Tag Archives: cell phone

One Year Anniversary of Cell Phone Ban in Manitoba

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Although a ban in Manitoba has been in place for one year now, Manitobans are still talking and texting behind the wheel of a car. A CAA Manitoba survey states that 99.4 percent of the respondents had still seen motorists talking or texting behind the wheel and 30 percent admit to talking on their phone while driving.

The survey also shows that 68 percent of all respondents believe violators will not be caught and ticketed by police. Liz Peters, CAA Manitoba’s Public and Government Affairs Manager, admits that the enforcement is hard because police and RCMP have to be sure the driver is first violating the law to pull them over. She does say that 2,600 tickets have been issued in the City of Winnipeg, and also understands that the RCMP has also been active in rural areas. Peters believes compliance from citizens will be achieved after more offenders have been caught.

58 percent of all respondents believed demerit points should also be added to a $200 fine.
The survey interviewed 11,000 Manitobans. 48 percent owned a Bluetooth, but 38 percent use it “only on occasion”.

Peters feels that the study results show the opportunity to advance public awareness. She believes that people know about the law, but don’t know how dangerous talking or texting on a cell phone is while operating a vehicle. She notes that you are 23 times more likely to get in an accident while texting behind the wheel of a car.

Overall, Peters does feel that the law is effective but will take time to sink in with the public.

Respondents from the survey show that 49 percent say they believe the ban has made our roads safer.

Ford Supports Ban on Cell Phones While Driving

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Ford Motor says it supports the federal ban of use of cell phones while driving. Ford now has a Sync hands-free voice-operating switching system which allows drivers to use voice commands to control all audio outputs and navigation as well as making phone calls when cell phones are connected to the Sync system.

Rep. Carolyn McCarthy introduced last month the Safe Drivers Act of 2011. The proposed act involves the Department of Transportation to set a new national standard of prohibiting all usage of cell phones except under certain circumstances or emergencies.

Ford is currently the first vehicle maker to support the bill. “Distracted driving is an important issue, and that’s why Ford became the first automaker to support proposed legislation banning handheld texting while driving in 2009 and why we are proud to support Rep. McCarthy’s legislation,” said Pete Lawson, Ford’s vice president of government affairs.

McCarthy’s legislation allows devices that allow the use of hands-free products like Sync.

The Department of Transportation is also going to be conducting a study as to whether mobile phones and other devices are distracting while using a hands-free device.

“Ford believes hands-free, voice-activated technology significantly reduces that risk by allowing drivers to keep their hands on the wheel and eyes on the road,” Lawson said.

Penalties for Cell Phone Usage While Driving

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Texting and driving is illegal in New York, and fines are now higher than ever.

“When you hear that noise go off it’s almost like its suspense you have to know who it is, you got to know what they want and I know for me I get excited every time I hear it so I look and I see,” says Brent Fallon of Endicott about cell phones.

Addictions grow just as fast as technology.

Fatal accidents from texting and driving now have New York State charging $150 and adding three points to your license if pulled over and ticketed, and police will no longer need a traffic violation to pull someone over if they suspect an individual of using a cell phone.

A local city department is now implementing new procedures to try and catch violators.

“We’ll probably start off with some unmarked car, these cars will be out at the traffic lights looking for people text messaging while they’re sitting at the light, and as they pull away the officer’s can go ahead and enforce the new law,” says Lt. Gerald Mullins of the Vestal Police Department.

Mullins also states that officers look for the same signs as drunk driving, like swerving.

“Well it will be much easier to make the charge for one, I regard texting as more dangerous than cell phone talking because you have to completely take your eyes off the road to sit there and type,” Broome County Sheriff David Harder says.

“Frankly people think that they’re the exception to the rule and I’m glad that there is a law against it because it is deadly to do that and I always remind my kids about it and other kids too,” says Barbara Schwerd of Westchester.

The new law applies to any use of all options cell phones carry, but police, firefighters, and EMTs are exempt from it.

The law also does not penalize the use of a handheld device stuck to a surface or a GPS.  For more information on handheld device law and the legal penelties of disobying these laws, contact Estey & Bomberger, LLP for more information.

Smartphones Tied to a Quarter of All Car Crashes

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Cell phones and smart phones are continuing to threaten American drivers each day as motorists continue to text and talk on the phone. The Governors Highway Safety Association conducted a study overlooking 350 scientific documents on the subject and came to the conclusion that drivers are distracted while driving up to half of the time on the road.

While driving and using a cell phone raises risks and dangers of causing accidents, texting and driving is proven to be even riskier than making a phone call while driving. The GHSA has estimated that 15 to 25 percent of all crashes involving fatalities are from driving distractions.

“Despite all that has been written about driver distraction, there is still a lot that we do not know,” said GHSA executive director Barbara Harsh. “Clearly, more studies need to be done addressing both the scope of the problem and how to effectively address it.”

The GHSA would like to see every state improve all efforts to curb distracted driving, recommending that all states ban texting and driving and cell phone use from novice drivers entirely. It also says states should do a more effective job in enforcing laws already out.

The Banning of Cell Phones

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A new Nevada law now bans talking and texting on cell phones while driving with the exception of the use of a hands-free device. However, a new study now shows that banning the use of cell phones in car does not decrease the number of car accidents. Mackenzie Warren from News 4 went deep into research and discovered that cell phone usage is not the main reason behind distracted driving, adding that no evidence has proved a hands-free device to be any less risky than a hand-held device behind the wheel. The study, conducted by the Governors Highway Safety Association, does not say that texting or talking on the phone while driving is safe, however it does say no real evidence has proved cell phone bans have cut down the number of car crashes.

The study used long-term data from all the nine states which currently do have a ban on cell phone usage behind the wheel, in which Nevada has just been added to the list. However the study also contradicts itself by saying drivers are distracted about 50 percent of the time on the road, yet people can learn to adapt to actually pay closer attention while driving and talking on the phone.

It also goes into how many drivers focus more while being at a risk, such as passing a construction zone.

“It’s popular to do. It looks like you’re doing something, but in today’s driving market there are a multitude of distractions of with phones are only one,” explains TMCC political scientist Fred Lokken. Lokken says it is still common for lawmakers to take action despite any data that may appear. He added the law passed Nevada’s legislature without much controversy.

Lokken also says the Governors Highway Safety Association is a great source for any information, along with another group called the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety which revealed interesting information. “In each of the states that have imposed texting and hands-free requirements for cars, the [IIHS] literally found an uptick in accident rates-not a downtick.”

Lokken believes this is because drivers now try to hide using their cell phone usage, rather than keeping their phones in front while they can still see the road. “They were doing it up here and still had some sense of the field of vision, they’re now trying to do it down here where they’ve broken the plane of what’s going on which is what increases the accidents,” he says.

Cell Phone Citations are Higher for 2011

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The Cheyenne Police Department has given out 321 citations for the use of cell phones while driving for the first half of the year in the city, meaning the department is now expecting a higher number of citations this year. Last year a total of 481 citations were cited all together.

Department spokesman Sgt. Rob Dafoe says the increase is particularly in part due to special details which have targeted the problem.

“We had a special mobilization, among others, from May to June targeting cell phone use, and we had 63 citations from that effort alone,” he said.

“Talking with some of the officers, it’s like fishing in a tank out there. There are so many people doing it – and honestly most of them have ‘2’ county license plates. They know about the law and are just choosing to ignore it.”

Laramie County license plates begin with the number “2”.

Dafoe states that this and last year’s citations consisted mostly of tickets for talking on cell phones while driving with no hands-free device, and only a small percentage is due from texting.

The city currently has a fine of $125 for talking or texting while driving, and is a primary offense which means officers have the right to pull over anyone who is suspected of cell phone usage behind the wheel.

As of last year, the state now includes a $75 fine for texting while driving which is also considered a primary offense.

Councilman Don Pierson is a former police chief of Cheyenne who voted against the bill when it passed, agreeing that texting should be considered a primary offense due to the attention it takes from drivers on the road, but says talking on the phone should be a secondary offense, meaning officers only have the right to cite someone if they’ve already been pulled over for another offense.

Pierson also add that even though the ban began two years ago, he still has yet to see a study proving the number of reduced accidents in the city limits.

“We were supposed to get that report a year after it went into effect, and I still haven’t seen that,” he said. “If I had to guess, I would say that it hasn’t had a major impact on accident rates. There are a lot of things that distract drivers, and that ordinance really only tackles one thing.”
Council President Mark Rinne says he too would like to see a study along the same lines.

“It would be interesting to see that kind of data, if there is any like it,” he said. “I still see a lot of people ignoring it while I’m driving around.”

New Law Enforcment Reduces Distracted Driving

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Ray LaHood, Secretary for the Department of Transportation, says new strong laws and “highly visible” police enforcement have cut down texting and talking on cell phones while driving by a miraculous number in two cities.

New projects which have been federally funded have measured the increased effects of new law enforcement and public education seminars and campaigns in Syracuse, New York, and Hartford, Connecticut.

“These findings show that strong laws, combined with highly visible police enforcement, can significantly reduce dangerous texting and cellphone use behind the wheel,” says LaHood in a statement. “Based on these results, it is crystal clear that those who try to minimize this dangerous behavior are making a serious error in judgment, especially when half a million people are injured and thousands more are killed in distracted driving accidents.”

Each pilot program conducted in both the states was supported by $200,000 in federal funds and $100,000 in state funds. The state labeled the pilot programs as “Phone in One Hand, Ticket in the Other,” which was the main media campaign theme based off the successful national seat belt campaign, “Click it or Ticket”.

Syracuse police have issued precisely 9,587 citations during four periods over the past year for drivers talking or texting on their cellphones while driving. Hartford issued 9,658 tickets during the same period for illegal phone use.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration observed the usage of cellphones while driving before and after the new law enforcement crackdown in the two cities which alsooffered public awareness surveys at local DMV’s.

The department stated that both talking on cellphones and texting on cellphones behind an operating vehicle in Syracuse had decline by a third.

Hartford produced even more dramatic results showing a drop of 57 percent, nearly three-quarters, in the usage of talking and texting on cellphones while driving.

The department now says that NHTSA plans to test the same three-part formula, consisting of tough laws, strong enforcement, and public awareness, at now an unidentified statewide level.

A statement from the department says nearly 5,500 fatalities and a half-million injuries were a result from a distracted driver in 2009. Distracted driving traffic fatalities in 2009 account for up to 16 percent of all traffic accidents.

Thirty-four states, including the District of Columbia and Guam, currently have enacted texting-while-driving bangs, while nine states, including the District of Columbia and the Virgin Islands, have banned all handheld cellphone use together while driving.

Bills Seek Banning Cell Phone Usage in Cars

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Texting or talking on cell phones while operating a vehicle can possibly become illegal soon if one of two bills on Tuesday is approved by a House committee, however the use of hands-free devices would still be legal.

The House Transportation and Highways and Public Works Committee approved both bills, one of which was approved by Rep. Austin Badon dealing with any vehicles, by a 12-2 vote in New Orleans.

The original bill was meant for the use of commercial vehicles only but was changed for the use of all vehicles.

“No one has the right to put another person’s life in jeopardy,” said Badon. Drivers who use hand-held phones are “four times as likely to get into crashes serious enough to harm themselves.”

Passing the bill is believed to allow the state half of the $94 million it would receive in federal funds divided amongst all the states that ban the use of cell phones while driving, making it a primary offense.

Officers have always had the right to pull over a driver and ticket them as long as something is declared as a primary offense.

“It’s a new carrot dangling out there,” Badon said.

Badon’s bill provides the first violation in exchange for $100 the second for around $150, and $50 more for the next two violations, giving the fourth an opportunity to attest to get it lowered.

Rep. Hollis Downs was approved to proceed all fines from the Transportation Trust Fund to help pay for improvements along the highway. He said that since the money is an excess, it will not be taking away any funds from any agencies.

Safety Group Calls for More Cell Phone Ban Data

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It is currently legal in 41 states allowing drivers to use cell phones, and a leading highway safety organization recommends keeping it that way.

The Governors Highway Safety Association, GHSA, believes states should not ban anything yet until effective research has been done by states.

“The problem is the research is conflicting on the issue,” executive director of the group Barbara Harsha says, who advises on safety traffic. “We don’t know if handheld bans are effective, and we don’t know if they actually make the problem worse.”

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety last year said it found no reductions in crashes after the use of cell phones while driving was banned in California, Connecticut, New York, and Washington, D.C.

The National Safety Council believes handheld cell phones don’t expand and cover enough territory. “We think there is enough research to enact total bans, handheld, and hands-free,” say senior director of transportation initiatives at the NSC David Teater. “And there’s no evidence that hands-free devices provide any safety impact.”

The federal agency that tracks road deaths, otherwise known as the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, says “we feel strongly there is robust evidence on the dangers of distracted driving,” says the administration’s director of communications.

The GHSA had made its recommendations after looking at research on distracted driving since the year 2000, which are about 350 studies.

This of course led to questions from governors and state legislators who are trying to unravel the unfolding aspects of road safety.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood has made curbing distracted driving as a severe issue.

Some corporations are also trying to restrict the use of cellphones from employees while being in company vehicles. The use of cell phones is limited among federal workers.

Nine states and the District of Columbia have banned cell phones for all drivers, which makes the greatest motive from lawmakers.

Texting while driving is still illegal in 34 states, not including the District of Columbia. Twelve states had it banned in 2009, and 11 banned it last year, but only two have so far this year.

No states currently ban all cell phone use by all drivers of all ages.