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Professor Motolla can be contacted at two web sites: The National Institute for Driver Behavior , and Skid Monster.com .

A thousand ways to lose control

There are thousands of ways to lose control while driving, says Professor Fred Mottola, and he isn't talking about a physical loss of control.

Mottola has developed a new system of driving he calls the Zone Control System , and it's been accepted by a number of prominent driver educators as a state-of-the-art method of teaching drivers how to be sensitive to changes in the driving environment and to react in positive ways.

Mottola's philosophy in developing the system was to shift the focus of safe driving away from crashes and move it to the area of driving strategy. Crashes are rare events, Mottola says, and using them to measure driving effectiveness is like measuring the performance of a car by whether it breaks down or not. Crashes don't provide a feedback system for everyday driving.

Driving errors, on the other hand, are an everyday occurrence, especially if the errors are defined in relation to a demanding driving strategy that's designed to keep drivers well cushioned from the total failure mode of an actual crash. Drivers using such a system, Mottola believes, have a powerful means to improve their driving habits based on enhanced feedback from everyday driving.

In Mottola's Zone Control System, drivers can lose control by failing to manage the zones to the front, sides and rear of their car. They maintain control by attending to their Line-Of-Sight (LOS) and Path-Of-Travel (POT). Anything that affects these features should be monitored by the driver and should result in changes in speed or position on the roadway.

Drivers practising the system try to keep the zones around their car open and they check their Line-Of-Sight and Path-Of-Travel for anything that might affect their zones. A tailgater dangerously closes the rear zone, for example, or the crest of a hill could close the Line-Of-Sight for the front zone.

The system emphasizes what Mottola calls the "ABCs of Zone Control driving": the driver spots a zone change, checks options, and then takes initiatives in speed, position and communication. Mottola identifies five possible lane positions as responses to LOS or POT changes: center lane, left and right of lane, and positions that straddle the lane markings on either side. The straddle positions, Mottola says, are for special situations. He also identifies five different speed responses.

Habits are critical

The key to Mottola's system is the formation of driving habits that protect the driver against hazards and provide an effective driving style. Habits and driving styles are formed over a period of time, says Mottola, and they're shaped by many influences: parental attitudes and performance, peer interaction, the performance of TV personalities, and by actions other drivers take. Often driving is a symbol of freedom and power. Sometimes driving and other drivers become the focus for pent-up aggressions, frustrations and hostilities. With all these factors complicating the driving picture, drivers need a system to develop positive driving habits.

Professor Mottola suggests that drivers consciously practice the system behind the wheel for periods of up to 10 to 20 minutes each day. The more the driver practices on a conscious level, he says, the sooner the Zone Control process becomes a habitual part of driving.

The system comes with an introductory booklet, a driving guide, a set of four videos, and colored response cards that students can use in class to indicate their responses to driving situations on the videos.

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Comments

Tim, on Tuesday, 15. July 2008 at 12:42 PM

DK, on Tuesday, 15. July 2008 at 05:57 PM

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