Driving in 2022

Being a new driver in this day and age can be exceedingly difficult. There are just as many unspoken rules about the road as there are spoken ones, and it can be challenging for someone just learning. As someone who is a new driver myself, driver’s education has helped me a great deal with knowing what to do in certain situations. I often find myself thinking that many of the people I interact with on the road could benefit from relearning their driver’s education.

One of the most poignant things that I learned in driver’s education was how to navigate intersections. As someone who drives almost every day and hears about the number of crashes that occur each day, it’s stark that so many accidents occur. In my opinion, new drivers are some of the safest drivers on the road. Although they lack confidence, they have the knowledge of driver’s education fresh in their minds and work hard to uphold things like speed limits and rights of way. Due to the fact that so many crashes are caused by overconfidence in driving and/or neglect of the basic rules of the road, if more driver’s paid attention to what they learned in driver’s education, there would be a significant decrease in crashes.

I often see drivers around me struggling with what to do when a school bus is stopped to pick up students. Every morning I see cars whiz past school buses in order to get where they need to go. Because of what I learned in driver’s education, I know to stop at an intersection even if the light is green for the safety of the students boarding the bus. Something so basic is nearly forgotten by drivers who have not had their education in years.

Personally, I have never been the victim of an accident, as I consider myself and my parents good drivers. However, I have seen my friends get into accidents. One situation was on a road my friends and I drive on frequently. There was a car with a flat tire stopped in the middle of a lane. My friend, who is a chronic speeder, didn’t notice the car in time but was able to come to a stop and had only minor damage. My other friend, however, who was right behind her did not realize what was happening. Her brakes failed. Even though she slammed them into the floor, she was unable to stop the car in time and had more damage done to her can than my first friend did. Even though I was not directly involved in this crash, it taught me that I should always be on the lookout for parked cars and not speed down the road.

There was also a time in which my dad got into an accident that was not his fault. He was going through an intersection when a car came speeding down the road, right through a red light, and ran into the front of his car. The car was totaled, and it wasn’t his fault. This taught me that I should always be on the lookout when I’m going through an intersection. Drivers of other cars may not be paying attention to the red light. It also taught me to be mindful when I approach an intersection, whether or not the light is red.

There are many steps that everyone who drives can take to be safer, for not only themselves but for the people abiding by the rules. For one, everyone should not speed. Where I live, it is difficult to drive and not find someone flying past you going 60 mph in a 35 mph zone. This makes it exceedingly dangerous, not only for people following the rules, but for people who speed (as seen by the experience my friends had). If everyone drove the speed limit on a regular basis, we would decrease the amount of crashes in not only the speeding category, but also the general crashes category as well.

All in all, I believe that all drivers can do better in their own ways by reviewing and learning from the mistakes of others. Reviewing what was learned in driver’s education would benefit society as a whole, as there would be no confusion as to the basic rules of the road and how to navigate certain situations skillfully and carefully.