Can Legislation make the roads safer?

I won't get into my opinions about chaos theory or probability factors, because numbers will not help you see the point I want to make in this article. However, if you too are familiar with those schools of thought then you will understand the profundity of the topic I'm going to explore here and now.

All of us American drivers on the roads today are familiar with "Click it or Ticket it". Some people don't agree with the government telling us how to drive and while I can see their points, I want to believe that legislation regarding transportation and driving is created to protect the people. Yes, I'm aware that legal drivers pay exhorbitant amounts of money for taxes, title, registration, and insurance on top of gas costs and repairs. I'm one of them. But I refuse to believe that this is taxation without representation. We have to support the system financially or instead of some semblance of order on the roads it will become pure anarchy -- looking like an even more horrific version of a Mad Max movie.

Road rage is a different problem and perhaps I'll talk about that in another article. Right now, let me stay focused on the legislation of driving and transportation. Do I like being forced to have insurance or being forced to wear a seatbelt? No. But I can respect the legislation that forces me to do so. I understand the reason for it. It is for safety and protection and therefore rebelling against it is not in my or the public's best interest. Sometimes it is important to question authority, but once you know the answer to your question, there is no further need to.

Transportation is probably one of the most expensive industries in the economy. Most people say it's healthcare or education, but I don't believe them. Yes, I realize that hospitals and schools employ many people, but everyone who can walk to the bus stop, is involved in transportation - not just patients and doctors, or students and teachers.

Think for awhile about the magnitude and importance of transportation in modern civilization. Think about it's effect on the economy. The lowest price of any new car today begins at $20,000. I don't care what job you have or how much you earn, that's not cheap. Think about the cost of a public bus or a school bus? Think about how much diesel gas it takes to run a fully loaded semi from one state to another? Are you beginning to see the influence of transportation on the economy? Are you beginning to understand why people complain about high gas prices and insurance rates?

Up until the last few years, the public transit system in Pinellas County would sell bus passes. I could get a day pass for $5 and ride the bus all day all over the county wherever a bus would go. Now deals like that are only available if you have a smart phone app. They no longer sell the daily printed pass. Was that new legislation? Or was that a decision made by a private company that owns so-called public transit? Who does it affect? It won't bother people who drive their own cars. It may bother old folks who are not smart phone savvy. But who cares, right? I mean they can just call Uber or Lyft or a taxi cab because old people are so wealthy living off their social security checks. Yeah right. I'm sorry, but I do not see how switching from a printed ticket to an app is for the safety or protection of the public. I disagree with that change.

Recently I discovered a new law that is in effect on the highways. I mentioned in a previous article that I got a ticket on I-75 as I was driving from Georgia back to Florida. The law says that if a state trooper has a car pulled over, we other drivers need to get out of the right lane. I did not know this law, and I got a ticket for not abiding. I can see how this legislation is meant to keep people safe, however I do not agree with this legislation. To me it's like saying you're going to get a ticket for not using your blinker signals when changing lanes. Do you know how many times I see cars everyday changing lanes without a blinker signal? A lot. What if everyone got a ticket for that? I see no difference in the safety precaution. A good driver doesn't need the blinker signal, nor does a good driver need to change lanes just because there are cars on the side of the road. Don't punish a good driver for a mistake that a bad driver could make. Just punish the bad driver when the bad driver makes the mistake. The same holds true in my opinion with DUI's.

Some people's lives were completely ruined because of a DUI. While I do not recommend or advocate that people drive intoxicated, I also do not think that people should be punished for driving correctly just because they are. There is no way to ascertain how a particular influencer (alcohol, marijuana, etcetera) will change an individual's driving except to see how they are driving. I've swerved on the road completely sober. It happens. Did I recover fast? Yes. But that's just because I'm skilled in defensive driving. There are some people like me who can not drive drunk. I know this so I don't do it. But there are some people who are not drunk even after three or four beers, which is beyond the sobriety limit. This is not a fair or accurate measure of a driver. Do not punish the driver for the legislation. Punish the driver for bad driving. It's not the alcohol that's going to hurt other drivers. It's the bad driving. You've heard the phrase "Guns don't kill people; People kill people." Same logic applies to driving. Cars don't kill people. Bad drivers do. A bad driver can be sober or drunk just like a good driver. The legislation should have been enforced like the seatbelt law. Don't pull someone over just because they don't have their seatbelt on. But if you catch them going 85 miles per hour in a 40 mph zone, as you're writing their speeding ticket, well hey throw in that not wearing your seatbelt ticket to boot. They asked for it. They are being a danger to themselves and others. They should pay for that crime. But if you're just going to harass someone who's following all the rules but doesn't have their seatbelt on, you're not a protector of the people. You're just a greedy quota filling robocop who is not only hurting a good driver, but wasting our tax money to do so.

Now I'm usually the one who says we need to clean our law libraries. I'm not a Capitalist, or a Communist, or a Socialist. I'm a Constitutionalist. I know the importance of the economy when it comes to legislation, but I also know that laws are supposed to be about keeping order instead of chaos. Laws are supposed to be about protecting people, not hurting them. I don't usually lobby for new legislation, but today I saw something on the road that made me worry about the future. Have you seen the new Cyber Truck by Tesla? It's a humongous hideous beast. I thought that the Hummer was a ridiculous size for standard driving, but now we have another biggie on the road. They used to say that men bought sports cars to compensate for small packages, but I think it has changed. I see less and less sports cars and more and more big SUVs like the Expedition or the Escalade, or bigger pick-up trucks. They are monstrous. Isn't it bad enough that a tiny car like a Chevy Spark or a Smart Car has to share the road with semis and busses? Now you want kids riding their bikes from school while a Smart Car and a Cyber Truck try not to kill each other as they change lanes without their blinker signal? Seriously, this is getting crazy fast. Something needs to change. You can't keep drawing bike lane lines if you think that Cyber Trucks, Expeditions, Sparks, Smart Cars, and mopeds are all going to share the road fairly, equally, and safely. It's beyond crazy. People want to know why kids don't ride their bikes anymore. It's not just the weather or because kids got lazy. They're not stupid or crazy. They want to live to see their 21st birthday and the way that transportation is going, if they get on one of their bikes, they might not. They probably have already told their parents about how one of their friends died that way. It's terrible.

So I do propose some new legislation. Anywhere a bike or a moped can be on the road, then all big trucks and SUV's like the ones I've mentioned should remain in the truck lane. But that really won't help the biker because that happens to be the right lane, where the non-motorized bike lanes are. So that makes it even more dangerous for a bike rider while making it safer for the Spark or Smart Car driver who can proceed to the other lanes without getting squashed between a Cyber Truck and a school bus.

I don't have it all worked out, but I think I've described the problem and offered a bit of a solution. I didn't come up with this system or the legislation in effect today. I'm just trying to explain how I see it as a tax payer and as a concerned safe driver.

The bigger they make the cars and trucks on the roads, the less affordable it's going to become for someone to get into a regular sized car. Some of us remember that the VW Beetle sold new for $2000 back in the 70s. The last time a new car sold for $2000 was the Yugo in the 80s. Now the cheapest new car you can get into is something like a Chevy Spark and you've got to add another zero to the price tag. Do you really think it's fair or safe that someone should pay that much money to share the road with a monster triple the size?