MESA, AZ — There are two simulators at DrivingMBA in Scottsdale, one for fundamentals, and the other for defensive driving.
"What we found is that kids are not being prepared well enough to be out on the roadways,” said Maria Wojtczak, owner of DrivingMBA.
Wojtczak and her husband opened their business 20 years ago with safety top of their minds. They’re trying to prepare young drivers, so they make it home alive.
"With teenagers, there's this fine line between confidence,” Wojtczak said. “You think they need to have confidence. But for us, it's really more about competence.”
She continued, “We're really paying attention to building their competence and making them understand that and having parents understand that your kids are going to be novice drivers for years.”
“It takes thousands and thousands and thousands of miles to become what's considered an experienced driver,” Wojtczak said.
Wednesday, three teenagers were killed in a crash near Ellsworth and Guadalupe roads in Mesa. Police believe weather and speed were factors.
This year alone, there have been 16 deaths on Mesa streets. Detective Richard Encinas with Mesa Police Department said in a news conference Thursday, “It only takes a couple of seconds to remind our kids about safe driving.”
“As a community, we can do that small thing and hopefully try to prevent something as tragic as what happened,” said Encinas.
Before this week's tragedy, Mesa Police Department launched their ‘Safer Streets’ program, to last through April.
The Police Traffic Unit is out across the city at various times looking for things like speeding or distracted driving. Officials say those behaviors lead to deadly or serious car crashes.
Mesa Police say in 2022, there were 44 deadly crashes and over 1,000 crashes where someone was hurt.