Tracking down texters
Share this pageCalifornia recorded a 20 percent drop in the number of collisions since the state in 2008 passed a law banning the use of hand-held cell phones while driving, but the effects of the ban on texting while driving have been less clear, in part because it is much harder to enforce, lawmakers said. [...]
“We are finally getting a wider awareness and acknowledgment of the nature of the problems,” said state Sen. Joe Simitian, D-Palo Alto, who authored a texting-while-driving ban in California that went into effect Jan. 1, 2009.
“It’s clear that people understand the dangers now in a way that wasn’t the case a decade ago.”
Simitian notes that texting while driving continues to be a big problem, even in states such as California where it is illegal. A 2008 nationwide telephone survey by Nationwide Insurance found that 18 percent of people who own cell phones send or read text messages when driving. That increased to 40 percent among drivers who were younger than 30, according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety.
But Simitian believes that with the help of the federal government, California can begin to drastically curb the number of texting-while-driving accidents.
“California has taken a good first step. We have saved a lot of lives and that is good, but we can and we should do more,” he said. [...]
View the full story (San Francisco Examiner)