Very often we see drivers who have bought their driving license on our roads
So, what’s the tell tale sign of a driver who has ‘bought’ their driving license? Well, over the years of driving you can tell when a driver has no clue about what they are doing behind the wheel of a car as you see the many mistakes they make when parking their car, moving in and out of tight street traffic, just driving along without noticing other road users and even worse, hogging the fast lane because they are highly nervous behind the wheel and lose themselves in ‘over thinking’ every aspect of driving.
They also like ‘honking’ at other road users as they think they are ‘right’ all the time and also it’s a way of ‘warning’ the rest that they ‘bought’ their driving license!
Please note that we are NOT talking about drivers who use their smartphone or play with their large, entertaining, full feature, communicative center entertainment touch screen in their shiny new car when driving daily. These are mostly ‘GOOD’ drivers as they can multitask!
We are talking about young and even quite old (45 years to 70 years or so) drivers who ‘BOUGHT’ their driving license and have little knowledge of what to do behind the wheel.
Now, for older drivers (we look at 70 years and above) there is possible eyesight issue, health issues, arthritis in the hands (slow to respond to steering inputs), knee issues (slow response in using pedals) and more which needs some patience from other road users.
Yes, they can be a huge bother at roundabouts (slow to move on) and hogging lanes at slow speeds (eyesight issues) but these drivers need mobility as they might be living alone or need to do errands.
BUT, when you deal with drivers who BOUGHT their driving license, we have to be firm and communicative with them as they are a menace on our roads.
We are highlighting this serious issue as we have come across ourselves individuals (friends and family), young and old who just cannot drive properly and have admitted to us after some ‘pushing’ that they BOUGHT their driving license.
Plus, they insist on driving large vehicles as this gives them confidence on the road in an accident …… BUT WHAT ABOUT THE OTHER ROAD USERS AND PEDESTRIANS!
I have constantly reminded them to seek ‘eyesight’ checks, trade down to a smaller sized vehicle to make parking and moving in and out of traffic easier and even better ‘USE RIDE HAILING and public transport!
Why? Well, for the older driving license buyer, decades ago our roads were not that crowded, today, we have heavy traffic and a large number of motorcyclists NOT following road rules which could lead to deadly accidents (we have seen enough weekly on our roads).
For the younger driving license buyer, it has been a waste of time advising them as ‘THEY KNOW IT ALL’!
For us, we constantly remind our immediate family under OUR roof to look out for other road users more than before as we need to predict the wrong moves by riders and drivers on every journey. Take the assumption that everyone else on the road is a bad driver and then work around them. Keep driving speed lower and it is better to be late than be sorry.
