EDITORIAL: Driving While Distracted: Bill Limits New Driver Cell-Phone Use
Posted on: Monday, 13 March 2006, 09:00 CST
By Tulsa World, Okla.
Mar. 13--The Oklahoma Senate has passed a bill that would prohibit those with a learner's driving permit from driving and talking on a cell phone unless they use a hands-free device.
A bill that would have banned cell-phone use by all drivers not using a hands-free device failed.
The measure by Sen. Clark Jolley, R-Edmond, is a step in the right direction, although these inexperienced drivers probably should not be talking on a cell phone at all when at the wheel. Whatever happened to pulling over in a safe location to take a call?
Research indicates that using hands-free equipment does not improve driver performance. It is the phone conversation that distracts, according to the Partnership for Safe Driving.
The partnership claims that those using a cell phone:
* Are twice as likely to miss a traffic signal.
* Are slower to respond to the signals they do detect. Their risk of causing a crash increases by 400 percent. This amount of risk is the same as if the driver were legally intoxicated.
The Harvard University's Center for Risk Analysis estimates that cell phones are the cause of 2,600 deaths and 570,000 injuries each year. Mobile phones also are to blame for 1.5 million crashes per year resulting in property damage.
Anyone who's been around teenagers knows that most teens would rather go without food than their cell phones. But cell-phone use is a bad idea while driving, particularly for beginning drivers lacking experience to make rapid-fire judgment calls.
The habit of talking on the cell phone while driving isn't just dangerous for beginning drivers. It can be a problem for anyone else who gets in their way.
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Copyright (c) 2006, Tulsa World, Okla.
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Source: Tulsa World
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