I want to give my 16 year old son driving trainig so he lear the basic of actual driving in an open area, not on the street yet. Only to prepare him about driving.
Austrian driver training centers
By: Dan Keegan
Date: Friday, 22. May 2009
Austria's motorists take their driving seriously, but the country's biggest motoring organization takes it even more seriously
One in every seven of the country's 7.5 million population belongs to the Austrian Automobile, Motorcycle and Touring Club (OAMTC).
The club offers the usual range of breakdown services and other travel aid. However, it is also proprietor of some of the most advanced and comprehensive driver training facilities in the world and is expanding its training centers to several other European countries.
The club considers its efforts to advance drivers' skills as one of its key responsibilities. To make this goal a reality, it has a special subsidiary called Test and Training Driving Technique Centres .
In 1988, Test and Training opened the most sophisticated driver training center in Europe: a huge, 300,000 square metre (3.2 million square foot) complex at Teesdorf, about half an hour from Vienna.
Two years later, it opened a second, smaller but equally sophisticated 60,000 square metre (646,000 square foot) complex near Saalfelden in western Austria.
The more than 30,000 drivers who train at the Teesdorf and Saalfelden centers each year enjoy more than high quality training.
"We want to make it fun and entertaining," says Test and Training's foreign business manager, Peter Widhalm. "The participant is the central figure, not the instructors or the facilities. We want to create a situation where the attractiveness of the centre makes it fashionable to attend it."
The reception facilities at the Teesdorf center are in a bright modern building with seminar rooms, a meeting hall, snack bar and even an elegant restaurant.
At Saalfeiden, the driving center is one of the facilities offered at the Brandlhof Sporthotel, which also offers horse riding, swimming, golf and tennis.
The two driving centers are designed to offer a broad range of activities. At Teesdorf, a specially designed "driving Kindergarten" area is available on a daily basis for unlicensed drivers to practise.
Features of the center include a skid pad, where experienced drivers are taught basic skid recovery and collision-avoidance techniques, and also skid surfaces that are set up on a variety of roadway situations.
Drivers learn the basics on the skid pad then test their skills on skid surfaces that are set up on curves with different bend combinations and on varying grades. A two-kilometre handling track simulates a variety of road surface conditions, including an aquaplaning section.
Cars entering the skid pad cross a five-metre diameter rotating turntable that pitches them into a skid. The direction of rotation and speed of the turntable are adjustable to provide an element of surprise for the driver.
Avoidance manoeuvres are set up using electronically controlled water jets that shoot up to form obstacles. Speeds in the manoeuvres are electronically monitored.
Widhalm doesn't believe that safe driving can be taught in the classroom. "We discovered that the most important issue in safety is that drivers realize their personal limits as well as the limits of the vehicle. Then they will realize that even a small reduction in speed can lead to a big increase in safety."
Drivers are encouraged to learn their limits through a process of discovery as they progress through their program. To enhance the learning, each car is equipped with a one-way radio that allows students to listen to instructions sent to other cars.
The Teesdorf center also has facilities for motorcycle training that include curves with varying radius, acceleration, and braking areas and a trail-bike area designed for control and balance exercises.
There's a special area for larger vehicles such as trucks and buses. There are even gravel roads and hilly areas designed for off-road vehicle training.
The facilities were planned to suit as many different activities as possible, Widhalm says. They can accommodate conventions and events such as product presentations or vehicle comparison tests. They're available for rental by any person or group.
Drivers who take either the one-day basic skid course or two-day advanced course (which includes the handling course with aquaplaning and skids on hills and curves) are encouraged to use their own vehicle so that they can develop a feel for its reactions in different control situations.
They don't have to worry about their personal safety or damage to their cars, says Widhalm, because safety has been a primary consideration in developing both the facilities and the programs.
In addition to their training program, drivers are encouraged to try out vehicles equipped with up-to-date technologies such as anti-lock braking systems anti-skid devices, automatic locking differentials and four-wheel drive. These are supplied by dealers.
To extend its training services, Test and Training has developed a number of mobile facilities for tours. The centerpiece is a self-contained machine that can turn any suitable paved area into a skid pad in 15 minutes.
The machine cleans the surface, lays down a five by 50-metre plastic skid lane, keeps it sprayed with water during the exercises and clears everything up again afterwards. It also includes an electronic speed measuring device and a computerized scoring unit.
The mobile skid pad is accompanied by a truck-mounted, air-conditioned seminar room complete with overhead projector and video system.
One of the mobile centers was built especially for British Petroleum and has been occupied training tanker drivers throughout Europe. Test and Training has also established driving technique centers in Germany and other European countries.
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Fayez,
