The invention and development of the internal combustion engine has been one of the most functional devices to escape from the imaginative brain of 20th century man. It has led to the production of vehicles, which allow us to move quickly from one part of the country to another; and those of us who can afford it have purchased a motor vehicle to assist us in getting around – mainly for work and sometimes for pleasure.
But we have to face facts. While motor vehicles are very useful indeed, yet they can also be very dangerous and deadly machines if badly managed and controlled.
Within recent times another invention has made its appearance. It is the cellular phone! This instrument, like the motor vehicle, is also an extremely useful tool which, if properly managed, will enable us to more efficiently order our lives, and unlike the motor vehicle it is not inherently a dangerous invention.
But trying to drive and control a motor vehicle while simultaneously using a hand-held cellphone and dialling numbers is a most deadly combination, since both exercises demand the use of the eyes and concentration of the mind. The result is often additional carnage on the roads when inattention to the business of careful driving is exaggerated by the shifting of the eyes from the road to the phone.
The call for the ban of hand-held cellular devices when one is driving and controlling a vehicle on our roads is therefore a timely one. It needs total support from the public because such a ban makes good sense. The result of this deadly combination is very often the death of someone other than the careless driver, or crippling lifelong injury to some other person who becomes the victim of such egregious misuse of two very useful inventions never intended to be used together.
The law should be quickly implemented with a level of fines for infractions that would cause a would-be lawbreaker at the wheel to think twice before engaging in such hazardous behaviour.
Such a law might make our roads safer, but to enhance that objective, other matters need equally urgent attention. There are simply too many vehicles on the roads of our small island which belch out almost with impunity dark clouds of poisonous deadly combinations of chemicals that cause nothing but harm to the lungs of other road users.
It is not surprising that the levels of asthma have increased among our population, for many of our young schoolchildren have to walk the streets to and from school trapped in an almost continuous shower of these deadly toxins. This matter too, needs to be seriously and urgently addressed.
We can no longer continue to tolerate these conditions which conduce to a non-communicable chronic disease, if we are serious about containing our health bill while promoting healthy lifestyles.
A further matter which cries out for attention is the manner in which some container trucks and other large mechanical platforms are driven along our roads. The most careful manipulation of these monsters is always needed, and by and large the drivers are careful and demonstrate much skill. Sometimes, however, one is left to wonder, except for an emergency, whether these large and overpowering vehicles ought to be on the roads at peak times of traffic flow.
Of necessity, our roads have to accommodate a mix of users, ranging from pedestrians to bicyclists, to motorcyclists, to private and commercial vehicles, all competing for the coveted spot on roads which were marked out for a different era of simpler and slower travel.
We must therefore do our best to ensure that laws are in place to make for safer use of our roads, particularly by drivers who refuse to recognize the damage they may cause to other road users through their careless driving.
And these laws must be enforced!