Knight Rider
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https://www.thestar.com/news/invest...-testing-drivers-on-roads-less-travelled?bn=1
BANCROFT - They come here by the carload: would-be Toronto drivers, chauffeured to the edge of Algonquin Park by Toronto driving schools that, for a fee, help them take their road tests on some of the loneliest byways in Ontario.
Once fully licensed by the lone examiner in this town of three stoplights and 3,500 people, they return to Toronto, merging with drivers who’ve passed their tests on some of Canada’s most congested streets.
Some of the would-be drivers who end up here in the "mineral capital of Canada" even bring their cameras, snapping photos of a small town they’ve never been to before and will likely never return to after they pass their road tests.
It’s impossible to overstate just how quiet the streets of Bancroft, population one-thousandth that of Toronto, actually are. Located 250 kilometres northeast of Canada’s largest city, Bancroft is more than an hour’s drive from the nearest four-lane highway, and rush-hour traffic is something residents know about only through CBC radio reports from elsewhere.
"It’s definitely a quieter drive around here," says Shane Malloy, who works in one of the town’s two movie rental shops. "There is only one main street. I guess that’s what brings them up here - every day."
Malloy is at least partially right.
Beating the system
A Star investigation has found that a number of Toronto-based driving schools are taking advantage of Ontario’s graduated licensing system, packing prospective Toronto drivers into four-door Toyotas and, for $200 a head, driving three hours into the Canadian Shield (passing by or near five DriveTest centres along the way) to towns such as Bancroft, where instructors coach their students on known examination routes and where drivers pass at more than twice the rate of their counterparts in the GTA.
Why is this happening? That depends on whom you ask.
The instructors say long wait times at Toronto test centres force them to go to such lengths to get their students licensed. But drivers who fear they wouldn’t pass their tests in Toronto say their instructors sell them on an easier road test outside the GTA.
Meanwhile, the owner of at least one Scarborough driving school says his instructors do it because they can make a lot of money by taking students out of town and coaching them through the exact routes used by rural examiners.
The math isn’t hard. If an instructor fills a Toyota Corolla with four students at $200 a pop and makes the long drive to Bancroft, he or she is guaranteed $800 in profit (minus the tank of gas needed for the trip), whether the students pass or not.
Brian Patterson, president of the Ontario Safety League, says the practice is cause for concern.
"No reputable driving school would need to do that," says Patterson, whose organization tries to reduce preventable deaths and injuries on Ontario roads through increased driver education.
"Reputable driving schools train people to an effective standard so that they could pass their tests anywhere in North America when they are done."
Charging extra for an easy ride
"Don’t need to test on Freeway for G Test, Flexible Test Sites in Cities or Towns," reads the website for Scarborough’s Evergreen Driving School. (The "G test" is the final hurdle to getting an Ontario licence that allows you to drive a car, van or small truck alone on any road at any hour.) Evergreen is one of four ministry-approved driving schools that the Star watched take a carload of would-be drivers from Toronto to Bancroft.
"We have the right to do that," says Harry Hua, president of Evergreen, which has 40 instructors.
Every week three of his teachers take students to Bancroft, where, according to data obtained in December 2008 through a freedom of information request, 77.1 per cent of divers pass.
In Scarborough, the pass rate is 52.7 per cent.
BANCROFT - They come here by the carload: would-be Toronto drivers, chauffeured to the edge of Algonquin Park by Toronto driving schools that, for a fee, help them take their road tests on some of the loneliest byways in Ontario.
Once fully licensed by the lone examiner in this town of three stoplights and 3,500 people, they return to Toronto, merging with drivers who’ve passed their tests on some of Canada’s most congested streets.
Some of the would-be drivers who end up here in the "mineral capital of Canada" even bring their cameras, snapping photos of a small town they’ve never been to before and will likely never return to after they pass their road tests.
It’s impossible to overstate just how quiet the streets of Bancroft, population one-thousandth that of Toronto, actually are. Located 250 kilometres northeast of Canada’s largest city, Bancroft is more than an hour’s drive from the nearest four-lane highway, and rush-hour traffic is something residents know about only through CBC radio reports from elsewhere.
"It’s definitely a quieter drive around here," says Shane Malloy, who works in one of the town’s two movie rental shops. "There is only one main street. I guess that’s what brings them up here - every day."
Malloy is at least partially right.
Beating the system
A Star investigation has found that a number of Toronto-based driving schools are taking advantage of Ontario’s graduated licensing system, packing prospective Toronto drivers into four-door Toyotas and, for $200 a head, driving three hours into the Canadian Shield (passing by or near five DriveTest centres along the way) to towns such as Bancroft, where instructors coach their students on known examination routes and where drivers pass at more than twice the rate of their counterparts in the GTA.
Why is this happening? That depends on whom you ask.
The instructors say long wait times at Toronto test centres force them to go to such lengths to get their students licensed. But drivers who fear they wouldn’t pass their tests in Toronto say their instructors sell them on an easier road test outside the GTA.
Meanwhile, the owner of at least one Scarborough driving school says his instructors do it because they can make a lot of money by taking students out of town and coaching them through the exact routes used by rural examiners.
The math isn’t hard. If an instructor fills a Toyota Corolla with four students at $200 a pop and makes the long drive to Bancroft, he or she is guaranteed $800 in profit (minus the tank of gas needed for the trip), whether the students pass or not.
Brian Patterson, president of the Ontario Safety League, says the practice is cause for concern.
"No reputable driving school would need to do that," says Patterson, whose organization tries to reduce preventable deaths and injuries on Ontario roads through increased driver education.
"Reputable driving schools train people to an effective standard so that they could pass their tests anywhere in North America when they are done."
Charging extra for an easy ride
"Don’t need to test on Freeway for G Test, Flexible Test Sites in Cities or Towns," reads the website for Scarborough’s Evergreen Driving School. (The "G test" is the final hurdle to getting an Ontario licence that allows you to drive a car, van or small truck alone on any road at any hour.) Evergreen is one of four ministry-approved driving schools that the Star watched take a carload of would-be drivers from Toronto to Bancroft.
"We have the right to do that," says Harry Hua, president of Evergreen, which has 40 instructors.
Every week three of his teachers take students to Bancroft, where, according to data obtained in December 2008 through a freedom of information request, 77.1 per cent of divers pass.
In Scarborough, the pass rate is 52.7 per cent.
sorry couldn't help myself, all in good humor. :razz:
