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They're Eager, But Not Ready

John Valenti

May 6, 2003

As he gets out of the green Dodge, Christopher White looks relieved. He has been behind the wheel only for about eight minutes. But, you can tell, those have been the eight longest minutes of his life.

He is 17, a senior at Lindenhurst High School. He has just finished the New York State Department of Motor Vehicles' "Road Test Evaluation" -- the test all drivers need to pass to get their licenses -- on a real-world street course in Brentwood.

As he steps to the sidewalk, his father, Keith, watches him. During the anxious wait, his father said: "He's a good driver. He's cautious. He doesn't have a heavy foot. But, I could tell he's nervous. My oldest son failed twice. So, who knows?" Now, Keith White walks over to his second son and says, "So?"

"I passed," Christopher White mumbles.

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Then, he breaks out in a grin as the two shake hands and hug and his father says: "All right!"

All right, indeed. State officials will tell you that the number of drivers who pass their road tests on the first shot has been dwindling during the past decade. Not because the test has become more difficult, but because the applicants are not as well prepared as they once were. They just don't drive as well.

That failure rate on the road test is in the neighborhood of 40 percent on Long Island, DMV officials say. A decade ago, it was about 30 percent. The failure rate is lower statewide.

"Some of it has to do with language barriers," said senior motor vehicle licensing examiner Maureen Marino. Because more immigrants are taking the test than ever before. But the most significant reason is more basic, she said: "Most of the drivers who come to get tested just don't know the rules of the road. They're in a rush to get their licenses. They don't have enough time behind the wheel. And there is no substitute for experience."

The causes are numerous: The elimination of most high school driver education programs because of budgetary constraints; the expense of auto schools; but the main reason is the state requires only five hours of classroom instruction before a driver takes his or her road test. Come Sept. 1, the state will institute "graduated licensing" for 16- and 17-year-old drivers, requiring a parent or guardian to document 20 hours of behind-the-wheel practice. But there will remain no minimum for other would-be drivers.

Instructors at road test evaluation sites such as the one in Brentwood do their best to weed out applicants who are not prepared to drive. But each instructor is scheduled to administer about 40 road tests a day, each a series of basic maneuvers on local streets lasting about eight minutes, and so who knows how realistic a gauge of driver skills this is?

Waiting in the line of cars along the curb on Grand Avenue in Brentwood, Angel Ochoa seems nervous as Marino climbs into the passenger seat to administer his road test. He is 23, a native of San Salvador, El Salvador. He speaks little English.

It all starts out well for Ochoa. He signals leaving the curb, negotiates the first right-hand turn well and proceeds down Grand to Alkier Street at 25 miles per hour. But it goes downhill fast. At the four-way stop sign, Ochoa is indecisive. He cannot decide who has the right of way. Then, after hesitation, he pulls into the intersection after another car had entered it.

Asked to parallel park on a side street, he almost sideswipes a parked car -- forcing Marino to grab the wheel and turn it to the left to avoid an accident. When he backs into the space, he runs onto the curb. During a three-point turn, he waves another motorist to go around his car -- then backs into his path just as the other driver started to proceed.

His brake control is herky-jerky. He fails to look both ways at another four-way intersection.

On return to the staging area for the road tests, Marino tells Ochoa, "You're not ready." She explains why, adding, "You need more practice."

Later, Ochoa says he has had his learner's permit for one year but knows he needs more time behind the wheel. Ochoa explains he has been learning to drive from a brother. Asked if he considers that brother to be a good driver, Ochoa laughs.

"No," he says. "I don't think so."

The bottom line, said auto school instructors such as Celia and Mariano Ramos, who run Autorama in Central Islip, is that would-be drivers need much more instruction than they receive. She would like to see drivers have a minimum of 20 hours of practice on all sorts of roads in all sorts of conditions.

"Would you rather have a kid with a license who doesn't know how to drive -- or a kid without a license who does know how to drive?" Celia Ramos asks. "You can learn about driving in a classroom. But that is a classroom. To go out and drive with a good driver or instructor is what makes you learn.

"Experience is what teaches."

As road test evaluator Anthony Nicoletti, 36, a DMV veteran, says during a break between tests: "There was a girl this morning who came in and she was incapable of driving. It was the third time she had taken the test this month. The third time she failed. A lot of these drivers aren't ready. They need more training. It's that simple."

Maybe it is time for state officials to do something about that -- and set some stricter guidelines.