Martin Cooper, who developed the first portable cellphone, recalled testifying before a Michigan state commission about the risks of talking on a phone while driving.
Common sense, said Mr. Cooper, a Motorola engineer, dictated that drivers keep their eyes on the road and hands on the wheel.
Commission members asked Mr. Cooper what could be done about risks posed by these early mobile phones.
“There should be a lock on the dial,” he said he had testified, “so that you couldn’t dial while driving.”
It was the early 1960s.
Yes, multi-tasking on a cellular phone while driving IS dangerous……no question about that. However, with every caveat about using a phone while operating a motor vehicle, there is another side which must be heard.
I am a physically disabled person, and I carry my cellular phone with me wherever I go for safety’s sake. For instance, if my car were to break down on the road and if I didn’t have that phone with me, I could be in serious trouble, since, as I need to use crutches and a wheelchair, I can’t even change a flat tire without help. AAA is just a cellular phone call away.
Texting while driving is just plain STUPID, and should be grounds for forfeiting one’s license to operate a motor vehicle…..permanently…..because when you do that, you’re taking the lives of others in your hands!
Here in California, we can call 1-800-TEL-LCHP to report unsafe drivers or road conditions, thus freeing up 911 for emergency calls.
My wife was hit twice in four years by people who were on their cell phone at the time. In both cases, her car was totalled. In the second case it was a police officer who totalled her car while driving and on the phone. Due to this, she and I have begun to take note the number of men and women in blue on the phone while driving. It is near the 100% mark. How can we expect and encourage our teens (and peers) to stay off the phone while driving when they see law enforcement officials modeling the opposite behavior on a regular basis? Do they need to be on the phone to do their jobs…perhaps…and perhaps they too could model the use of hands-free mobile phone use for the people they are working to protect and serve. Not picking on our men and women in blue, however, leadership usually comes from the top down.
I use a hands-free device called a Bluetooth earpiece, via which I receive calls, and when I need to make a call, I pull over to the side of the road……or off the road……to use my phone and the Bluetooth.
Some now are saying that we shouldn’t talk to our passengers, listen to music and the radio while driving, yet they don’t explain how the police will enforce such a ban. The answer is that they can’t…..and won’t. The only time when a police officer can enforce such a ban is when he or she sees someone in violation of the law, and as you say, police officers violate that ban as well. It is quite literally unenforceable.
Respectfully, I, nor anyone I know is suggesting that we stop listening to the radio or visiting with passengers. I believe the concern is that someone holding a mobile phone has one hand up to their ear and their mind divided between what is going on in and with the car and what is going on in the environment of the person they are comminicating with on the other end of the phone. Their attention is seriously divided in this act. I see people all of the time talking on their mobile phones in the car that are so engaged in the phone conversation (gesturing, laughing, large head nods) that it seems that driving the car is actually a secondary mental priority to their phone conversation activity. Enforcement…well first we’d have to get hands-free mobile phone use a requirement across the country and then it would be as easy as shooting rats in a barrel (forgive the analogy) for police to find violators. Just sit at a red light sometime and start counting the number of mobile phone users passing you.
My understanding is that even talking on a hands-free set turns out to have similar effects as driving drunk. This seems counter-intuitive — at first glance, talking on a hands-free set seems like it should be equivalent to talking to someone in the passenger seat — but it appears to be the case. Apparently passengers in the car will unconsciously pause the conversation whenever something happens that the driver needs to pay attention to; someone on the other end of a phone call obviously can’t do that.