Running Over Red: An Examination of Driver Safety and Education

In the fading light of dusk the green light shines out like a beacon. A signal drawing you out, out into the intersection. You should be safe, the light says go, your foot presses on the pedal, willing your little blue car to accelerate into the intersection. Without warning, a car whips across from the cross direction. They are going 50, maybe 60 miles per hour. Before you can even process what is happening, they have passed you, a mere yard or so from your car. A couple feet or so from your death. You pass the rest of the intersection and start down the road. Aside from the hum of the engine, it is silent. You can hear your heart beating in your ears. You pull over to a side street and stare at your hands. They are shaking violently.
You replay the scene over and over again. Your light was green, right? They had a red light? You didn’t do anything wrong. You didn’t do anything wrong. You almost just died. You almost died. This opens the floodgates for memories of so many other near misses. Dozens of times crossing the street, cars turning without checking the crosswalk, illegal turns, riskey merges, and people on phones. So many people on phones. But for each of your near misses, there is someone else who wasn’t a near miss. They were a hit. Tonight, you are one of the lucky ones.
Driving is one of the most dangerous activities most people participate in. In Utah, eager and nervous fifteen year olds march into the DMV, and after taking one little test, are given permission to (with parental supervision) pilot a massive steel vehicle capable of killing at a mere fraction of its maximum speed. Teaching teenagers, and really all drivers to properly drive can help immensely in reducing the number of deaths related to driving. Drivers education is the time in which the seriousness of driving responsibly is instilled.
In my community, the two biggest driving issues are generally considered to be texting while driving and running red lights. In Drivers Ed they bombard us with statistics: the number of times more likely you are to die while texting, while talking on the phone, etc. In some ways, this is effective, in many other ways, it is not. Once drivers feel confident in their abilities, they tend to start taking out their phone. Maybe it’s just at red lights at first, or to quickly check a text. If you go long enough without getting into an accident, comfort begins to sink in, and what was once the exception becomes habit. This raises the question, how do we keep drivers out of their phones? There are many possible solutions, and we don’t have an effective one right now. Some phone companies have driving modes, but those require activation by the driver. It is my belief that stricter texting while driving laws, if enforced properly, may help stop some texting while driving, thereby reducing accidents. An exact solution is hard to find, but it is very needed.
The other major issue that I see in my community concerning driving is running red lights. I live near a major intersection, and we have had several fatal car crashes due to people running red lights. A two year old little girl. A pregnant mother. A father of three. All gone. With long yellow lights and (barring a serious car accident or the off-chance of a cop waiting around) no accountability for running a light, red lights are run often. Usually it’s a car or two trying to “make” the yellow light, but in actuality running straight through the red. Other times, it’s like that car from the story I told. The car that almost killed me. Running a light despite its stubbornly rosy hue. For this issue, I do know of a more concrete solution. In my old neighborhood, we had lights on the traffic stops that had cameras to snap a picture of any car running a red light. This deterred this behavior, and I’m sure stopped many accidents.
Overall, it is important for drivers to know the rules of the road, and follow them. If that requires scaring them into obedience with statistics and stories in drivers education, then let’s do it. A text message or five minutes of time waiting at a red light is not worth a life. I know I am always striving to do better as I drive. It is always tempting to check the ping of a text message when stopped at a red light, and difficult to judge the distance from which it would be better to try to go through the light or slow down when it turns yellow. Driving safely doesn’t just start and end with the driver, if there is a passenger in the car, they can aid by navigating and helping the driver stay focused. I wish I could say that preventing driving deaths is simple, but the reality is extremely complicated. We are humans, with a variety of emotions, circumstances, and distractions that vye for our attention, even when behind the wheel, but hopefully, we can teach our drivers to be careful, to be safe, and to help each other hold to those mundane rules that for some, may be the difference between life and death.