I've often wondered about this point. There seems little doubt that at some point in their lives, people become unable to safely drive a car any more, yet many of these people may continue to drive. Should there be an age at which they should be subject to mandatory retesting every so often?


Source: Public Affairs : older drivers - The AA

Personally I think licenses are handed out to readily at all ages and they should be taken away more often for idiot behaviour.

I agree. I think one of the best solutions to solve traffic problems and reduce emmissions is get all bad drivers off the road, not just the old ones. I'd say, just from personal experience that about one in ten drivers aren't skilled enough to be on the road.

They are considering the disasterously stupid idea of building a rail system in my area. At a cost of $10,000 per taxpayer in my state, it would relieve only about one or two percent of traffic.

For a fraction of that cost, they could beef up the licensing system to where drivers had to demonstrate skill at an actual driving test every few years when they renew their license.

Police officers should also pull stupid drivers over when they see them doing stupid things like slowing down to merge onto a freeway. They issue the stupid driver a fix-it ticket, and the driver has to go in for a thorough driving test to retain his license.

Anyone who fails a test gets their license revoked for six months, has to complete driver training, and is issued a free bus pass. When someone is caught driving without a license the vehicle they are driving is seized and auctioned off unless it is reported stolen.

The free bus pass bit I don't get - why should they gain financially? Travelling by bus is probably much cheaper than they would normally spend on fuel etc.

And the auctioning off of cars unless reported stolen seems a bit universal to me too - perhaps "unless reported stolen OR can be shown to belong to someone *who allowed the driver to use it voluntarily*, in which case they should also be fined". I guess it could be a bit semantic to say for example that ... kid takes dad's car from the driveway out front and the keys from the house and drives, gets busted, so Dad has to 'report car stolen' in order to get it back. In a way I guess it is stolen.

Here they have fairly recently introduced "anti-hoon legislation" (not sure if you have the term hoon over there - basically means hotheads/revheads/etc who do dangerous stuff behind the wheel like drag racing at traffic lights). Under this, police confiscate vehicles on the spot for idiot behaviour - first offence is a short time like a few days, repeat offences for a longer term or complete forfeiture of the vehicle. This seems a good approach to me.

Interesting figure on the news just last night was the overwhelming majority (I forget the actual number, but in the order of 80-90% I think) of road fatalities last year here were young people aged 18-25.

If you'd start building more public transportation it's getting cheaper, but I doubt that it would be an easy endeavour on an American island.

I don't have a car for instance, and buying one wouldn't even be profitable, as the public transportation usually gets me somewhere way more cheaper and starts even getting faster.

Highspeed Train to Paris anyone?


To Topic, Every driver should be tested more regularly if he's capable of driving the way it is intended.

On The German Autobahn for instance there is no speed limit, you can drive as fast as you want, and people do drive as fast as they want. It's rare to not see a BMW driving 250km/h past you.

And when I think that maybe 5-20% are too stupid to drive, well...

Rail systems work in some areas - the areas where they were built a long time ago and neighborhoods grew around them. The one they're talking about on Oahu just wouldn't work. The same type of project hasn't worked elsewhere its been tried. They relieve about 1% of traffic. So the cost far outweighs the benefit.

As for driving in Germany, I'm pretty sure I saw somewhere how its much much harder to get a license in Germany. That's what I want here. If we could get idiots off the road, we wouldn't need speed limits either.

They like to say here "speed kills," but that is simply not true, or no one would survive the Indy 500. What kills is lack of skill at driving. Collisions are virtually always the result of poor driving skills and/or bad decisions.

I don't know what I was thinking about the bus pass, tho I am in favor of increasing incentives through subsidizing bus fairs over spending 100 fold more on a dumbass train.

The reason for crushing the car is the same concept as your suggestion that the owner be fined for allowing an unlicensed driver to use his car. I'm just raising the stakes. Someone is more likely to take a risk an loan an unlicensed driver their car at the risk of a couple hundred dollars (which the driver might offer to cover if she's caught) than if the risk is never seeing their vehicle again, and joining their friend at the bus stop. The same goes for the unlicensed driver and their own car.

As for the "hoon legislation" that's great, but it should be steeper. I think they should get the car they're driving confiscated too.

Back to the original point. Yes, older drivers should be tested. I think that some states are moving in that direction, starting with a simple eye exam.