Italy tries to curb murderous driving habits

By Stephen Brown

ROME (Reuters) - A gruesome spate of deadly road accidents this summer may finally destroy the Italians' belief that their agility at the wheel compensates for a cavalier attitude to safety and their reactions are not dulled by drink.

In the country with world's second highest density of car ownership, traffic accidents are depressingly common on roads clogged with irascible drivers who disdain traffic rules, park anarchically and treat pedestrians like moving targets.

But reports of toddlers and teenagers mown down by drunk drivers -- and not least the president's wife who was knocked over on a pedestrian crossing outside the palace -- have prompted Italian politicians to react.

Prime Minister Romano Prodi, unusual for preferring bicycles even though the red Ferrari is the ultimate Italian status symbol, called for a "major moral and civic shake-up" regarding Italy's diabolical driving habits.

The influential Catholic Church decries "collective madness" on the roads and Pope Benedict has issued "10 Commandments" for motorists, saying cars "tend to bring out the 'primitive' side of human beings".

That certainly seems to be the case in Rome, where the heirs to the cradle of European civilization turn surprisingly aggressive behind the wheels of their pint-sized city cars, or mounted on the buzzing mopeds that swarm the streets.

"If you scratch my paintwork, I'll kill you," a burly truck driver shouts at a mother trying to maneuver a pushchair round his vehicle, which is occupying the width of the pavement.

On the busy Via Salaria, a blind woman trying to negotiate a pedestrian crossing blocked by cars parked three abreast vents her frustration by beating them with her white stick.