Stop texting, start waving

After taking a circuitous route to become law, Gov. Sean Parnell signed new legislation May 10 banning texting and driving. Alaska joins 39 states and the District of Columbia in prohibiting the activity while driving.

Legislation intending to ban texting and driving was first passed by the Alaska Legislature in 2008, but a Kenai magistrate ruled that legislation was not specific enough to prohibit texting while driving.

House Bill 255 now says the crime of driving while texting is committed if a person reads or types a text or other non-voice message or communication on a cellphone, or similar device, while driving.

While a host of companies are working to craft high-tech solutions that prevent texting and driving, there is a second effort under way on the low-tech side.

U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood announced a plan last week to give $2.4 million to fund pilot programs in Delaware and California to combine increased police enforcement with publicity campaigns that target distracted driving. He said similar pilot programs in Syracuse, N.Y., and Hartford, Conn., have been successful in reducing distracted driving.

National Highway Traffic Safety Administration says nearly 500,000 young adults are injured each year due to various forms of distracted driving. Compounding the risk is the fact that teens and young adults also are overly confident in their ability to “safely” text while driving, LaHood said in a press release.

“We need to teach kids, who are the most vulnerable drivers, that texting and driving don’t mix,” he said.

In highlighting the effort to address distracted driving, LaHood cited a new survey released last week by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that reports 58 percent of high school seniors said they had texted or emailed while driving during the previous month. High school juniors reported doing the same, but at a lower rate — 43 percent

Linda Hill, a clinical professor in the Department of Family and Preventive Medicine at the University of California at San Diego, completed a separate study on April 24 about texting and driving behaviors. That study revealed that 78 percent of San Diego-area students admitted to talking or texting while driving. Of those students, 50 percent admitted to texting while on the freeway.

Anne Collier, co-director of Connetsafety.org and editor of Netfamilynews.org, said some of the teen drivers she interviewed feel so tied to their phones that they actually see driving as a distraction from texting.

“Those comments illustrated for me the challenge we have ahead of us as a society in changing a highly risky behavior in which some young people (and probably some adults, too) seem even to take pride,” she said.

In the old days we used a different, low-tech form of communication while driving. Back when fewer people lived here and there were fewer cars on the road, we waved at everyone out of friendliness and a general assumption that we knew them.

Why not stop texting and start waving?