St. Louis drivers earn failing marks
Men’s Health magazine has come out with new rankings that show St. Louis drivers are the second worst motorists in the country - behind only Columbia, S.C. and earning an F along the way.
According to a brief item on its website, the magazine crunched numbers from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), the Governors Highway Safety Administration and Allstate Insurance.
It looked at fatal accident rates, including those caused by excessive speeding, and data on speeding, accident frequency and seatbelt use.
Kansas City also received a failing grade and Southern cities held down seven of the 10 worst. The best city, according to the Men’s Health rankings, was Des Moines, Iowa, where drivers earned an A+. (Also earning an A+ were - gulp - New York City drivers).
The fact that two Missouri cities made the list may come as a surprise to some. Missouri highway-safety officials announced recently that statewide traffic deaths had dropped to a 14-year low.
Here’s a link to the article on the Men’s Health web site.
I have lived all over the country and I have to agree, St. Louis drivers are the worst drivers ever. Do they not teach you how to merge??
St. Louis is the only place I’ve ever seen some guy in a very large pick-up or SUV driving one inch off your bumper while going 70 mph but as soon as traffic slows he will back off and leave a quarter mile between cars!! What is up with that?? No wonder rush hour is so bad!!
Of course St. Louis drivers stink. No one has to have any formal driver’s education to get their license. As a result, everyone was taught by their parents, who learned from their parents. Bottom line is, 90 percent of the drivers on the road in this state have no clue what half the rules of the road are and they were “trained” by bad drivers in the first place. I grew up in the Chicago area, and the only way to get your license prior to the age of 18 was to take a Driver’s Education course, taught by an instructor. Just because your stupid parents have a driver’s license doesn’t mean they’re qualified to teach someone else how to do it properly. My wife is from here, every time we have a disagreement about her doing something wrong when she’s driving it starts with “My Mom said… ” after that all I hear is “blah blah blah.”
I agree completely with this survey. To many times have I seen people both on the highway and downtown become oblivious to traffic signs stating that they need to merge into a certain lane and they just keep going along in the lane and wonder why they get dirty looks. Also, what is up with everyone leaving a car length and a half between them and the next car in front of them at a stop light? Tapping your breaks on the high way also in the left hand lane and not allowing faster traffic to pass you??? Oh, and people who go 3mph to make a left hand turn. These are just the observations I’ve made and I work downtown and don’t take the highway. This happens on the regular roads. People ignore No left and No right turn signs and you’re lucky if they actually stop at a stop sign. I’ve driven in chicago, dallas, boston and NYC and people use their horns there. I’m going to start here. So you hear a honk Saint Louis, you’re obviously doing something wrong.
This is surprise to me. I’ve lived in Tucson and central Massachusetts, compared to those places driving in St. Louis is a piece of cake. I’ve been here two years now and am still amazed at how courteous and aware other drivers are here. The New York City drivers score doesn’t surprise me, it’s hard to be speeding and get into a fatal accident when you’re going 1 mph in bumper to bumper traffic. Data is nice but it doesn’t tell you everything.
I agree completely that Saint Louis is one of the worst in the country for driving. It doesn’t matter the time of day/night or where you are headed I always encounter an accident that backs up traffic for miles or hours. I just don’t understand the ignorance in knowing how to drive.
And if it sprinkles or rains then just stay home because people just don’t know how to drive in it!
Just this week I looked to my right to see a man brushing his teeth on Southbound 270. What is wrong with people??? Just shut up and drive!
I have lived in St. Louis for two years and I cannot agree with this artical more! St. Louis has the WORST drivers on the planet. If I see one more person going 50 mph in the speed lane on the highway I’m going to puke.
I drove in other states for about 16 years before returning to the Lou. In comparisin, St. Louis drivers are horribe - theya re safe to a fault!
While I, too, question the value of a traffic and driver’s study in Men’s Health magazine, having driven and traveled elsewhere, I still believe St. Louis fares poorly when it comes to driving. I think it boils down to how driving is perceived these days; it’s a chore, it’s mind-numbing, it’s “hard.” So, folks feel the need for distractions that go way beyond listening to the car stereo to take the “edge” off. Eating, drinking, applying make-up, shaving faces (can’t leave guys out), talking on the mobile phone, texting, playing video games, etc., after all, the car’s supposed to do all the work, isn’t it? We just sit there (tongue planted firmly in cheek). Also, I agree with the dearth of formal driver’s education and the notion that just because your parents and grandparents have drivers’ licenses doesn’t necessarily make them good drivers.
Also, many people drive as if they’re playing a video game at home on the couch. As soon as everyone here realizes that there’s no cosmic Reset button available to use if you make a mistake, the better off the rest of us will be when we’re behind the wheel. In sum, the problems are, IMO, too many distractions and not enough personal responsibility combined with an astonishing lack of courtesy and knowledge about operating a vehicle in public!
That studty has no merit. My stepbrother has 3 dui’s and he lives in des moines.
I was born and raised in St. Louis and lived there for 23 years, but am now in New Mexico. I will say that St. Louis drivers are awesome drivers compared to drivers in Albuquerque. There are plenty of places where drivers are far worse then STL.