This is the 6th in our series of tips from Stephen Haley, author of ‘Mind Driving - New Skills for Staying Alive on the Road’.

Movable objects cast danger into the spaces around them, and any space you want to enter is threatened if someone else could get there too.

A moving vehicle casts extreme risk forward into its stopping distance.  Similarly, a space that is ‘closing’ in traffic will be higher risk than if it is ‘opening’.

This is the 5th in our series of tips from Stephen Haley, author of ‘Mind Driving - New Skills for Staying Alive on the Road’.

If you surprise someone, they are more likely to hit you.

Signalling is the basic way to inform, but should not be used ‘automatically’ as the information you want to give may be too early, too late or confusing.  Position, the vehicle’s ‘body language’, gives vital indications too. This helps to explain the reason behind a lot of what safe drivers do. (Editor: Why is it, for example, these drivers don’t always signal (they know to signal at that time would be confusing or superfluous), yet other drivers know exactly what their intentions are?).

The aim is to actively help other road users to anticipate and adjust safely. It gets the driver more involved in what other people need to know, and being predicatable is readily under a driver’s control and relatively easy to improve.

This is the 4th in our series of tips from Stephen Haley, author of ‘Mind Driving - New Skills for Staying Alive on the Road’.

High skill is not embodied in lightning reactions. Actions that are early and light show better control than ones that are late and severe.

The difference is in what the driver is reacting to, and whether it is past events (what has already happened) or the future (what is going to happen). It is safer, and more skilful, to anticipate and prevent a crisis rather than react to one. 

A driving style that relies on sudden reactions is not only high risk, but also shows slow thinking and a lack of foresight.

This is the 3rd in our series of tips from Stephen Haley, author of ‘Mind Driving - New Skills for Staying Alive on the Road’.

Choosing a safe speed is a driver’s responsibility, and cannot be delegated to a speed limit.

Most crashes happen at legal speeds, so ‘legal’ is often too fast. Speed limits might give the illusion of safety, but they do not give permission to ignore the circumstances.

Obeying speed limits is not a real skill, but properly assessing danger definitely is.

This is the 2nd in our series of tips from Stephen Haley, author of ‘Mind Driving - New Skills for Staying Alive on the Road’.

Staying safe is about how much control you have over what happens to you.

A threat is created if what happens to you is significantly in the hands of someone (or something) else, and a good question is always, “How much control are you happy to surrender to others (or to chance)?”

Reducing risk involves maximising control over how events unfold for you, and not giving it up needlessly.

This is the first of a series of tips, or rather thought-provoking statements, from Stephen Haley, celebrated author of ‘Mind Driving - New Skills for Staying Alive on the Road’, which will be published here over the next few days.

“You are part of every hazard you meet and this is what gives you control over the outcome“.

This statement involves a more involved approach to hazards, rather than seeing them as just ‘out there’. It encourages drivers to actively predict and prevent danger, rather than react to it.

It is a more realistic and constructive view which also promotes a higher sense of responsibility and being in control. It explains too how a poor driver will be part of worse hazards than a good one in the same situation.

It was revealed tonight, on local television news in East Anglia, that the regions rural roads are the most dangerous in the country, having the highest crash rate with the highest fatalities.  A call has been made for the speed limit on rural roads to be drastically reduced in order to lower these casualty figures. 

We do not believe that this will have the desired effect since policing of it would be almost impossible and it is highly unlikely rural communities will welcome additional roadside ‘furniture’ in the form of speed cameras.  Therefore, the only use speed limits would have would be when apportioning blame, which is exactly what happens now since most of these crashes occur at speeds in excess of the 60mph limit. 

In other words, the current speed limit fails to prevent drivers from driving at much higher speeds than this.  Drivers need to take responsibility for their own actions, and recognise the potential dangers around - it is sheer folly to drive at speed on a single track road around a blind bend!  But this is what happens.  More than a decade of relying on speed cameras to do the work of traffic police has led people to the belief that the speed limit is the ultimate goal - if 60 is the limit, then 60 is safe!  On many stretches of our rural roads it may well be safe, but on many others it is far too high, so drivers need to adjust their speed accordingly.  If we were to try to fix a ’safe’ limit on all 6500 miles of rural roads in Norfolk alone, the countryside would be littered with speed limit signs.  Do we really want that? 

The answer to the problem has to lie in driver education.  If we are to influence a lot of people, there needs to be an advertising campaign, such as those for driving at 30mph, to educate drivers about driving in the countryside.  Perhaps  help could be enlisted from horse-riding groups, cycling clubs, farmers, ramblers, as well as the various motoring groups, to get the message across that the countryside is to be respected, when driving on its roads as well as walking its lanes.  For the unsuspecting, unthinking driver, it’s a very dangerous place!

Please email your comments on this post.

The IAM (Institute of Advanced Motorists) has called on the government to do more about the carnage on our rural roads, particularly as two thirds of these crashes, too often resulting in death or very serious injury, involve young drivers who, in the words of a spokesperson from the road safety charity Brake, “treat rural roads like personal race tracks”.

Read the full article at the Times Online: http://driving.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/driving/article2859626.ece

The Metropolitan Police is one of several forces that have decided to investigate company road-safety policies after research by the Health and Safety Executive which shows that 20 people are killed and 250 seriously injured each week in crashes involving someone who was driving for work.

More than half of companies (53 per cent) fail to check that employees using their own cars for work have insured them for business use, according to a survey by the fleet management company Arval. Just over a quarter (26 per cent) ask employees to produce an MoT certificate and an even smaller number (17 per cent) make inquiries about whether private cars used on company business have been maintained regularly.

Superintendent Mark Bird, of the Met’s traffic unit, said: “More and more we carry out follow-up investigations with companies after collisions, to ensure that work-related road safety is embedded within company policies. In the event of a collision or injury, the police take seriously all the reasons that have led to it happening including the condition of the vehicle and why the driver was on the road, including if they were travelling for business reasons.” He said that employers needed to realise that their responsibility for ensuring safety did not end when employees left company premises.

“Just as employers would make sure that employees are safe in the workplace so they should while they are on the road. Businesses must face up to their duty-of-care responsibilities and realise that they are responsible for employees’ welfare when on the road for business purposes, whether they are driving a company car or not.”

Department for Transport figures show that about 300 people are killed each year as a result of drivers falling asleep at the wheel. About 40 per cent of crashes related to tiredness involve someone driving for work. Pacts said companies should be obliged to report any road deaths and injuries involving staff travelling on business. There are about 200 fatal injuries to staff in the workplace each year, compared with an estimated 800-1100 on the road.

Stats:

• There are 3m company cars
• A further 1m private cars are used on company business
• 33% of company cars are involved in a collision each year
• The Health & Safety Executive estimate that £2.7bn is the annual cost to employers of “at-work” crashes
• There are 150 deaths and serious injuries each week in crashes involving someone driving on business

(Source: HSE, Pacts)

Source of article: Advanced Driving UK.  To visit their site  click here:  http://www.advanced-driving.co.uk

 To discuss your company’s needs, call Care Motoring today.

For too long now Government policy has been over-zealous use of speed cameras, catching many drivers whose speed had inadvertantly slipped above the limit because their concentration was given to prevailing traffic conditions as opposed to the accuracy of their compliance with the speed limit.  We have no problem with drivers who are travelling at a reckless speed being caught by a speed camera and fined, but we do object to so many careful drivers finding themselves criminalised through a minor infringement.  We should return to proper traffic policing, catching the true criminals, those who drive recklessly and irresponsibly, showing no thought for anybody else on the road.  These are the drivers we want to see targeted, and it looks like the tide is beginning to turn in our favour.  Click on the link below to read The Times article on this subject:

http://driving.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/driving/article2781340.ece