More on cell phone use while driving

Lin · January 31, 2010, 09:31:19 PM

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704878904575031572761080024.html?mod=rss_Today%27s_Most_Popular

robertglines1 · February 01, 2010, 04:45:07 AM

I have been hit by a kid on a cell phone....had several come across line while texting...charge them with reckless driving or driving under influence...in our state (Ind) they did away with driver training in school..the quality of drivers has decreased and no longer follow common sense rules of the road...sorry for venting..

kyle4501 · February 01, 2010, 05:09:52 AM

Unenforceable laws do little more than breed contempt for all laws.

If the lawmakers want to impress me, they'll pass laws requiring more driver education with an emphasis on driving is an earned privilege - NOT a birth right.

How about drivers taking the written & road test EVERY time they renew - the higher the score, the longer the renewal is good.
The cost of such testing has got to be cheaper than all the collisions . . .

Lin · February 01, 2010, 08:19:55 AM

Insurance statistics show, that contrary to common sense, ABS brakes do not reduce accidents. One theory about why is the concept of homeostasis of risk. In short, if you decrease risk in one way, people will find a way to increase it in another way. For example, thinking, "I now have better brakes so I can go faster or brake later."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risk_homeostasis

expressbus · February 05, 2010, 01:27:14 PM

Lin,
Amen Brother. I work for a DOT and truer words have never been spoken. Every item that has increased driver occupant safety has been met with negative changes in driver behavior.

compedgemarine · February 05, 2010, 07:24:19 PM

Lin, there was a study done a while back of "safe roads vrs dangerous roads". the base theory was that an interstate being wide and reasonably straight was "safe" and the winding mountain roads were dangerous because they are narrow, winding and climb and decend a lot. what was found was the opposite. when you make the road safe and easy people became lax and unfocused causing accidents from inattention. the mountain roads were shown as fairly safe because the drivers are too scared to not pay attention. same problem as found with the anti lock brakes, etc. I for one am annoyed that they do not teach drivers ed in school anymore. I was at the DMV for my class A license and a woman was there to get a class B to drive a passenger bus and had failed the written test more than a dozen times. For my driver test the first guy to get in the truck used all his points and had not finished the first part. sooner or later these idiots get a license and are out there reading the paper with the cruise on and a knee against the wheel hurtling down the road at 80 mph.
Steve

belfert · February 05, 2010, 07:40:40 PM

Is a road test at every renewal really going to cut down on accidents other than people who can't drive for medical reasons? I'm fairly certain I could do better on a road test today than I did at age 18 almost twenty years ago. Certain driving behaviors take months or years of experience to learn.

Schools locally here don't teach driver's ed anymore either, but driver's ed is still required to get a license. It is taught by private driving schools instead. The state of MN has for a few years required young drivers to have their permit for a longer period before they can get a driver's license.

BG6 · February 06, 2010, 12:12:58 PM

It doesn't matter whether you are holding the phone to your ear or using a handsfree system. The problem is "IMMERSION" -- you get so involved in the conversation that you pay less attention to the road.

Since the laws encourage people to use handsfree systems, there is no effect.

Interestingly, the problem doesn't affect people using other types of radio, where it's necessary to key a microphone to talk. The physical action of keying, holding the key, then releasing it helps prevent immersion.

Me? I just ignore the law. Any cop with so much time on his hands that he can stop me to give me a $25 ticket for using the phone is going to find some other reason to make a stop.

One friend of mine got stopped for talking on her phone without a handsfree system, and after the cop handed her the citation, she demanded that he call his sergeant. When he finally did so, she showed the sergeant the citation, then invited him to look all through her car, which was a rental. The only cell phone which was found was in the trunk, in her suitcase, and had a dead battery which wouldn't even power up the phone. The trooper said "you must have put it away when you got into the trunk."

She then informed the sergeant that she had recorded the entire incident on her pocket recorder, that she had noticed the Dashcam on the first trooper's patrol car and would be demanding the video as evidence (and as proof that she had kept her left elbow leaned on the door, thus couldn't have been in the trunk), and that the minute she got to her hotel she would be calling her attorney to file the lawsuit for false arrest.

I dunno how much she got from the agency (the out-of-court settlement included confidentiality), but I will note that the check arrived in early January, and she has extended her Hawai'i vacation twice because it's still rainy weather at home.