TIME TO TAME RED LIGHT RUNNERS
Is Government the Answer this Time?
Observation
I remember a time when you could safely cross a road in the crosswalk, assuming you obeyed the lights and weren’t walking at night in dark clothing. That’s no longer true. People routinely ignore red lights, even as they see pedestrians crossing. In California, where “right on red” is legal, you see people making the turn at top speed without even slowing down. I was shocked when a police car nearly hit me. His lights weren’t on—he wasn’t in hot pursuit. Still, he ran the red light and tore past stunned pedestrians. The red-light-runners also come close to hitting cars who are obeying their green light. In one case, turning left onto a three-lane street (six in total), all cars were stopped and as I began to enter the intersection, one car blasted past the stopped cars and nearly tee-boned me.
Red light running is part of an increasing tendency for some people to think that their needs are primary and that they need not consider the needs or rights of others.
Most People’s Response
I now routinely wait a beat after the light changes to make sure no one is powering through their red light. I also watch carefully on both sides of the crosswalk to ensure that I can stop if someone is ignoring the lights. But that doesn’t make you safe. Especially for pedestrians, roads have become incredibly unsafe. I’m not sure what happened, but people’s driving skills have declined over the past few years, all while cars have become more expensive to repair and medical bills drain people’s savings. There’s only so much the law-abiding can do…and we’re doing it.
Time For Government to Step In
People who know me are aware that I think the government should shrink to at least a quarter of its current size. But this is one case where we need some help. Keeping people safe seems to be a goal of the Left, but only in areas where their solutions make no sense, or where they are intruding in private areas (such as soda size and banning “harmful” content.)
We have two options that I can see. Please respond to the blog if you have other ideas. The first is to copy England in making the driving test much more difficult. Even Sterling Moss, the race car driver, failed his first retest when he turned 65. I suspect that a lot of drivers out there are incompetent drivers, and since schools no longer offer training, we can easily see that those who are self-taught may need a refresher. If you can’t pass, you can’t drive. The penalties are stiff in the UK for those who drive without a license. People should also be retested more frequently, perhaps by private companies who ally with motor vehicle departments. This should be at the driver’s expense and yes, it should be required.
The other option, one that appears in some places, is red light cameras with stiffer penalties for violations to really discourage drivers from pushing a yellow to its limits. Add more costs if the person was texting while running the light. Yes, I’ve seen this. Charge high fees AND points on their license. This will increase the cost of their insurance and have a discouraging effect on the need to shave milliseconds off their drive. Can’t pay? You lose your license and if you repeat, your car will be towed away.
The only reason more people aren’t dying or being badly injured is that most of us are taking unreasonable precautions to save our lives. As I age, I realize that elderly walkers can’t dodge a car, nor are their reaction times as good. The group I’m now a member of is not only more likely to be hit; they are also more likely to have long recovery times and hefty hospital bills.
I’d love to think there were better ways to make us all safer, so please share your ideas. If I get more than mine, I’ll share them with our governor who purports to care about our lives. At least, he should care about his and his family’s lives.
