Tragedy Shows Flaw in Auto-Only Culture
The horror in which an elderly man killed ten people and injured forty-five others in a traffic accident highlights the flaws in our excessively automobile oriented culture. Russell Weller, the 86-year-old who wrecked havoc when he plowed through a farmer’s market, lived in California, the most notoriously car glutted state in the nation.
Many are wondering if older people with poor reaction times and health problems should have their driver’s licenses taken away from them, thus making them members of what may be America’s most stigmatized group: non-drivers.
Columnist Bob Greene once wrote, “If you thought child molesters were a despised minority, try telling people you don’t drive a car.†A young woman showing an identification card instead of the usual driver’s license commented, “People look at you as if you’re a Martian.â€
As a member of that minority, I can attest to the reactions of “Everybody drives!†together with lectures about how I am limiting myself.
Those lectures are not needed. I know only too well the severe restrictions attendant upon being a non-driver. I grew up in Los Angeles, where public transportation was terribly inefficient and I was forced to put other people out of the way to drive me places.
Since then I have lived in cities like Atlanta where the transit system is quite a bit better. However, it is still far more difficult for someone like me to get around than it is for a driver.
I cannot help but wonder if many of the same people who complain that Russell Weller should not have been behind the wheel are also those who complain about spending money on mass transit. I also wonder if they themselves would consider relinquishing the use of their cars.
The problem of increasing numbers of elderly drivers and the disproportionate number of accidents they have is ultimately just one result of our extraordinarily automobile focused country. The spreading out of American cities through suburbanization made reliance on other forms of transportation largely impractical as buses and rails need dense population centers to be viable. The lack of sidewalks on many streets is like an unwelcome mat to pedestrians.
As a society, America concentrates on the healthy, the independent, and the economically successful. Those who need public transit are disproportionately the disabled and the poor, some of our most neglected Americans.
Baby Boomers were the most self-consciously youthful of any generation of young people. We have found it something of a shock to discover our hair graying and skin wrinkling so perhaps it is not surprising that we made little provision for that time when vision would dim, reaction times would diminish, and forgetfulness would set in.
Some good may come of the Weller tragedies and others like it if they serve as wake-up calls to the United States as a whole. Simply telling some people not to drive will not make our roads safer if it is not possible for them to function without cars. Many will get behind the wheel without licenses if there is no other way for them to get around. We need far better mass transit and more intelligent city planning if our roads are to be made safer.
As its very name implies, the automobile is a way to personal autonomy. It will continue to be prized for the unique degree of freedom and independence it confers on drivers. It will always and inevitably be a convenience. It ought not to be a necessity.
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