How Do We Teach Drivers?

Lane Courtesy

Achieving a high degree of lane courtesy on America's highways will require a commitment to education, public relations, and a more enlightened approach to traffic management.

State and Federal agencies have invested billions of dollars in public relations campaigns promoting traffic law compliance, seatbelt usage, construction zone safety, and anti-drinking and driving messages. Lane courtesy has been largely ignored, perhaps because this is one concept most motorists endorse. A small investment to promote lane courtesy and how it works would pay major dividends. Add in an educational component for beginning drivers and reminders for older drivers and the benefits would be immediate.

However, the major entrenched obstacle to the firm establishment of a lane courtesy ethic still remains; that being politically concocted speed limits.

As long as low speed limits allow slower drivers to usurp the left lane under the claim of moral superiority, "I'm doing the speed limit," we will not realize the full benefits of a national lane courtesy ethic. Until the establishment of rational speed limits (those that reflect the actual prevailing speeds on each highway system), the current limits will remain the most entrenched impediment to the faster, smoother, safer, and more efficient travel our highways can inherently offer. We made a big step forward in 1995 with the repeal of the 55-MPH National Maximum Speed Limit, but we still have a long way to go.

Regardless of the political obstacles, America needs and deserves a lane courtesy ethic.

How Do We Teach Drivers?

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