A COMMON DILEMMA.

Waipa Post, Volume 48, Issue 3470, 24 May 1934, Page 6

A COMMON DILEMMA.

If the horn is sounded a man in the road is disconcerted, and if it is not and there is an accident the authorities may say that the motorist was driving dangerously, pointed out a London coroner, in commenting upon a dilemma of which many drivers are painfully aware. The question he has raised is one of importance. There are undoubtedly many occasions when an experienced driver realises it is safer not to sound the horn. Courts are very apt to draw incorrect assumptions from a negative answer to the question "did you hoot?" It is only a very discriminating and knowledgeable Bench that is able to weigh the argument that to hoot would have been dangerous at its proper value. It frequently happens, of course, in a really serious difficulty, that the driver has no time to press the horn button. As a broad rule, when a pedestrian crosses the road in front unexpectedly it is wise to hoot. The case in which to refrain from horn-sounding is when the pedestrian is fairly far across the road with his back to the car and it is proposed to pass between him and the kerb he has left. This is decided by the fact that a sudden horn blast usually causes people to start backwards. There are, it must be emphasised, exceptions to every rule such as this.