Viewpoint

Last September the Parents Advisory Committee (PAC) at the Ecole Oceanside Elementary School in Parksville asked me to help establishing a crossing guard program for what they considered to be a dangerous intersection at one corner of the school grounds. In past, the principal had raised the issue of liability concerns that needed to be looked into and that was the end of the conversation.

Chuck Hawks turned a career in the motorsport and automotive industries into being the CEO of Teen Driving Solutions School, a US non-profit organization. In this TED Talk, Chuck speaks about the state of driving in the US today. His opinion is not a flattering one. It's not much different in Canada.

I've been driving with eDriving's Mentor app for about a year now and know that it has made improvements in my skills. I haven't cracked the top 10% barrier yet, but I'm still trying! The secret to having a high score appears to be trying to anticipate and plan for what is happening around you as you drive.

In this article Paul discusses inattention blindness. "A phenomenon that occurs when the brain is engaged in something else besides driving and your brain fails to process some of the available visual information." The conclusion is that our focus must shift from “hands on the steering wheel” and “eyes on the road” to “brain on the road”.

Our current system of trying to change driver behaviour largely consists of traffic tickets, vehicle impoundment and driver's licence suspensions. They all rely on traffic policing to find and deal with those who don't follow the rules. How efficient is that?

Many drivers believe speeding alone does not actually cause crashes. While not totally inaccurate, this over-simplified phrase does not paint the whole picture. The fact is, very few crashes are caused by one factor alone, and this includes speeding, but downplaying the impact of speeding can prove to be deadly.

Misbehaving and incompetent drivers get off too easy in the media. How many times have you seen news headlines like these?

I find it interesting that following 2 serious crashes, Neil Menard, the mayor of Merritt, has been taking shots at the maintenance crews that are responsible for the Coquihalla.

Paul Hergott is a personal injury lawyer that practices in Kelowna are regularly writes on road safety. His latest article examines what might happen when the government increases the penalties for distracted driving. The position that he takes is that this could increase the problem by driving everyone to switch to hands free technologies.

I’ve spent most of my 40+ years of driving in Metro Vancouver, but have also had the opportunity to drive in major cities in England, Greece, Egypt, and France. When I return from these trips, I’m always amazed at the level of hostility on our local roads. With the traffic density in these foreign cities much higher than in most North American cities, I expected to see a lot more hostility amongst drivers.