Ear on Chicago; Unidentified

This is Hugh Hill speaking from the corner of Chicago and Homan Avenue on Chicago's West Side. I'm setting in a Ford station wagon pointing east. This is a check on how safe a driver I am. And this is the story of Harold Smith and his instructions to safety people and drivers in the Chicago area. Now Harold is an advisor to the Ford Motor Company and has been a safety instructor for many years in automobiles. There are five gentlemen in the car besides Harold and myself who are safety men. We'll be talking to them as the program goes along. Harold is going to take the microphone and tell us what he tells drivers as they drive along. He'll point out hazards. He'll point out the things that I am doing wrong. He'll point out the thinking that is going on in my mind, even though I don't realize it. And he'll probably point out, at least I hope he does, some of the things that I do right. So Harold, for the next few minutes, I'll turn the microphone over to you and I'll be driving east on Chicago Avenue just leaving Homan. Thank you, Hugh. Here we are now just pulling

away from the curb. Traffic is clear at the moment, except for one vehicle off to our left about 100 yards ahead. We're riding in the right -hand lane close proximity to the park cars at a speed that is reasonable and proper for these particular conditions. It's raining today, but it's raining today. Visibility is not its best, but under these conditions, we are safe. We are now approaching a green light. We have a truck attempting to turn across our bow. He just made the left turn. This requires some deceleration and braking. We are now in the clear again. We have visibility and space of approximately two city blocks. Space and visibility, as you might guess, are the two most important phases of expert and safe driving. Without them, you can't be safe for very long in today's traffic. We just had a truck pull into our forward path and is now moved in front of us. He made a right turn while we had that nice big space

and took a lot of it away from us. Had horn was proper here at the time, alerting the driver that the fact that we were here. The truck driver has accelerated now, gone on ahead. We have conservatively allowed an ample space which allows us to see. I'd like to emphasize here that I'm not talking about space for stopping distance. I'm talking about space for visibility. For instance, we have a great big truck tractor and trailer in front of us at this moment. Just moved into our path. Now, as far as stopping distance is concerned, he was doing a nice job of keeping the normal three car lengths. However, since we cannot see through that billboard, we are driving blind. Just as blindly as a matter of fact, if we were in a dense fog. Now, you get frightened when you have to drive in fog because you can't see. And yet, I wonder how many of you will follow such a truck at three car lengths clear across the city on certain days. These are the things we're trying to point out to good drivers and driver safety people

in all truck fleets and every place we go to alert them to the fact that the two basic fundamentals are constantly being violated by good drivers, well -intentioned law -abiding drivers day in and day out by their daily driving habits. We are now approaching a green light. We're passing a truck tractor without in the center lane near the center of the street. We now have passed the truck and have clear visibility once more. Well, Harold, I think that gives them a pretty good idea of some of the things you talk about as you teach drivers how to drive. I'm still moving east on Chicago Avenue, just passing Campbell Avenue. Now, Harold, I'd like for you to talk to some of the gentlemen in the back here, identify them. And perhaps they might have a comment on the driving that I've been doing. We had to come out west on Chicago and then turn around and go back east. So they've been watching me drive now for pretty close to half an hour. And they might have a few comments on some of the things that I did that were either wrong or right. So you go ahead and talk to those gentlemen and I'll just drive and listen. Thank you. First of all, I'd like to introduce Robert Kane, Bob

is with the Specter Midstates Trucking Company. And I think Bob would have a few comments to make at this point. Bob? I think he was doing a very nice job under the conditions of figuring weather and visibility, but he is like so many people in Chicago at first, he was using a horn to alert people that he is either coming along in a near lane to a parked car or to someone nosing out of a driveway. All I can say is that he's doing a beautiful job to what I would go for what I would call a layman driver. However, I'm not looking for that. I'm in a professional driver field. Now I have a couple of gentlemen in the very back seat of our station wagon. The next man I'd like to have you hear from is John Harrington. John has been with the post office department almost 30 years. And John has been overseeing the problems of our mail trucks, which you see on the streets day in and day out. John? John Harrington, I know. How about it, John? I think Mr. Hill is doing a very fine job under the conditions we're operating today. My only comment would be that he is missing

a little light on some of these hazards and taking care of them below short. The comments that these gentlemen have been making up to this time have to do with the time lag between the time that we see the need for the driver to do something to dispose of a particular hazard. By this something we mean there are only three things you can do with a hazard. You can adjust your speed, you can change your lane, or you can give a signal. And of course by adjusting speed we mean stopping if necessary. And in our business of evaluating drivers, we're all looking out the same windshield at the same set of conditions that Mr. Hill is driving under. And when we see a situation that calls for some action on his part, and we mentally count a two, three, four, or five second lag between the time we saw it and the time he responded to it, this is indicative of his low -ane seeing habits. It indicates very strongly that he is not seeing it as rapidly as he should see it.

We recognize that most drivers in these United States, after seeing trouble, normally do something about it. But most people after an accident usually say, I didn't see him, and that's why I had the accident. I have one more gentleman I'd like to introduce now, and this is Mr. Curtis Goodwick, and he's with the Chicago Park District, right here in your city of Chicago. I think Hugh Hill has done a very nice job of driving. In fact, he has improved since we started out and in discussing the traffic situation. Well, thank you very much, Harold, for talking to the gentleman in the back. Now, what I'd like for you to do next is to run down the checklist that you have in checking a driver. You might have the boys check it for me and see how I scored on it. Rule number one is to aim high in steering. By this we mean aiming one's body down the center of any given space you want the vehicle to occupy, and it's done. Your steering problem is taken care of, rather than looking low at the left edge of your lane and lining your fenders up with lane markers. Now,

in this particular area, Hugh has been handling this problem of steering much better than average. His eyes have not been far enough down the road to get into Rule 2, which are getting the big picture. Once your steering problem is handled routine fashion, it should be very easy for one to raise his sights and see a block ahead in town and be able to see the big picture. In big picture viewing, we're supposed to see a wide, deep traffic scene, which embraces all of the elements in a given traffic picture. We have park cars, we have moving cars, we have pedestrians, intersections, and so forth. And by getting the big picture, it's easy to make split second judgments by relating the vehicles and the people to the ground. The ground is stationary, the picture, the background of the picture is stationary, it's the people moving over the ground that enable us to make such judgments. Now, the reason we've criticized Hugh in this number two rule, getting the big picture. When he was short on space, it's only natural that your eye is pulled down to that vehicle immediately ahead. I commented

a while back about being three car links behind a truck. Yes, we had ample, safe, stopping distance, but we had virtually no visibility. So during this time, you're in trouble because you can't possibly get the big picture when you're following a billboard. Now, in this particular area, we also mentioned that there was a lag between the time some of us saw the need for Hugh to do something and the actual doing. So we say that he's not getting the big picture, like an expert does, but we feel that his score in this particular area is no worse if not any better than average. Rule three has to do with keeping your eyes moving. In order to retain this big picture viewing, it's very necessary to keep your eyes in motion. You must constantly scan the up and down ahead, back and forth ahead, and you must be scanning your rearview mirrors. You're doing this so that you're preparing yourself for rule four. You'll know where everybody is at any given moment in relation to your vehicle, their speed,

their direction, and their obvious intentions by your interpretations of what it is legal for them to do, what they're in a position to do, and by where they're looking, you can tell whether or not they are committed to doing. These are the little clues that we use for our defenses in blending and getting along with other drivers. Number four, of course, is leaving ourselves and out. Leaving ourselves and out has to do more with space than any other factor. If you have a space question around your vehicle, most of the time, space in front of you, or at least space on two sides, all sides if necessary, there's little likelihood for you to be trapped into an accident, even if you are distracted momentarily. After having handled the out situation, your fifth and final rule is one that you must use to protect you when you cannot have an out. When space is running out and you're going down through a narrow channel of space that's open only to you, you have other drivers and vehicles with engines running on either side. Who by seeing the space in front of you may impulsively elect

to move into your path. This is the time when it's very necessary, some signal be given by you to alert these people to your presence. These then are the five rules and the manner in which we thought that you carried them out. He was very much above average on rule one, aim high. On rule two, he was just average. On eyes moving, he was average again. We found 15, 30, 40 seconds go by between the times he looked in his rearview mirror. Leaving and out, he's a pretty fair space man. He doesn't crowd in with other people most of the time. So on this, he was better than average. On number five, we thought he was rather weak in trusting too many other people when we didn't have space and had to be close. The overall average is, I would say, that you is a little bit better than average typical American driver. Harold, we've stopped here at Chicago Avenue and what is it? King's very straight. We're still heading east and we're getting closer now to have your traffic. I'm going to ask you to take the wheel and

I'll let you take the microphone at the same time and as you drive along, you can talk your way down the street here and tell us what you're thinking as you drive along on Chicago Avenue. One of Chicago's really busy or thoroughfares. We've started up again and we're moving, as I said, east on Chicago Avenue. And Harold has taken over the wheel. Now I'm going to turn the microphone over to him and Harold, you'll be driving with one hand but you're a pretty good driver and you go ahead and talk as you drive down downtown. Now at the wheel and just moved out into the center lane next to the double yellow line overtaking a truck. I just tapped the horn to alert such truck driver of my presence. Presently I have a conservative space ahead approximately five car lengths and now approaching a red light at Wells. The car ahead of me that was five car lengths away is obviously gotten through on the tail

end of the yellow light. We are now sitting first up at the intersection of Chicago and Wells. The truck which I passed a few seconds back is now on my right. Because the truck is on my right, visibility at this point is blocked. Because it's raining today, pedestrians usually run and scurry about with their heads down and this is a kind of a day that we have to give extra caution to that particular hazard. When the light turns green, I can see here all four corners, all three corners but the fourth one ahead of the truck I cannot see. I have allowed him to move forward which insulates my right hand path and now I'm overtaking the truck so that the visibility is open to me now on all sides. We're back in this area of a signal light at each corner so we don't have very far to move. Now we're stopped once again at the corner of La Salle. I'm still first up at the light. I'm in the left hand lane. The truck is on my right but this time the truck is about five feet behind the crosswalk and I'm out where visibility is perfect. All four sides. I'm checking both sides before starting on the green light to make sure that some other driver

unintentionally misjudged the change of light and had to come through on the red. At this point I have a vehicle in front of me and I'm far enough ahead of the truck that I'm pulling into the right hand lane. Now I have a male truck on my left. We're stopped once again for a red light at the corner of Clark Street. I have moved out ahead of this truck to keep him from blocking my view of the crosswalk on the left. I can see all four corners watch all people and when the light turns people are stabilized I'm watching this bus getting to a stop on my right. All vehicles have stopped and we are now proceeding across the intersection. I'm accelerating a little bit faster than the male truck so that I don't have to watch him as a hazard. I'm entirely free now for looking ahead a full block to a block and a half down the street. There is no one immediately ahead or to the sides or to the rear. We're coasting through state street on the green light. We're gliding to a stop for Wabash which is now red. I am now at the tail end of another cluster of vehicles.

This means of course that all space and visibility have been taken from me. Since there is no one behind me I need not be in a hurry to catch up to the pack. I'm trying to wait for the pack to break up slightly and as the breakup comes I'm able to lift my sights once more and can now see a block and a half ahead. Even though I'm still comparatively close to some other cars. Once again we're stopping for a red light at Rush Street because I'm clear on the right I'm going to elect to take the right side and stop beside another vehicle who's in the left lane of this two lane roadway. I have immediately ahead of me in the middle of the next block a truck that is double parked. He is not my immediate problem. My immediate problem is clearing this intersection. The driver on my left should elect to turn left. I shall be free to move out around the truck. If the driver on my left elects to go straight I'm going to let him go and drop in behind. That is what he's done. We're

moving out very smoothly. We're back out in the center passing the double parked vehicle and now we're approaching another red light at Michigan. I'm back in the right hand lane. The same vehicle is on my left. We are side by side at Michigan Avenue. I have a complete view of all four corners so that I can watch pedestrian moments during the change of this light. After having checked pedestrian moments we always turn our head and check left and right for some driver who unintentionally because he was distracted or looking at something else did not see the light. If the light surprised him you can expect he'll go through on the tail end of his green. The light has now changed. All traffic on Michigan from both sides is stabilized and now I'm going to move out ahead of the driver on my left. He doesn't seem to want to move very fast. This gives me an opportunity once more to get space on all four sides. We're riding in a comfortable space question now. I have visibility right out to Lake Michigan as we just cross

Michigan Avenue. I have no one ahead behind around either side. Our speed at this point is about 25 to 27 miles per hour. Coming to a blind intersection we're hesitating taking the good look beyond the barrier. It's all clear. We go on and accelerate once more space and visibility space and visibility. I can't say it enough. It's the only protection you have if you're driving automobiles in today's traffic. Nobody really wants a traffic accident. The only reason people have them is because they didn't see the trouble in time to avoid. We're now approaching out our drive. I'm going to make a right hand turn at this point on a green light. I made a clean sweeping smooth turn and the drive is clear ahead of me. I have a car following closely behind at this moment. I don't want to be pushed. I like to have space back there. So I'm moving over and allowing that pressure to be relieved

from behind. He's now overtaking me on the left hand side. Pressure from behind with space out in front is very, very poor judgment. The throttle back there wants to go faster. Take the line of least resistance and let him go. Very, very good, Harold. We have just approached Erie Street now and we're going to turn right off of the outer drive and park over here by the CBS Studios. As we park, I would like to talk to some of the safety men who are riding with us in the back seat as to what the instructions that Harold has been giving them are going to do for them. Harold, if you'll just park over here to the right somewhere, I'll have a chance to talk to these gentlemen in the remainder of the program. I'll come back to you in just a few minutes. Now, the first of all, the first gentleman, give me your name and your affiliation and tell me what you'll be doing with some of the lessons you've learned. Well, my name is Bob Cain. I'm driver trainer, Perspector, Wednesdays, Freight Lines.

My immediate job and the job that I will use anything that I can pick up from Mr. Smith will be in the evaluation in the hiring and training of new drivers, not necessarily new as drivers, but new to our company. And the next gentleman, my name is Ross McDougall. I'm a standard accident insurance company. I hope to incorporate in our already existing safety program the teachings that Mr. Smith has conveyed us. I believe that through Mr. Smith's instructions, I can improve my own driving and since I road test all new drivers to our company, I believe I can do a better job in evaluating their driving habits. Curtis Goodwick, Chicago Park District. I've learned a great deal from Mr. Smith here in regard to driving. It's an entirely new concept of driving and driving habits. And I intend to use this with our existing employees who are drivers now to

improve their driving habits and reduce our accident rate. John P. Harrington, Superintendent Vehicle Service Facility, Chicago Illinois, or Post Office, Chicago, Illinois. I believe that this is the first time I've had the chance to find a new concept of safety training. And to pass this on to my trainers and to use it in my own evaluations of accidents, what I have learned today is invaluable. Gentlemen, I want to thank you one and all for going along with us and also offering your criticism on some of the driving that I did and telling us about some of the things you'll be doing with the instructions and the lessons that you've received here from Harold Smith. Harold, I think that one question I'd like to find out from you is how you're going to transmit this information to the mass public. It certainly seems to me that if you could do that, it would help every driver. We haven't as yet you found the method of implementing

such a task. However, we have hope that since the captive audience that we find within the trucking industry, both private and common carriers, since the truck drivers are taking whole heartedly to this new look at their daily driving habits, I believe that Mr. and Mrs. America, on wheels today, once realizing the importance of such an approach, will come to us in the very near future. And demand ways and means of getting this training out. I do believe our high school driver training program has gone way into the future in predicting the need for such training among our youngsters today. And I just like to leave our audience with three reminders of all we've talked about. Remember this every moment that you're driving. Remember it, practice it, memorize it and use it, and I think you'll stay out of trouble traffic wise. Get the big picture, keep your eyes moving, and make sure they see you. Thank you. Thank you very much, Harold, and that's the story of safety driving, and this is Hugh Hill speaking.