Teen Driving Safety Tip
Keep Your Thumbs on the Steering Wheel!
Text messaging is a nationwide teen driving menace.
Eight out of 10 of all teen driving crashes are attributed to driver distraction, says the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. There’s no telling how many of those teen drivers specifically named texting as their distraction, but consider this.
Last year, 900 children, ages 15 to 19, were surveyed about teen driving. Nearly 75 percent of them admitted that cell phone texting was their biggest threat to safety while driving. Even with that knowledge, almost half of the group said that they still text and drive simultaneously.
It doesn’t take a mathematician to figure out, that adds up to big trouble. Teen drivers are aware of the dangers associated with texting-while-driving, but they are unwilling to stop.
Government Intervention
Someone wants to make teen drivers keep their hands on the wheel and off their keypads. It’s the government.
First there was President Barack Obama’s “beer summit,” just a friendly conversation between guys about race discrimination. Now his administration is proposing a “texting-while-driving summit.”
No question, in both cases everyone would agree something needs to be done, but no one is quite sure of the grand plan that will accomplish it.
Here’s what the government is thinking:
Fourteen states have passed some sort of texting while driving ban. But, considering the sobering teen driving statistics (Mile for mile, teen drivers are four times more likely to have an accident than older drivers), that’s not good enough. So the federal government wants to take matters into its own hands.
One possibility is that it will strongly encourage states to make it illegal to text or e-mail while operating a motor vehicle. The carrot at the end of the stick is federal highway funding. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood suggests the feds cut, by 25 percent, a state’s annual allotment of road funds if it doesn’t comply. Hello, national drunken driving ban, reinvented.
Parents recognize this little game of mind aerobics. We may have even tried something like it in our home, for teen driving. The authority figure responds to undesirable behaviors with the threat of withdrawing support. Parents also know that this tactic often works.
One could guess that, with teen driving safety, and a lot of money involved, more states will be passing bans on texting.
The Virginia Tech Transportation Institute did a study and concluded that the task of texting took a driver’s eyes off the road longer than any other driving distraction. Think about how long it takes to dial a cell phone, change a radio station, peek in the glove box, or any number of other teen driving tasks. Texting takes longer; 4.6 seconds over a 6-second interval. That’s equal to a driver traveling the length of a football field at 55 mph, without ever looking at the road.
Will Teens Be Targeted?
Some teen drivers are seeing another side to this issue. We all know that when we see a teen driving, the odds are very, VERY good that he or she is also texting. Will teen driving result in unfair police profiling?
Perhaps. But it’s not like that hasn’t happened before. At one time people thought cell phone use while driving was dangerous. Some cities passed laws to curb this nasty habit. Were those laws passed to target white-collar, three-piece suit types and soccer moms?
Here’s some maybe (not-so) surprising news: When it comes to handheld communications, teens today text more than they talk on the phone. Way more: about an 8 to 1 margin. In the U.S. as of June last year, teenagers from the age of 13-17 sent or received 1,742 text messages per month on average, and only 231 cellular calls. On the average for all ages, it’s 357 text messages and 204 cellular calls.
Some wonder why teens, and particularly teen drivers, would prefer texting. One would think speaking to someone would be easier and faster than punching a series of tiny buttons. Whenever I see a teen driving like that, I ask him.
Recently on a teen driving blog on this issue, several individuals claimed to send or receive 250 to 500 messages a day.
“I think that this generation of kids is going to have some serious issues,” said one blog responder, “because they are walking around with their heads in their phones, instead of experiencing the world.”
How will it be enforced?
The big question is, if a law gets passed in your state banning texting and driving, (It likely will, and will be justified), how will police enforce such a ban?
Police have a hard enough time enforcing seat belt laws. Do we think they’re going to be cruising around looking for teen driving and texting scofflaws? Couldn’t their time be better spent doing something like getting drunk drivers off the streets?
Teen driving is a multi-task activity, and in fairness some teen drivers can handle it. If they are being pursued by a policeman, they might just put a quick end to the texting, turn off their phones and toss them aside.
Then again, there’s that little matter of the SIM card and the SIM card reader. Sometimes, even deleted messages and e-mails can be retrieved. Prosecutors can subpoena phone records, if proof of cell phone texting was necessary to win a case.
Teen driving is a lot more regulated than it used to be. Do we really need a law for teen drivers to realize that texting behind the wheel is stupid? Can legislation really stop stupid?
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Tags: government, safety, Teen Driving, tip
