At a time when silent sporters are decrying the deaths of cyclists at the hands of motorists on the roads, and while government grapples with the issues of drunken driving, texting and talking on cell phones, a whole new class of people “feeling no pain” is getting ready to lurch onto our highways.

Emboldened by medical claims and an increasing number of elected officials ready to buy into them, this new impaired class of drivers threatening others on the streets and roads is what, in the 1960s, was known as the pothead generation. Instead of smoking pot just to get high, they now claim they need marijuana for everything from pain control to anxiety reduction.

It may be true that marijuana has the ability to reduce suffering for people like cancer patients. So, too, do prescription drugs. But it’s difficult to separate the recent cannabis medical claims from the decades-long effort by potheads to just get stoned.

We know the effects are of drunken driving. We read about drivers with multiple convictions still operating motor vehicles. In Wisconsin, you can get three strikes before you are out and heading to prison. We also know the dangerous distraction tuning a radio can present, demonstrated by the recent death of a cyclist in Michigan. And texting? It is hard to imagine a greater distraction behind the wheel.

But not a lot is known about how much marijuana contributes to traffic crashes. Yet there’s no doubt its use can mean incapacitating injury or death for a runner or bicyclist when hit by thousands of pounds of steel, plastic, glass and rubber. Police have breathalyzers but don’t carry “potalyzers.” Statistics are very elusive on pot.

Rutgers University published a brochure aimed at its students, saying effects of THC (the main active chemical in marijuana) include sleepiness; altered sense of time; reduced ability to perform tasks requiring concentration and coordination, such as driving; and decreased social inhibitions that can increase exposure to risky situations.

That’s just what we silent sporters need on the roads and highways. Isn’t it bad enough there are countless drivers putting on lipstick, combing their hair, handling cups of hot coffee, texting friends and searching the Internet, all while supposedly trying to avoid us?

“Marijuana decreases attention and concentration, which is one reason why people use it,” the Rutgers brochure says. “One study showed that young people who reported driving frequently while on marijuana were twice as likely to be involved in accidents.”

“It seems that the marijuana-induced changes in perception and sense of time may be entertaining in the living room but can be deadly on the highway,” the university publication continued. “Combined with alcohol, the hazards of driving under the influence of marijuana are far more extreme than with either drug alone.”

We know that alcohol is already involved in many vehicle crashes and that our public officials have been reluctant to do much about it. It is ingrained in our culture. Multiple drunken driving convictions are reported all the time in the media. In Wisconsin, there was a movement recently to make the fourth driving while intoxicated (DWI) offenders subject to a prison term. Habitual drunken drivers get three free strikes. In contrast, a dog gets only one bite under Wisconsin law.

So-called medical marijuana has been legalized in some western U.S. jurisdictions. The result has been a proliferation of pot pharmacies. Efforts are underway elsewhere to take the prohibitions off California brown. The ruse is requiring a prescription. That sounds good until you realize how many unscrupulous doctors there are who will proffer their signature for anything if the sale lines his or her pockets.

What’s most disturbing about the current trend is that much of the pressure is coming from the baby boomers – member of the pot generation of the ’60s and ’70s who either kept puffing or want to again.

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration recently reported the aging of the baby boom generation is resulting in a dramatic increase in levels of illicit drug use among adults 50 and older.

“An estimated 4.3 million adults aged 50 or older – 4.7 percent – used an illicit drug in the past year,” the agency says. “In fact, 8.5 percent of men aged 50 to 54 had used marijuana in the past year, as opposed to only 3.9 percent of women in this age group. Marijuana use was more common than nonmedical use of prescription drugs among males 50 and older – 4.2 percent versus 2.3 percent – but among females the rates of marijuana use and nonmedical use of prescription drugs were similar – 1.7 and 1.9 percent.”

A landmark study of pedestrian and cyclist deaths in New York City from 1994 to 1997 concluded that motorists were at least partly to blame in 90 percent of the fatal crashes. They were largely or strictly culpable in 74 percent of pedestrian deaths.

“Older New Yorkers stand a far higher chance of dying beneath the wheels of an automobile than of being murdered,” Charles Komanoff and members of Right Of Way concluded in the 1999 report.

While we know what the problem is, the question of what to do and what is possible is a lot less clear.

Impose jail terms, you say? Judges don’t impose tough sentences now because the jails and prisons are full. Elected state officials are moving toward wholesale releases of nonviolent offenders to save money in the face of growing state budget crises. Guess who’s in that nonviolent group being turned back out on the streets?

I believe DWI offenders need to lose their licenses to drive. I would propose mandatory revocation on a second offense. Everyone should be given one chance to make a mistake, just like a dog. Then, if they want to commute to work, they ought to experience things from our perspective: in running shoes or on the saddle of a bike. I’ll bet that would be more effective in changing their behavior than all the alcohol and drug assessment program time they could possibly be sentenced to. And they might even find they like it as much as we do.

And I want to just say “no” to a whole new generation of “weedheads” and to a problem that has gone begging for a solution for too long, and at too great a cost in human suffering and lives. If the cannabis crowd wants to smoke, they ought to stay in their living rooms and out of cars. Let them walk, run or bike with their DWIs. You and I will be a lot safer if they do.

Bill Hauda is a bicyclist, veteran of some 50 marathons, including 13 ending in Boston, a former competitive triathlete, founder and first president of the Bicycle Federation of Wisconsin, currently a BFW board member, and former director of Wisconsin’s two major cross-state bicycle tours, GRABAAWR and SAGBRAW.

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