New Driving Laws Essay, Research Paper

The Driving Dungeon

In the US in the last year, states and providences (such as Salt Lake City and Colorado) have been changing their driving laws for new teenage driving. This is making the process longer and more stressful for a teens to get their licenses. It is also taking away from the great joy of a parent to allow their children to legally go out for them to run errands or just to have some free time alone. Instead what it is doing for the parents is forcing them to stay with there kid, take time out of there day, and put them into a car with their child behind the wheel. This is usually very stressful on that parent, while at the same time making the teen feel trapped and locked up! I propose to show you the many negative sides to this law, compared to the few advantages!

Effective July 1, 1999, Colorado has a new law that changes how a minor (anyone under 18) gets their instruction permit and driver s license. This new law changes the age that a minor may apply for a permit and also restricts the license of drivers under 17 years of age. Along with that new drivers will now be required to hold their first instruction permit for at least 6 months and be at least 16 years of age before they can get a driver license in Colorado. This means that if they get their permit on your 15th birthday, you will have to hold the permit for a year (until your 16th birthday) before you can apply for the license.

If you apply for your permit on or after July 1, 1999, at the time you apply for your driver license, law will require you, to submit a log of your driving experience; a total of 50 hours or more. At least 10 of those hours must have been night driving experience. An attached Drive Time Log Sheet is used any time you drive. The adult fills in the appropriate box with you while you are driving. They fill in the date, the total drive time, the amount of night driving (if any) and their initials. (The Comments section is optional for the licensing sheet if you need more than one to complete your 50 hours.) But, nowhere are there any boxes saying errors, close accidents, or dangerous actions! Making the whole 50 hour process not useful at all because then whether the adult is with you or no; if they don t ask or any errors they will give you the licence anyway!

Statistics show that the most teen accidents happen between 11PM and 12 midnight, this being the last hour of curfew! So, they have come up with the conclusion to change the curfew (in many townships) to an hour sooner at 11PM. Now, lets think about this. The majority of accidents are occuring at the end of curfew, so they make curfew an hour earlier, when there are MORE PEOPLE OUT ON THE ROAD, so now there are even more accidents. Why? Because of the larger population of automobiles out on the road at that hour! Its obvious, if they are having accidents because they are rushing home, they are still going to be rushing no matter what time it is, just the earlier it is the more traffic you will have to make it easier to hit another driver.

I admit there maybe are no answers to these problems, but the way the government is trying to solve their teen driver problems, at the current time, is not the right way to go about it. They are looking at the good side (keeping kids off of the streets) and not reviewing the oppssing side reguarding what it will do to the parents and how it will put more innocent peolple at risk of being in a major accident. While, at the same time, making today s teens feel like a low- life scum. This makes us peel like we can be pushed around, while locking them in a dark cell with out any rights in our FREE country!

Bibliography

- Online, Internet. http://www.dckids.org/safe_teenage_driving_amendment_a.htm

- Online, Internet. http://www.golocalnet.net/drive/select1a.htm

- Online, Internet. http://www.highwaysafety.org/

- Online, Internet. http://www.iii.org/individuals/auto/teendrivers.html

- Online, Internet. http://www.ohio.gov/odps/special/teenlaw.html