Damn cell phones

Very clever, but how will that help you if the cross signals are also
green?

There's so much running of orange and red lights around here, I wish
the city would put up signs saying "ON RED LIGHT WATCH FOR CROSS
TRAFFIC".

 

I wonder if there are statistics on how many lives cell phones save
versus how many traffic deaths cell phones cause....

Otto

 

I have nothing against people using cell phones while they drive.... the
annoying thing is, it seems like they forget how to drive. They usually start
driving 10 mph under the speed limit, forget to signal, and forget just about
every other driving etiquette.

Am I the only one that can drive normally while conversing on the phone? It's
like rubbing your tummy and patting your head at the same time, to some
people.




____________________________________
Do not write below this line. Reserved for me.

 

snip

But you're wrong. Driving with a cell phone is NOT the same as
talking to a passenger. It's intuitive that it would be, but it's
not. There's something about it that prevents the driver from paying
attention to the road much more certainly than does talking to a
passenger. There was a young woman here in central Ohio a year or two
ago who came to a stop sign while talking on her cell phone, stopped,
looked both ways, and then proceeded to pull right out in front of a
an onrushing semi. She was killed instantly because she was so
engrossed in the phone that she looked right at the truck but wasn't
able to register it as a hazard. This just does not happen because
there's a passenger in the car, but this kind of brain disengagement
definitely does happen secondary to cell phones. This is a perfect
example of why the laws against them must not allow "hands-free" phone
use in moving vehicles. It's not the dialing that's so dangerous,
it's the degree to which the ensuing phone call distracts the driver.
Ron

 

I only cross-posted so the poster would get the message

Would you believe that my uncle actually taught his kids how to drive
with their knees? He actually drove with his knees with his mother
(my grandmother, maybe 80 at the time) in the car with him! He and
his kids all live in GA and the family doesn't speak of him for other
reasons.

 

As others have pointed out, this leads to more distraction by drivers
desperate to
reconnect. Though the device would still provide amusement in theaters,
restaurants and doctors' waiting rooms.

How about a remote, targeted ignition killer instead? By targeted, I mean
vehicle-specific, so you won't be indiscriminately shutting down all the
drivers around you. I read an article a couple of years ago about police
departments looking into these EMP guns as a safer alternative to high-speed
pursuits.

Such a killer could accomplish 4 things:
1) slow the unsafe driver down
2) driver would likely begin paying more attention to the vehicle and
driving than to the phone convo
3) force them to pull off the road (which most ppl wish they'd do while
their cell is glued to their head)
4) the call would likely -- though not necessarily for those tragically
addicted -- be disconnected, as they must tend to the business of pulling
off the road and trying to find out what's wrong with their vehicle

Nothing is foolproof, so a couple of potential problem areas come to mind.
Some dimwits might not bother pulling off the road and would simply sit
there dead in the middle of the freeway. But generally, when people, even
dimwits, experience car probs they tend to pull it off the road, at least to
the shoulder area.
Also, once word of these ignition killers got out, the driver would just
assume that's what somebody did to him/her and they would be back on the
road, cell firmly affixed to ear, in a matter of seconds.

BUT.. perhaps the realization that these devices MIGHT be used on them
(repeatedly) might be enough to discourage the behavior. Nobody likes
inconvenience, not even tragically addicted cell users.

Okay, so I suggested the above method mostly just to vent. I fully realize
that we can't have millions of drivers out there shutting each other down on
our highways on a whim. Traffic jams are bad enough as it is!

But I've had numerous close calls (pardon pun) with dipshits who didn't move
their phone a micron during the entire close encounter with my vehicle.
Most of them didn't even realize they almost hit me!
Think what you will about other distractions -- music, reading, eating,
applying makeup, yadda yadda..
The vast majority (95% or so) of all close calls I've had involved cell
users. I've routinely driven the Houston, TX area for decades, so I have a
substantial amount of personal experience from which to draw conclusions.

There's just something extra consuming about talking on the phone. I'm sure
it's partly due to the emotional element of having another person in your
ear, be it a phone sex, a spousal disagreement over finances or maybe little
Johnny got expelled from school (again).

Now some of you may be thinking (correctly) that it's a numbers game. The
"official" studies say cellphones are no more distracting than the other
distracting activities drivers engage in. So be it. Those other activities
may be equally distracting, BUT.. If there are more people using cellphones
while driving than doing those other things while driving, the result is
statistically greater potential for accidents caused by a cell user. If
more people were driving while reading than driving while cell'ing, we'd
bitch about the readers more than we bitch about the cell'ers.

 

turns em red, very quickly. used for emergency vehicles.

 

Yes. I was behind a woman leaving San Pedro and by the time we got to Long
Beach, she had changed her blouse, put on deodorant and makeup and brushed
her hair.

 

Donorcyclist.

 

Wouldn't it be nice to have one of these gadgets in your car! ThenSeems to me that cell phones in moving cars creates 3 groups of
drivers. Sort of like walking while chewing gum;

1. Those who can, and do, without difficulty.

2. Those who can't, and so don't.

3. Those who shouldn't, but do anyway.

It's really only those in group 3 that concern me. A 'stupidity' test
for cell phone endorsement on your licence, maybe??

Nah, that wouldn't last long in any democracy which insists on
allowing idiots to vote.

Regards, Al.

 

I know when I am drving and talking on my cell phone that when the call is
dropped in the middle of a conversation I swerve, accelerate and look
down... sure as heck hope I am not tailgating somebody like you in my rusty
old truck when this happens.

--

 

My favorite was when I was driving on the expressway and first the woman
used one of those eyelash curlers (in traffic - moving) and then got out an
eyeliner (?) pencil and drew a line of makup under her eye. Imagine if she
had been hit or had to stop fast during EITHER thing??? Agggggh!

 

It is good to know how to do that, but, just like teaching your kids how to
roll-stop when there is snow on the ground, you HAVE to emphasize when it is
and is NOT appropriate to do. It is really handy to do when you are trying
to pry off the top of a beer bottle in traffic, though (kidding)

 

Hey, it is called N A T U R A L S E L E C T I O N!

 

With the call from an irate boss or mother in law?

 

Oh Yeah! Now we have more idiots distracted trying to shut down a vehicle
with another gadget. Scrolling through all the options menus trying to find
a make and model of specific vehicle, so now we have two idiots on the road
distracted instead of one.

 

What might help stop it is if police were to put it on accident
reports and tickets and the insurance companies were allowed to gouge
for cell phone use for every claim or ticket. Just like speeding
tickets, it's not the ticket cost that stops the people it's the
insurance financial body blow that stops most.

Just ask any young kid paying $6G a year for insurance on his rice
rocket if it's the tickets cost, or the insurance cost he's worried
about.

 

I will agree completely with this statement. Its not the 'distractions'
that make it dangerous, its the people that use them. I may use my cell
phone while driving, but the difference is my 1st priority is driving. So
whatever is happening on the road is my concern. Hence, people don't like
talking to me while driving cause I annoy them by not paying attention to
them and constantly say "what did you say?" or something similar. I
actually prefer the Direct Connect feature from Nextel, it seems to require
so much less attention to pay attention to the phone. But regardless of
what you do, the road is the first priority of what you are doing. Eating,
talking on the phone, changing the radio station, heck even looking at your
speedometer come after that. Cause as much as people rant about speed being
dangerous, I would rather have someone driving 5 mph over the speed limit
and watching the road than doing the speed limit but constantly watching
their speedometer instead of plowing into someone cause they didn't see them
slow down. I know people will think I am terrible.. I have driven and read
maps, magazines, pamphlets, eat and drive, talk on the phone, sort through
cd's. And amazingly... no accidents, still signal and check my blind spots
when changing lanes, and the other good stuff that makes driving safe.

Don't ban cell phones, ban stupid drivers.

 

Cell phones don't cause deaths... Stupidity causes deaths. That is like
asking how many guns save lives as oppsoed to cause deaths. Its not the
gun, its the moron using it. Lets not restrict my abilities cause someone
else is limited. Why should I have to be held back. Make them learn to be
like the rest of us. This is what causes the degradation of the American
society. We keep holding back our people to some miniscule level that
everyone can maintain. Great, so I have to be stupid cause someone else is.

Trust me, I know I have been able to save 3 lives while using my cell phon
on the freeway. One drunk that slammed into the median wall and then veered
back across the highway into a ditch. A lady that fell asleep while driving
and went through a guardrail. the third was a fellow that had some front
end part on his car bust while driving and veered him into a median wall and
flip his car. I happened to be the only other person on the road in all
three incidents. Two of which were at least 6 or 7 miles from the nearest
exit and were late at night so who knows if anything was open. I have 3
lives saved, and I have never taken a life using my cell phone.

 

I may not be an electrical genius, but wouldn't an EMP shut the system down
and fry parts of the circuitry? Plus when you shut modern day cars off, you
go back to manual steering and manual brakes... I don't want someone on the
freeway trying to cut across 3 lanes of traffic in front of me while trying
to manually steer their car quickly dropping speed, I think that might maybe
just sometimes cause a huge fucking accident. And that would probably save
a few lives right there, by save I mean they wouldn't have to go to work,
they could instead go to the afterlife. If it fries circuitry the car won't
restart, and than you are talking expensive auto repairs. All because the
kid called and asked where the left over roast beef was.