Houston suburb close to banning cell phone usage in school zones
West University Place in the Houston area has passed an ordinance banning the usage of cell phones in school zones. The ordinance is intended to make school children safer by preventing drivers from occupying themselves with their phones when they should be paying attention to the children in front of the schools. What sets this ordinance apart from others in the country is how it extends the ban to the use of hands-free devices like headsets and also forbids text messaging. First time violators will face a $200 fine and repeat offenses will cost drivers $500 each. This ordinance is the first in the country to ban the use of hands-free devices. It must be passed a second time to make it into law.
(via The Houston Chronicle)
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I’m all for it.
My son’s school has already banned them from the car pool lane as several teacher that help kids get out of the cars have either been hit or almost hit.
And I thought that Minnesota led the nation in being a nanny.
Why not ban smoking, eating, loud radios and other distractions? After all, they all contribute to “distracted driving”.
I think that following the lead of a number of EU Countries the use of hand held cellphones in cars should be banned. We’ve all seen the idiots yammering away or texting when their eyes should be focussed on what’s in front of them. I feel the same about car smokers and eaters. What is so important about these things that you can’t safely pull over somewhere instead of risking peoples lives by not being in full control of your car.
In the UK you can be prosecuted for ‘driving without due care and attention’ which would cover eating etc.
Here’s one result: http://www.redding.com/news/2008/feb/12/records-say-woman-texting-before-crash/
Drive safely now! :-)
And to think, all of this could be avoided with some simple gadgetry.
If something like this would happen in Utah, I guarantee there would be a hell of a lot less funerals…
This all goes back to the idea that driving is a privilege not a right. In some cases like this it needs to be revoked. Although this kind of action would likely be very hard to prevent, making it illegal would I hope atleast reduce the number of people doing it.
It seems that some drivers have taken forgranted the idea that when they are driving, its not like riding a bike, hitting a person with a car will kill em… everyone knows that but its obvious that knowing it and understanding it is not the same.
Distractions are distractions and if you are willingingly distracting your self while driving, that ain’t good.