Taking Rural Mail Carriers Out Of Context
Are Some People Trying To Imagine A Driver Seated On The Passenger Side In An Urban Or Suburban Setting?
My Rural Location Is More Like The Wild West.
First, it probably comes as shock to some that we have no car inspections for any reason in our state. On the other hand I can’t imagine having to deal with those restrictive regulations.
Rural mail carriers are not a hazard here. They are patient and observe traffic (when there is any) and don’t pull out in front of anybody when leaving a mail box for the next one. They usually have a blinking light, strobe, or flag on their cars. We don’t have much traffic here, period.
Operators of 4-wheeler ORVs and snow mobiles are allowed to drive on the shoulders of our county roads. Often times they don’t stay on the shoulder, travel at high speeds and throw up stones. These folks are more a hazard than mail carriers.
Heavy county snow plow trucks sometimes use more than their share of the road and force drivers off the roadway onto unplowed shoulders, which is more dangerous than a few mail carriers on the road.
I live in “a small drinking village with a fishing problem” where half the people on the road could be intoxicated at certain times of the day or night. Now that’s a hazard.
Farm tractors and combines are often encountered, sometimes taking up both sides of the road, pulling hay rakes at 15 mph and getting around them with all our hills and curves is difficult.
I can literally stand in my dining room and safely fire a rifle out the door and nobody cares or even notices it. So, you need to consider the context when assuming that rural mail carriers, sitting on the wrong side, are a danger to those around them.
It’s wild around here, miles of roads, few vehicles, and lots and lots of trees, just the way we like it.
CSA