Reckless Driving in My Neighborhood

Reckless Driving In My Neighborhood

Nancy S. Young

COMM105

Gayla Nelson

March 13, 2006

Reckless Driving in My Neighborhood

Our neighborhood is a place where we should be comfortable letting our children play, without having to worry about them getting hit by a reckless driver. If our children are in their on yard, there is still a chance for a speedy driver to loose control and hit one of them.

On the street that I live on there is a great deal of children, of all ages, that ride bikes and play basketball. The children sometimes use the road to ride their bikes, because there is no other place for them to ride. Are we supposed to make our children stay off their bikes to satisfy the drivers, because people do not want to drive safe and slowly through our neighborhood?

People will speed down the streets at a high rate of speed and then when they have to stop all of a sudden, they go into a rage. They should not be driving fast to begin with. Sometimes they start at one end of the street, accelerating to a high speed and landing in a non stop spin at the intersection. People have also raced against other drivers’ side beside from one end of the street to the next. “What would happen if a child was in the street and they did not have time to stop? Or they ran into another vehicle or someone’s house?” A person who drives in a reckless manner has no respect for someone or their property.

My future mother-in-law, said: “It makes me very upset that there is lack of traffic control on our street and protection for my grandchildren as they play. Instead there is verbal abuse and fear.” Our streets do not have sidewalks, so the children want to ride their bikes in the street. We have taught our children to ride on the edge of the street and to watch for cars, but also we are there with them. There are little children playing all around the neighborhood and we can not count the times we have screamed at the drivers to slow down, that there are kids playing. What upsets us is the drivers stop alright, to yell at us, using verbal abuse and obscene language and tell us to keep our children out of the streets. Because the drivers have to stop all of a sudden, does not make it our fault that they are speeding. The reckless drivers are the ones playing laud music, talking on their cell phones, speeding and not paying attention. They are making our streets and yards not safe for the children.

I have contacted the police about this matter and they have told me, that they are going to investigate and watch our streets to see if they can put a stop to the reckless driving. I also may be interviewed by an officer of the law.

It shall be deemed reckless driving for any person to drive a motor vehicle in a careless or wanton manner without regard for the safety of a person’s property or in violation of the conditions outlined in Section 11-801 of Motor Vehicles, Title 47. (OSCN) The punishment for reckless driving if you are arrested and convicted to me is not enough. According to the Okalahoma Statutes Citationized, if someone is convicted of reckless driving in the first offence you will either spend not less than five days in jail and no more than 90 or ordered to pay a fine of $100.00 to $500.00 dollars, if not both. On the second offence you could face ten to six months in jail or a fine between $150.00 to $1,000.00 or both (OSCN). I believe that people need to know what could happen to them if they were to get caught or hit someone.

“What could be done to help control the traffic in our neighborhood?” Maybe speed bumps need to be installed at random areas or signs saying: slow down, due to children playing. I know that there are not enough police officers to patrol every area all the time, but maybe they could just go through our neighborhood enough that people can see that the area is being patrolled and then maybe the traffic would be calmer.

Traffic calming can be achieved through citizens-based, grassroots education, enforces and engineering (City of Tulsa, 2005). If the neighbors are worried about traffic control and the safety of their family, having knowledge on what we might can do, will create communication between neighbors. The city is developing a traffic-calming program, which will help establish guidelines and criteria for speed humps or other traffic calming devices (City of Tulsa, 2005). Drive 25 is a program