Driving attitudes must be improved

I have to mention some very serious issues we drivers have to face, starting from unnecessary stressors imposed by the authorities themselves such as the short-sighted concept of narrowing certain new roads. This has reduced the flow of our ever-increasing traffic. Haven’t the designers read the statistics of our yearly increase in car registrations?

Another source of stress is the many speed cameras, some of which, like the one at Tal-Barrani Road, reduces our speed in a wide and straight road to ridiculous levels. Then there are the suspension-wrecking sleeping policemen, some of which are definitely illegal by EU standards, others unmarked and some not conforming to any standard. An example of this is that the rubber type are wrongly used in streets when actually they are designed and used in more developed countries only to stop cars just before entering or exiting parking lots. And I must also mention the deficit in road and traffic signage.

But worse, we have to deal with the selfishness of certain uneducated drivers. These drivers block the outer lanes with slow driving, almost stopping dead at the sight of a speed camera.

They linger at the lights and slow down when crossing green lights. They deny drivers behind them the chance to exit and they block traffic flow, create more frustration and possibly cause more accidents. Some also have no idea of what the yellow boxed road markings mean or the need to allow crossing traffic to pass when their lane is hopelessly jammed.

Our roads have become gridlocked and using them more efficiently by improving driving attitudes is a must. It is not just over-speeding and drink-driving which we should tackle.

So my suggestion is to start those beautiful TV spots once again and highlight these wrong and selfish attitudes on the road. A hundred new roads without proper driving skills would be a waste of money.