My first list of infractions started with speeding and ended with a collision.
My second started with swerving and ended the same way.
Whether it was using my cellphone behind the wheel or being under the influence of marijuana, the experience was a bit of a blur to be honest.
But that was by design.
I wasn’t actually doing any of those dangerous activities, just trying my hand, as college students were doing, at a simulator replicating that type of driving in a real vehicle at the University of Michigan-Flint campus this week.
Trying to keep your ride on the road in the simulator under those conditions without crashing or hitting someone becomes quite a challenge, and my attempts
wrapped up, like a lot of other folks, in less than a minute.
Aydan Jay, the touring brand ambassador for the Arrive Alive Tour, provided the instructions on this Wednesday, Sept. 23 stop, including how to properly fit the virtual reality goggles while I sat in the front seat of the 2016 Jeep Patriot. Jay, who lives in Ionia, also tracked the infractions.
After my two very short trips − I got to choose the type of dangerous driving, which can include being drunk − I was handed a couple of citation cards with information about the dangers of impaired and distracted driving.
Here are some of the highlights, according to those cards:
- 9% of all fatal crashes involve distraction.
- Texting can increase your chance of crashing by 23 times.
- 56% of drivers involved in a serious or fatal crash were under the influence.
- 11.7 million U.S. residents over the age of 16 reported driving under the influence of marijuana in 2020.
Jay, who’s been doing this work for about five years and has traveled across the country, from New Mexico to New York, described having an alcoholic relative who would drive drunk. He said he’d be glad to “push people from that path.”
For those who took their own spin while I was there, the experience left an impression.
Just as Imari Allen, 21, of Flint, was finishing her ride, she moved her hands instinctively to her face and said, “I hit someone.”
Allen, a college junior studying to teach special education, described family members who text and drive, and said “it scares me.”
She was surprised, she said, at how quickly things went wrong while she was trying that in the simulator.
“Literally, a second changes the trajectory or your life and others,” she said.
Roshawndra Huffman Opara, 56, of Saginaw, who’s scheduled to finish her doctorate in educational leadership in October, chose marijuana impairment because she’s around people who use pot and drive, and they don’t think it’s a big deal. But her experience in the simulator showed something else, she said.
“I was really taken aback by how I couldn’t control the vehicle,” said Huffman Opara, who, in addition to her educational pursuits, works in a couple of programs helping teachers and foster kids.
The Arrive Alive Tour has upcoming dates in Michigan in the coming week, in Newaygo County and Saginaw.
Eric D. Lawrence is the senior car culture reporter at the Detroit Free Press, and he also writes about recreational vehicles, boats and bikes. Send your tips and suggestions to elawrence@freepress.com. Become a subscriber. Submit a letter to the editor at freep.com/letters.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Not easy to drive distracted without crashing quickly in simulator
