themselves and others safe. It seems like basic knowledge, but when you hit the road for the first time, you realize that a lot of people don’t know these facts.

I still remember that in my second drivers lesson ever, when I had only been on the road seriously for two hours prior, my instructor took me on the Atlantic City Expressway and I-295, two highways with astronomical numbers of traffic and negligent drivers. Also, it was raining. However, now I can confidently drive on those highways in the rain, like I did coming home from work last Sunday. It’s hard to say exactly what would happen if I didn’t have that practical lesson, but I know that the drive would not have been as smooth or stress-free as it was. And then, maybe I would be breaking my almost one-year accident free streak.

I may have an accident-free streak, but I am the only one in my family of four. My father was in a car accident almost ten years ago, and to this day, his shoulder and back still affect his day to day life. There were times, when I was younger, when we couldn’t play in the pool or go on piggy-back rides because his back and shoulder were in too much pain. My mother and brother were in a car accident five years ago, and walked away unscathed, but getting that phone call was one of the most terrifying moments of my life. Both of those times it was another driver’s fault.

Drivers today are constantly distracted, dissociated, and dangerous. One glaring cause, besides the lack of education, is the use of handheld devices. At a stop light, if you look around, everybody is looking down at their lap or off to the side. They aren’t brushing crumbs off their lap, they are checking their messages, or social media, or email. They have an incredibly delayed reaction time, and besides that, they aren’t fully focused on the road and other drivers. That is the reason people die. One person doesn’t think, and others are then impacted by that decision, sometimes literally.

My phone is always face down on the passenger’s side, and I don’t even flip it over to change the song playing if I don’t like it. That can be credited to the videos I was shown of people who got into accidents while on their phones, and how the victims and their families had to adapt to life afterwards. That is one thing I can’t have on my conscience, and again, was highly focused on in my drivers education classes. More people need to be aware of what phones can do to drivers, which would be the first step into reducing the number of deaths as a result of driving. Distracted driving is the leading cause of vehicular deaths, and phones are the main cause of distractions. The second step would be annual drivers re-tests, whether that be every ten years or every fifteen. People always worry about the elderly on the road, but what about those who went to college in a city and didn’t have a car for years? Or those who got a serious leg injury and couldn’t drive for a long period of time? They are just as much of a risk on the roads as those teenage drivers just getting their license.

These steps seem straightforward, but when riding drivers with their phones, many of those drivers have been doing it for years, and a mix of confidence and muscle memory will make it hard to break the habit of using the phone while driving. Annual re-tests will make people furious, especially those who know that this is targeted for them, and will take years to plan out and enact. However, they are some of the best steps that can be taken to reduce deaths due to distracted driving, and also to make individuals safer drivers to themselves and others. Regardless of state legislation over driving, there are also personal goals each driver should achieve.

For me, personally, if I was to become a better and safer driver, I would revert back to my mindset when I first got my license. I remember that I was shaking driving to work because I was so terrified. I had no music, and my hands were fimly at ten and two. My car had at least a one-car gap between me and the car in front of me, and the speed limit was a true maximum, and I was cruising at least five mph below. Now, I blast music, take speed limits as suggestions (that’s the Jersey girl in me), and have one hand on the steering wheel. That’s not safe, and while I am comfortable and not reckless, it would be one hundred percent my fault if I got into an accident. Just because I don’t use my phone doesn’t mean that I am not still a risk.

I can’t help others become safer on the roads, I can only offer suggestions. Less distractions and a more focused mindset are the themes prominent in this essay, but overall drivers need to be aware of the fact that other cars are full of real people, who are the main characters in their own stories. They aren’t NPC’s, and they have people who would miss them if they got injured or seriously hurt due to someone else’s selfishness. That awareness starts in drivers education classes, learning about right of way at four way stops.