Just the Ticket: Attend Traffic School on the Net -
March 1997
By Lisa Petrillo
The Union-Tribune

No pain, no pizzas, no wasted days off.

Yes, someone has finally invented a new way to take some of the sting out of that peculiar adults-only punishment known as traffic school.

Now there is The Online Traffic School, apparently the only Internet-linked traffic school in America.

It was created by a 30-year-old independently employed computer graphics artist.

"The best part is you don't have to be a brain surgeon," she said of the Web site program launched in late March.

The owner is herself a graduate of several traditional traffic schools since high school, she admits.

"My last one (ticket) was speeding through The (San Fernando) Valley at 5:30 a.m., I was six miles over the speed limit," she recalls. "It was dark out still; I think I was going to the gym."

A woman who speeds for pre-dawn workouts (after all, who wants to wait in line for a sweaty Stairmaster?) is no vampire-ish propeller-head.

Her sense of fun and funny graphics spice up the constant flow of traffic facts in the 55 pages of material that make up the program.

"We wanted to make it really fun," she said. "I didn't want to make it dry like DMV (Department of Motor Vehicles) books."

Of course she also had to keep the site sober enough to get approved by judges, not often known for their sense of humor about the law.

Like most traffic schools, passing the course takes off your license the point you got from violating the vehicle code. Driving laws in California constitute one system in life where lots of points don't mean you win. They mean you lose your license.

The program requires a fee, only this time with just yourself and your computer. Hopefully, you have forgiving Internet access plan that doesn't rack up excessive connection fees.

"What I'm most proud of is helping people go through this without sacrificing family time. We've been able to help lots of people." - Says the Online Traffic School Creator

Not only is this deal a bonus for fast readers, it offers the option of dismissing your entire legal obligation stark naked, if you choose, eating Cheetos, listening to music and taking any number of breaks to put children in bed, do laundry, attend the opera.

This online way to make lawbreakers' lives easier required a solid year of work from the owner to cram the entire course into one site, she said.

"What took the most work was creating and incorporating that much material with that many links and not having technical problems," she said.

The program is compatible with both PCs and Macs, fast modems and slow modems. And, she maintains, it is accessible from most all Internet providers and browsers.

Despite her considerable technical and political success so far, says the owner, "What I'm most proud of is helping people go through this without sacrificing family time. We've been able to help lots of people."

Her online traffic school is available only for certain bad drivers, and only those who break traffic laws in approved courts. Currently she is working on expanding her reach beyond California.

Until then everyone else will have to continue to either admit guilt and take the points against their license, or attend the traditional 3-D traffic-schools in any of their enormous variation: the standup comedian style, the chocoholics version, the budget ones, the pizza-eating ones, all of which require you to physically show up in an appointed place and time and be lectured at and indulge in bloody videos. There are in Los Angeles two other variations, an at-home book oriented program, and a home-study video course.

Doing it the online way takes you to a site that starts with a discussion of the science of driving, kinetic energy and impact, G-force. You learn how G-force in effect for more than millisecond can tear apart a human. It gets your attention.

Her site is studded with factoids: a typical driver violates traffic laws more than 400 times before being caught; 50 percent of accidents come from drivers under 24; and more than 50 percent of drivers have no insurance.

The most popular portion of the program, the owner said, are the factoids about new traffic laws.

"Everyone seems to like learning about new traffic laws, it's something they can bring up in conversation, I guess, so we're constantly updating those."

Like this new law, a bane to teens everywhere, that allows cops to impound the cars of drivers caught racing - before conviction.

There's a little anti-smoking dig in the discussion of insurance rates being higher for smokers, with the explanation being, "People who smoke are reputed to care less about their lives than those who do not."

And she devotes much space to drunken driving: Drunks kill 26,000 people per year; they account for more than half the traffic fatalities; 40 percent of drivers on the road after midnight on weekends have a blood-alcohol level greater than 0.08 percent.

Here's another online factoid for thought: Drivers guilty of DUI in Malaysia are jailed along with their wives (in this case it's never the women's fault since females can't drive in Muslim countries). And authorities in San Salvador have rid their nation of repeat offenders, because they simply execute drunken drivers.

Considering that the online traffic lecture has to eat up approximately eight hours, there is a predictable amount of "duh" advice. Like how distractions cause accidents, so "don't shave while driving," "don't daydream," and this helpful gem: "Anger should be controlled prior to driving."

The site comes complete with its own section of review quizzes and final examination forms. It's certainly an open-book test, in case you forget such quiz answers as the number of traffic fatalities that could have been prevented with seat belts, you are encouraged to go back and find the answer (45 percent).

Even then, if you flunk out the first time, On-line promises a second chance to retake the final with no extra fee.

But then there are questions that only can be answered by reading this program. There are approximately (fill in the blank) drivers on the road at any given time who are DUI for ever one arrested? (The answer is a scarily high 2,000.)

The On-Line program does not exclusively ban the more primitive forms of communication. It provides toll-free phone numbers where humans can answer your questions.

They even mail your completion certificate to court for you, and send you a copy via the good-old U.S. postal service. Suitable for framing for the achievement-starved among us.