[GTO]

Statistically, air & rail travel might be safer than cars, but that doesn't mean cars are "unsafe". As long as there is a good driver behind the wheel of a safe car on good roads, and you follow our the best practices listed in this thread (e.g. avoiding night driving on highways), you're okay. Sure, there is some risk, but that is also there while walking in the neighbourhood or going for a late night dinner. I think we're fine and don't need to get paranoid.

Of course, if one drives like a mad man in a dynamically unsorted car, overtaking dangerously on two-lane highways with worn out tyres...well, you're just asking for it.

Agreed on motorcycles. They are too risky for India. This is the sole reason I don't have a sports bike parked down in my driveway.

Why do people insist on driving their car to a destination that can be covered by air, train or bus in a much safer manner?

Our ethos is:

[Raghu M]

I agree with most of the points. I stopped driving a bike beyond 1 km radius of my home. It's a colony so, it is safe only around home. I don't bike to office or anywhere else. I clearly know that you stand no chance of safety on a bike. You can go armed in a knight suit and still get smacked by an auto. Car on the other hand is the safest proposition in city and outskirts. The safety on the highways is debatable. We have seen buses fall off gorges and kill everyone on board. And a bus wouldn't come to your door step to pick you up. So, the journey to the bus is equally risky if we have to evaluate all details.

[StableRide]

Interesting discussion. I agree with bike not being a safe option (if you have choice).

There is another group of people (apart from healthcare professionals), whose views on this topic may be relevant. If you/your closed one have suffered in a car accident, did it make you a better driver, or did it make you avoid self-driven long journeys?

I think the organic solution is for everyone in the society to become better car drivers and take all precautions.

Are we moving towards this future, or is the quality of drivers on road declining on an average, is what I would like to know from experienced drivers.

[Kosfactor]

Originally Posted by Sarath_

There is a narrow band of distance within cities and across a few states where driving a car makes sense in the head but statistically still puts you at great risk of injury.

Is it time to ditch our car?

Change our travel habits - booking offseason flight tickets or AC / Executive class train seats (on par with flights in comfort) or try out the sleeper or coach buses?

Any points or counterpoints are greatly welcome.

The 1 hour flight actually takes ~6 hours taking into account all the remaining logistics. I do not know why is flying so complicated even after all these years of air travel industry.

As for those who know how to drive long distances , the car is right at home, keep the luggage in the boot and drive. One may add another hour or two to the overall trip time but its a lot more convenient and more importantly you still have your car wherever you are - nothing can beat that.

Similarly a delivery boy would rather risk his life on the road than sit at home and starve to death.

The point is as adults we must understand the consequences of the decisions we take in life, if the reward is worth the risk - why not.

[DogNDamsel12]

You are presenting counterviews to what my personal belief and experiences are. My two cents -

1. I believe that everyone must drive as a lifeskill (and yes, some of us do Live to Drive!)

2. I am sure everyone has had fairly scary share of stories to share with the wheels in someone else's hands. I remember this one time in Bhutan where I had to sit with a novice driver and eventually I cajoled him into letting me drive. I dont know how people trust their lives into other people's hands

3. The pandemic made me dump the airway and made me drive cross country from Delhi to Kolkata to be able to avoid contact with people. Thank god that I could use the pandemic as an excuse to choose driving over airline. I hate airport check in. "If airport checkin had a face, I would slap it" kind of hatred. Agreed that airline is the safest mode of transportation by statistics - but do you know someone who has come out alive from an airline accident? I know of people who have come out of car accidents and are still behind the wheels

4. Possibly environmental damage / crisis could have been a better basis for this conversation rather than general paranoia for road safety.

[vb-saan]

Originally Posted by Sarath_

Why do people insist on driving their car to a destination that can be covered by air, train or bus in a much safer manner?

Change our travel habits - booking offseason flight tickets or AC / Executive class train seats (on par with flights in comfort) or try out the sleeper or coach buses?

Some good points there, especially on motorbikes. I used to ride a Yezdi in Kerala (20 years back) but now is absolutely horrified with the thought of riding a motorbike.
Regarding cars (or any mode of road transport). I prefer self-driving rather than being a passenger in a vehicle driven by an unknown person (more so in my home-state). The feeling of safety is much higher, and the whole process of driving is an enjoyable affair.

And I love flying; being in a long haul flight for 17 hours is not an issue at all. But if the choice is between an hour’s flight vs 500-600 kms of driving, I will definitely choose the latter

[gischethans]

I was in the same boat in terms of risk assessment. Felt I was making a great choice by choosing a bus over a car for all kinds of travel. My reasoning was even in the case of a crash, chances of survival are many times higher in the case of a bus. But once I started driving, I felt I would be better off by trusting my own skills which get honed with experience.

You never know if the driver of the overnight, inter-city bus had a sound sleep that day or in what mood he is in. Whether the bus is mechanically sound is another question. I have seen some Volvo bus operators use Chinese tyres and maintain their fleet in a questionable manner but drive at insane speeds. In one of my trips, such a tyre was torn to shreds after a burst en route.

Then comes the time factor. Time is the most valuable asset today and moving in a car to a few destinations in my case takes a lot less time than it would have taken with multiple route buses. No train option to any of the destinations I head to frequently.

[Samba]

Originally Posted by Sarath_

It was a great inconvenience for the public which for decades has been riding helmet less and such is the case even today in villages. The helmet also took away the joys of riding and made the expression "feel the wind in your air" moot.
Dial back a few years and seat belts were welcomed with ridicule and outrage. Being strapped to your own car seemed like an abomination.
At every step driving was thought of as an emotion and every safety measure was described as an inconvenience at most taking the fun out of a very visceral experience.

You take away the human from the machine and focus your efforts on minimizing mistakes you could in theory have zero vehicular collisions. And if it did it would never be repeated since that data set is now in the system, it only keeps getting better.

This leads us to a future where we will not have the option of driving a car anymore. I assume it will eventually be outlawed to drive a powered vehicle by humans. Maybe 30 years in the future. I am not wizard.

"I love driving and it's worth the risk" could be a statement that could be banned in the future for the safety of everyone.

Are we ready for that?

1) There are certain risks involved, so we wont do that!
2) There are certain risks involved, so let us be cautious and do that.

The rule which made wearing helmet and strapping seat-belt compulsory falls under point number two.

Coming to the point of autonomous cars, in next 30 years perhaps we wont need a doctor or a maid or anything! Robots will be assigned for different works!
Just think how jobless people are going to be or have a super boring, but a safe life!

Then again few questions arise?

Even the most high-end autonomous flights do not fly without a pilot. Why?

There are debates that artificial intelligence will take over the humans and make us their slave! So we cant rely on what's going to happen in next 30 years.

How can a study say, with autonomous vehicles there will be ZERO collisions!
Machines may fail! Even in a human operated car, many accidents occur due to a part failure. How can machines be so reliable and full proof?

Anyway am not very convinced to quit driving and opt for safer options. If there is a risk, I will be cautious, but I wont quit.
In future if I do not get to drive, then I will plan more drives now to compensate that!

[adisan]

For many people, driving is not only a pleasure, it is almost therapeutic. Driving, especially long routes, helps clear the mind. It helps release pent-up stress.

So it eventually depends on the individual. If driving makes someone feel stressful, then they could choose rail or air. If driving helps someone feel more sorted, they could go for it.

[fiat_tarun]

Apart from the points of 'Living to Drive', the convenience of having your own set of wheels, travelling by public transport to go on a holiday usually involves a lot of cab usage.

I think it might be the same for the most of us Bhp-ians but I hate sitting in a car unless I or a known person is driving. Being a passenger in a cab is way higher on the risk scale which kind of nullifies the travel via the relatively lower risk transport that brought me to the destination. Yes, self drive cars are an option, but that again has it's own share of problems like availability, cleanliness, reliability, etc. which does not make it a dependable alternative to your own car.

[AJ56]

This statistic of planes being much safer than cars is thrown around casually but it’s not so clear cut, partially because we’re using two unequal standards of measurements. I’ll explain:

Numbers: using raw data for total fatalities in the air vs in personal cars is useless as there are some 300-400 million cars on the road globally and some 6000 (roughly) wide body commercial aircraft in use. Many, many more people drive and for a much longer time compared to those who fly. You can take deaths per hour flown/driven per year but very difficult to approximate those numbers. You’d need to multiply total passengers who flew in a year with the total number of hours each flew for and divide this total by the fatalities in that year. This will give you the number of flight hours that result in 1 death. To compare do the same with cars (nearly impossible).

Units: using deaths per km travelled is inaccurate as the speeds are vastly different, a jet cruises at 850km/hr and a car at 100km/hr. A person will spend 8-9 times longer in their car covering the same distance as you drive everyday but fly once every few months maybe (on avg.). Using deaths per hour spent in cabin would be much better or rather the number of hours spent travelling that result in 1 death.

To better illustrate why using deaths/km is wrong when speed is not held constant, imagine a warp drive, where the odds of getting killed are 50% per trip but you travel 10000 trillion km/sec although the entire trip takes hours. Here using deaths per km wouldn’t yield accurate results but using deaths per hour spent travelling would yield the correct stat of 50% mortality.

[KrisTvpm]

I work & live in one city, and my parents/in-laws in another state/city - at a distance of close to 800km.

If I were to visit them couple of times a year with the family in tow, and have to travel by air/train/bus - I'd be shelling out anywhere north of ₹40000/- on a very modest estimate. Generally air-travel, even if planned ahead costs above this, plus the need to use cabs at either ends for the last-mile.

Compared to this, if I use my car I could comfortably do couple of trips per year within ₹25000/- or so.

I need a break perhaps once a year to go on a vacation - mostly to places not serviced by air/train. So options are either the entire stretch by bus or air/train + bus + some cab travel. Add in the family in tow + luggage + time/effort needed.

I simply can't discount the practicality that my car offers -- way above any other modes of transportation!

While not discounting the various risky variables involved with road travel in India by car and the hazards involved, a careful/observant/keen driver could nullify most of these, ofcourse except the "force majeure".

So until we have Singapore-level excellent connectivity to any corner of the country by public transport, our cars are very much in need!

Add to this, we are in THIS forum for a purpose! We are car & bike enthusiasts

[sunikkat]

The journey is more exciting than the destination and most of my trips are done by car.

The drive itself takes you to a blissful state of mind. Majority of Indian highways are in good condition now and if one is careful while driving there is not much of risk (I know exceptions are there). These long drives, with good music, are the time when you really connect with the car. Infact readying your car for the long drive itself is so exciting.

Travelling by flight for me is all about destination and when time is essence. Do not prefer to travel by bus / taxi's, as I trust my driving more than the bus driver (due to various reasons). Travel by train requires lot of planning and not something I enjoy too. Getting driver for my car is totally NO, as I dont like to give my car to anyone else for driving :-)

[for_cars1]

Majority of the car owners in our country use it for only local use. A subset of these cars are used for inter city morning to evening drives upto 400KMs typically few times a year.

If you consider long interstate drives, the subset of cars become even lesser. I've mostly observed that once you cross into another state, it suddenly feels like yours is the only outside registered car in a sea of local cars and very accasionally you'll see another outside car. The relatively few (out of the total cars) who venture out need to be seasoned drivers who have good defensive driving skills and can guage the risks and keep themselves safe.
Knowledge becomes the key here. With the right attitude(lower speed, patience) and skills, driving becomes as safe/risky as taking a walk on the road.

On volvo buses you'll find drivers pulling a screen between them and the passengers (blocking their front view of the road) and ripping at breakneck speeds at night, have found that to be a very scary and risky experience. If you are a competent driver, better self drive rather than entrust the driving job to someone else.

One should do an honest self assessment and take to long distance driving only if the right skills are in place to keep them safe.

[Hayek]

Interesting post. But I must say I am amazed that the OP believes that traveling by bus is safer than travelling in one’s own car (assuming there is a good driver, a safe car, and all passengers are buckled up). Of course flights and trains are statistically safer than cars per passenger km travelled. But that is partly because they carry several passengers over very long distances on a regular basis. And even after taking a flight or train, you need to take road transport to get to your final destination. Thus is often boils down to which mode of road transport is the safest option.

For me, driving my own car is the safest of these choices. Why? I have confidence (May be over confidence) that I am a safe driver, I ensure that the car is in good condition and all passengers are buckled up, I avoid night driving (though I do take early morning starts) and I largely drive on 4 lane National Highways. In an ideal world, I would hire a safe self drive car at an airport and use it for local or regional transport - that’s what I do on almost all my overseas vacations. But in India, self drive cars are not easily available - and even where available are entry level models - the highest end product I have seen is the Creta automatic. Hence one can’t choose that, and ends up renting an Innova - with the risks around quality of tires and quality of drivers. Which is why if the flight end point is not too far from Bombay (of course Poona but also Goa), I prefer to drive my self. And as our roads improve, longer distances become doable as well.

Would be good if the OP can check in what percentage of the cases he sees were vehicles not overloaded, and all passengers buckled up. I think he would find that a disproportionate share of fatal accidents occur with Boleros or Trax which are carrying 8-10 people in a vehicle meant for 6-7, and where no one was buckled up.

On bikes, I agree with the OP. Biker friends will want to bash me up for this - but bikes are fundamentally unsafe - with them it is a matter of when and not if you will end up getting hurt badly.