I admit, I do it. From time to time, I find it convenient to talk on the cell phone while I’m cruising to wherever I gotta go. Especially on those long trips with no one else in the car. Frankly, I don’t see what the big deal is. I never have to take my eyes off the road and I can easily drive with one hand.
And admit dopers, I’m sure a lot of you do too. However, I have noticed on this board a bit of hostility toward this action. I understand the risks and dangers associated with driving, it is a very serious matter. I just think using the cell phone to talk while driving is a completely reasonable activity. Beats texting, eating food, even changing the radio station, all of which require the driver to take their eyes off the road.
So this isn’t really a debate, I’d just like to know what’s the big deal?
On a lonely stretch of highway, sure, no problem. Some people are capable of multi-tasking, some aren’t. It’s those people who are easily distracted by the conversation that ruin it for the rest of us. They can’t take the phone away from the side of their head to shoulder check, check mirrors, blind spots, oncoming traffic etc.
Doesn’t help that 95% of people who own a cell don’t use or are unaware of the built-in features of the phone that would increase safety considerably.
The use of speakerphone, wired or bluetooth earpieces help immensely.
That way both hands are free to hold a latte and swat at the screaming kids in the back.
I admit it. I talk on the cellphone, through my GPS’s FM Transmitter.
I almost never drive with two hands, however I find that not having my 2nd hand available, or using my 2nd hand for a cellphone, lowers my overall driving capabilities. I can drive perfectly safely while eating, but not while talking on the cellphone.
Maybe it has to do with the fact my field of vision is impaired by my wrist? I donno, but eating isn’t a problem, though.
It’s illegal in California for very good reasons. 80% of the truly stupid fucking driving moves I see is due to driving with cell phones. They may be drunk also for all I know. I heard that it’s as dangerous as driving drunk (no cite). I’ve taken a call on my cell phone once since the law went into effect. I’ve got a wired and a bluetooth headset, and will take a call on those. Texting is even worse. I was stuck behind some tard in San Francisco driving erratically somewhere between 1 and 3 mph. He had a laptop on his lap.
People that think that talking on a cell phone does not impair their driving are exactly the same as those who say they can drive just fine when they’re drunk. They’re deluding themselves. The impairment is exactly the same.
You know, I thought I was just fine talking on my cell phone while driving, too. I never felt the least bit distracted nor that I was any less in control.
That it, until I bought a bluetooth headset (because the law now requires them). I immediately recognized how really distracted I had been by juggling the phone while driving. I will never drive while holding a phone again.
As others upthread pointed out, lots of studies have shown that driving while holding a cell phone makes your driving as dangerous as being drunk.
This is something you can learn how to do. The first time I talked on a cell phone in my car I thought, “Holy shit, this is worse than if I were drunk!” (I should note that due to an experiment back in my journalism days I know for an absolute fact that I drive better “impaired” than four out of five of the other subjects drove sober).
That was many years ago, before people started yammering about how dangerous it was. Metropolitan taxi drivers routinely talk to their customers, listen to and decipher unintelligible (to others) voices on their radio, jump bells, all while driving a route they might never have been on before.
So, are taxi drivers more intelligent than average? No, they are not. They learned to do this.
Part of learning this involves knowing when to drop the phone and control the car, of course.
Anybody who texts while driving though is an idiot.
Yeah, and it’s not the same as talking to someone next to you in the car. When talking to a person in the car the other person will naturally pause and moderate their side of the conversation to allow you to concentrate when required such as at intersections. People on the other end of a phone don’t do this.
It’s illegal in the UK, but you still see loads of people doing it. They invariably bring themselves to my attention by driving like idiots, then I look at them and see that they’re on the phone. I never take calls when I’m driving except on the loudspeaker, and if I do then the first thing I say is that I’m driving so the other person knows that I may need to give my attention elsewhere (or break into uncontrollable swearing, though I try not to do that when it’s my mother!). You can also be fined or worse for (I think) “driving without due care and attention” if you’re eating or drinking, reading a map, or texting, even if you don’t cause a hazard to anyone. A woman was fined a while ago for having a drink from a bottle of coke while stopped in standing traffic. I thought that was a little harsh.
Personally I think the most dangerous thing that’s still legal to do while you drive is smoking. You can drop a mobile phone, a sandwich, whatever, if you need both your hands in an emergency. Try dropping a lit cigarette into your crotch while trying to negotiate a sudden hazard and see how it helps your driving. (In my experience: it will not help.)
ETA smoking I think is the most dangerous thing for yourself. Talking on the phone seems to me to cause more accidents for other people.
Because your brain is now diverting a significant part of its ability to dealing with the conversation you are now holding. Note that this is not the same as holding a conversation with someone else in the car because in the latter case they too can be looking out for danger. Secondly, you now have only one hand on the wheel to cope with emergencies, and the other hand is not ready to return to the wheel.
And it’s not the same as changing stations on the radio: in that case, contact is fleeting and intermittent. You press the button and return your hand to the wheel.
At the very least, get yourself a hands-free headset.
I will leave the stories of when I’ve almost been hit by people using a cell phones out of this post.
A guy in his early 20’s took out the electric pole and two sign posts across the highway from our house at full speed because he was on the cell phone talking. He crossed the highway lane first before going off the road. Never fear he was very fortunate on how the pole struck and how he missed the other stuff, being able to phone the police himself. The electric pole flew into the air over his car and came down on the fire hydrant, breaking in half and one half bouncing to a new location on rebound. There were live wires on the ground so I couldn’t take pictures until the power was disconnected.
The car crossed the highway hit the electric pole and a sign. The pole sheared off at about a foot above ground level flipping into the air while the car went under it. the car went over the flat area and over the side road in the back of the picture taking out the stop sign. The pole came down on the fire hydrant and broke in half. The half that stayed close to the hydrant is in the picture. the other half rebounded into the air and came down a distance from there. The car continued down the road bank, narrowly missed a tree the shrub in the car picture conceals, and started back up the bank of the highway stopping before it went onto the highway.
There were parts from the hardware on the electric pole that landed in our yard across the highway.
I admit I was disappointed that the hydrant didn’t break from the pole hit and shoot water high into the air.
I always wonder how much of the danger is due to the nature of the conversation, rather than the fact that a conversation is taking place. I frequently use my cell phone while driving (hands-free). It doesn’t take much concentration because I’m not having important conversations. They tend to be about what I’m expected home, or that I should pick up milk, or perhaps I might order a pizza. When I see people whose driving is clearly being affected by cell phone use, they seem to be having much more animated conversations- sometimes yelling, or waving an arm or pounding the steering wheel.
A woman I work with has a partner who is a police officer. She said recently that her partner told her that so many accidents result from people using phones that they now routinely ask for the driver’s phone when called to accidents. They check the recent calls to see if the phone was being used.
I use my phone daily while driving. Never had a chargeable accident. IMHO, there are some folks who should not chew gum while driving, and there are others who can multitask.
Maybe I would be safer if I didn’t make/receive calls while driving. Then again, maybe the boredom of driving would cause my attention to wander.
Should driving after less than a full nights sleep be illegal? What about driving after a fight with your spouse?
A lot of people drive drunk without having accidents as well.
Well for a start your examples are extremely difficult to police, whereas phone usage is not. That’s beside the point though, “B is not illegal” isn’t a very good argument as to why A shouldn’t illegal. In reality such discussions are way more complex than you seem to think.
Also, driving whilst exhausted may well be illegal, coming under rules such as the UK’s “Driving without due care and attention”.
