WOW. Biker kicks car, woman tries to run over biker.

I have mixed feelings about who was in the wrong here.  If a guy kicked my wife's car and a situation like that ensued I would obviously be rooting for my wife.  But her reaction was extreme.  Its easy for us to see that now, but in the heat of the moment when an angry man was coming at her was it a matter of revenge on her part or was it fight or flight at that point.  Anyways here's the video.

Leaving It All Behind

Imagine selling your house, quitting your job, jumping on your bike and just riding away.  Thats what this couple has done from Toronto, Ontario.  Might seem crazy, but there's a certain appeal to it.

You can track their progress on their blog here.  http://www.ridedot.com

Are new cars catering to distracted driving?

There is a new ford commercial which shows an interior dash with avtouch screen interface. Having been using an iPad to type some of these blog postings I'm familiar with touch screens and their advantages and disadvantages.

One major disadvantage is a complete lack of any reference point. In my current car I don't even need to look down really to change the temperature or radio station. I can just reach over and feel the controls. This is completely impossible with a touchscreen. The driver must be focused on the screen at all times. Wouldn't this be considered distracted driving?

I realize that car makers want to one up each other to get an edge to sell more cars. But honestly I think cars should be coming with less crap in them not more.

Probably the only way we'll see the end of distracted driving is by the development of cars which drive themselves. This will probably strike fear into the heart of the driving enthusiast, however it is the only way to take human nature out of the equation.

The truth is we want all the extra stuff in cars. Most of us probably see driving a car as dead time, time that's being wasted until we get somewhere to do something. So we try to fill that dead time with something meaningful. Also with commute times in the gta well over an hour, entrepreneurs and contractors have a long time when no one can get a hold of them. This is what's made the cellphone so popular.

I personally like driving, and will be sad to see the day when my car starts driving itself. Although in all likely hood I and most people I know won't be able to afford to operate a car at that time... but if my car starts driving itself and is talking to other cars so that they all know what the other is doing then a large problem of driving is removed. Road rage would no longer exist. Well actually it probably will it's just that the cars occupants will be unable to act on their anger... Cell phones are no longer an issue, except for the cancers and degeneration of the human language and the global decline of social interaction and all that... Traffic may actually get better.

The one concern I have about a computer controlled car however is what happens when it locks up!?! I will probably avoid ones made by Microsoft.

Drive safe.

Removing Traffic Lights for safety and congestion?

Last year I heard about a town in Europe somewhere which removed its traffic lights at every junction and left it as completely uncontrolled with no signage or rules except don't hit anything or run over anything.  Pedestrians motorcycles and cars were all given the same priority which made for no right of ways, every move was based on using a gap or opening to cross the intersection.

Naturally when I first heard about this, I was astounded that they would do this and had images in my mind of mass carnage.  But the fact that I never heard anymore about this made me wonder if it had worked.

Having thought about the concept a little bit more since that time, its started to make more sense to me.  Driving is one of the most social things we do all day.  Whether we know it or not.  We share the road with thousands of other road users daily and every action we take on the road usually ends up affecting at least a dozen people.  Or in the case of a highway it can end up affecting hundreds.  One of the things about cars is that they seem to isolate the driver from the rest of the world.  When a driver closes the door to their car, they can tend to get into an observer mindset.

I've had this discussion with many people now.  Especially about how drivers often only see other cars on the road, not other people.  It's easy to forget that the little hatchback in front of you that's driving so irritatingly slow, could contain a young family with children.

I'm unsure of which town had removed its traffic lights which was my initial interest, however while reading up on the subject, I found a study done in a town called Portishead near Bristol England.  Congestion was so bad at a particular junction that there was waits at the light for up to 20 minutes.  In an attempt to relieve congestion they turned off the lights.  The travel time went from 20 minutes to 5 minutes.  It's been stated that the junction when the controls were in place took as many as 1700 cars and 300 pedestrian per hour with excessive delays.  After they turned off the lights the junction takes over 2000 cars per hour and still 300 pedestrians with almost no delays.  The test was so successful they've permanently removed the traffic signals.  Its been running successfully for 8 months now with only 2 minor accidents and no pedestrian injuries.

ONE IMPORTANT NOTE.  That is noted in the study is that blind people ignore the intersection, and that their concerns haven't been met yet.

Here's a 2 part video I've found on the subject which features the junction mentioned above.

In the video they only show the intersection after everyone is used to it.  I'm curious as to how much adjustment time was necessary to successfully navigate it.

But when we think about this experiment it might be easy to forget that there's a very large population of people who live in areas which do not have traffic controls at every intersection.

Take this video for example.

The video doesn't state where this particular intersection is, however my guess would be Vietnam due to the amount of scooters.  I looked up the crash fatalities in Vietnam and compared them to the crash fatalities in the United States.  Vietnam actually had less fatalities per 100,000 people than the US did.   Vietnam had 394 per 100,000 while the US had 449 per 100,000.  In perspective Canada had less than both at 260 deaths per 100,000.    These statistics are from the WHO website.

I'm not 100% for getting rid of all traffic signals.  However I think it is a very good thing that drivers are forced to look at all aspects before entering an intersection.  Drivers use pauses at intersections to concentrate on other things and then once the green light comes up they feel a security in knowing they have the right of way.  When the traffic controls are taken away from them suddenly they are responsible for knowing whether they can get through the intersection or not. 

Some food for thought.

Drive Safe.

Hit and Run leaves former Baseball star paralyzed, but there is hope.

This story is all over the news today but it bothered me a bit.  There was little background story on this particular person and I wanted to try and find out a little bit about him.

Rob Summers is a paraplegic.  In the summer of 2006 he was hit by a car which hopped the curb and struck him.  The driver of the car then sped away leaving him crippled on the ground.  As a result of this collision, he was paralyzed from the waist down.  Left to live life in a wheelchair due to someone's drunk driving, inattention whatever the case may have been for the driver.

Rob Summers was a baseball player for Oregon State University.  He was a pitcher infact.  He was on the 2006 All Star National Team.  He was actually playing for the Aloha Knights during the 2006 offseason, in the period of time he was hit.

but he's recently made medical history.  He was able to stand on his own for the first time since the accident.  Doctors have installed a device which is able to stimulate his muscles to help him move and coordinate his lower body.  He is now able to stand for short periods of time and move legs and toes on command.  Doctors stress that this is not a cure, and may not work in all cases.  There are 4 more trials planned with different patients to try and come up with a purpose built device to aid people in these types of cases.  This research was funded by the Christopher and Diana Reeve foundation.

Hopefully this is a reminder to everyone that when we do something stupid behind the wheel, it doesn't always only affect ourselves.

Drive Safe.

Victoria day weekend OPP blitz.

Please remember folks.  The OPP will be out like they always are looking for speeders, talking on cellphones etc.

Don't give them a reason to pull you over!  Have a good holiday and drive safe.

I'll leave you with a view of Port Perry.

Does videos of aggressive driving really affect peoples driving?

When I was little I remember seeing car commercials where cars were advertised for their performance.  Not unlike today, its just that now a days the rules seem stricter on such advertising.  Older adverts used to show cars carving down the road much more aggressively than commercials of today.

Take this commercial for a Ford Capri 2.8 from 1981.

During the advert the top speed of the car is listed as well as the tag line "it goes like..." with the ford emblem showing up and a lightingish sound.  If this advert was modernized and applied in a similar way.  I bet you it would be removed from the air almost immediately by advertising regulators. 

Now I never thought when I was growing up that these commercials ever had any effect on me.  After all I was growing up in an age when a popular tv show glorified jumping cars over random road works to escape the police. 

As well as tv shows about cars with computers in them that shoot laser beams go insanely fast and can leap frog into the air at will.

But never once did I think that these cars ever actually existed or that it was a good idea to jump a car over a road works.  Many people from my generation were exposed to the same shows and the same influences. 

Shows like these don't really exist on TV anymore.  Now they've been replaced by reality TV shows which are generally causing people to cancel cable in droves.  But a more modern version of this type of driving influence can be seen on Youtube.   Typing in keywords such as arab drift and crazy car into the search box will give you hours of viewing of people doing insane things on public roads.  This is where youtube fails, since a lot of younger people will want to make their own movies of the insane things they do.  As such we end up with such movies as.

 

Drive safe folks