NTSB Urges Ban of Cell Phone Use While Driving

My car was rear-ended by some clown talking on his cellphone, so I'm all in favor of the ban. It can be as dangerous as someone under the influence when driving.

 

I have a package IV with the hands free device. I am a good driver, overall. However, whenever I'm on the phone, my driving sucks. Even with the handsfree (and I try to keep my conversations to under 1 minute), I can't tell you what has happened on the road for the duration of the phone call. Without the phone, I can give you all sorts of details.

The brain is competing with processing visual and audio cues needed for driving vs processing the conversation from the phone. I cannot switch back and forth easily (there is no such thing as multitasking, just switching your focus from one thing to another) and I don't kid myself that I can.

Ban them all. I'll gladly suffer the loss on my built in bluetooth if the ban extended to everyone. For repeat offenders, make the fine ridiculously expensive and a point on your driver's record (cut them slack (lower fine, no point) on the first ticket as a warning, nail 'em to the wall from that point on).

I'm good with banning food, makeup, etc too. But freaking start somewhere! And electronic devices would be a great somewhere to start.

 

Zealous cops and colluding judges?

 

Imagine that a law is passed tomorrow which bans cellphone uses. What do you all think will happen?

 

altogether or whilst driving? you think cops and judges want to convict people of talking on the phone whilst driving when they were not?

 

While driving, of course.

Do you think people will stop doing it, or will they find ways to go around the law?

 

some will stop, some will try to find eays around. pretty tough to detect the hands free. i got a ticket for driving without a seat belt. i have never been pulled over while wearing a seatbelt. i still don't wear it unless my wife nags me. i have even considered laying a fake belt over my shoulder so it looked like i had one on.

 

Enforcement would be a nightmare, IMO. I do not expect such a law to be straightforward. There would likely be exceptions and loopholes and stuff that make lawyers jump for joy.

I'm not convinced that a law is the best way to solve this problem, which I wholeheartedly agree is dangerous and real.

In my mind, this issue is analogous to abortion. As someone who is pro-life, I don't believe that outlawing abortion is the best way to reduce its occurrence.

 

As Feri said, we have laws here in Australia banning the use of a cell phone while driving, unless it is hands free. However, I see people using their phones every day, despite the law and the publicity we have had on it here in Sydney.

Every now and then, the local police run a campaign on phone use and photograph the driver, then pull them over. They did a big exercise - every day for a week in the same spot - outside a school, complete with a TV news camera, so the offenders also appeared on that night's news. They caught one offender, not once, but EVERY day of the campaign .

Obviously, some people either think that they are above the law, or are just so dumb that they do not learn from the experience.

 

As I read the post and think more about the matter, I suspect the best answer is to control the matter via the cell phone itself. They all have GPS now .... when they detect movement over a certain speed, they cease to function. If you have, or witness an emergency, pull to the side of the rioad, and whammo ... she works again.

I believe such a device would be difficult to disable .... I could be wrong, and for sure there are some that will know how .... but certainly I am not that clever.

Another help would be to configure the regulation/law such that an investigating officer following an accident would be authorized to check the cell for the most rrecent call. In the event it reveals that the phone was in use moments before, that becomes admissible evidence, and perhaps helpful in establishing fault.

 

"The initiative would apply to hands-free as well as hand-held devices, but devices installed in the vehicle by the manufacturer would be allowed, the NTSB said."

http://www.cnn.com/2011/12/14/travel/ntsb-cell-phone-ban/index.html

 

Good thought, but it would also prohibit passenger use, and aboard more conveyances than cars: trains, buses, airplanes, etc.

Ultimately the best answer, to my mind, is to prevent people from being the operators of dangerous machinery: robots should control the hazardous machinery and leave humans free to be our distracted selves. Cars, trucks and power drills would all be instructed what to do by a person, but would carry out the instructions autonomously without requiring the undivided constant attention of a person. Undivided constant attention is what we're especially bad at.

Those who desire to operate machinery directly would be allowed to do so - in venues created for the purpose, isolated from the general environment. So there'd be special driving courseways set up to pilot your Corvettes and Ferraris (to their performance limits, too, unimpeded by the environmental constraints that limit them now).

I think this could all be accomplished by next Tuesday, if we'd just get off the damn cell phones for a minute and get busy.

 

On the freeway, I can often tell when people are beginning a conversation on a cell phone while driving.

First they slow down gradually as their attention is directed to placing or receiving the call. They might also weave, but just a little bit, more like a gradual wander from one side of the lane to the other.

Then they maintain that slower speed, until their attention returns to actually driving the car.

Finally, they return to the speed they were driving before, possibly a bit faster.

 

It would be helpful to know where the most fatalities occur, and try to fix that part of the problem first.

 

The arguments being put fort against phone regulation could just as well be made against drunk driving. For a long time we treated drinking and driving as a normal part of life; if not a right, it was certainly tolerated. Eventually we wised up.

Phone use while driving has been shown to be as bad as drunk driving, with or without a hands-free device. As a society, we shouldn't tolerate dangerous behavior just to avoid the difficulties of enforcement. Changing behavior requires social pressure. Enacting a ban is a good first step.

Tom

 

You pretty much nailed this one on the head!!!

 

I'm not against enacting a ban. I am against enacting a blanket, across-the-board ban without consideration for other factors (local politics being an obvious one).

Not only would it be difficult to enforce and cost a lot of money, it might not achieve the intended purpose.

We need to come up with a solution that has a more realistic chance of success in saving lives that costs the least to implement.

A reasonable place to start, IMO, is a ban against texting while driving. But at the end of the day, it is still up to local governments. In Texas many municipalities have enacted such a ban, many others have chosen not to, and governor Perry recently vetoed a bill that would have made it illegal statewide.

 

I second the robotic cars idea... we all just have to move to Nevada to see it happen!

 

An automatic speed-based lockout would probably not be accepted, since passengers would then be unable to use their phones.

But a BIG advantage to a blanket ban on phone use while driving is that it would allow passengers to insist that the driver not use his phone. When it's legal, you can ask the driver not to use his phone, but he's likely to answer that this call is important, or tell you you're being a fuddy-duddy. But if it's illegal, you can respond that it's against the law.

Something similar happened when North Dakota (where I lived at the time) made seat belt use mandatory. I will not even start my car until my passenger is belted in, and I always fasten my belt before starting the car. But I had a few friends who were (I'll be blunt) too frigging stupid to wear seat belts. Once the law was passed it was much easier to get them to buckle up because I could point out that I'd be liable to get a ticket if they did not.

All cell phone use while driving should be banned. First offense should be a really hefty fine, say maybe $500. Second offense should be a one year suspension of driver's license. Third offense should be permanent loss of driving privileges and a year in jail.

We're talking about a behavior that kills thousands and thousands of people! Not some minor infraction like failing to feed a parking meter! After 9/11 America went to war in two different countries, one of which was not even involved, and Americans accepted security measures that significantly impinged on our rights and freedoms. But distracted and impaired drivers kill more Americans every year than the 9/11 terrorists killed that day. Distracted and impaired drivers are terrorists. They should not be treated as though they'd simply parked 45 minutes in a 30-minute zone.