Ways for Driving to Become Safer

Over the years, driving has become safer due to innovations like the seat belt. However, an average of 34,000 people die each year as a result of driving in America. While it has gotten safer to dive, many are still killed or injured, with that number increasing in recent years. My grandmother was in a car crash that resulted in her losing her leg. Losing her leg made it harder for her to do things that she loved to do like going on bike rides or gardening, but at least she survived. The best way to lower the number of deaths by driving is to get more people to attend driving school, reduce the number of DUIs, and have better infrastructure for bicyclists.

A way to reduce the number of deaths related to driving is to have more people attend driving school. If people attend a driving school, then they will learn how to drive and the correct way to drive, as well as the dangers that come with bad driving, creating good drivers. Creating good drivers helps reduce the number of deaths because people who are not good at driving will make mistakes that could end up killing some. Bad drivers might not check their surroundings before making a lane change on a highway and could end up crashing into someone, killing them. They also might go well above the speed limit and swerve around slower cars. While swerving, they could lose control and crash into another car or hit an object that they did not see, effectively killing at least 1 person. Good drives do not run red lights which could result in a car crash and death. Now, one way to get higher attendance in driving schools is to make them cheaper. When I took driving school, the cheapest program was $499 for 6 hours behind the wheel, 6 hours of observation, and 30 hours of class. The best class was $699 for 9 hours behind the wheel and 30 hours of class. $499 is a lot of money that many people do not have to spend on learning to drive. The prices create a barrier for many which encourages people not to take the classes and learn on their own. Those who do will only learn as much as they research or are taught by friends/family, creating bad drivers. If the prices were made more accessible than people could take the better classes or any classes in general, which in turn means they learn more and create good drivers. More excisable prices also mean that more people can take the better classes, which will also lead to better drives. The hours of observation in the cheaper classes are not as helpful compared to actual driving. People learn by doing, so more hours of driving with an instructor leads to better drivers, which they will get in the more expensive class that more would be able to take if cheaper.

Another step that can be taken to reduce the number of deaths related to driving would be to lower the number of DUIs. A DUI means driving under the influence or driving while drunk/high. Driving while intoxicated is dangerous as a person will have poorer decision-making skills and reaction time, so they will drive recklessly and be unable to react in time to prevent the consequences. One way to lower the number of DUIs is to have harsher punishments for DUIs. In Wisconsin, your first DUI will result in a fine ranging from $150 to $300, and your license revoked for 6 to 9 months. That punishment is very lenient for a crime that kills over 11,000 people each year. If the punishments are made harsher than people will be less likely to drive drunk again, whether it be because they learned their lessons or because they are in jail. A better transportation system would also lower the rate of DUIs and in turn, lower the amount of people killed from them. If the transportation system were better, people would be able to go to bars/clubs and get home from bars/clubs using it and not by car. A person cannot get a DUI and potentially kill someone while driving if they are not driving a car in the first place. On a similar note, better walkways would help lower DUIs. Currently, many places in America are not very walking-friendly with dangerous crossroads, sidewalks that are in disrepair, or no sidewalks in general. If the walkways were made better than people would be able to walk home instead of having to rely on other transportation systems like a car or bus, preventing a potential DUI.

Finally, a way to lower the number of deaths as a result of driving would be to have better infrastructure for cyclists. In driving school, people are warned to always look out for cyclists for good reason. They can be hard to see like pedestrians, always popping up out of nowhere, but faster. They also have the protection levels of a pedestrian but must share the roads with cars that do not always respect them. While car crashes with bicyclists are not as common as other types of crashes, they are often more deadly due to the little protection that the bicyclists have. However, if the infrastructure for cyclists was made better, then there would be fewer crashes and in turn fewer deaths as a result of driving. Compared to other countries like the Netherlands, the U.S. has terrible infrastructure for bicyclists. Many places do not have designated bike paths or if they do, it is a thin line on the road that often is driven in by cars. The infrastructure cyclitis’s could be made much safer in many ways that would not cost that much money. In places like the Netherlands, bicyclists usually have their own paths off the road, like sidewalks, that are blocked off from the road. That type of infrastructure would be great if implemented as it prevents cars and bicycles from ever meeting. Yet, that cannot be implemented in places that are already built since it would require the already built buildings to be moved back to make space for the new area. Usually, in places that have bike paths, the path is between the road and car parking spaces. Instead of that layout, they can instead put car parking spaces between the road and the bike paths, another type of infrastructure found in places like the Netherlands. Having the car park between the road and the bike path offers protection to the bicyclists while also not requiring any more space, allowing it to be implemented in places already built. There are many ways to make cyclists safer, too many to list. The problem is not if it can be done, but would it be funded, and that answer is often no.

In conclusion, there are many ways to lessen the amount of people killed as a result of driving. A step that I can take to become a better and safer driver is to review my driving book which contains the laws and how to drive, more often. By doing that, the information will stay fresher in my mind, allowing me to drive perfectly. I can also encourage people who are driving while I am in the car to follow the speed limit since that is a thing that is often broken.