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NY Police Get Tall SUVs To Combat Texting While Driving
coondoggie writes "The New York State Police have a new weapon to fight the plague of drivers that insist on texting while operating their vehicle: tall SUVs. Most recently reported by the AP, NY has begun operating a fleet of 32 unmarked SUVs that let troopers more easily peer down into a car to see if the driver is texting or not. 'Major Michael Kopy, commander of the state police troop patrolling the corridor between New York City and Albany, quoted a Virginia Tech study that found texting while driving increased the chance of a collision by 23 times and took eyes off the road for five seconds — more than the length of a football field at highway speed. Kopy worries that as teens get their driver's licenses, texting on the road will become more prevalent. "More people are coming of driving age who have had these hand-held devices for many years, and now as they start to drive, they're putting the two together, texting and driving, when they shouldn't."'"
And how far does an SUV travel while the driver tries to see whether a person in another car is texting?
Stilts.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stilts :)
..don't panic
How about instead of deploying a gas guzzling waste of taxpayer money, they mount a video camera to the left and right on their roof and wire it into their existing displays?
Its about sending a message. I am completely competent in my driving abilities. That said, I do not want to die in a collision because some self absorbed cunt insists on texting while driving. Same goes for drunk drivers. Drunks rarely kill themselves when they wreck.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
speed and tailgate even when their lights aren't on. Because they're trained professionals. (Yes, I'm being sarcastic.)
Did you know 80 to 90% of the moderators on slashdot wouldn't recognize a troll even if one dragged them under a bridge.
It's not the law that's "bad".
The people who text while trying to drive are the bad actors here.
Your logic is so flawed you must be insane.
A 63 year old friend of mine got a smartphone to take payments with for his business...
less than a week later he rear-ended someone on the freeway while texting.
any age can be a fucking dumbass.
My experience is that most people have great difficulty altering daily behavior habits
Counter-example: Seat belt use went from about 11% in 1981, when the first mandatory seat belt laws took effect, to about 75% today.
People who text while driving get punished by getting into accidents.
What about the people who weren't texting that they hit?
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
I don't suppose there's any chance that the cost of the police buying this with taxpayer money will be made up with reduced collisions, accidents, injuries/fatalities, etc.? My knee-jerk reaction would be that it will not, and they're probably just using it as an excuse to get some new fancy cars. 32 new cars pulling people over at times a regular police cruiser would not, just for texting while driving, doesn't seem like it's going to make huge changes in driver behavior... or any changes at all.
The thing about knee-jerk reactions is that they're normally wrong.
Texting whilst driving is one of the worst things you can do on the roads and having driven in the US, most drivers are barely competent to begin with. If we took 100 experienced US drivers and gave them a Western Australian driving test, I'd be surprised if 2 passed. The WA test hinges on vehicle control, looking and signalling, three skills that US motorists seem to lack in spades. If we made them take the test in a manual, I'd be surprised if 1 passed (I passed in a manual, flow gets a lot harder when you've got to understand how gears work).
You're right that it is driver behaviour that needs to change, ultimately fines dont cut it in this regard. People who text and drive are dangerous (doubly so if you're naive enough to think you're capable of doing it safely, Dunning-Kruger in effect) and not just to themselves but to others. Repeated tests have shown that texting whilst driving has a very negative affect of driving abilities. Unfortunately sometimes the only way to get though to people is to take their phones and cars away, so unless suspensions are issued, people will keep writing this off under the old revenue conspiracy theory and as you pointed out, refuse to change habits.
Really, its not a question of if new vehicles will be effective, rather its a question of whether the punishments are effective and from what I saw driving in the US no-one seems to care about the punishments for anything.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
Its about sending a message
Isn't that what got us into this mess?
Science is all about firing a drunk pig out of a cannon just to see what happens.
There's supposedly some "alternative" way to make it zoom in/out by holding and then moving up/down, but I can't get it to work.
To zoom with one hand, do a double-tap, and upon the second tap, hold. Then slide down to zoom in and up to zoom out.
i.e. tap, tap+hold... (while holding) slide up/down
Dropbox drops it like it's hot.
Get a different car, seriously. I am about the same height (slightly taller) and will still fit in the front seat of most cars. Some are impossible (who needs a Ferrari or Jaguar anyway?) but most cars are fine. Key here is to make sure that the height of the seat is adjustable and that there is no sun roof installed.
The strange thing is that there only seems to be a limited correlation between the overall size of the car and the height available between seat and roof in the front seat. A (new) Mini is fine, a Renault Laguna Estate is like you describe.
In the back it is even worse, mostly because the seats are usually placed a bit higher than the front seats to make sure the rear passengers still have a view to the front. There's only a handful of cars where I can sit up straight in the rear.
beauty is only a light switch away
People who text and drive are dangerous (doubly so if you're naive enough to think you're capable of doing it safely, Dunning-Kruger in effect) and not just to themselves but to others. Repeated tests have shown that texting whilst driving has a very negative affect of driving abilities. Unfortunately sometimes the only way to get though to people is to take their phones and cars away, so unless suspensions are issued, people will keep writing this off under the old revenue conspiracy theory and as you pointed out, refuse to change habits.
It's not even the texting that makes them dangerous. What makes them dangerous is that they think it's okay to have their attention focused elsewhere while they continue maneuvering several thousand pounds of machinery. The text messaging is just the latest example, but there have always been examples of people reading, putting on makeup, eating, playing with the radio, talking on the phone, etc. People just don't understand, or care, that driving IS the activity you're doing. In a logical world, these people would be the biggest supporters of public transportation, so they can do those things without risk.
I would be fine with you not wearing a seat belt, as long as it does not affect me when you get into an accident, including:
- my health insurance premium does not go up because you pose a greater risk of requiring treatment (if your answer is: differentiate premiums between seat belt wearers and libertarians, how do you monitor that differentiating without an even greater breach of your Liberties?)
- my taxes don't go up because you are now a burden on the emergency medical care system
- the road is not closed off longer because the accident is now more serious, leading to more traffic jams.
- if an accident is my fault, my punishment does not go up because you are now dead/seriously injured instead of not/lightly injured
- the police and medical staff are still available to help me and not wasting their time on the greater time required to investigate/treat a serious or fatal accident compared to a fender bender. If your answer is: hire more police and medical staff, than realize that this will drive up the cost of said staff by more demand. If your answer is: train more staff to increase supply, this will cost taxpayer money since those institutions are generally subsidized, and/or take potential candidates from other fields where they would actually add value to society rather than scrape your libertarian remains off the tarmac.
In other words, your decision to not wear a seat belt places a claim on a number of scarce goods if you get into an accident, which affects more people than just you.
Being 6'4", I have to drive with my head stabilized against the roof, when I'm not ducking to see the stop light. If I sit further back, either I can't steer properly, or my head bounces off the top of the windshield when braking and occasionally the top of door when turning right.
Was this the largest automobile you could afford?
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)