Someone sent me an email awhile back asking me why I keep on the fact that there seems to be a lot of poor drivers in town. While I wont go so far as to say the drivers are poor, but there does seem to be people who for whatever reason, dont pay attention and obey the rules of the road.
That got me thinking…is it just me? Am I being too picky? Apparently not as more and more letters to the local paper seem to justify my analysis that there are people taking liberty with the rules of the road when it comes to stop signs, speeding in residential areas and aggressive driving.
John Airyo’s letter to the Champion this week seems to outline the same concerns I, as well as many other people in Milton share.
It concerns the way many people treat traffic stop signs. I can recall more than 15 times recently where drivers haven’t used traffic stop signs properly — with a few of them nearly causing an accident.
In all those cases, it happened that I got to the stop sign and stopped by the white line. My tire touched the white line and I made a complete stop. Then I went forward.
I knew I touched the line before some drivers, but they proceeded before me as if they were blind.
A couple of times I almost ran into those drivers because I had no inkling they were going to advance before me. I don’t know whether they were impatient, rude or simply inexperienced — or a combination of these.
These incidents have happened all over Milton, so I can’t really pinpoint a particular place.
Please use our traffic stop signs properly to avoid an accident.
JOHN ARIYO, MILTON
It’s not an unreasonable request is it? The stop signs are there for a reason. To safely control the flow of traffic and help keep drivers and pedestrians alike as safe as possible. We can go back a couple of years to Yates Drive where a number of these problems lead to a house being hit by a car…twice…in less than a year. A car driving down Yates at a high rate of speed (for the record a “high rate of speed” was perception based on cars driving the speed limit) drove through an intersection with a stop sign. The person at the stop sign didnt fully stop and did what was described by witnesses as a fast, rolling stop turning left onto Yates. The car with the right-away swerved to avoid the car coming from the stop sign, lost control, jumped the curb and sidewalk to slam into this persons home.
The second occurence happened almost identical with the result being the same less than a year later.
I’m sure youve seen it too. On your way to work in the mornings, or coming home at nights many people take liberty with the rules of the road and most times, nothing ever happens.
A friend commented to me that there should be mandatory retesting for our licences on a regular basis to make sure we remember and comply with the rules of the road. I dont think that would make much difference because anyone can put on good behaviour during the test, shine the like star that they are and when its securely in their hands…speed off and fly through a stop sign on the way to make it to the 401 parking lot in the morning.
