This post is going to be very Utah-centric. I apologize in advance, but continue on anyway.
You know how people tend to complain that Utah drivers are absolutely horrible, and how whatever state the the complainee came from has much better drivers? And you know how Utah drivers often say it’s all the people who move to Utah from California who are really the bad drivers?
Well now there is proof that it really is those Californians! Actually, it turns out a lot of Americans are horrible drivers. “Results from the 2009 GMAC Insurance National Drivers Test released today found that 20.1 percent of licensed Americans – amounting to roughly 41 million drivers on the road – would not pass a written drivers test exam if taken today.” [link to the source of the quote and details] This is incredibly sad and kind of frightening considering how easy the written tests are.
How did Utah do? Number 7. Idaho came in at number 1. And California? Number 48. That’s right, it really is those bad California drivers that are so troubling on Utah’s roadways! New York came in last.
Sadly, I live in the District of Columbia. We came in at number 44. And we totally deserve that rating. The drivers here are horrible! But I came from Utah, so I’m clearly a good driver. I mean, obviously.
(Quick note before the snarking in the comments commences: Though the story that generated this post clearly correlates how a person does on the written test with how a person actually drives, I don’t know if there really is a correlation there. I mean, it’s certainly possible and even probable, but I don’t actually know. But I’m willing to go with it for now.)
I’m sorry, but I can’t respect any study that places D.C. drivers (you excluded, of course) anywhere above the worst in the U.S. I realize it’s not completely their fault–I don’t know the insane person who designed the roads there–but, when I lived there, the drive from New York to D.C. was perfectly pleasant until we hit the Baltimore-D.C. expressway and, more specifically, until we hit D.C., at which point I saw scores of middle fingers, insane weaving in and out of lanes, tailgating, etc. (Maybe, of course, the problem is Maryland or Virginia drivers who are driving in the District–I don’t remember the license plates–but I have never enjoyed driving less than the year I lived in Northern Virginia.)
Sam, according to the article, Virginia comes in near the middle of the pack. I’m guessing the southern part of the state is where the good drivers are.
Tanya, you really could not address a more controversial subject. Luckily, there is empirical evidence from Allstate:
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E06E6D71031F93BA25755C0A9609C8B63
Note that none of the 10 cities with the best drivers are in Utah. Only a few of the cities with the worst drivers are in California. So, your hypothesis falls to pieces (except the part about DC, which is obviously true).
The problem with state-wide rankings is that they have huge statistical disparities that will skew results. A driver from Chico, California has nothing in common with somebody from LA. A driver from Jacksonville, Florida is completely different from a driver from Miami.
I have seen other rankings that show Miami as the large city with the worst drivers. Having lived there and driven all around the country, I would have to say that there is certainly some truth to that.
I now live near Fort Collins, which is one of the safest cities. You can imagine my car insurance rates are about one-third what they were in Miami.
There are some general comments that can be made about driving habits and the safest and worst places to drive. In general, medium-sized cities in the middle of the country are the safest places to drive. In general, the worst drivers tend to be cities on the East Coast or the large cities of California. So, if you live in Provo or St. George or Sandy, you are probably going to have better drivers than if you live in LA, SF, Miami or Newark.
Geoff, I’m not sure if it’s fair to bring logic and reason into the discussion ;-). You do make good points, though.
It’s been my experience that the notion that Utah drivers are bad stems from the fact that there are so many transplants, people from areas with different driving manners, protocol, habits, etiquette, etc.. The driving seems to be less hectic when the majority of students go home for the summer.
J., I’ve heard BYU referred to as the University of California at Provo, so… yeah.
(As a side note, I grew up in Utah County. I definitely found the pace of life slowed noticeably in Provo as soon as April graduation was over and picked back up again as soon as fall semester started. It was nice in the summer.)
I nearly flunked out of drivers education in high school, but can now readily and quickly recite Arizona traffic law as a I drive. 🙂 Truthfully, I enjoy reading Arizona traffic law. Yeah, I’m clearly boring.
Of course, when it comes to driving, my knowledge of traffic laws does not always translate into my driving. I frequently exceed the speed limit, but try not to exceed it by more than 10mph.
As a pedestrian, I find most drivers, regardless of license plate, to be insane, inconsiderate, and deadly.
We’re looking for you, Ardis. Or is it not looking…?
Ardis,
Come to New York City; here, there are enough pedestrians that pedestrians (myself included at times), rather than cars, get to be insane and inconsiderate (although few are big enough to be deadly).
Brian, I don’t believe I’ve ever met anyone before who enjoyed reading traffic law. That’s, um, an interesting interest.
Ardis, as a frequent pedestrian myself, I definitely understand what you’re talking about.
Tanya, I do volunteer work with a local law-enforcement agency and frequently take accident reports while waiting for sworn officers to show up on scene. I enjoy piecing together what happened and determining which traffic laws were violated.
Ohhhh…, then that makes more sense, Brian. I no longer need fear for your sanity 😉
In no particular order:
The first time driving around Washington, D.C., I noticed that the fenders of the other cars had a higher frequencey of scraped and dented than I considered normal. Left me feeling paranoid.
When I moved to Los Angeles, for the first several months other motorists would honk at me, and I would have no idea why. I must have got with the program, though, because I quit provoking honking after a while.
One Friday at lunch with a Korean and a Taiwanese, they started talking about how hard they had to study to pass the drivers’ tests in their home countries. After a few minutes of that, the Korean lamented that the difficulty of passing the test didn’t translate into better driving or safer roads.
The problem with Utahns is that they don’t know how to merge and won’t let people in. It’s amazingly frustrating.
Gotta agree with you Clark on that point.
Clark, they? I think you mean “we.” 🙂
Geoff B (#3), the Allstate statistics are number of years between accidents, which is affected by a number of other factors beyond driver safety – notably commuting distance, weather, congestion, infrastructure age, road maintenance level, design of streets and intersections, urban planning, and so on.
John Mansfiled’s Korean friend has the right thought. The link between passing a written test (e.g. How far away from the curb can you park?) and courteous yet defensive driving is not a given. Correlation is not causation.
Growing up in California, I loved to just get in my car and take a drive on the freeways in the San Jose area. After moving to Utah and driving around for a while, I’ve never liked driving anymore.
Take that for what it is.
I live in Utah where I take someone honking a car horn as a sign of displeasure. On my first trip to New York City a couple of months ago (I wasn’t driving), I was surprised at the large amount of honking that seemed to be entirely polite. It seemed that cabbies were pressing the horn to let people know they were moving around them.
When I got my Utah Driver’s license, it was openbook …
California’s is not.
I think that explains a lot :-0.
Any drivers license division facility that allows an open book drivers license test is derelict in its duty. The practice of allowing drivers who do not pass to study and retake the test soon thereafter is one I have seen and which seems reasonable to me.
As far as honking goes, I don’t mind if it is short and given after a reasonable time interval has expired for the driver to notice the issue.
I have never seen an open book drivers license test in Utah, btw.
Did they use a single test for everyone?
Because I’ve heard California has a much harder written test than Utah’s.
I’ve been a non-member and a convert, a California driver and a Utah driver…in other words, I’ve seen it all, driven there and back, lived to tell the tale and share the gospel!
There was a wonderful degree of difficulty to driving in California that I grew up understanding and no other freeway feels like home, and other state’s drivers just don’t quite get it as well as we do.
Insert your own state in that “state”ment and it applies, I’m sure.