Defensive Driving: Staying Safe on the Road

Driving is scary. As a kid, you watch your parents drive with ease, and never feel endangered when they are behind the wheel. Unfortunately, experience with driving is not easily obtained, and it can take years before one is an experienced driver. Newer drivers make up a majority of motor related accidents. Drivers ed can greatly reduce the risk of car crashes for newer drivers.

Drivers ed is very important in preventing vehicle accidents because new drivers can learn what to look out for and how to avoid danger. A new drivers parent teaching them to drive most likely does not remember what it was like to drive for the first time. Drivers ed offers advice from those who are specialized in training new drivers. These educators are also up to date on newer road safety laws compared to experienced drivers who still follow rules they learned in drivers ed decades ago.

A step that can be taken to decrease the amount of deaths on the road would be to start newer drivers off with an instructor while driving. In my state, after taken a multiple choice test, new drivers can get their permit and drive with anyone who has driven for long enough and has a license. This could lead to dangerous outcomes because experienced drivers who drive with newer drivers may forgot to teach all the fundamentals to driving when they start off. This could lead to a newer driver getting in an accident because the person they were driving with failed to prepare them for a situation. Having all new drivers start off driving with a certified instructor would ensure they are taught everything they need to know about driving and would further prepare them for dangerous situations.

The closest I have been to an accident would be when I blew out a tire by hitting a curb too fast. Luckily for me it was in a parking lot and no other cars were around. This happened because I was trying to carry on a conversation while also driving. Considering it was my fourth time out driving, this was a bad move. I learned from this situation that driving requires a driver’s full attention to be on the road, and that outside distractions of any kind are dangerous.

In order to make driving on the road safer, it is important to be a defensive driver. Always assume that other drivers on the road are going to make the worst decisions while driving, and you should set yourself up to react accordingly. If you are approaching an intersection that doesn’t require you to yield or stop, it is still important to slow down in the case that a driver that is supposed to yield for you fails to do so. Small actions like these greatly reduce the risk of you getting into a crash on the road.