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Copyright © 2001 FleetWatch magazine and FleetWatch On-Line. No part of this publication may be reproduced without the prior written permission from the publishers. Views published are not necessarily those of the publishers. |
Accidents Readers of Chris Barry’s regular page titled ‘Industry Observations’ will have noticed that this was halted a few months ago and replaced with an advertisement. However, due to the popularity of his past column, we are including a monthly – albeit shortened - column on views from Chris Barry’s desk. The content will not always be directly related to insurance issues but rather be his own views as seen through the eyes of a passionate insurance ‘trucking’ man who always thinks ‘out of the box’. Here is the first column… With FleetWatch
placing a lot of emphasis on accidents in recent editions, I
thought it apt to put in my bit.
The other morning I observed a taxi full of school kids do the inevitable ‘dodge the traffic’. As I have commented before, without properly planned and dedicated bus/traffic lanes, taxis are transporting sixteen passengers at great speed and I am a ‘single’ in a ‘single’ vehicle. Clearly the error is mostly on the traffic systems rather than on the taxi drivers. In many countries, passenger transporting vehicles have their own lanes. So there we were - the traffic queue - ‘staring blindly in front of us’ hoping that the traffic would proceed smoothly and quickly but unfortunately, it clearly wasn’t! In the 100 metre bottleneck ahead, about half way down was a conventional traffic circle. Our enterprising taxi driver, noticing there was advantage to be had in the queue if he went around it ‘the wrong way’, promptly did so - and certainly leap-frogged say twenty cars! Fine! Well done! The taxi driver is not the subject of the article. I remind you that the passengers were not adults but school kids. In my reckoning, our taxi driver has now educated about sixteen kids that driving around a traffic circle the ‘wrong way’ is ‘cool’ (which it probably was!). Never mind all the other items like the first rule of Africa: Just because you are at the back of the queue, you can be first if you take your ‘rightful’ place! (Just as a side joke). The point is that we have a sustained system of rules transgressions in our country which starts from an early age when youngsters see adults adopting the attitude that it is OK to transgress the law. This is influencing the youth of our country at a very early age. In other words, the probability that bad operating practices, ill-discipline in driving, the accepted level of accidents and fatalities in South Africa is going to change is not occurring – and will not change so long as bad habits are being passed on to the kids. The systems and ways that people conduct their commuting, transport and travel responsibilities is never going to change until the youth are educated as to ‘proper behaviour’. In this regard, I stress the call for school education which has been drummed many many times before but is not being heeded. Anyone who says South Africa’s road fatalities and accidents are not NOW an epidemic needs to think again! Epidemic it is!
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