Designing it into the system (Road Rage)

Member Name: tomc

Product:	Road Rage
Date:	08/08/01 (101 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: You want a fight???

Disadvantages: You name them!

I live in a town in which has a road system which seems specifically designed to provoke road rage among the many drivers. It's as though the town planners went out of their way to build road systems with chicanes and oddly shaped roundabouts, annoying traffic lights and pedestrian crossings in the wrong places, so that even the most patient person will find themselves taxed by the ludicrous traffic systems.

I have never seen quite so many traffic-light controlled cross-roads where there are three lanes going in to the cross-roads and two lanes going out. This means that as soon as the lights turned to amber there is a mighty revving up of engines as those at the front fly ahead of their neighbours into the lane ahead of them. Even worse for those behind them who have to filter in behind, while trying to avoid getting knocked and scraped in the general jostling that takes place. Needless to say, a pedestrian who is still crossing the road is honked at and gesticulated at to get out of the way.

We also seem to go in for very large roundabouts. These enable cars to enter the roundabout at about 40 miles an hour and to accelerate out at an even faster speed. Woe betide any innocent motorist (or even cyclist) who happens to be joining the roundabout from one of the more awkward entry points at a slower speed.

Or take our High Street for example. I suppose there wasn't much the town planners could do to stop Kentucky Fried Chicken, McDonalds, Blockbuster Video, Pizza Hut, Cullen's late-night store and an all night pharmacy to opening within a 500 yard stretch. But the effect of this is that not only are the parking bays either side of the high street fully occupied but there is a constant stream of people double parking, jumping out, popping into the various shops and running back out again. To drive up our High Street at say six o'clock on Saturday evening is like being on a dodgem car ride.

The town pla
nners are obviously conscious of the dangers to pedestrians in this madness and so they have taken it upon themselves to erect two “tables” as they call them, or raised sections of road which slow the cars down and appear to provide places for pedestrians to cross. But as they are not marked with zebra lines they are in fact more dangerous for pedestrians. Many walkers assume that the traffic is going to slow down and stop for them as they step off the now non-existent kerb, but the car drivers seem to be determined to prove the point that these are not zebra crossings and so they race on attempting to weave through streams of shoppers as they wend their way home.

Another feature we seem to enjoy in the town are cycle lanes which are designed not to benefit cyclists but rather to calm the traffic. This means that the cyclists can be quite happily cycling along feeling safe within the boundaries of the kerb and the white line to their right, but suddenly the cycle lanes will stop at the very point they need them most. For example where a traffic island means that the road narrows down to such a degree that cars have to squeeze into it and knock the cyclists of their bikes on their way through.

The point I am making in all this is that there is a lot can be done to minimise road rage by a bit of careful road planning. Our are giving far too much priority to motorised traffic and not enough to pedestrians, cyclists and other road users. They seem to pay lip service to modern means of managing traffic but at the end of the day of the car still rules and other road users are unwelcome guests on the roads.

Of course being a highly prosperous Surrey town we have an excess of very expensive and powerful cars. BMWs abound, as do Range Rovers, Saab convertibles, Porsches and the inevitable glut of four-wheel-drive people-carriers, so important for taking children to school these days.

Lives are so busy with holding do
wn complex and demanding jobs while at the same time coping with family life and all the many clubs and activities that children take part in such as horse-riding, ballet and theatre classes, sporting activities etc, it is inevitable that their parents are rushed off their feet. To be held up by a few seconds can seem like a disaster in a crowded day.

It is very difficult to see what to do about road rage. We seem to have this innate ability to believe that everybody else is against us and plotting to hold us up. We seem to be surrounded by incompetent drivers, people who have just passed their driving test, elderly drivers, and people who shouldn't be allowed on the roads anyway. There seems to be a conspiracy around us to make his late. Frustration mounts and is it any surprise the road rage becomes the order of the day?

In order to avoid road rage I think we need to limit the number of cars allowed into our town centres. I think we need to raise the priority of pedestrians and cyclists so that they have space. Many towns are adopting policies like these. I heard just this week for example that the city of York has cut down the number of car journeys to work to such a degree that 20 percent of commuters are now using bicycles. I recently went to Oxford and was amazed to look at the station car park and see row upon row of bicycle racks, a huge area crammed full of commuters bicycles. My town needs an approach like this.

I think we also need to tackle road rage more aggressively! People need to learn how to manage their anger and anybody who is caught offending in this area should be sent on anger management courses so they can learn to survive the pressures of modern life without threatening their fellow road-users.

I recently had a week's holiday down in Dorset in a small market town near the sea. I expect residents of such places also think that their towns are full of stressful driving and opportunities
for people to lose their temper on the road. But when compared to Surrey it seemed like there was a completely different attitude on the part of the drivers. People gave way to each other. They waved each other on, and slowed down for pedestrians. People waiting to turn right off a main road would find oncoming cars pausing and waving them on. It was all very refreshing and within a day or two I had got out of my Surrey driving habits and was sitting back in the seat more, relaxing and letting things take their course. Possibly it because I wasn't in such a hurry myself that I was able to take this attitude. But after a week, when I came back to Guildford it was like coming back into Piccadilly Circus, driving round Eros a few times, and then driving down Oxford Street.

I don't know complete answer for road but some of these suggestions may be useful in cutting it down. In the meantime I suggest we all take a more relaxed attitude to a driving, understanding that the environment we are driving is sometimes making us worse, and trying to get across to our local planners that there are things they can do to reduce road rage to the benefit of all.

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