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 Gitzbitah wrote:

Compare that against humans, who, as a group, are about as safe as we're going to get as drivers.

Not in the US you aren't. There are several countries with notably better driving safety records, which shows it can be improved further with humans at the wheel. The US is fairly lax on some road safety stuff. The UK has half the deaths for the same distance driven for example.

Not that this is an argument against driverless cars, but humans can certainly be improved in their capabilities.

I think a driving licence will remain a valuable life skill for the next 25 years. It will take at least that long for self-driving cars to start to replace the existing stock of normal vehicles.

The interesting thing is what happens when the majority of the cars on the road are self-driving. Will people be allowed to take their classic cars on the public road? Perhaps with special insurance...?

 Kilkrazy wrote:
I think a driving licence will remain a valuable life skill for the next 25 years. It will take at least that long for self-driving cars to start to replace the existing stock of normal vehicles.

The interesting thing is what happens when the majority of the cars on the road are self-driving. Will people be allowed to take their classic cars on the public road? Perhaps with special insurance...?

This is the chief issue I see with driverless vehicles. Such vehicles replacing practical driving- commuting, transport, freight- makes absolute sense.

However, I enjoy driving, and I enjoy exploring rural areas whilst driving. I think this is an issue that needs to be resolved. The most obvious is to restrict recreational driving to private tracks, but this loses a lot of the fun of driving for many people.

I suspect a more practical solution would be to bar "classic" (human driver) vehicles from traffic-dense areas- urban environments and trunk routes- to maintain safety and avoid incidents clogging up commercial traffic as much as possible, but allow them to drive more minor routes which are less critical (and generally scenic). Special insurance seems like a given, although I don't see how that would be much different from existing car insurance. The driving test requirements would likely get more stringent over time (as they are anyway) and as less and less people obtain a driving license due to a lack of need, driving will become an increasingly niche hobby, and slowly fade into insignificance from a safety perspective.

This seems like the likely approach to me. It is basically what happened to horse-riding skills- as the skills became obsolete, they became a relatively niche hobby overall.

 Haighus wrote:
The driving test requirements would likely get more stringent over time

This is the most likely outcome. You'll be able to get a special license to drive a car recreationally, but the licensing requirements will become a lot more like what you have to do to fly a plane. For comparison, to get my pilot's license it was a legal minimum of 40 hours of training on specific subjects (usually finished in 60-80 hours), a practical test with a federal examiner (~1-2 hours flying, ~1-2 hours knowledge test), a mandatory 2-3 hour review with an instructor every two years, on top of any requirements by the company that rents you a plane or the insurance company if you own one yourself. Add on even more if you want to fly higher-performance aircraft, fly for a job, etc. And if you screw up you can get mandatory training required before you can fly again, or even lose your license entirely.

Contrast that with getting to drive a car, which was a 5 minute "test" consisting of "pull out of the parking lot, turn right, turn right, do a 3-point turn, turn left, turn left back into the parking lot, here's your license". Expect those days to end, and driving to become a niche hobby that only the most dedicated people are going to be willing to do.

That might explain why US drivers appear to be worse than UK ones. My driving test lasted about an hour, most of which was driving in traffic.

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
That might explain why US drivers appear to be worse than UK ones. My driving test lasted about an hour, most of which was driving in traffic.

Agreed, except mine was even longer.

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
That might explain why US drivers appear to be worse than UK ones. My driving test lasted about an hour, most of which was driving in traffic.

UK driving test can vary a lot depending on the area its taken in and the time and road conditions. I've heard of some who basically drove around the inner town mostly in thick traffic, so spent more time immobile than mobile.


It also suffers the problem most countries have which is that once issued they never re-test you. You're not even required to take a training session with an instructor every few years. In contrast most tools and machines require you to be re-trained and evaluated every few years. If not to keep the training itself valid then to keep your insurance cover valid. It not only reinforces good practice but enforces updates on people on legislation and such.

I think a lot of driving problems could be resolved with at least a 4 hour or so refresher training course (practical and theory) every three or so years.

Amusingly, I took my driving test in Isleworth, west London, which happens to be one of the very few London boroughs with no roundabouts. So I was never tested on how to navigate through a roundabout.

My usual driving lesson did include a roundabout, but it was one of those ones with spiral lane markings. It took me ages to figure out roundabouts which have multiple concentric circular lanes.

As for retests, if you feth up badly enough, you can be forced to retest. And once you hit 70, isn't there some additional requirement?

I HATE roundabouts - they should all have traffic lights on them. It's even worse when they've got those silly writing on the road surface lane markings ; great idea until you put traffic on the road and make it impossible to read!


Andrew yes if you mess up AND get caught you can be forced to re-take; but that's kind of already too late as you've already done damage. And might have caused many issues before being caught! Lots of car related accidents go unsolved because they happen out of the sight of CCTV (or CCTV good enough to ID the car/person); or when it happens no one gets the number plate.


I think at 70 you're required to present a medical note from your doctor to ensure you've got good eyesight and normal body control. But otherwise I don't even know if there's another test. Still that means for 50 years you can be driving without any formal retraining or test of abilities save if you get caught messing up.

In contrast things like chainsaw tickets or life-saving training require top-up training/tests every few to give years.

I love roundabours- they are efficient road structures. They work great until they reach their designed capacity, and then clog up. Roundabouts that do this regularly need expanding or lights. Recently drove on the Swindon magic roundabout, which was fascinating. Didn't have any problems with it- it was well signposted and easy to follow.

Peregrine, the US test sounds like a joke- is there a theory component? In the UK there is a theory test consisting of 50 multiple choice questions based on the Highway code, followed by 75 marks for a situational awareness test also done on a computer. Both sections have to be passed (it was 43/50 for the theory and I think 45/75 for the situational awareness when I did it, the boundaries have been creeping up though).

Drivers then have to take a 45 minute practical exam with an instructor, which is supposed to cover a variety of road types and includes at least one "manouevre" (three point turn, bay park, parallel park are the current ones, I think they removed reversing round a corner). The actual roads covered to vary a lot depending on the location though, as pointed out up thread. One of my friends took his test in Manchester, and didn't have to drive above 40mph. When I took mine, I had country lanes, 70mph dual carriageway, roundabouts, the lot The actual drive is often above 45mins, but 45 mins are tested. Mirror use and other general droving skills are assessed. The instructor also briefly checks eyesight, and asks a few theory questions about maintaining the car, generally stuff under the bonnet, like "show me the oil metre and how you would check it" stuff.

3 minor faults in one section (such as not checking your mirrors enough three times), 15 minors overall, or a single major (like running a red light) causes a failed test.

It is fairly stringent nowadays. However, I absolutely agree that the lack of reevaluation of driving ability is an issue.

UK cars also have quite stringent annual safety checks (unless they are within three years of manufacture), I believe these are also more strigent than the US checks. The majority of cars on UK roads are less than 10 yrs old.

It all combines to make UK roads pretty safe, but there is undoubtedly more that can be done (like retesting driving ability).

There's no statistical evidence that people get worse at driving the more practise they have.

Despite the more stringent tests now (when I took it, there was just a practical test which included some theory questions) the group most likely to have an accident is young men who have recently qualified. (Or piss heads, maybe.)

This is because of two factors. The first is that the instinct for anticipating how other drivers are going to drive is something you can only develop from experience. For example, lot of drivers don't bother to indicate when navigating roundabouts. You wouldn't learn that from the theory exam. You have to see it happening again and again to understand that it's fairly typical and always to look out for it.

The other factor of course is that young men are full of piss and vinegar and take more risks.

At any rate, these are both things that humans routinely get wrong which an AI car will routinely get right. You won't find an AI car failing to indicate and position itself properly on a roundabout. It won't speed in slow areas, and it won't drive too slowly in fast areas.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
There's no statistical evidence that people get worse at driving the more practise they have.

I've always heard that two things are killers with machine operation. Inexperience and complacency.

One you get from being new to something, the other you get from being experienced and developing bad habits, taking short cuts, getting lazy and because "I've done this a hundred times and never had it go wrong".


I do agree, judging what other cars/drivers will do and reading care body language (its position in the road, where its drifting, its speed etc..) can tell you a lot about what is going to happen. And that can only come with continued experience and actual driving.
However at the same time bad habits develop very easily.

A lot of people who, for example, go to take a trailer test later often fail on technicalities relating to their regular driving rather than their trailer driving skills specifically.

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
That might explain why US drivers appear to be worse than UK ones. My driving test lasted about an hour, most of which was driving in traffic.

US driving standards are extremely low by European standards. When I was in high school I was part of a foreign exchange program, and something that occurred a lot was students getting licenses in the US and converting them to domestic ones upon return, apparently it took a third of the time and a tenth of the cost and they could do it before they turned 18, with the license fees running upward of several thousand dollars in Germany and wayyy more training time required. I don't know the exact details of how that worked, but it was a big enough issue that the program had to go out of its way to tone it down.

Because driving is so necessary in the US, its almost impossible to function without one, basically as long as you arent totally blind and can get a 75% score on a 5 minute drive, you get a license. Getting a license as a teenager is also practically treated as a god given right.

 Gitzbitah wrote:

I would love for this technology to become standardized, so my children need never learn how to drive, or get into the inevitable traffic incidents that occur in a lifetime.

Having just watched the old anime Ex-Driver, we should move this one over to the 'Mankind has learned nothing from Science fiction' thread.

 Haighus wrote:
Peregrine, the US test sounds like a joke- is there a theory component?

A 5-minute multiple choice test that you could probably pass if you'd never even driven a car. Contrast that with the theory component of the test for my pilot's license, which was an hour or two of the FAA representative questioning me on whatever they felt like asking (with an emphasis on any missed questions from the written test taken previously).

Vaktathi wrote:

Because driving is so necessary in the US, its almost impossible to function without one, basically as long as you arent totally blind and can get a 75% score on a 5 minute drive, you get a license. Getting a license as a teenager is also practically treated as a god given right.

Thing is unless you live in a big urban area and work within that urban area; a car is pretty much a requirement to function in many modern nations. Even a lot of poorer nations some form of transport is almost essential (and a horse and cart is no longer fast enough). So that aspect alone isn't unique to the USA and yet other nations function pretty well.

Peregrine wrote:

A 5-minute multiple choice test that you could probably pass if you'd never even driven a car. .

See I think that the UK Theory test isn't hard enough, whilst some bits are of questionable value (eg stopping distances, in practice you learn to judge them by eye but not with a ruler).That the USA one is even simpler is quite scary to think of.

 Haighus wrote:
Not in the US you aren't. There are several countries with notably better driving safety records, which shows it can be improved further with humans at the wheel. The US is fairly lax on some road safety stuff. The UK has half the deaths for the same distance driven for example.

Not that this is an argument against driverless cars, but humans can certainly be improved in their capabilities.

True, but most of the safety improvements come from better roads and better emergency response, not improving the skill of the drivers themselves.

It's just personal observation, but the drivers I've seen with the most technical skill and most situational awareness were in India and China. Largely because you have to have those skills and maintain that level of attention because the roads there are wild. But because the roads are wild you also have a horrific road toll.


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 Overread wrote:
UK driving test can vary a lot depending on the area its taken in and the time and road conditions. I've heard of some who basically drove around the inner town mostly in thick traffic, so spent more time immobile than mobile.

Here in Australia I know a couple of people who failed their driver's test in the city, so they headed out to a small country town and organised to have their test there instead. A lot of these towns are just one long, wide road so the test isn't anything more than driving down one side, turning around and driving down the other side. Maybe they'll head out on a couple of country roads if the police officer has the time to kill.


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 Kilkrazy wrote:
There's no statistical evidence that people get worse at driving the more practise they have.

I agree, and think re-testing older drivers is a really wrong headed approach for just that reason.

However, rather than testing I wouldn't mind people having skills refreshers, largely because road rules do change. Here in Perth we used to have fairly short merging lanes on the freeway. Main Roads finally redeveloped the roads to give long passages to get up to speed before merging... and most drivers still try and merge straight away, even coming to a complete stop to push their way in.

Just a couple of hours every five or so years to tell people how they're supposed to merge now, how roundabouts actually work, that kind of thing, it would be great.

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
That might explain why US drivers appear to be worse than UK ones. My driving test lasted about an hour, most of which was driving in traffic.

Few months practicing, written test, driving test for about hour, later secondary test for night/slippery driving after which I got full license(previous one was temporary one for 2 years).

That's how it was for me though it has changed it seems to contain even more steps based on what workmate is going through.

tneva82 wrote:

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
That might explain why US drivers appear to be worse than UK ones. My driving test lasted about an hour, most of which was driving in traffic.

Few months practicing, written test, driving test for about hour, later secondary test for night/slippery driving after which I got full license(previous one was temporary one for 2 years)..

Night/slippery driving and ice/snow driving should be part of every test. Sadly UK doesn't test for these, you can train, practice and pass all in the summer and likely hardly have a heavy heavy rain/night/snow/ice driving to speak of. Which leaves it no wonder that when bad weather hits many people don't know how to drive in it. Even if they have to use skidpads and such (to keep it safe and so you don't have to wait for winter) it would at least help ensure people are properly trained.

 sebster wrote:

I agree, and think re-testing older drivers is a really wrong headed approach for just that reason.

However, rather than testing I wouldn't mind people having skills refreshers, largely because road rules do change. Here in Perth we used to have fairly short merging lanes on the freeway. Main Roads finally redeveloped the roads to give long passages to get up to speed before merging... and most drivers still try and merge straight away, even coming to a complete stop to push their way in.

Just a couple of hours every five or so years to tell people how they're supposed to merge now, how roundabouts actually work, that kind of thing, it would be great.

You'd need to enforce it with a test or the people that really ought to do it wouldn't bother.

Personally, I'd make the driving licence expire after 10 years, and require a re-test for renewal. I remember when I passed back in, what, 1996? and the expiry date on my new licence said 2046... Thought it was crazy then and still do now.

 Overread wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
That might explain why US drivers appear to be worse than UK ones. My driving test lasted about an hour, most of which was driving in traffic.

Few months practicing, written test, driving test for about hour, later secondary test for night/slippery driving after which I got full license(previous one was temporary one for 2 years)..

Night/slippery driving and ice/snow driving should be part of every test. Sadly UK doesn't test for these, you can train, practice and pass all in the summer and likely hardly have a heavy heavy rain/night/snow/ice driving to speak of. Which leaves it no wonder that when bad weather hits many people don't know how to drive in it. Even if they have to use skidpads and such (to keep it safe and so you don't have to wait for winter) it would at least help ensure people are properly trained.

Hated the night part(well I hate driving in night now as well which is why I avoid it where possible). Loved the slippery driving part though! Apart from it being useful in Finland(eventhough I live in south) it was just bloody fun! Especially the part where we were told to deliberately do incorrect way to break when one side of tyres have less grip than the other. I made it so bad teacher complimented for an excelent text book example of how to NOT do it And I had fun doing nearly 360 degree spin! Not often you can do that ;-)

Crispy78 wrote:


You'd need to enforce it with a test or the people that really ought to do it wouldn't bother.

Personally, I'd make the driving licence expire after 10 years, and require a re-test for renewal. I remember when I passed back in, what, 1996? and the expiry date on my new licence said 2046... Thought it was crazy then and still do now.

Agreed, retrain and test. However the pass/fail mechanic should be different. Because of how integral driving is to modern life the test should be less formal in a sense that if you fail on minor areas you don't lose your licence. You would have to repeat until you do pass (so it would come with a financial and time punishment), but it wouldn't take your licence (thus your ability to get to work and earn money to pay to take tests etc...) away unless you displayed clear dangerous driving.

That way the system isn't playing "gotcha" at trying to ban people, but is putting some pressure to learn whilst reinforcing good driving practice and method.


We are also almost approaching this via these new "black box" units and apps that many insurance companies are now teasing onto the market. Right now its an encouragement, but I suspect that them and dash-cams will eventually move from being an option that lowers your premium to a mandatory element (or near mandatory as without premiums would be exceptionally high).
It's my understanding that Russia has many insurance companies that already have mandatory dashcams.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

tneva82 wrote:

 Overread wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
That might explain why US drivers appear to be worse than UK ones. My driving test lasted about an hour, most of which was driving in traffic.

Few months practicing, written test, driving test for about hour, later secondary test for night/slippery driving after which I got full license(previous one was temporary one for 2 years)..

Night/slippery driving and ice/snow driving should be part of every test. Sadly UK doesn't test for these, you can train, practice and pass all in the summer and likely hardly have a heavy heavy rain/night/snow/ice driving to speak of. Which leaves it no wonder that when bad weather hits many people don't know how to drive in it. Even if they have to use skidpads and such (to keep it safe and so you don't have to wait for winter) it would at least help ensure people are properly trained.

Hated the night part(well I hate driving in night now as well which is why I avoid it where possible). Loved the slippery driving part though! Apart from it being useful in Finland(eventhough I live in south) it was just bloody fun! Especially the part where we were told to deliberately do incorrect way to break when one side of tyres have less grip than the other. I made it so bad teacher complimented for an excelent text book example of how to NOT do it And I had fun doing nearly 360 degree spin! Not often you can do that ;-)

The other big bonus is that now you've had at least one safe experience of doing all those wrong things you get a feel for what happens. You can also pick up on lots of little tell-tale signs of when things are just about to go bad - lots of little warnings that can make you react earlier when it happens for real.

Crispy78 wrote:

 sebster wrote:

I agree, and think re-testing older drivers is a really wrong headed approach for just that reason.

However, rather than testing I wouldn't mind people having skills refreshers, largely because road rules do change. Here in Perth we used to have fairly short merging lanes on the freeway. Main Roads finally redeveloped the roads to give long passages to get up to speed before merging... and most drivers still try and merge straight away, even coming to a complete stop to push their way in.

Just a couple of hours every five or so years to tell people how they're supposed to merge now, how roundabouts actually work, that kind of thing, it would be great.

You'd need to enforce it with a test or the people that really ought to do it wouldn't bother.

Personally, I'd make the driving licence expire after 10 years, and require a re-test for renewal. I remember when I passed back in, what, 1996? and the expiry date on my new licence said 2046... Thought it was crazy then and still do now.

Where I live, a license is good for 5 years before it expires. But there is no test to renew it, just a fee. Another cash grab.

Crispy78 wrote:
You'd need to enforce it with a test or the people that really ought to do it wouldn't bother.

There's a difference between to not really thinking about your driving or making an effort to keep up with the road rules, and actively ignoring information while you're sitting there with nothing to do but listen to a presenter. The first is how maybe 80% of drivers operate, the latter is how maybe 1% of particularly disfunctional people operate.

Personal anecdote - a while ago they changed the policy at work and everyone who used a company car now had to take an emergency and dangerous roads course. It was silly and everyone in my assigned class thought so - the test was geared for people driving on country backroads (where we have a lot of offices), but all of us now added to the course were just city drivers. Despite that, when we had the course everyone engaged, asked questions, and learned stuff useful to our driving. Because when you actually have to be there, you will learn stuff.

Personally, I'd make the driving licence expire after 10 years, and require a re-test for renewal. I remember when I passed back in, what, 1996? and the expiry date on my new licence said 2046... Thought it was crazy then and still do now.

Remember that most bad driving is reckless stuff people know they shouldn't be doing - texting, speeding etc. They won't be doing that on their test.

Then think about what happens to someone's life when as a working parent they suddenly lose their license. We're not going to do that to people because they forgot to indicate at a roundabout. So as a basic, practical reality we're not going to set the test so even with a number of skills mistakes they won't be failing - there is no social interest in throwing millions of families in to that kind of chaos.

So then what is the test going to be? A rubber stamp exercise, which at best will just get people to refresh their skills and knowledge of the road rules. Which is exactly what a couple of hours refresher course offers.

Refresher course and assessed driving. The former helps people top up and refresh their minds on driving as well as advances/changes in driving since they last took their test/refresher.

The assessment gives a moment to properly review their driving skill in a practical situation. Sure most people should pass this, they should be at a competent safe level of driving. The practical forces them to display this at their best and might challenge them into doing a few things that they might otherwise avoid.

Many people (esp those who are not as skilled/confident) can often end up driving to perhaps only a couple of places along roads that they know really well. They might even take a longer route to avoid things they are unsure or unsafe with (eg they might take a route that avoids roundabouts).


Making people take a practical alongside helps reinforce their driving and if done by the right instructor can help bolster self confidence.


And I agree it should be a competency test aimed at assessment and review rather than one aiming to pass/fail. Failure would be with serious dangerous driving or multiple infractions - which should in theory be small.


The practical and assessment helps wake people up and makes sure that the theory they know translates to practical skill.

 Overread wrote:
The other big bonus is that now you've had at least one safe experience of doing all those wrong things you get a feel for what happens. You can also pick up on lots of little tell-tale signs of when things are just about to go bad - lots of little warnings that can make you react earlier when it happens for real.

Yeah. That's the reason why we have to go through it! Beats getting first taste of it in live enviroment. Makes me think if it might be possible to retake it voluntarily? Depending on how pricey it is it might be worth it to go over it again. It's better to do that in safe controlled enviroment than amidst real traffic! And it's been like 17 years from that. Could do refreshment.

I think everyone in the UK should go on an advanced driving course to be ready for the post-Brexit Mad Max wasteland.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
I think everyone in the UK should go on an advanced driving course to be ready for the post-Brexit Mad Max wasteland.

It actually surprised me that driving instructors are not required to do the advanced driving course to teach.



Also I've already started stockpiling leather and old rusty pipes in advance of the fall of civilization!

On the subject of roundabouts, interestingly enough they actually increase the number of accidents, but reduce the severity of said accidents. More fender-benders are to prefer (to an extent of course) if they reduce the ones with serious injuries, after all.