TRAFFIC CONTROL.

Press, Volume LXV, Issue 19786, 26 November 1929, Page 13

TRAFFIC CONTROL.

TO TWX «DITO* or TOT FItMS Sir.—Mr Hill's letter on traffic control do*# not eoroe a moment too soon. The only complaint about it is that he does not emphasise sufficiently the futility and stupidity of motor association* and local bodies in their endeavour to control, by a network of childish regulations, our every action from the | moment we set foot in oar car. If | these busy bodies will not learn from i other people's experience, the only | option is to go and learn for themselves, | unless they can appeal again to their j own common mm#, in the hope that it will direet them more fortunately next ! time. ~ . . . _ I also have had considerable driving experience abroad, and the following fact has perhaps made a greater impression on me than anything else. In England, where the traffic is the densest m i the world, and the standard of driving the highest, the number of traffic laws and enforced is absurdly small. Whv, there is not even a driving test. I do not maintain that there i» anv necessary relation between the standard of driving and the fewness of regulations, but what I do maintain is that man* of our regulations here are a waste of time and expense, and an abominable nuisance. I saw it was given as an excuse for the regulation necessitating rear reflectors, in a local body meeting, '"that accidents had been , known to occur for want of them." Accidents have been known to occur through a thousand and one equally triding things, but it is useless to legislate against all of them. And now someone wants to make a regulation to fiuarc the sa.fety of idiots who are in the habit of jumping out into the street from the driving seat of a car at the kerb without looking to see if any traffic is approaching them. If they forget to look before they jump, will they be any more likely to remember to give some ! elaborate signal! A wonderfully consistent and complete system of traffic signals is employed by motorists in England, and vet I am rot aware of any regulation , enforcing their use. Even if there , were, it is certainly not the regulation which induces people to follow them, but the knowledge that they ensure the greatest safety. I think I nay say that the essence of good driving lies in knowing always what the other man is going to do, and in acting upon that knowledge. In turn, what the other man is going to do depends upon the driving custom of the country. Now at present there is no knowing what the other motorist is going to do in Christchurch. He may keep to the left of the traffic dom>' or to the right of it: he may put out hi* hand when pulling out from the kerb, though probably not: he . quite often omits t» -ignal before turning to the right, and scarcely ever does so in plenty of time. I fear it will be > a long time befnr«- we follow a uniform set of customs io driving, but this will ' only be delayed still further by new i and changing regulations, whieh arc both confusing, and which are some--1 ; times given as an excuse for thoroughly bad drit ing. I agree wholeheartedly with Mr Hill when he advises leaving ' the individual unhampered by regula- ! tiona, but making him "prove what he ' waa doing was in the interests of publie safety" if he has an accident. " The motorist will then learn to help himself. Moreover, if our cyelists would condescend to keep near to the kerb where the state of repair of the road permits it, and would proceed ia

straight lines instead of a series of curves and would signal properly before turning to the right: and if our pedestrians would take the trouble to look before they step gaily into the street and to remember that more tratric inconvenience is caused by a car having to applv its brakes than by their stepping out of the way nimbly instead of in that dignified Christcburch manner: then our traffie control would show a vast improvement. If I have succeeded at all m damping the ardour of any of those in this over-governed country who seem to spend their time actually looking for new regulations to make, then I shall fee! that I have not written in vain.— Tours, etc.. November 25th, 1»2».