NEW DRIVING TESTS

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXIX, Issue 20105, 11 May 1935, Page 10

NEW DRIVING TESTS

All those who have learned to drive since April 1, 1934, and all new applicants for driving licenses, will have to undergo a test of their competence (says the Riley Record). Before they are allowed in a car alone, they will have to satisfy an examiner that they are able to drive without being a danger to themselves or to anyone else. There has been a good deal of outcry against the imposition of,, such tests, which are regarded in certain quarters as an attack on the traditional liberty of the Englishman. It has been argued against such tests that they will prove of no value, for most accidents are caused, not by novices, but by those with six months’ or so experience behind them, who have lost the fear of speed and who tend to drive;faster than an experienced motorist would do under similar circumstances. When driving is properly taught by the instructor of a reputable school the learner receives something more than mere instruction; he gets also what may be termed “road education,” learning what is and what is not “done” when in charge of a car. He will learn the proper way to execute every kind of manoeuvre, while the chances are that if he be a self-taught driver or one who has only had a few hours at the wheel under the instruction of a ffcend, he will unwittingly teach himself bad habits, which are aggravated by the very experience of which he is so proud. The good instructor, therefore, brings the motorist up in the way he should go, sandwiching in between instruction in gear changing, starting the engine, etc., all kinds of hints towards better and safer driving. For this task of motor driving is far too complicated a subject to be picked up in the course of occasional short lessons with a friend who may perhaps only have acquired his driving experience witHin a couple of years or so.

When a pupil is taking a course at a proper school of motoring, the in-

structor sees to it that he does everything exactly right from the beginning. Consequently, by the time he is allowed to drive by himself, to make his first “solo” as it were, he has a true appreciation of the finer points of driving. Such a man or woman will seldom be found driving in an imprudent or inconsiderate manner.

It is a very general rule that people only value that which it has cost them a good deal, both in effect and in money, to obtain. In the old days anybody could come along, deposit five shillings and be free to take the road to the peril of passers-by. Now that an examination has to be passed before a driving license is issued, the applicant is likely to take the whole thing very much more seriously, studying hard and practising continuously, so that he can make sure of passing at the first attempt instead of being sent back to “school” in disgrace. The psychological value of the driving tests, therefore, is at least as valuable as the practical aspect. So afraid will the beginner be of failing in his examination that he will enter upon the subject of driving in all seriousness, learning everything he can about his car and how he should control it upon the roads.

A new system of hydraulic transmission has been developed in Germany in which the required gears are selected automatically, the driver depressing the accelerator pedal only.