There is nothing you can do to counter act human stupidity. Cell phones, eating, loud music, not paying attention, crossing the middle line, trying to hurry and lack of sleep I think have more to do with it than road rage. Plus there are just so many more cars on the road now than what there use to be.

Brysanda hits on some excellent points. Traffic congestion is much higher than it was 20 years ago. It's also faster -- many roads which had speed limits of 55 mph now have limits of 70 or higher. While today's cars are built to handle those higher speeds, I'm not convinced most drivers have improved similarly.

Personally, I think you can expect trouble whenever parallel parking is the most difficult part of the driver's test. :-p

Drivers not being focused. Everyone should spend some time on a motorcycle or behind the wheel of an 18 wheeler to see just how you have to always stay alert and aware of where other drivers are and to think ahead!

You have to be really careful with the way people present statistics. It can be very misleading and even cause you to draw the wrong conclusion. You can find statistics to support about any conclusion you want to make. I notice they say motorcycle fatalities have doubled since 1997. Go through the annual reports for motorcycle companies and see how many motorcycles have been sold. You will find that the no. of motorcycle sales has far more than doubled since 1997. So if there is twice as many motorcycles on the road, why is it a surprise that over twice as many people die from motorcycle accidents? It's not a surprise to me. in fact I would be surprised if there wasn't twice as many motorcycle deaths.

Everyone is in a hurry to get no where.Plus there cars are now phone booths.The younger crowd even not so young think everynight is party night.Bars are popular and people fill them to escape there pitiful lives.Of course they call it having a life?I say why arent there more traffic deaths?

I enjoy what you write ,JohnDeere, Cars used to be living rooms on wheels, now they are wheeled phone booths !!

Driver/psychological testing must be made to be much more difficult...
Today it seems to be a "trivia based joke"..

we have created a monster, the personal use vehicle, and it has grown, it now wants its pound of flesh and its getting it. time to restrain it, or put it to rest.

They need to put bathrooms in todays vehicals along with the phone booths.Because the way people drive they must have to go and there speeding to get to the nearest mens or ladies room.Maybe talking on the phone has an affect like listening to running water?

Gas price up = miles down = fatalities down.

Gas prices up = more motorcycles = more motorcycle accidents and deaths. (besides they are the hip thing now)

Gas gets too high = more public transportation = more subway muggings.

You just can't win.

More work at home on the internet = less gas burned = cleaner air but no one out there to enjoy it. (they are all in front of a computer.) LOL

Got any more?

America allows any brain-dead idiot to drive their engine of destruction.

Toss in how murder-by-car (just avoid alcohol) as being a socially accepted method of killing others ("it was JUST an accident") and expect tens-of-thousands of deaths and a quarter-million very serious injuries yearly.

Interestingly, back in the 1980s, the article told of American soldiers stationed in Germany who applied for a German drivers license. Fully three-fourths of the applicants failed the test.... especially the driving portion of it.

After thorough training on how to operate a vehicle safely and with consideration for others, the majority passed. Some who simply did not possess the skills to operate a vehicle safely no matter how much training were not given a license.

Observe the drivers around you as ye motorvates down the road. Look at how attitude towards driving, wanting to avoid accidents and wanting to avoid harming other, makes for a safer driver.

The all-too-prevalent attitude of "me me me" causes many problems. Rushing to get somewhere with little to no thought of other's safety is a prime cause of innocent folks being maimed or killed.

Interestingly, back in the 1980s, the article told of American soldiers stationed in Germany who applied for a German drivers license. Fully three-fourths of the applicants failed the test.... especially the driving portion of it.

I loved driving in Germany! No one distracted by their mobile phones, very serious limits on driving under the influence, and no one hogging the left lane (in fact, there's a de facto death penalty for that so people stupid enough to do it don't pass the genes on to another generation).

When the toughest part of a driving exam is parallel parking, one cannot expect much. You can get a license in the U.S. with just a few hours of actual road experience, none of which needs to be in the dark or on ice or snow or even rain (unless you're lucky). We get out of this skill what we put into it. Too bad poor execution of this skill can kill you....

This is a topic that get's me a little steamed up. IMHO I think CELL PHONES are one of the most dangerous things to have while driving. I'm all for progress and I think technology is moving ahead by leaps and bounds and a cell phone is a great thing to have WHEN USED PROPERLY. If I seem to be upset by them, let me share with you something that happened on my way to work one morning. I ride a Motorcycle to work and one morning I was going down the freeway and noticed that the traffic was unusually heavy,which is not uncommon in Los Angels. As myself and a couple hundred other motorists where inching along, I finally made it to the cause of all the traffic. I was expecting a stalled car in a lane or an accident but no,instead it was some mindless fool IN THE FAST LANE talking on his cell phone. You can imangine what type of bottleneck this was creating at 6:00 am on a workday.This idiot is talking away without any clue as to what is going on behind him so I took it upon myself to show this fellow motorists the error of his ways. When i pulled alongside of him, I could hear his conversation crystal clear and he was talking to his wife or girlfriend, and they were arguing about the dinner they had the previous night. I about siezed up right there on the spot. So I did what any other person would do when faced with such a dillema, I SLAPPED THE PHONE OUT OF HIS HAND and grinned all the way to work.

Everything you just said, man.
I'm probably not going to make a lot of friends with this opinion but I think cell phones should be illegal to use when driving. I even admit I can't drive & talk & pay attention.