Traffic Laws To Be Suspended When You In A Hurry

It takes effect on the first day of school next week, but sooner if you really need it.

Jerusalem, August 23 – To recognize the necessary exception to traffic regulations, the Ministry of Transport has enacted rules allowing you, specifically, to disregard laws when obeying them would prevent you from getting to your destination on time.

A committee within the ministry approved the Driving Ordinance Urgent Circumstance Hurrying Exception (DOUCHE) directive by a unanimous vote. It will allow you to run red lights, ignore stop signs, pass on the right, tailgate, honk in quiet zones, speed past schools, disregard seat belt and child safety seat laws, make illegal turns, travel the wrong way on one-way streets, block intersections and driveways, and implement lane changes and turns without signaling, if under those circumstances upholding the traffic law in question would cause a potential delay of more than 0.8 seconds. You, after all, are the most important person on the road, and your punctuality trumps everyone else’s safety. During rush hour, the delay threshold will be reduced to 0.2 seconds, in recognition of your being in an even greater rush.

DOUCHE goes into effect on the first day of school next week, but sooner if you really need it. Potential delays of over 10 seconds will justify the violation of other laws, notably the right-of-way generally granted to pedestrians and emergency vehicles. Regardless of any delay, laws prohibiting the use of mobile devices while driving will no longer apply to you, because what you have to say, text, or read is so important that other people’s lives take a back seat.

Minister of Transport Yisrael Katz pushed for adoption of DOUCHE after you repeatedly voiced your wish that so many other people not be on the road when you, clearly, have needs that override theirs.  “This is a milestone in transportation history,” he told reporters after the measure was adopted. “It is always gratifying to see common sense win.”

Opposition to the bill came mainly from libertarians on Twitter, who said the measure did not go far enough, as it allowed these exceptions only for you. “As this proposal had too narrow a focus, I could not in good conscience endorse it; instead, the government should be repealing traffic laws entirely, as they represent government overreach into the lives of private citizens,” wrote one opponent.

Katz hopes to follow up by prevailing on his colleagues in the Ministry of Environmental Protection to adopt a rule that would cancel all littering prohibitions as they apply to you, because you’re actually providing work for the people whose job it is to clean up.

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