Terror on the Highway: Rage on America’s Roads

A doctor chases then assaults an elderly woman after she cuts in front on his BMW; a teenager shoots another driver because the driver ‘looked at him with disrespect’; one man kills another because ‘he was driving too slow’. These a few of the many examples of extreme road rage documented by Paul Eberle in this shocking look at the havoc caused by angry people in their cars. He makes it clear that young and old, men and women, and all socioeconomic classes are involved in this epidemic of rage and violence on our highways. In 1998, the California Highway Patrol recorded 209 incidents of Assault with a Deadly Weapon in which a car was the weapon used. And in the same year, the media reported more than 4000 stories on road rage nationwide. And the problem is getting worse. The author lists the warning signs of potential road-rage drivers, suggests ways to avoid such dangerous individuals, discusses the psychology of the car as a ‘holy icon’ and the effects of traffic congestion on ‘mad car disease’, expresses scepticism about psychologists specialising in aggressive driving, and proposes ways to reinvent our cities to make them less stressful, dangerous places. Complete with graphic pictures showing the dire consequences of driving while enraged, this book should be mandatory reading in all driver education classes.