Path: utzoo!dciem!nrcaer!cognos!geovision!pt
From: pt@geovision.uucp (Paul Tomblin)
Newsgroups: ont.general
Subject: Re: Ontario Highway Driving
Summary: Tomblin's laws
Message-ID: <644@geovision.UUCP>
Date: 20 May 89 02:16:40 GMT
References: <6147@sunray.UUCP>
Reply-To: geovision!pt (Paul Tomblin)
Distribution: ont
Organization: GeoVision Corp, Ottawa, Canada
Lines: 42

In article <6147@sunray.UUCP> roberts@cognos.UUCP (Robert Stanley) writes:
>We have had an amazing amount of speculation on the subject of driving,
>particularly driving faster than the posted speed limit, over the last
>few weeks.  Clearly it is a divisive issue, and it would appear that
>many of us are misinformed and ignorant, at least with respect to some
>of the issues that have been raised.

I'm posting what I consider my laws of safe and responsible driving.  Like
Asimov's laws of Robotics, each law is only applied if it doesn't conflict
with previous ones.

1) Minimize deaths and injuries in the whole system.  This means driving to
avoid accidents to yourself, but more importantly, don't _cause_ accidents
to others.  This also covers cases where you can save several pedestrians by
plowing into some jerk speeding out of control (I was a pedestrian in this
situation once.  I was very grateful!)

2) Minimize delay to the whole system.  This means don't cut somebody off to
save yourself 5 minutes if it's going to delay 10 people by a minute. 
Following this rule will keep traffic flowing freely for everybody.

3) Minimize total acceleration (scalar sum, not vector sum) in the system. 
This means that don't pull out to pass somebody if it means slowing down
somebody bombing along in the passing lane, even if you think they're being
an idiot.  Following this rule will keep the total fuel consumption down, as
well as contributing to free flow.

These "laws" are based on my education as a Civil Engineer, and 5 years
experience working in highway design for MTC, as well as (IMHO) being a
courteous driver concerned about the environment.

The thing that annoys me the most is people who won't wait in a line up, but
rather scoot along the shoulder or exit lane, then try to merge back in to
traffic.  I once had a chance to chew out one of these idiots when they got
stopped next to me.  Do you believe they honestly believed that they weren't
harming anybody or slowing the rest of us down!

-- 
Paul Tomblin,  First Officer, Golgafrinchan B Ark       | ADA was invented 
    UUCP:   nrcaer!cognos!geovision!pt ??               | because  Vogon 
    Disclaimer: The opinions expressed here aren't      | Poetry wasn't
    necessarily even mine!                              | deadly enough.