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SALT LAKE CITY — It could be that drivers in Utah are more vocal than those in other states, but one thing is certain: More Utahns are reporting poor roadway behavior online.
"I see offensive drivers on the freeway every day," said Alyssa Gold, who lives in North Salt Lake and drives I-15 on a daily basis. "I'm kind of ashamed to admit that I generally don't do much about it. What can you do really, other than just try to be as safe as you can in your own car and hope you don't pay for someone else's bad decisions?"
Driver-Ratings.com, a website set up by two guys in Los Angeles as a social experiment, has repeatedly seen the most Internet traffic from the Salt Lake City area, despite the fact that other areas actually have more street traffic.
Millions of close calls that do not result in accidents, but rather spark intense road rage, are witnessed by drivers every day and have gone unreported until now.
–- Taylor Peck, co-founder Driver Ratings.com
This week, Utah drivers are squaring off with those in Seattle to have the most influence on the site. But lots of frustration, as well as examples of good driving, are being shared from other cities around the country as the site nears its 80,000th rating.
"It is a non-violent outlet to vent your frustration about bad drivers," said Taylor Peck, who founded the site with his friend, Nick Boutelier.
While the site allows anyone to leave ratings anonymously, Peck said he's confident that the majority of them are legitimate. And at least 40 percent of the ratings have been positive, he said.
With no budget for advertising, word of the site has spread quickly by mouth, and "a lot of people sharing the link with their friends online," Peck said.
The founders are surprised that so many people want to "discuss their driving experiences, whether they are pleasant, annoying or hysterical," Boutelier said.
"I just couldn't live with myself if something happened and I could have helped prevent it," said Utah driver Kelli Sundberg, who has notified officials of bad drivers on the road before.
The U.S. Department of Transportation has reported that most of the approximately 6 million car accidents each year across the country are caused by irresponsible driving behavior.
"Millions of close calls that do not result in accidents, but rather spark intense road rage, are witnessed by drivers every day and have gone unreported until now," Peck said.
The site is not intended to punish drivers or involve law enforcement, he said, but to generate an awareness of conditions on the nation's roads and give people a venue to fret about it, instead of causing a physical altercation.
Gold once reported an erratic semi driver, but public safety officials never caught up to him on the freeway, which frustrated her. She said police are obviously outnumbered by commuters and can't always help.
"If people were aware that others can easily report you, I think we'd see a decrease in erratic driving," she said.
Drivers can also log on to see if they've caused any problems on the roads, and perhaps pointing it out to them will help to correct the behavior, Peck said. The idea grew from an incident he witnessed in L.A., where an errant driver almost caused an accident and drove away without any consequence.
"There are so many sites out there where people can talk about their experiences with shopping or dining, in an anonymous way. I just wanted a place to talk about bad drivers," he said.
The site does not generate any money for the duo, but Peck said he hopes to team up with various organizations in the future, using the driver ratings for research.
More than 3,000 people from Salt Lake City have posted on the site, the most of any general area, followed by Seattle; Providence, R.I., Madison, Wis., Dallas, Jacksonville and Phoenix.
Email:wleonard@ksl.com
