Posted by I was heading home from a job with a colleague yesterday, and we were behind an AMG Mercedes, a car with huge power and fantastic handling. It was being driven by an older person, someone who had presumably worked hard to afford their dream car. But the thing is this, they might as well have been in a 1 litre car, or maybe smart car, because they were in no hurry, and seemed hesitant at every junction.
Later we came across other expensive cars cruising along in the outside lane of the motorway while the middle and lane one were free. There seems to still be the sense of entitlement of those who can afford expensive cars, that they should also be in lane three, as if lane one is for peasants, lane two for middle classes and lane three solely for posh people! Strangely I take an opposite view. Lane one is for those that heed the law and understand the keep left except when overtaking rule. Lane two generally for those overtaking the slower traffic like lorries, and lane three for arrogant plonkers in expensive cars who don’t care for rules and peasants. I find it amazing that the risk takers in the outside lane are more often than not, driving with less than 1 second of space between each other.
I understand all the arguments about why it’s fine to drive like this. Anyone is entitled to drive how they like within the law, older people are quite entitled to drive more slowly, young executives are allowed to pose in their BMW’s and Audi’s etc. However, it got me thinking, and here are my thoughts.
I wondered if there might be a better way to allocate driving entitlement because currently, once you have a licence, you can literally drive any car you like. So a brand new driver with enough money can go out the next day and buy a supercar, insure it, albeit with an astronomical premium, and quite possibly crash it the next day. I’ve known this to happen.
So, my idea is this; When you pass your test, you are entitled to drive cars up to a very limited horsepower. Then you have subsequent voluntary tests that allow you to drive higher power cars. This is effectively what happens already with motorcycle licences but with the addition of age related parameters.
The tests should include simulator time, and include things like judgement when pulling out of junctions, time spent on motorways including lane procedure, observation, skid control, overtaking ability and so on.
It would be interesting to see whether manufacturers suddenly started making very high quality, high spec cars with small engines and low horsepower for those who currently can only get the kind of luxury they desire in very high end cars.
It’s a bit like those that want a beautiful smartphone but actually only want it to make calls. They end up having to buy the latest all singing all dancing phone that has endless things on it that they don’t need or want. If they buy a phone that is just a phone, they get an unattractive brick. The answer of course is high end but simple product.
There are other reasons that this would be a great idea. More cars on the road would be more eco friendly and it would help further the electric car market because manufacturers could focus on making beautiful cars with adequate performance. I actually feel that this would sell more cars too, because electric cars currently have premium prices and for now are generally only affordable to those with deep pockets.
People with less than average ability would never end up in performance cars. The crash statistics would probably improve dramatically and the roads would be a less frustrating place for those with the ability and knowledge to pass the more stringent tests.
Read this piece and you’ll understand that some morons even think that middle lane hogging is perfectly acceptable, because quite frankly, they have almost zero ability. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/11696135/Allison-Pearson-Why-Im-proud-to-be-a-middle-lane-hogger.html
Read this fabulous piece to see how another frustrated driver feels about lane hogging. https://oldmangrumbling.com/grumbles/hogging-the-middle-lane/