I agree with you there Geoff... It's all very good to say that 5km will save a life and change your breaking distance but if you’re spending 95% of your time while driving looking at the speedo to make sure your not speeding you are at a greater risk of hitting something... Like in the city link tunnel their are like 50 cameras in their we all know about it and spend most of the time glancing at the speedo to check were not going over 80...(or what ever speed it is that at any given point in time)...
I have a similar view with mobile phones they say that a phone is a huge distraction as your paying more attention to the conversation etc… How come were aloud to have passengers in the car and talk to them while driving down the road along with those.. People that smoke in their cars… we all know to light a smoke you need two hands….
Again only way to improve road tragedies is to teach people how to drive and how to act in various conditions in controlled environments.. Not the close your eyes and pass tests that we have at the moment…
A lot of drivers on the road have no idea what it feels like to have their car spin out of control on them and how quickly you can loose control of the vehicle once this happens. If people had an idea of how quick this happens and what it felt like in a controlled environment they may not rush to driving as stupidly as they do on our roads…