Walter S

As I've practiced a more carfree life I've found riding in a car, especially in busy city traffic to be pretty frightening. I can't relax during the process. As I write this I'm riding with my sister. Like many car drivers she seems to always be trying to go a little faster and is frustrated about the stupid other drivers. She speeds up just to hit the brakes a couple seconds later, as I grip the armrest on the window a little tighter.

Is my fear irrational? Are car drivers fearless because they've been brainwashed? Or am I just hyper sensitive?

vinnyvincent

I'm voting hyper sensitive.

kickstart

I'm a professional class A CDL driver, a cyclist, and motorcyclist who rarely drives or rides in a car. I feel the least secure in a car for the obvious reason, but I'm not afraid of them...........unless my wife is driving, but that's a different issue.

tandempower

This is one of the reasons I favor buses over personal automobiles. CDL drivers are often more conscientious about their driving and passengers/freight than private drivers, who too often become slaves to their emotions in traffic. People ask how I can stand it to have big semi trucks passing me when I ride on highways, but I think those are typically the least likely to be texting or otherwise careless, because their jobs are on the line.

No, I don't think it's hyper-sensitive to feel uncomfortable sitting in a vehicle with an erratic driver. I do think it partly has to do with not being in control of the vehicle, though, since being in control allows your body to anticipate momentum changes before they happen, unlike when you're a passenger.

I-Like-To-Bike

I think it is irrational to think your your sister represents "car drivers". Maybe you should drive, in a manner more to your liking, instead of her.

timsataurus

I can kinda relate, but not with fear. I found that as I started cycling more, and driving less. I started to drive and ride in cars with a cycling mindset. Which means that as people who drove made decisions on there speeds. I looked at their behavior with my cycling speeds. Which means that many of the turns they made seemed crazy. Once I accounted for this I no longer worried about it. Now when riding with other cyclist. I make turns in traffic which makes them nervous. Since as a I cyclist I turn in front of oncoming cars. Which are closer than some are comfortable with. I rarely ride in cars, but find the bus drivers in Tucson do the speed up and slam on their brakes. Which is why I try and not take the bus very much.

Ekdog

What's to worry about? Don't listen to these LCF hippies. Cars only kill about 1,300,000 people per year and injure another 20,000,000-50,000,000. A drop in the bucket, right?

Road Crash Statistics

kickstart

The odds of being killed by injury in ones lifetime are around 1 in 20.

The odds of being killed in a automotive incident in ones lifetime are around 1 in 400.

The odds of dying in ones lifetime are always 1 in 1.

So the real concern is if the risk is worth the benefit of taking it. For most people who drive, or benefit from those who do, the answer is yes.
Awareness, and fear are 2 different things.

B. Carfree

I'm more concerned with the quality of my life than the ending of it. The odds of being injured by a car in a lifetime are shockingly close to 50%. That's far from trivial. Sure, many of those injuries are not life-changing events, but they still hurt enough to inspire some level of dread if not outright fear.

I notice that many cyclists wear helmets, but the odds of a traumatic brain injury while cycling are 12% lower than the odds of getting one while in a car on a per hour basis. Thankfully, the probability of traumatic brain injury in either activity are quite low (0.41-0.46 per million hours), so I don't give it a second thought. However, I am amused at all the finger-wagging motorists that scold me for not wearing a helmet while cycling who then get into their cars and drive away without putting on a helmet.

CliffordK

Racing lights and speeding up just to slam on the brakes wastes gas.

But, in general, I've decided never to be a major pain in the arse backseat driver. I might comment on something especially frazzling, but otherwise, I just let it slide.

Riding as a passenger puts me to sleep

Ekdog

Also worth considering:

Study: Air pollution causes 200,000 early deaths each year in the U.S.

New MIT study finds vehicle emissions are the biggest contributor to these premature deaths.

https://news.mit.edu/2013/study-air-pollution-causes-200000-early-deaths-each-year-in-the-us-0829

JBHoren

It's been my experience that car drivers like the OPs sister rarely, if ever, let anyone else drive their car (and never, with them as a passenger).

I-Like-To-Bike

Seems to me that the rational choice of someone afraid of a risk of death when renting a car and afraid to be a passenger in a car is: stick to transportation that doesn't result in living in fear.

Machka 

Most of the time, when I get into a car as a passenger, I am so relaxed I have to fight off the desire to fall asleep. Something about the motion of the car and the hum of the motor puts me to sleep.

Roody

I've known several people who died in cars, or had their lives forever changed by severe injuries. My own son was in a coma for a month and had seven major surgeries after sliding on ice, on a side street, while driving less than 30 mph. So scared, yes. I avoid it when I can. I feel safer with all the other modes of transportation. However, my fear is not a major reason for me being carfree.

B. Carfree

I would think that yours is a normal reaction. In fact, I'm surprised so few people take what has happened on the road to friends and family to heart. I recently reconnected with an old friend after a decade out of touch. She had been in a serious car crash (her fault) where her two child passengers and their mother were fortunately uninjured but my friend was lucky to have survived. Oddly, she still drives and has no real fear of getting behind the wheel. However, she feels an enhanced vulnerability when walking and won't even get near her bike.

I may set up my old tandem and see if she'll go riding with me when she visits this summer. I don't want to cause her undue stress, but she used to derive such joy out of riding that it pains me to see it taken away from her. Of course, it wouldn't pain me to see driving taken away from anyone, so I guess my bias is showing.

kickstart

It's very subjective, I've known folks who died because of a wide range of reasons, but the drawn out suffering of natural causes is one of my primary concerns.

cooker

People are bad at estimating risk.

I've mentioned before that I travel to Sault Ste. Marie at one end of Lake Superior. There is a small regional airline called Bearskin Air that flies from there to Thunder Bay, near the other end of the lake, one hour over water. It's a small and seemingly rickety plane.

One of the local staff in Sault Ste. Marie told me her daughter went to University in Thunder Bay and tried taking that plane, and was so terrified, that after that she always drove back and forth, for Thanksgiving, Christmas etc.

Yeah, driving eight or nine hours on a northern Canadian Highway in all seasons, is probably hundreds of times more dangerous than that one hour flight.

Walter S

So at least if you die in a car crash, you'll probably go quickly. Cars are an advance forward of society in general as we facilitate traffic fatalities and save those people from a slow death.

B. Carfree

Or not. The risk of a head injury is greater inside a car than on a bike, per hour. Then there's all those other pesky things, like lack of movement and enhanced toxics exposure in the cars.

Dave Cutter

I vote for irrational fear.

B. Carfree

Hear, hear!

While nearly every road death is unnecessary and easily prevented if people would behave themselves, the odds are still so much in favor of getting home to my bowl(s) of ice cream at the end of the day that I really don't give the thought of being whacked much thought.

Dave Cutter

Is THAT what you thought I meant? How very sad for you. No one gets out of here alive... as we are all mortal. But most of us have come to accept our place.... and set aside childish fears.

blackieoneshot 

After traveling by bike and foot exclusively for six months my first car ride was one long panic attack.

I-Like-To-Bike

Not on this list for the people who boast/brag about their irrational/"crazy" fears.