Chapter 1 Mobility & Driver Education

1. Chapter 1 Mobility & Driver Education

2. Chapter objectives • 1.) List some factors that might affect your ability to drive safely • 2.) Explain how the highway transportation system is regulated • 3.) Identify the foundations of effective driving

3. What can you gain from this class? • The opportunity to learn much of the information and skills you need to be a good driver • Gives you the potential to become: • Alert, knowledgeable, and skillful driver • With this you will be able to handle a wide variety of driving situations and understand some the problems of driving

4. Useful Knowledge • Driver education can also help you understand several other important concepts: • How your personality, emotions, and maturity affect your driving • How to maneuver and control your vehicle to minimize risk in different driving environments • How alcohol and other drugs impair your ability to drive, and a knowledge of penalties for their use • How to interpret traffic laws, rules of the road, signs and signals, and roadway markings • An awareness of limiting factors for yourself and your vehicle • How a vehicle works • A knowledge of what to do in an emergency

5. Awareness of limiting factors • Other factors that can seriously interfere with your ability to drive safely include: • The foolish feeling that there is little or no risk involved in driving and that if a collision occurs, it’s the other person’s fault • An illness or injury that you have, or the side effects of the medicine you may be taking for it • Your emotional state at the time you are driving • The effects of alcohol and other drugs

6. What is a Crash? • When a motor vehicle hits another motor vehicle, a pedestrian, an animal, a bicyclist, or a fixed object • Young drivers are involved in crashes to frequently • The over-representation of young drivers results in twice as many motor vehicle crashes or accidents involved 15-20 year old's that would normally be expected • Drivers aged 15 to 20 are only 7 percent of the driving population, but they are involved in about 14 percent of the motor-vehicle crashes each year---double what you might expect

7. Factors of over-representation • Young drivers lack experience • Young drivers drive at dangerous times and transport passengers • You drivers drive differently • Why is that?????

8. The Highway Transportation System

9. H.t.s • When you drive, you become part of the... • Highway Transportation System. • The H.T.S has 3 parts. • People • Vehicles • Roadways

10. people • Roadway users • Walking, running, driving or riding in a vehicle.

11. Vehicles • There is a wide range of vehicles. • Small – with little protection • Large trucks weighing many tons

12. roadways • Vary from dirt roads to gravel roads, • To expressways and everything in-between. • Some roads are flat, • Some are hilly, • Some have sharp turns.

13. H.T.S • H.T.S • Purpose of Highway Transportation System? • To move people and cargo from one place to another in a safe, efficient, and economical manner

14. How is the h.t.s regulated? 1. Federal Government- establish traffic-safetyguidelines. 2. Federal, state and local government agencieshelp regulate the H.T.S. 3. Federal, state and local governments enforcethe guidelines. 4. Courts decide if you are guilty or innocent.

15. The risks of driving • Driving involves risk: • The possible of personal injury or damage to vehicles and property • Motor vehicle crashes kill about 38 percent of all people who die between the ages of 15-20

16. Reducing the risks • Keep your vehicle in top conditions • Checking brakes, tire inflation, window shield wipers, windows clean • Anticipate the actions of others • The best drivers are defensive drivers • Protect yourself and others • Drive only when you’re in sound physical and mental condition • Make a conscious effort to develop your driving skill • Learned from good habits

17. Visibility, time, and space • Visibility: • What you can see from behind the wheel and how well you see it. • The ability of others----pedestrians and other drivers---to see you • LESS VISIBILITY=MORE RISK AND VICE VERSA • Time: • Involves the ability to judge your speed and the speed of others • Space: • Distance • Must keep a margin of space between your vehicle and other vehicles and highway users when you drive • The margin of space allows you plenty of room to safely maneuver or to stop if necessary

18. The costs of driving • In the US, the total cost of motor vehicle crashes has been estimated at more than $230 billion dollars every year • COSTS are measured in dollars and lives • costs of mobility can be grouped into two categories: 1.) crash costs 2.) noncrash costs

19. 3 ways to minimize crash costs • Wear seat belts • Not drinking alcohol before driving • Driving at an appropriate speed • If everyone used protective devices such as safety belts and helmets, about 10,000 people would not die in crashes each year

20. Noncrash costs of driving • Operating costs • Gas, oil, and tires • Fixed costs • Purchasing price of car, insurance, and licensing fees • Environmental costs • Pollution, hazardous waste dumping, and urban sprawl to motor-vehicle use