I just saw, and decided to not take a picture, an electric bicycle being used as a family car.

This fellow was riding his electric bike through the streets, in and out of the shopping area of RBS. He was holding shopping bags in his hands and hanging from the bike handles. He had a daughter in a bike seat behind him, while he was on the bicycle seat, and he had another, younger daughter, seated in front of him on the bar of the bicycle.

At least they all had helmets. They looked pretty unstable, so I just hope the helmets don't actually get put to use!

We suffer from what might be considered a plague. A rash of incidents in which a child was forgotten in the back seat of a car and left to bake on a hot day.

A recent law proposal to deal with this has been under discussion, and after some initial support it looks like that probably isn't going to pass. The main opposition to the bill is that it is not right to move the responsibility of the children from the parents to the day care center and teachers. Also, it is not right to move criminal responsibility to the teachers when they aren't even with the kids and it is the parents who forgot them - if the law is placing the onus on the teachers, it will also place the liability on them. And  if they can't get hold of the parent, if he or she doesn't answer the phone, or the line is busy or whatnot, and suddenly the ganenet is on the hook for the parents distraction and forgetfullness.

So it looks like that law won't pass, and another law is needed in its place.

MK Ayelet Nahmias-Verbin (Hamachane Hatzioni) has proposed a law that would require all cars to have a sensor installed that will beep and alert the driver at the end of the ride that there is a child in the back seat. The sensor will continue to beep until the child is taken out of the back seat.

Nahmias-Verbin's proposal comes after her participation in the NRG-sponsored trial placing 7 Israeli public figures in hot cars for 10 minutes (video posted earlier).

Nahmias-Verbin compares this proposed requirement to the requirement of keeping a yellow vest in the car.
source: NRG

Anything that might help is worth trying, and a sensor is probably the best overall solution. Details would have to be worked out, such as requiring all new cars to have it factory installed, along with some stage of requiring cars already on the road to have them installed by a certain deadline. Obviously the annual test would have to look for the sensor and check that it works as part of their inspection.

good news for bike riders!

In a law proposal that is supported by MKs from across the political spectrum, automobile drivers would legally have to be more careful when passing a bicycle in the road.

According to this law proposal, on an intercity road, a driver would have to stay at least 1.5 meters away from a bicycle when passing. On local roads the distance drops to 1 meter away.

The authors of the proposal explain that there has been a sharp upswing of  cyclists getting injured from cars.
source: NRG

bike riders should love this news. I regularly hear from cyclist friends how dangerous road biking is and how frequently they nearly get hit...

We have two more interesting "tazkirei chok" - preparatory calls for legislation in advance of the formal submission of a law proposal. One comes from Minister of Interior Gideon Saar, and the second comes from Minister of Transportation Yisrael Katz.

1. Minister Gideon Saar called for legislation to turn the day of municipal elections into a national holiday, just as it is for national elections.

Saar saw the low voter turnout in the recent municipal elections. Bet Shemesh had a decent turnout, with turnout in the range of 65%, but many municipalities had turnout as low as 20%!!! Nation-wide the average turnout in the municipal elections 3 weeks ago stood at 51%. The assumption is that this is affected largely by the fact that people have to go to work as usual, so cannot vote during the day. Then they get home at night and find the lines at the voting booth to be too long to bother, or they are just too tired and frustrated when they get home and decide to not bother going to vote.

Turning municipal elections day into a national holiday, would most likely involve more people in the democratic process of voting.

I am in favor. And, I think municipal elections and national elections should be scheduled so that the effect of the voting vacation days will be maximized.

2. Minister Yisrael Katz wants to change the system of obtaining a drivers license.The drivers license testers have gone on strike today in an attempt to rework their group agreement.

Katz, not giving in so quickly, announced that he has had enough of the testers and their behavior. Instead of providing good service they are going on protests and strikes and harming the young people who have been waiting for drivers license exams. Katz says the solution to the issue is to privatize, and he has instructed the director of the Ministry of Transportation to prepare a plan by which the exams will be privatized. Anybody who wants to take the exam will be able to go on any day and take it. Competition - no lines and long waits, no bureaucracy.

I don't know how it works in other places, but I do not remember from when I got my drivers license in Chicago that the system was private and I had a choice of testing places. I seem to remember that it was controlled by the State, the City of Chicago, through the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV). Is the examination for drivers licenses run privately in any country? How does that work? I am not sure this is something the State should really be giving up control of.

Yesterday the Knesset committee for the rights of children approved unanimously the law proposal by MK Orly Levi-Abuksis (Likud Beyteynu) to prevent forgetting children in cars. The law proposal will now move to the Knesset for voting.

The law proposed by Levi-Abuksis is that when a child does not show up to his or her daycare or school facility, the caregiver (metapelet) or teacher must call the parents to inform them that the child is not there.

Obviously, the idea is that if the parent had forgotten the child in the car, at that point he or she will be reminded of it and will run to the car and save the child, hopefully before it is too late.

I don't know if this will help much. It seems like so many ways it can go wrong - the teacher won't call quickly enough, the teacher will find it to be a pain and a bother to call right away considering he or she has a full class to get settled and then to have to start calling a parent or a few parents to find out where their kids are, the teacher won't be able to reach the parents by telephone, etc...

If it even saves one kid it is worth it, but it seems like there might be better solutions out there that will be more efficient and more effective. Maybe this will be more effective as an additional method alongside other methods such as sensors or other ways of reminding the parent to check the backseat of the car.

Deputy Minister of Transportation Tippi Hotovely, responsible for the area of road safety has been coming up with ways to decrease accidents. She says that 80% of accidents are due to the driver being distracted. her approach, therefore, is to minimize the possible distractions.

Last week Hotovely recommended an idea that perhaps young drivers, especially with the minimum age now being lowered, not be allowed to use a mobile phone at all in the car while driving, even with a hands free device. The problem is not the phone or the hands, but the distraction of talking. her idea met with opposition and she will most likely drop it.

Now Hotovely has pulled an old idea out of the hat and is resurrecting it. She wants to raise the fine for people caught using their cellphones, including for text messaging, while driving. Hotovely would raise the fine to 1500 NIS from the current rate of 1000 NIS..

The large fine would be a deterrent, and without the mobile phone there would be less distractions. I don't know why 1000 NIS was not enough of a deterrent, but 1500 would be, but if it works and decreases the number of accidents, great!

Last week I mentioned how the first victim of public policy in this election season was the campaign begun by Shas putting advertisements up against Netanyahu and Lieberman. Because of the haredi policy of banning images of women, Egged had to come up with a policy of banning all human images so as not to be seen as being discriminatory against women. So, when Shas advertised on buses, someone actually called Egged on their stated policy and the Shas campaign had to come down.

Now we have the second victim as well. Rav Ovadiah Yosef's BMW.

With SHAS focusing on the social aspect of their party platform in this election, it was decided that it does not look good for them to be talking about how so many people are in financial troubles and there are the haves and have-nots, claiming that a vote for SHAS will be supporting the have-nots in the next Knesset, when Rav Ovadiah, the leader of SHAS, is being driven around in one of the most luxurious cars in the country. It should be noted that while those in SHAS explained the reason the car was being replaced as being due to the social focus of their campaign, others in the Yosef household claimed it was simply a matter of cost - the car is very expensive with high maintenance costs, and the rav does not travel all that much anyway, so they decided to get something more reasonably priced.

The BMW was replaced by a more modest Skoda Superb.
(source: NRG)

So, while Yair Lapid was criticized as being a phony when he entered politics for replacing his luxury car (with a slightly more modest luxury car) due to the focus of his campaign being on the middle class, SHAS ends up doing the same thing. I wonder if the people will believe the social claims of SHAS in the campaign and forget that the "haves" are also in SHAS...

The Knesset's Finance Committee yesterday approved a change in the amount of fines one would receive for not buckling your child in safely in the car.

Until now the level of the fine was 250 NIS across the board, for not buckling properly a child from the ages 0-14.

Now, with the new level of fines, it will be a staggered amount, depending on the age of the child, with the largest increase being an increase of 400%!!!

The new fines are, for not properly buckling a child..:

• 0-3, in a car seat: 1000 NIS (an increase of 400%!!)
• 3-8, in a booster seat: 750 NIS
• 8-14, in a seatbelt: 500 NIS

I imagine that with the fines being so high, the police will probably be on the lookout as a way of increasing revenue...

So, besides for buckling your kids up due to safety reasons, you will also want to buckle up out of financial concerns...
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Supreme Court Justice Dorit Beinisch finished her term today as president of the Supreme Court justices and retired. Justice Beinisch chose her final verdict to be on social issues, as she says social issues are close to her heart and dear to her.

The ruling Beinisch leaves us with is overturning part of the welfare law that says that a person who owns a car is disqualified from receiving income support. The car has been looked at in the law as a luxury, and someone on welfare and income support, should not be able to collect if they can afford that luxury. This law has been attacked for a very long time as discriminatory against the weaker sectors of society. (source: Jpost)

Beinisch overturning this qualification means the car will now be considered a necessity rather than a luxury.

Beinisch's important decision might have been rendered meaningless even before it was announced. The price of gasoline in Israel is going up to about $8 per gallon. While families on income support might now be allowed to own a car, the director of the Finance Ministry thinks people who can't afford the gas should instead take a bus, reminiscent of Marie Antoinette saying "Let them eat cake"..

The Finance Ministry rejected suggestions that they lower the taxes on gasoline. Instead, they feel they "can influence the use of alternatives and encourage the public to use public transportation and buy cars that use less gas...".

Another Toyota Prius was in trouble today when the car began to speed up unintentionally and the driver could not get it under control in New York, after it just happened in California the other day.

While this time the driver was lucky and he had only just pulled out of his driveway, sending the car speeding across the street into his neighbors wall, suffering only some injuries, this disaster by the Japanese auto maker is a serious problem with more and more life-threatening situations happening at more regular intervals. Get all those Toyotas off the road!

While I should not joke about it and take this lightly, I do wonder if this is a good "out" when a cop tries to stop and ticket for speeding someone driving a Toyota. When the cop pulls up behind him and call for him to pull over to the side of the road, the driver should speed up even more increasingly and call out that his car is out of control. I wonder if that would get him out of a speeding ticket..

Yesterday evening a 3 yr old kid got into his parents van, and somehow knocked the gear shift into neutral. The parking lot had a strong slope, and the car rolled backwards gathering speed and somehow maneuvered and smashed right into the side of my parked car.

Somehow, perhaps it was a miracle, nobody was injured. The "driver" managed to not run over any of the dozens of kids playing in the lot. The "driver" himself was not injured or hurt despite the force of the crash - the crash was so hard that it blew out the whole back window from the drivers car, it shoved my car over and lifted it up partly onto the sidewalk, and it caused my car to smash into the car parked next to it. The damage to my car was minimal - just some denting, but nothing serious.

Today I just spoke to my friend and found out he was in an accident yesterday. he was driving with his family, local city driving, and someone ran a red light and smashed into his car. The car was totaled but everybody was ok (after being checked in the hospital), thank God.
He told me that if not for the seatbelts, they would have had some very serious injuries. His wife would have been seriously injured, but her seatbelt saved her.

So, please everyone. There are lots of cars on the road. Even if you are a cautious and safe driver, other people might not be. Somebody might be tired but driving. Someone might be in a rush and not careful.

Drive safely, but especially be careful to make sure everyone is wearing seatbelts.

And after all the stories I have heard over the past day of people who's kids knocked the gear shift into neutral and caused some sort of accident, I would recommend the car manufactures install some sort of safety catch on the gear shift so it would not be so easy to knock it into neutral.

Everyone has already heard of the tragic car accident on the Highway 38 outside of Bet Shemesh on Friday just before shabbos.

The driver, supposedly at fault, was a 20 year old guy. I am told he is the son of the guy who owns the watermelon stand in Bet Shemesh (the watermelon stand) at the corner before Migdal HaMayim.

My thoughts:

1. How the heck does a guy who sells watermelon for a living afford to buy his 20 year old son a brand new BMW??? I am definitely in the wrong line of work!

2. We drove by the scene of the accident this morning on the way to the train. There was not even the slightest sign that anything had happened. No sign of any accident. They cleaned it all up right away. Amazing that something so tragic can happen and just a short while later one can go to the same place and he would never even know about it...

The Hatzala organization has developed a unit of bike riders to respond to calls. This unit is very beneficial in some cities, some neighborhoods, where access by car is very difficult - narrow streets, alleyways, etc. This helps them respond even quicker in those areas.

They have now considered increasing the usage of the bike brigade. The biek brigade would respond to a higher percentage of the calls on shabbos, thus minimizing the use of cars.

They brought the bikes to the Rabbinic Committee of Hatzala to discuss the possibilities. Rav Ezriel Auerbach - the son for Rav Shlomo Zalman Auerbach zt"l and son-in-law of Rav Elyashiv and a gaon in his own right, approved of the use of the bike brigade, but warned them that it should be made clear to all the medics that in any situation where using the bike will provide the care not as fast as it would be provided by car, the bicke brigade should not be used and a car should be used.

So the Bike Brigade is a good solution for certain situations, but it is not a replacement for cars. In any situation where a car will provide faster care, the car should be used.

The Ministry of Transportation has announced that they have approved a price hike for public transportation (buses and trains) effective January 1. The increase will be at the unprecedented level of 8% (they were shooting for 12-14%, but have decided to start with 8%).

With the price of gasoline continuing to drop (13% last month, and another 9% tonight), will people stop using public transportation and go back to using the car?

Personally, without having made the full calculations, there are still the issues of auto maintenance (wear and tear, mileage, etc.) and sitting in what is almost always horrible traffic during rush hour that would deter me from taking the car instead of the train.

But perhaps others will find it worthwhile?

The moment you have all been waiting for is almost here!

I saw a little notice in the paper this morning that the importer of Fiat cars also holds the import rights on Ferrari and Maserati cars.

The importer says they are weighing the possibility of bringing these cars in. They say there is a market in Israel of people who buy cars worth between 1 and 2 million shekels. There are people in Israel who look for the "top", and therefore they are considering it.

I would like to see those driving around the Tel Aviv area. I already get to see the occassional Porsche...

My car keeps shabbos! That is the new way I can describe my car.

"New?" you ask. What is the old?

The old description is "my car was drafted to the army". But that is for another post.

So what is this new thing about my car keeping shabbos?

Shas MK Yehuda Margi is proposing a new law that would require car owners to not use their car one day of each week and let it sit idle. The car owner would choose which day of the week the car would sit idle. The owner would register his car for the specific day, would stick a registration sticker on his windshield stating which day is his car's "day of rest" and life goes on.

Of course that means on that day the driver would not be allowed to drive his car. He would get a hefty fine if caught driving on his chosen day.

The idea of it is to cut down on energy waste, traffic accidents and air pollution.

The precedent for this is after the Yom Kippur war a similar system was instituted to save on fuel consumption, due to the energy crisis at the time.

So, if I had to choose a day, I would choose shabbos, Saturday, and then I could officially say, "My car keeps shabbos".

If they really want to give incentive for people to stop driving one day a week, he should give some sort of reduction in the car taxes. We find this commonly among insurance providers who offer a discount for people who do not drive on shabbos, because the car is off the road one day a week. We find it on cellphone deals, and in other service providing fields as well. A deduction in the taxes and registration fees would be a nice addition to this law.