Larry Hatton

Distracted Driving

For years, the numbers of traffic accidents and fatalities decreased. Most attributed the decline to stricter laws about driving while under the influence; setting better manufactures safety standards in cars such as safety belts and airbags and better law enforcement techniques such as red light cameras that have been installed at busy intersections all over the country. They all worked to reduce automobile deaths to an all-time low. But, then the number of accidents and fatalities declined in cars started to rise again. Fernando Wilson and Jim Stimpson cite evidence that traffic fatalities declined between 1999 and 2005 and then began to increase by 28 %. (2213). Once the increase became an upward trend for more than two years in a row people began to become alarmed by it. Officials did not half to look far to find the cause of of the increased deaths either. The date when the increase began provided a clue because it points to a trend that may have reached its peak around the year 2005. That trend is using a cell phone while driving. Before that time, some people resisted getting a cell phone because of price or the belief that it was perhaps a passing fad, but by 2005 nearly everyone had one, and everyone was driving around with them in their cars. When the phone rang, they answered them and continued driving. Some of them could not handle the two activities and caused accidents. Many people lost their lives because they were holding a cell phone and driving. That new activity coincided with the increase in traffic accidents and deaths. Cell phones have evolved to perform so many more activities than just voice calls, and they are still being hauled around and used in cars while people are driving. They are a major source of distraction to drivers. True, distracted driving can be blamed on many activities not just the use of cell phones in cars, but they are definitely the lead culprit. The statistics show that distracted driving is an epidemic and something needs to be done about it, but the solutions that have been attempted are not adequate and those that are proposed are not practical. People forget that when they are driving they have a lethal weapon in their hands. They carelessly take risks in cars that they should not. People know they should not take their eyes off the road or their hands off the wheel for even an instant, but they do and nothing terrible happens, so that emboldens them and they do it again and again. Eventually, it becomes habit and the fear they once had that something terrible could happen when they do let down their guard is gone. They recklessly multi-task while driving and put their passengers, other drivers and pedestrians in danger. Everybody is guilty of being distracted from time to time, but the more activities one tries to accomplish while driving, the bigger the odds that a disaster will happen. Yet, if a person were to drive on any of the nations freeways on any given day s/he would see drivers reading maps or directions, eating, dressng, putting on makeup, entertaining or feeding their children, playing with their pets, changing the radio station, changing CDs, talking on their phones, watching movies, surfing the internet and the most distracting of all texting. Since it was invented people have used cars as offices, homes away from home, and playgrounds for both children and pets. The drive thru resturant was invented to make it easier to eat and drive at the same time. Pull in, buy food unwrap and keep driving on down the road. When a person spills hot coffee in his/her lap or drips ketchup from their burger on their white work shirt, their attention is taken from the road while they clean it up. What woman, running late for work, has not taken advantage of all the mirrors so conveniently placed within a vehicle to apply her makeup, do her hair, or just admire the results while driving? Mothers shuffling kids around become