Is Driving Even Safe?

Every single day all of us come inches away from possible death, we don’t even think about it; but it’s right on the other side of the yellow line. All of us have felt the effects of a car crash to some extent. For me, it happened as a Junior in highschool, I had been driving for a few months and thought that I was pretty experienced and skilled. Driving caused me no worry, stress, or anxiety which is good but if you fail to recognize the possible dangers, it can lead to reckless driving. I didn’t want the person behind me to think I was taking too long to pull out at a stop sign, so I gave a quick glance and ended up pulling right into a minivan full of kids. If I had not taken driving so lightly and weighed the actual consequences of unsafe driving, I could have saved a lot of money, time, and stress for both drivers.

Driver education is extremely important in reducing the amount of deaths caused by car accidents. On average 34,000 Americans die a year due to driving which is why, in some way or another, it has likely affected every American today. Without driver education those number of crashes would be increased drastically and make driving even more unsafe. Knowing the rules of traffic are vital to maintaining road safety because they allow all drivers to be on the same page and have something to abide by that goes outside of instinct or natural understanding without being educated. If drivers got behind the car without initially being educated, the rules of traffic would be left to interpretation by each person behind the wheel, which is extremely unsafe. Especially in moments such as pure instinct like when you start hydroplaning you might initially want to slam your brakes, but if someone tells you that you should instead turn your steering wheel in the direction you are hydroplaning you could be kept safe in a way that could mean life or death.

Certain steps that are currently in place that are making a difference to reduce the current yearly number of car crashes include drivers education courses that are often taken by people with their permit, alive at 25 and similar classes, a system that requires a year of learning to acquire a full license, and cars with extremely high technology that can make driving much safer. But there are other things that could be put into place in order to increase driver safety all across America. Drivers education courses could be put into more schools and created as a requirement for all students to take in high school, because at least for the students at my school there is nothing like this offered. Certain safety features could be made into requirements for all cars to have, such as automatic braking systems or lighting that notify drivers when someone is in their blind spot. When I was studying to take my permit test, my parents and brother all took the test too to see if they could pass it; the only person able to pass out of the three was my dad when in theory all should have passed! By enforcing classes to be taken more frequently the rules and laws would be known much better. Finally, increasing police patrol on the roads would create less distracted and reckless drivers in fear of tickets or jail time.

Earlier I mentioned that I have caused a car crash, but I have also been in three other ones caused by different drivers in my short 18 years of life and have even seen almost all of my friends crash! When I slammed into the minivan after school last year, unbelief and fear surged through my body and was met by an angry woman screaming at me to pull over nearby. Car crashes are scary, dangerous, financial burdens that should be limited however possible. A few months ago my friend, Marisa was driving me to our friend’s house, she got distracted and ended up being unable to break in time, rear ending the car in front of us. Although no one was hurt, the damage was minimal, and the police report only took a few minutes, I remember the fear in her face and how she kept repeating “ I’m in trouble.” Car crashes are never fun experiences, even when they are small and no one gets hurt.

In my own personal life, I can become a safer driver by being less distracted. Even if I’m not distracted by a phone, it’s easy to want to crank the music up so high you can barely focus on anything around you or even think about anything but the road in front of you. Also as a passenger, I would want to make sure that I am doing what I can to keep my friends undistracted, especially considering how we are by no means very experienced drivers. By understanding the privilege it is to drive and the serious dangers involved with it, we all can make the road a much safer place every single day.