BMW Pushing For Driver Training
25 May, 2007
6 Comments 
You might all be getting a little sick of our Road Safety agenda here on Car Advice but we believe it to be an essential topic that needs as much attention as it can get. We have said it countless times, with Australia’s road toll not improving, and higher infringement fines not having any effect, better driver training and education is the only way to reduce the road toll.
Whilst this message has been echoing slowly across the aussie motoring world, transport authorities refuse to take on the challenge. After all, its hard work to train all motorists. Or is it?
According to German manufacturer BMW, driver training will reduce the road toll as well as cut down on the enormous cost that road accidents have on our economy.
“We have invested a lot of money and resources over 30 years because we know it saves lives,” BMW board member responsible for safety Dr Klaus Draeger said.
BMW training recently turned 30, and with the data collected by BMW it seems that although driver training does not lead to accident free drivers, it dramatically cuts the trained drivers accident rate.
“We can’t say that people who have been with us are not involved in accidents because they still are. But they are involved a lot less than others. The problem if you are working from a purely academic perspective is how do you count accidents that do not happen?” Dr Draeger said
He also went on to admit that no amount of driver training would make inherently bad drivers… good drivers, and there is obviously the natural ability which comes into play.
“The problem is both the mindset and the skill of the driver and changing that takes a long time. The earlier we start the better it is and the better we can get them to drive,” Draeger says.
Dr Draeger took the words right out of our mouth by asking the state and federal governments to enforce compulsary advanced driver training for all drivers, specially those just starting out.
“Governments should make it compulsory to go through driver training schools” Dr Draeger said
Its obvious that BMW is also fed up with the lack of government action to tackle the road toll. Whilst the government blames speed as the single biggest cause of accidents, little is done to actually teach drivers how to stop in an emergency situation.
“How can governments claim people can drive safely when none of them knows how to stop a car in an emergency? People are released on to the road without learning what happens when it goes wrong. They don’t know how to do an emergency stop and this is the biggest problem.” Dr Draeger said
Unfortunately for Dr Draeger, he is preaching to the converted, we whole-heartedly agree with everything he has said, and yet despite all our efforts and all the efforts of our friends at RoadSense.com.au - the authorities refuse to act on the issue. No one wants to take the responsibility to enforce better driving training.
“Studies reveal that, on average, every person is involved in nine accidents during his or her life. That’s an accident every five years and he or she actually causes an accident every nine years.
“And the reason for 95 per cent of accidents is human error. Assuming that each participant in a driving safety course was involved in only one accident less during the course of their lives, that would be a wonderful achievement.” Dr Draeger said.
Given these figures, its statistically obvious that driver training is essential to ensure a safer road environment, even if accidents are reduced by 1 accident per person, the effect would be enormous!
Arguably the most successful German manufacturer in the last decade, BMW is a little reluctant to directly blame the road toll on the authorities lack of understanding. However Dr Draeger was willing to cast doubt on the state government Road Safety plan which refuses to conceed that driver training will reduce the road toll whilst favouring older drivers and lower speed limits.
Thank you BMW, you have earned our respect.
Location: Home / BMW, Speeding, Safety, Statistics / ...
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May 25th, 2007 at 7:35 pm
I wanted to do the course with the M3s {strangely enough} for my 40th but they don’t come over to Perth a whole lot so you had to do it QLD then I think. I think there a great idea , and especially with performance cars you get to learn a lot about your cars and your own capabilities. Not sure if anyone else does it but FPV gave a free day driving course with your own car when you first purchased them . Hubby had lots of fun in his. Not much left of the tyres at the end of the day and the brembos and the standard brakes on the GT’s under normal stopping conditions were the same,only around the track were the Brembos an advantage.
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May 25th, 2007 at 8:34 pm
Driver training should be enforced at all levels,
BMW driver training, by all accounts, is fantastic, but there is of course the limitation, that you have to own a BMW to participate (i believe) or otherwise its rather costly.
I think its time state governments enforce driver training for ALL drivers, even ones currently on the road.
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May 25th, 2007 at 9:13 pm
I don’t think you’re crapping on about road safety all that much. It’s automotive news, so it’s all relevant.
It’s a pity that third parties must offer driver training of any kind rather then the Governemtn enforcing it.
Though they will happily make motorcyclists go and learn to defensively ride a bike first before getting their license, or even allowing them to take the test.
pipsqeek
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May 30th, 2007 at 12:53 pm
You don’t need to own a BMW to register for BMW Driver Training, but if you bought a BMW under the Employee Preferential Pricing (EPP) plan, you’re entitled to your first course at a discounted rate of ~$150 (usually $700-$800). The website is at http://www.bmwdrivertraining.com.au/ - I’ve booked mine, and i’m looking forward to it!
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June 16th, 2007 at 2:50 pm
There is plenty of research internationally that shows that post-licence driver training does not reduce accidents. Would seem to intuitively do so, but the studies consistently show it does not work. More research is needed. There is a summary of the research at this link: www.qoh.com.au/resources/newsl.....r-training
Need to develop new techniques. There are some links to the research articles in this area. I suspect this is why to authorities are not acting. Certainly graduated licensing programs do work and Australia is well ahead of many countries in this area.
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June 16th, 2007 at 3:43 pm
Well the stats also show that increased regulations aernt working either, they previously upped the hours for Ls, made both greens and reds tests harder, banned high performance cars etc in NSW… yet the road toll has shown no downward trend, in fact its been up and down and all about!
As for driving course, I couldnt be bothered looking at that link just yet, but Id be interested in how they determined it had no effect… its a rather ambiguous thing. And as I just highlighted, the stats indicate more restrictions aernt working yet they went with that, I dont think they didnt include driver training courses because of the research… they didnt include it becuause it would almost certainly cost them money. The restrictions they have brough in on ther other hand dont cost them jack, if anything earning them more through increased failure rates, fines from passenger restrictions, costs in having to reinstate your license after losing it from one speeding offence etc etc etc.
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