
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, July 30, 1995                   TAG: 9507310008
SECTION: CURRENT                    PAGE: NRV-2   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: STEVE KARK
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

DO WE REALLY WANT OUR ROAD TO BE `SMART'?

The way some folk talk, you'd think a "smart" road is the best thing since rippled potato chips. They see it as the first step toward a bright, rosy future, one in which we'll be able to sit back in our cars, a Little Debbie in one hand and a cherry Coke in the other, and let a computer do the driving for us.

Has anyone taken a good look at the average American driver lately?

Ever since the first Model T rolled off the assembly line, the automobile quickly became something more than simple transportation. We drive cars named Cougar and Mustang because these names suggest a wild, independent spirit. Cars of a particular model may look alike as they roll off the assembly line; but the moment they are sold, they are changed forever into something that reveals each owner's tastes and desires.

The average American driver is a person who hangs Bugs Bunny or Garfield from a window of his car. He has a hula dancer that wiggles in the rear window, and sports a bumper sticker that says "Caution: This car brakes for Bodacious Babes." These are the ways he sets himself apart from the crowd.

Indeed, American drivers are as variable as the cars they drive. Some are inveterate lane changers and are not afraid to communicate this fact through the use of horns or obscene hand signals, should you be so unfortunate as to get in their way.

Most push the speed limit. Few follow the rules all the time.

Don't get me wrong: I'm not condoning this sort of driving, I'm simply pointing out that this is the way it is.

Behind the wheel, Americans are not simply involved in getting from one place to another. We are riding the great American dream machine. We relish the feel of manipulating all that horsepower. For most of us, it is the most powerful machine we will ever operate - our connection to the power grid.

The freedom of the open road may be a great American myth, but it is one we wholeheartedly embrace. You feel it when you pull out of your driveway on that long cross-country vacation.

The automobile has become our last bastion of self-expression and individuality, and the highway the way to the promised land.

We are not the kind of people who would casually accept a technology that turns the great American road experience into something akin to riding an asphalt escalator.

We will not easily give up the sense of control. Having a car that drives itself sounds like a novel idea, but has anyone asked if people would really accept it?

We need to visualize a future that takes our basic natures into account. We not only need to ask if something can be built, but also whether it should be built.

Let's make sure we also drive our technology and not the other way around.

Steve Kark is an instructor at Virginia Tech and a correspondent for The Roanoke Times' New River Valley bureau. He writes from his home in scenic Rye Hollow, in a remote part of Giles County south of Pearisburg.

by CNB