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by Scott Stevens, Lakes Weekly Bulletin

Have you ever had the feeling that driving from A to B in your hometown is not as simple and risk free as it should be? I have. Many times, hence, the need to keep up with the latest 5 star safety rating in your family vehicle when commuting around this district.

Case in point. Driving like most days, with daughter number two along Arrowtown Lake Hayes Road. Nice day for it, I thought, taking this child of mine to ballet lessons in her pink tutu. No traffic ahead until I noticed a green van in my lane, obviously traveling in the same direction as me, or not, as it turned out.

What freaked me out most was my brain’s very slow reaction time to realising this green van was not going in the same direction. It was just so unexpected to see a green van in my lane coming towards me on a collision course that was split seconds away. Just before I took evasive action into the side of road ditch, just outside Mora (a very good if not the best lunch venue town) the “foreign” looking bloke in the green van looked up. Surprise is the way I would describe the look on face. Then he started laughing as he swerved back into his rightful line and continued on. No harm done except for the nightmares this Dad of three young kids feels now, every time he takes to the roads with his precious cargo onboard. Fearful of every f-wit the rental car industry does business with.

It doesn’t get any better in winter with our over stretched mostly volunteer emergency responders picking up the pieces and sending those still breathing to our over stretched and underfunded local hospitals. Usually by way of community funded emergency helicopter services. Sounds expensive because it is. Not only in dollar terms but emotional terms as well. It’s messy and ugly for all involved. In a death by blunt force trauma sort of way.

But let’s not discriminant. New Zealanders are known as some of the worst drivers in the world. Our biggest problem is our inflated sense of our own greatness as drivers. I’m an excellent driver of course, so would never make a silly mistake, yet I have, more than once.

The point here is tourists are rented cars on dodgy local roads when they have no idea what ice, grit and a dotted white line in the middle means. If I was the Dictator of all things, I’d charge the rental company Jucy, Hertz, Budget or whoever, for every cent of the damage done to local people, property, rescue and hospital treatment. These services are for us, the people who live here. User pays, and double for f-wits. But this is a pipe dream to think those muppets in Wellington politicians give a hoot about us. So, my real point as a local Dad, is prepare and drive like your life and the lives or your dearest depends on it. Because it does.