The car finally stops as I pull over to the side of the road. I had just spent the past 30 minutes driving on the freeway for the first time and I was exhausted. Sweaty palms, quick breath, and a tight grip on the steering wheel. Breathing out for the first time in what felt like hours, I finally relaxed. I had been taking driving lessons for the past few weeks and had slowly progressed to driving on the freeway. For me, unlike most people, learning to drive was a stressful, anxious process that I could not understand why other people enjoyed. Every time I got behind the wheel, I felt like I was one bad move from ruining my life and the lives of the people around me forever. Of course, this was not a rational belief, driving can be safe and comfort comes with experience. Now, around a year later, I am able to drive everyday from my school and back, around 30 minutes everyday, without any driving anxiety.
Driver’s education played a critical role in combating my driving anxiety. Driver’s education provided me with the necessary information and skills to navigate the complex roadways in my community. After I had expressed discomfort with driving, my parents had decided to purchase a few extra driving lessons so I could get the hang of driving before taking my test to get a driver's license. This helped tremendously with my comfort and is part of the reason that I am driving today at all. Unlike what I worried about in driving, uncontrollable accidents or losing control of the car, most car accidents today happen due to either complacency or impatience. Driving every day causes people to become complacent because we no longer see the danger in driving. Although driving is single handedly the most dangerous activity we do on a daily basis, and the number one cause of mortality in teenagers, because we do it every day it becomes routine and we no longer treat driving with the same respect as we do when we start learning how to drive.
When you first learn to drive, you are constantly reminded that you are operating heavy machinery at high speeds with the power to seriously harm or kill yourself, the other occupants in the vehicle, or the people around you. As you become more comfortable, driving just becomes part of your routine and you no longer have the same fear nor the same respect for driving. Regardless of how hard you try to concentrate, as you continue driving you will grow more complacent, it is simply a matter of how much. The most important aspect of drivers education in reducing deaths due to driving is not just teaching you how to drive safely and the driving laws, but instilling the safest possible habits of driving so that even if you pay less attention to the road, you are still driving safely. It is the little things in driving that are the most important such as looking before you turn, glancing over your shoulder after checking your mirrors before changing lanes, being aware of your surroundings, not glancing at your phone while driving, not driving tired or overly emotional, and a million other small things that we as drivers can do to make the road safer. Ultimately, it is complacency that kills when driving because as you grow more complacent you also pay less attention to the road which makes you more susceptible to getting into an accident. It can be hard to stay focused on the road while driving everyday. I myself am not perfect and have had to remind myself to stay focused as I grow complacent driving on the same roads to school and back every day. But ultimately the most important thing you can do while driving to stay safe is to not be complacent and to build good driving habits from the very beginning.
However, in addition to complacency the other aspect that makes driving so dangerous is impatience and arrogance. I have seen too often how impatience and arrogance both cause people to make dangerous and poor decisions on the road. Going 60 mph in a road with a speed limit of 40, turning right on a red light only to flip a U-turn and turn right again just to avoid the red light, barrelling across five lanes of traffic on the freeway at the last second so they don’t miss their exit rather than taking the next exit, speeding down the bike lane only to notice parked cars or construction and coming veering on over to try and get ahead of people, and too many other reckless acts while driving. Unfortunately, among teenagers and young adults this attitude of reckless arrogance while driving appears to be commonplace. At school, I have overheard people joking about getting into an accident while speeding or losing control of the vehicle while taking a turn too fast. While complacency can be dangerous for the everyday person, the people that truly terrify me are those who are impatient and arrogant. Impatience can cause you not to think rationally and make dangerous decisions. For example, you may speed up to get to an intersection with a yellow light already so you don’t have to wait for a red light. Or you might not fully stop at a stop sign and instead only slow down because you don’t notice any cars or pedestrians. For people who drive impatiently and recklessly the only way to curb such behavior is to have stricter enforcement of the traffic laws. The laws are there to ensure the safety of everyone on the road, drivers and pedestrians alike, and need to be enforced consistently in order to reduce such behavior. We will never see everybody driving safely, but if the rules are rigorously enforced then we can reduce how many people drive recklessly.
Ultimately, driving can be a safe activity so long as you follow all of the rules. Putting your phone down, not driving under the influence of alcohol or any other drugs, not driving tired, not driving emotionally, keeping calm, following all traffic laws (yes that includes the speed limit), and overall just practicing good driving habits combined with patience and logical thinking. It is also important to remind others to drive safely and create a culture that respects the dangers of driving by practicing good driving habits. Not only do you need to drive safely, but you should teach other people around you good habits. That is another reason that driving education is so important, because it shapes how the next generations will choose to drive. If everyone receives a good driving education, is patient on the road, and does not overestimate their driving abilities, then we are a massive step closer to a better safer world for all.