We in New Zealand have just had a long weekend. Monday was a public holiday so many people celebrated Labour Day and Labour Weekend by going away for the weekend. Packing up the car and going to their baches, cribs or tents and caravans.
As with every holiday weekend the police keep statistics on how many people died in traffic accidents. Unfortunately 7 people died this past Labour Weekend. My thoughts are with families who lost family members this past weekend. I can't imagine what they went through when they heard the news of their loved one's death.
How can we prevent these accidents from occurring? What can we change to make it more difficult for these statistics to increase? Here are some of my ideas:
1. Lower the tolerance of drink driving to zero. It is amazing that some people will drive to a pub and then try to calculate how many beers in how many hours they can have like it is some kind of complicated mathematical problem. Sometimes I find it it ridiculous the lengths that people will go to. Make it zero and then all of the guessing will taken out of it. Of course in saying that transport to and from this kinds of establishments will need to be improved although that could be arranged by the establishment themselves.
2. The speed limit on the open road is 100km/h. I consistently drive between 96 to 100km/h. I am amazed how often I am passed on the open road. There seems to be a misconception that around town it is OK to drive at 60km/h and on the open road it is OK to drive at 110km/h. Where drivers got these arbitrary numbers from is anyones guess. If you think about, in built up areas it is 20% more than the limit while on the open road it is 10%. What should they so in 70km/h zones? Drive at 80.5km/h because that is 15% more? Slow down. Don't be in such a hurry to get anywhere. You are probably only arriving 5 minutes earlier anyway. This is another one that should be looked at closely. Have the speed limits and enforce them strongly.
3. I have talked about speed limits but it seems that people get even more irritated with people who drive too slowly. People get angry and do stupid things to get past the slow coach and accidents occur. Just on a side note I find it mildly amusing how people's personalities change when they get behind the steering wheel of a car. Talk about Dr. Jeykll and Mr.Hyde. So why don't we have a speed limit of 85km/h to 100km/h? This would keep the slow coaches off the roads and keep everything running smoothly.
4. Have prohibitive consequences for people who are not wearing seat belts in both the front seats and back seats of cars. This will make sure that people buckle up more readily. I'm sure every year people's lives could be saved if they wear seat belts.
5. A couple of weekends ago I drove to Whanganui which is about a 45 minute drive from Palmerston North. What I noticed about the road was that it has improved a great deal and there were many passing lanes what I didn't see were places where people can pull over. Some times for drivers it can be quite disconcerting with cars up your ass trying to get past. If possible I try to let them past and that would be easier if we had areas on the side of the road that we could pull into.
6. Make it a rule to have a rest after driving for a period of two hours. Cars will be fitted with a timer that can not be altered once started. If the police officer checks the timer and finds that it is gone over the time period then penalties could be enforced. Also the timer will also calculate how long the car has stopped for, so for example the minimum time is 5 minutes.
7. Because of the one lane each way concept that is most New Zealand open roads, a barrier between the lanes is not feasible but it could be done on the double yellow lanes. I wonder if a lot of head on collisions are at double yellow lines. So build barriers along those double yellow lines. The only problem I see with this is that there are a great deal of farm entrances and other smaller roads along these major highways and that may cause difficulty for people trying to off.
8. I said before that we need areas to the left of the road to be used so people can move over, do we also need more passing lanes? This will allow the traffic to flow more freely and hopefully bring down the road toll.
9. How much is a life worth? This question can not be answered. Can New Zealand improve it's public transport system so it is more worthwhile for people to travel by public transport to their holiday destinations? Less people are on the roads and people are using trains, planes and buses. I think the road toll would be lower if that was the case. This would be cost a great deal of money to implement but if it helps save one life, wouldn't it be worth it?
10. I said before that people following closely behind you can be disconcerting. I don't think there is any law that says how far you have to be behind a car. Should there be? I'm sure that this would be quite difficult to judge and it would be a subjective thing on the part of the police but if you start pulling people up for it then that could help. So, what I am saying is that we should standardize following distances.
Those are just some of my ideas. If you have any ideas, I would love to hear them.
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