August 30, 2003

Dear Sir,

I recently experienced a near head-on collision with a bike on a bad corner in Southampton with my five-month-old son in the back seat. Pure selfishness!

The following are suggestions to make our roads safer:

1. Change the solid yellow and white lines on the centre of the roads to be broken (or dashed) in places where it is safe to overtake and solid to indicate that it is unsafe to overtake.

2. Increase the driving age for bikes to 17. Many of our youth have a "no fear" attitude.

3. Do not permit young persons to tow anyone on the back of their bike for at least one year after getting their driver's licence. Passengers distract! A special licence plate colour could differentiate them from others.

4. Implement stiffer fines. Add some community service to the penalty. Bathroom cleaning around Hamilton will keep them out of the court rooms.

5. Make it illegal to pass a bus if it is not in a bus lay-by.

6. Increase the speed limit to 40K, but enforce it. Let's be realistic and make the speed limit, just that, the speed limit - something that you must obey.

7. Make the Police visible to the public morning and night and a ticket must be issued if someone is stopped. Ticketing funds can defray the cost of the enforcing Police units and courts.

In conclusion, don't let the recent road fatalities be in vain. Speeding is a choice. Those that chose to speed should be severely penalised so as not to cause harm to the law abiding public. We live in a small community where everything has a solution and enforcement and penalties are the answers!

P.S. Please stop at the crosswalk by the intersection of Whale Bay Road in Southampton!

TEACHER,

Southampton

August 30, 2003

Dear Sir,

Given recent tragedies on Bermuda's roads and the extensive coverage that these events and their impact have received from the local news media, I found myself on Saturday questioning whether I should be more dismayed by the irony or by the stupidity of what I was witnessing as I drove along North Shore Road at about 10:50 a.m.

In front of me was a silver car travelling West at about 30 kph to 40 kph and wandering erratically from one side of the road to the other. I couldn't help but imagine that the driver of the vehicle must either be drunk, asleep or both.

I followed at what I felt was a safe distance behind this car for a few minutes, and as it reached the sharp blind left hand corner on the North Shore Road immediately before the junction with Spanish Point Road I watched it continue on a straight path across the centre line and into the path of a white van that was travelling east.

The van and car were within a split second of a head-on collision when the driver of the car took evasive action. Fortunately the vehicles escaped contact by a couple of inches and nobody was hurt. When a few seconds later I pulled up behind this silver car at the junction with Spanish Point Road, it became clear to me what had just happened.

The driver had been reading a newspaper perched on his steering wheel instead of keeping his eyes on the road. I waited for a minute or so behind this silver car, which fortunately by then was stationary at the junction, whilst its driver continued to read the newspaper.

When it became obvious that he was totally unaware that a queue of cars was building behind him, I beeped my horn. The driver's response was a nonchalant glance over his shoulder, after which he turned the page of his newspaper and then proceeded left en route to Fairylands.

As it happens, I was going in the same direction and consequently had enough time to memorise the licence plate number of the car. I considered reporting the incident that I had just witnessed to the police, but felt that a letter to The Royal Gazette might prove more effective.

At any rate, I'm sure that members of the Police Service and Transport Ministry do read your newspaper and therefore have the opportunity to follow up as they see fit.

In the event that you choose to publish my letter, I would like to pose a specific question to drivers of silver cars with licence plate number 09739. As you meander down the North Shore reading about the recklessness of some of Bermuda's road users and the tremendous pain that they can cause, do you wonder who they might be? Did it ever occur to you that one of them might be you?

ROB MORGAN,

Hamilton Parish

August 29, 2003

Dear Sir,

I read with a sense of irony your lead article on Monday, August 25, `Lack of concern for safety and speed take their toll'. That very morning, before 8 a.m., I had been harried and intimidated while driving into Hamilton along a section of Harbour Road by vehicle L3009, operated by HWP, that most of the time was no more than three feet from the rear of my car.

It eventually arrived at Front Street 20 yards ahead of me, having "tailgated" other vehicles in the same fashion en route.

At 30 mph (50 kph) on a dry road with a good surface, your vehicle has travelled 30 feet before your foot hits the brake pedal and takes on average another 45 feet to stop (HMSO Highway Code).

In other words, if you are fully alert, you have travelled more than two car lengths just while your brain reacts to the hazard in front. If I had been obliged to make an emergency stop around the blind corners of Harbour Road at half that speed, an accident would have been inevitable.

Such driving is dangerous, intimidating and stressful and in our traffic conditions, pointless. Intimidated drivers slow down, not speed up. If we all want safer roads, we have to respond as a community.

I contacted HWP, the operators of vehicle L3009, to complain. I also suggested to HWP's Customer Relations Dept that the company should put "how's my driving?" stickers, with an independent, confidential phone number, on all its vehicles. They agreed it was a good idea. Commercial vehicles are intensive users of Bermuda's roads. How long before there is a Road Safety Council-operated Code of Conduct to display such stickers on all commercial vehicles? Meanwhile, HWP, why not make a voluntary contribution to stopping the madness?

DAILY COMMUTER

August 30, 2003

Dear Sir,

There has been a lot of media talk recently on what should be done to improve the local driving standards and I personally think that the following three steps should be considered:

1. Make the driving test harder. The present tests, on both two- and four-wheeled vehicles, are laughably easy. I mean, five minutes to parallel park? Can you imagine the chaos it would cause if everyone took that length of time to park somewhere like Reid Street? We can't blame the instructors, their job is simply to instruct someone up to the standard required to pass the test, but I'd like to point out that passing your driving test only allows you to drive on a public road: it does not automatically make you a good driver. Once you pass your driving test, then you should be learning how to drive properly. I think the difference between the average Bermudian driver and the average overseas driver is that the Bermudian driver gets into hazardous situations and then tries to get out of them, whereas the overseas driver is taught not to get into hazardous situations to start with.

2. Have some sort of formal training for auxiliary and motor cycle riders. Right now I don't think there is any (with the possible exception of Project Ride), with the result that whoever wants to learn to ride a motorcycle has to do just what he did learning to ride a pedal cycle, namely learn from one's falls! That's all well and good, but it doesn't teach one to ride properly with regard to other road users. There is a difference between riding a motorcycle, and riding a motorcycle without being a road hazard.

3. Make any disqualified driver undergo formal driver training and re-sit a driving test before being allowed back on the road. I would also like to see the carrying of one's driving licence being made obligatory while riding or driving a vehicle.

DAVIE KERR,

St. George's

August 29, 2003

Dear Sir,

I feel compelled to respond to the writer identified as `Poet,' which appeared in your newspaper on Thursday, August 21. I take exception to the statement that: "The faces of the PLP leaders are full of hate and bitterness."

The unidentified writer goes on to say that the PLP leaders will never get over the injustices of the past. Should one apologise for revealing history that speaks to some of the injustices of the past? I think not. We as a community need to be reminded of these injustices, and make sure that our children and grand children do not ever have to suffer the same type of injustices as those passed.

We need to be reminded not take for granted the liberties which we all enjoy today, that came about as a direct result of the PLP type of individuals fighting the racism that was being laid upon us yesterday, and, unfortunately still exist today only in a more subtle way.

It is not my fault that there was a time, even as a Policeman in uniform, I could not sit down and eat in certain restaurants in this country because I was black.

We have, in fact, gotten over the injustices of the past, otherwise your party, the UBP, will still be in power today. Why, `Poet', are you ashamed to reveal your identity? You have to get over the fact that the Progressive Labour Party, and not the United Bermuda Party, forms the Government of the day. However, I can assure you that our party will look out for the interest of all of Bermuda. Be at ease `Poet,' you have nothing to fear from the PLP or me as history is revealed from time to time. `Poet', you and I need to sit down and talk to each other. We might learn something from each other. We need discuss how people like you and I can better understand, and love each other more. We are all in this together.

NEVILLE T. DARRELL

Devonshire