We have not for nothing said that every truck driver has similar reflective clothing in the car. According to statistics, it is professional drivers who carry out long-haul flights, as no one else understands the need to wear clothing with reflective tapes at night when there is a forced stop on the side of the road, or car repairs are required. They encounter similar situations in their work almost daily. If with regard to Russian truckers flying within the country, it is still possible to say that not all of them have reflective clothing, then their colleagues who make flights beyond the Russian borders use it without fail. And for good reason. For example, crossing the Polish border, the Russian driver immediately sees just a huge array of reflective clothing on Polish drivers and pedestrians. Unusual for such illumination, the Russian eye is at first difficult to get used to it. But then everything falls into place. Practically in all countries of the European Union, at the legislative level, there are rules obliging drivers and pedestrians to wear reflective clothing at night outside the settlements. In addition, in European countries, there are impressive, especially by Russian standards, fines for the lack of a reflective vest or jacket. For example, on the Portuguese country roads, you can safely walk in the dark near the car without a vest for 300 euros. If the police recorded a similar offense on a high-speed autobahn, then the amount of the fine doubles and will amount to 600 euros. In neighboring Spain, there is a fixed fine of 140 euros; on Italian roads, the local police can find a hundred euros on Italian roads for lack of reflective clothing. In Switzerland, there is a norm that obliges drivers to not only wear reflective clothing when forced to stop, but also to include a special light signal, which must be issued by a special device placed on the driver’s clothes. For the absence of reflective clothing and a light signal, a penalty equivalent to 200 euros is provided for it. The smallest penalty in Europe for violating the rules for the use of reflective clothing exists, oddly enough, in Germany. It is only 15 euros. But interestingly, almost all German drivers have similar vests or jackets. Probably conscious Germans care about their own safety and the well-being of their passengers. The longest legislative rule for the use of reflective equipment for drivers is in the United Kingdom. Since the mid-80s of the last century, British drivers have to put on reflective gear when they are forced to stop on the road or on the side of the road.
The reflective vest invented in the United States and began to be massively used by American drivers in the late 60s of the last century. At the same time, at the legislative level, a similar rule appeared in the American rules of the road only in the late eighties of the last century. Europeans began to introduce a similar rule for their drivers and pedestrians somewhere in the mid-90s. And only in the CIS countries, it is still possible to walk along the side of the road with impunity or stand near a stopped car without reflective clothing. Therefore, experts say that this innovation in the Russian traffic rules was 10-15 years late. Western drivers very often acquire reflective equipment for their passengers, at least for one of them. They are well aware that the safety of passengers is in their area of responsibility.
European drivers, Americans or Canadians do not have to be afraid of fines. They have a well-developed sense of self-preservation, which tells them that using reflective clothing in the dark on highways simply saves their lives. For Russian drivers and pedestrians, most likely, the main argument for compliance with the norm of the law will be the punishment for its failure. What kind of penalties provided for Russian pedestrians and car owners who do not use reflective clothing on the roads in the dark?