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"Phone In One Hand, Ticket In the Other"

Posted by Soulskill on from the doesn't-that-leave-zero-hands-for-the-wheel dept.

Hugh Pickens writes "The NY Times reports that federal regulators plan a pilot project to test 'high visibility' crackdown efforts to curb cellphone use by drivers in two cities, Hartford and Syracuse, spending $200,000 in each city, while each state would contribute $100,000 more. The Transportation Department says it wants to send the message: 'Phone in One Hand. Ticket in the Other,' and plans on ramping up enforcement on state bans of hands-free phones by motorists, advertising the campaigns and undertaking studies to see if the efforts curb behavior and attitudes. Safety advocates say that curbing the behavior requires enforcement and education, which they say has been clearly evident in past efforts with seat belts with the 'Click It or Ticket Program' (PDF) that helped increase seat belt use to 83% nationally. 'It's time for drivers to act responsibly, put their hands on the wheel and focus on the road,' says Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, who last year called distracted driving an 'epidemic.'"

3 of 419 comments (clear)

  1. Use It, Lose It by DesertNomad · · Score: 5, Interesting

    a good slogan - the driver can reclaim their phone, sealed in the same bag the officer had the driver put it in, down at the station 2 hours later. worse than any ticket.

    1. Re:Use It, Lose It by Volante3192 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      however, it does seem unfair to punish those who can drive while talking without a loss in attention or skill.

      http://arstechnica.com/science/news/2010/03/rare-supertaskers-balance-driving-and-cellphone-use.ars

      The authors also took the time to remind their readers that the supertasking population really is small, so you shouldn't assume you're one of them. Unfortunately, it looks like most people tend to believe they're the exception to this rule, as the authors note, "our studies over the last decade have found that a great many people have the belief that the laws of attention do not apply to them (e.g., they have seen other drivers who are impaired while multi-tasking, but they are the exception to the rule). In fact, some readers may also be wondering if they too are supertaskers; however, we suggest that the odds of this are against them."

  2. Dangerous water for civil liberties? by dmomo · · Score: 5, Interesting

    One thing in all this that frightens me is the fact that by letting law enforcement pull someone over based on something that is not a clear moving violation, but something the can claim to witness happening inside a vehicle,
    we are effectively giving them a tool for racial profiling. This power seems ripe for abuse.

    1) See someone who "looks" like they might be carrying something illegal
    2) Pull them over, obtain cause to search vehicle
    3) If successful, book them
    4) If failure, cite them for cell phone use.

    How easy is it for a customer to obtain proof that they were or were not texting at a given time?
    How easy is it for Law Enforcement?
    Is this proof permissible?