Skills

Welcome to fall! It's the time of year that I have trouble driving to work in the morning. The sun is low in the sky to the east at the time of my commute and there is one spot on the highway where it shines directly into my eyes making it very difficult to see. Worse still, this location has an intersection with a traffic light that can be completely obscured by the glare.

Although this instruction takes place in a right hand drive vehicle, the principles are exactly the same for left hand drive. Three methods or steering are shown: push-pull steering for general driving, hand over hand for slow speed maneuvering and fixed input for small changes in direction.

Evolution has shaped us to process visual information perceived at a walking speed of 5 or 6 km/h. This means that looking ahead for 3 to 6 seconds of travel time is plenty to keep from running into objects in our path. However, this natural tendency is insufficient for reliable driving decisions and collision avoidance.

I almost always check the price of gasoline when I pull onto the highway headed for work each day. An increase in the numbers usually brings a groan and starts me thinking about how to use less. The way I drive my little truck can have a significant influence on how much fuel it uses.

Twenty years of traffic policing has left me wondering if today is the day that another driver will involve me in a crash. I seem to be asking myself this more and more often as I observe the behaviour of other drivers around me. Driving is probably the largest risk that I take in my life right now.