There's compulsory reading in the Saturday Essay in last Saturday's Melbourne Age. Roger Rees, Emeritus Professor of Disability Studies in the School of Medicine at Flinders University, argues that it is how people think more than vehicle and road design that is the major cause of traffic accidents.
Not off the hook
But before we follow that line too far, let's be clear that he doesn't let car designers off the hook completely:
It is true, of course, that design matters, and that manufacturers need to think not only of a car's occupants but also other road users. Four-wheel-drive vehicles are a case in point. They may be tougher, capable of moving on ever steeper inclines, protected by their huge alloy bumper bars. But are they really safer for the driver or the pedestrian? At higher speeds or on wet roads they are less stable than the conventional sedan, and, because of their height above the road, drivers are less likely to notice pedestrians.
…or, indeed, cyclists.
Between the steering wheel and the seat
Rather than roads or cars, Professor Rees argues that the major problem can be found between the steering wheel and the seat:
it is the lack of preparation for the journey and the aggressive, irrational, often non-thinking behaviour that all too often characterises the driver. Put simply, our road toll is high because we are not using our brains. And the main casualty in these accidents is, paradoxically, that most powerful and delicate of human mechanisms, the brain.
[emphasis added]
Ah yes, the brain. Often not properly engaged before engaging gear:
Impulsiveness and aggression are a principal, yet rarely identified, cause of almost all accidents. Their roots lie within the individual and society. On the one hand there is the person's state of mind, and on the other the environmental stimuli — aggressive advertising, the easy availability and social acceptance of alcohol or drugs, and ultimately a culture that does not stress careful preparation for the journey.
In a culture where it's normal to trash-talk other road users and drive like it's a race, careful preparation for the journey requires
a radical rethink in the way we teach our young people to drive. It is not enough that they simply learn the basic physical and technical skills needed to direct and control their vehicles; they must be taught how to think. Firstly young drivers (and many older ones) need to understand that their feelings are created internally as a result of their own ideas and thoughts — the language they use to talk to themselves.
For example:
When the self talk is negative and aggressive — "Get off the f--king road, you halfwit," or even "Do you think I've got time to wait for you!" — then the person's perception is distorted. For them, other drivers become enemies… When this happens, the correspondence between perception and response breaks down and aggression becomes maladaptive, violent and dangerous.
[emphasis added]
That's serious stuff he's saying there - and any cyclist who's been on the receiving end of road rage can attest that it's no exaggeration.
I think Professor Rees's proposed solutions are a bit vague - perhaps he has outlined it better in the academic literature because in this essay they come across as a bit fuzzy. Nevertheless, they sound like they're worth trying.
2¢ worth
However it's long been my belief that not everyone is fit to hold a driver's license. Maybe they lack the perceptiveness, intellectual capacity, and/or co-ordination - some people just don't get it. Unfortunately in our society there is an expectation that driving a car is a right to be claimed rather than a privilege to be earned.
Awhile ago there was a programme on TV called Britain's Worst Driver - it was a game show, presented for "entertainment". Personally I found it horrifying not just because the "contestants" - licensed drivers - were frankly suicidal/homicidal in their driving but because every other bad driver watching was boosting their self-serving bias saying to themselves "I'm a much better driver than that bozo".
By definition, the skills of half of the drivers on the road are "below average" and if you drive regardless of what you think there's an even chance that you're one of them.
Frustration
I empathise with Professor Rees's experience:
Each week I observe the disabling and tragic damage to young lives. On just one 20-kilometre stretch of the Victor Harbor road south of Adelaide four deaths and 20 serious injuries occurred on average each year from 2000 to 2005. Exceeding the speed limit, impatient and intolerant behaviour were the major causes.
In a previous life I had extended exposure to people whose lives had been derailed by head or spinal injury. And I can promise you that the road toll - that simple, tragic number - tells less than half of the story.
Comments
Of course it's the human element that plays a big part in accidents and in road safety in general. I'm a private pilot - I fly light aeroplanes - and so have a big interest in aviation safety. What they now call 'the human factor' plays a part in, very conservatively, at least 80% of aviation accidents. And remember pilots are significantly better trained than your average driver.... but we all make mistakes (it's part of being human - I think the technical term is, 'shit happens'). If I make a serious mistake as a pilot, I die (along with anyone else in my aircraft at the time). If I make a serious mistake as a cyclist, I die. But if a car driver makes a serious mistake, they may not necessarily be the ones who bear the brunt of it... others die. People need to realise the awesome killing power of the average family car....