There is no downside to looking as far down the road as you can.

Many drivers focus on the road only 5 or 8 seconds ahead, when really they should be concentrating 15-20 seconds in front of you (at a minimum!). In practice, this means keeping your eyes UP and concentrating down the road. This gives you the time to recognize and avoid most potential hazards before they become a problem, making you a defensive driver rather than a passive driver. You’ll see buses or construction areas, traffic congestion, truck entrances, mishaps, etc. long before they’re directly in front of you. This technique is also useful for new drivers when learning how to steer. Keeping your eyes focused far down the road (instead of just past the end of the hood) creates visual stability in the roadway. In other words, it helps people center themselves in the road and eliminate the unsteady weaving that is characteristic of a novice driver. 

There are other important ways to use your vision as a Defensive Driving tool especially in city driving. Drivers should see, and be mindful of, everything around them on all sides of their car (left, right, and rear) and for several hundred feet ahead (about two blocks). Do this and you’ll be able to see—and avoid—the immediate hazards others don’t notice: balls rolling into the street followed by children, cars about to pull out from a parallel parking spot, pedestrians hidden between vehicles, runaway trucks bearing down on you from behind, etc.

Also, make sure not to concentrate on any one thing in your field of view for more than a second. Your focused field of vision is very narrow, less than 5 feet wide at 100 feet. Everything else you see is first picked up by your peripheral vision, which is effective at picking up motion but doesn’t provide a clear view. If you don’t believe this, try our thumb exercise (see picture).

While your peripheral vision is not very clear or focused, it does detect movement—it serves as your “early warning” vision. If you allow your eyes to remain fixed on any one thing, your peripheral vision immediately begins to narrow down into “tunnel” vision and you lose your ability to detect movement to the sides. Keeping your eyes moving prevents this from occurring.

Your vision is perhaps the most important tool you have while driving. Use it effectively! Look as far down the road as possible, and use a scanning motion to take in and analyze everything that is happening around you, especially things that might become a driving hazard.