Drivers, take the hit

As mentioned previously, one of the biggest frustrations I have with the powers-that-be in the Police is their road traffic strategy. Over the years they have not changed their focus one bit, and the reported collision rate on the island remains high and constant.

Aside from a brief period when mandatory seatbelts became law and there was a bit of a clampdown to ensure everybody buckled up (which I have to say was somewhat effective; most Bermudians now buckle up with regularity, I believe), efforts have gone to pointing radar guns down straight roads every now and then. That's where you see them. Not monitoring intersections, roundabouts, places where there are stop signs or traffic lights. Every Christmas they're hanging outside the public library chatting with people.

So, after watching this clown riding 867AI overtake me a little too close for comfort, skylark up Palmetto Road (I passed him), zoom past me on the inside before zooming past the typical big-ass Honda FR-V (which is a truly ugly-looking and seemingly-inappropriate kind of car for our roads, but that's another matter) - again on the inside - and forcing the driver to slow down and get out of the way, I think policing the roads perhaps should be taken out of the hands of the police and into the hands of drivers.

By that I mean, and I'm not being as tongue-in-cheek as you may think, stop giving way to the fools who do dangerous crap like overtake on the inside. Hold your position, hell inch a little to the left if you want. Either the idiot gets frustrated and tries to do some other crap or they take a good wallop when they deck out or crash into your vehicle.

Yes, I know, there's a hit to your insurance. But hell, it's because of these idiot drivers that your insurance is skyrocketing as it is. And since there's uncontrolled anarchy on the roads that the powers-that-be can only spurt press statements about and hope the problem goes away, it may as well be the driving public that does its part in taking bad drivers off the road.