The Virginia Department of Transportation has a way of making us all 'grumpy' at times, to be sure, but it is ridiculous to blame VDOT for 'dangerous roads' when there are so many 'dangerous drivers' in our midst. The fact is, there are far more dangerous drivers out there than there are physically dangerous roads or intersections.

Even in the case of intersections with new traffic patterns, like those with a new stop sign that didn't use to be there; drivers on 'automatic pilot' are going to miss it despite flashing lights while conscientious drivers will stop in every case. The mindless driver is busy doing other things; i.e., thinking about things remote from the roadway or talking on a cell phone, and they are probably doing it for the umpteenth time at speeds in excess of posted speed limits. Or perhaps they are drunk.

Large speed bumps should be installed at every intersection with changed traffic patters, for no less than six months. It's better to kill the errant car instead of an unsuspecting driver.

Anyone who travels I-64 from Williamsburg to Hampton and beyond knows how dangerous that stretch of roadway can be from a human behavior standpoint. Cars race along it bumper to bumper, barely leaving a car's length between each other. It is a disaster constantly in the making.

The driving public apparently does not know that safety requires you to leave one car length between you and the car in front for every ten miles of speed. The driver of a car traveling at 60 mph, therefore, should be maintaining six car lengths in front of them in order to be in a position to successfully stop their vehicle in an emergency situation.

I usually try to leave at least three or four car lengths in front of me in that heavy traffic, more if at all possible. But drivers routinely take my deliberately allocated space to mean that it is there for the taking. They are constantly cutting in front of me. And drivers behind me will furiously tailgate me if they think that I am not moving along fast enough because I am leaving (gasp!) an empty space in front of me.

That's in addition to all the diabolical LANE-CHANGERS who swish in and out of empty spaces like some gigantic checkers game.

It is this kind of immaturity behind the wheel that puts all of us in harm's way.

We should have a law that confines all large vehicles including pickup trucks and SUV's to the right lanes, leaving the left one (or two) lanes to standard sized vehicles that don't otherwise stand a chance in their wake. Passing should be prohibited except in strategically placed 'passing' lanes that could easily be marked. This is not unlike you find on many two-lane byways in rural America. It works. And it keeps the speeding down.

Adult male drivers in S.U.V.s and medium-sized trucks are the worst offenders on the interstates. They force their testosterone on the rest of us via their bullying 'I am bigger than you' ways. The S.U.V. is the newest demon on the road; it will crush any smaller car in a collision -- which is a safety feature for them. But what does that say about their care and respect for the rest of us on the road with them?

S.U. V Safety

Says Malcom Gladwell of S.U.V.s (The New Yorker Online, Jan 11, 2004):

"People are more concerned with feeling safe than with being safe", hence the popularity of limited-feedback, poorly performing vehicles like S.U. V.s. He speaks of a growing bap between the technical characteristics of a vehicle and its real-world use. In other words, the sheer size of S.U.V.'s and their off-road capabilities belie how they actually perform on the road. We ought, he says, to be buying cars optimized for the conditions that we actually drive. The majority of S.U. V. drivers clearly are not fording streams and climbing over boulders with them.

Gladwell says, too, that "the more expensive an item becomes, the more psychological factors play into the purchase decision." He goes on to say that market research shows that S.U.V.s tend to be bought by people who are "insecure, vain, self-centered, and self-absorbed, who are frequently nervous about their marriages, and who lack confidence in their driving skills."

The roads are lousy with S.U.V.s s these days. And smaller cars don't stand a chance against an S.U.V. in a collision. Gladwell says that, as a non-S.U.V. owner, he cannot afford to get into any accident at all these days. "If every car on the road was a Mini, then the cost of an accident would be quite small: if you are in a Mini and you hit a Mini, you aren't going to be that bad off. So, in the old days, the premium on active safety wasn't so large. On the other hand, if every car on the road is an S.U.V., the cost of an accident grows substantially. When a Ford Explorer hits a Chevy TrailBlazer, both parties suffer enormously. And, if a Ford Explorer hits a Mini, the Mini driver is a dead man. I'm more interested in active safety now than ever before."

When asked what can be done to address these problems, Gladwell states: "What we can do-- and ought to do -- is limit the damage that the S.U.V. obsession does to others. The important thing to remember is that the harm that S.U.V.s do to other vehicles is not a simple function of their excessive weight. In other words, if a five-thousand-pound S.U.V. hits you, you aren't automatically dead. Cars are so beautifully designed these days that they can safely absorb tremendous forces in an accident. (I always think of the fact that the bodyguard in the front seat of Princess Diana's Mercedes survived that crash, which was into a concrete pillar reportedly at a speed in excess of ninety miles per hour. That's how good car safety has become.) But all those safety mechanisms usually work if the car is hit squarely (or, at least, on the same plane) by the opposing vehicle. That's what is not happening now. S.U.V.s are so tall that cars simply submarine them. The kind of redesign that the automakers are talking about-making S.U.V.s less "aggressive" in their accident posture and reducing the risks of that kind of submarining-is critically important."

But there is more

Drivers who run red lights are some of the worst offenders on city streets. They kill more often than not. Somewhere deep in their psyche they think that a yellow light means GO FOR IT. Every driver who runs a light and is caught should be automatically jailed for 24 hours whether they kill or cause an accident or not. They could have, and they put everyone at the intersection at risk. They should also loose their license for at least ninety days. We have to get tough with folks like this or real change won't happen. Getting tough on offenders is clearly in the public's best interests.

Short of running a light, there are those who don't bother to use their turn signal or, if they do, they turn it on at the very last minute. They view it as bothersome when it is, in fact, a vital safety measure.

Right-turn lanes

Our local governments and departments of transportation can do us all a great favor by making all right lanes TURN ONLY lanes on public streets. There is no reason not to do this. We've got the cameras up there on many intersections now; so let's automatically ticket those drivers who violate the TURN ONLY requirement. It will speed up the flow of traffic and it will help ease driver frustrations. A passenger car is no less lethal than a loaded gun in the wrong hands. We have to do a better job of policing the immature driving public for traffic infractions.

Something to remember

The roadway is only as safe as the maturity of the driving public permits. More than ever before we need to be solicitous about our own and others' safety on the road.

Being concerned only for one's own safety is immaturity at its worst, which is something that is not being adequately addressed today at any level of community.