Using navigation or something or banking. I remember one kid in South Dakota a few years ago that ran down a young mother out for a walk on a rural road. The Sheriff proved that he was checking his bank account at the time. I don’t remember how many years he got but substantial.
People on cell phones while driving are total idiots!
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Agree they are as bad if not worse than drunk’s I wish there as a way to get them both off the road but the more law’s & restriction’s we put on them the more way’s they find to get around them.
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The problem (as my state is discovering) is that we pass laws about using phones while driving, and then the cops go on an enforcement blitz for a couple of weeks. Maybe a month. And after that they’re right back under bridges running radar because it’s easy and lucrative.
It’s why I’ve long held the opinion that we should not be banning the use of specific devices. “No smart phone use while driving” means they can use a tablet because it’s not a smart phone. It means they can read a book, or put on makeup, or use a laptop. And now the cop has to spend time building up enough evidence that you were, in fact, using the specific banned device and not doing something else that caused you to drive like an idiot but which is not specifically banned.
We should be banning driving outcomes, not specific behavior. In other words, if you’re driving like a moron, it shouldn’t matter why. Maybe you’re drunk. Maybe you’re using the phone. Maybe you’re just an idiot. Either way, you get the same penalty, and it’s harsh.
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Agree it’s impossible for the the people who enforce law keep up with all the rule’s & regulation’s that are on the book’s now adding more would only make it worse I am old school in a lot of way’s & don’t get into a lot of the new tech I don’t have or know how to use a smarter than me phone the thing I like about cell phone’s is after year’s of trying to find a pay phone when I needed one the cell is there when I need it for whatever reason but I will not use while driving I always pull over first. My wife always says I was born a hundred year’s to late I should have been born in the 1800’s.
If you are driving like a moron or an ldiot & have to go to court & get a judge who goe’s by the book you would get off as there is no law against being stupid.
If we outlawed stupidity, we couldn’t afford the taxes to build the jails.
That sounds like a famous quote in the making. Y’all feel free to use that lol.
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85%of the traffic in SW FLA seems to drive that way. The slightest hint of a corner makes them tap their brakes and slow down. Car or SUV, doesn’t matter. Slowing down for the slight bend on the highway. A bend that is banked for hands-off travel at about 65-70. Some even brake. Sheesh!
And rain is like 6 inches of snow to about 50% of the drivers. The other 50% drive the same speed but swerve in and around the 25% locked in the left lane and the 25% locked in the middle lane.
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I uh, didn’t think I had to make this specific, but by “driving like a moron,” I meant things like weaving, erratic acceleration, drifting out of your lane, etc. Stuff that’s already unlawful.
A law could be made that was quite specific as to what you should not be doing, and if you do it then you get in the same amount of trouble whether you’re doing it because you’re drunk, or high, or texting, or yelling at kids, or willfully running your car with equipment you know will make it hard to control such as summer tires on snow.
Because at the end of the day, the exact vector for the crappy driving doesn’t matter to the kid you run over. It’s not like the kid’s gonna be sitting in his brand new wheelchair breathing through his brand new ventilator thinking “Gee, I wish he’d been intentionally using unsafe equipment instead of texting. That would make this all OK.”
In short, the OP question is kind of like asking if you want to get shot by a Glock or a Colt. I don’t want to get shot by either of them, and the laws should be (and are) written such that my assassin gets the same charge no matter what brand of gun he plugs me with.
You must be out West, no way can you cruise at 80 on the East Coast. I only drove ine rig that would do 80mph, it was a GMC general with a 490 hp V12 andI was pulling two 45 foot trailers from Tonawanda ny to Framingham MA. It had twin 80 gallon fuel tanks that were topped off in Tonawanda and I ran out of fuel when I pulled into the Framingham terminal. Less than 450 miles.
I’m afraid if they actually enforced some of that (weaving, erratic acceleration) with stiff penalties…well some of that is open to interpretation to an extent and needs to be very well defined. How much “weaving” constitutes unlawful, for example?
Pretty difficult to enforce too. Much easier to catch someone speeding, as they don’t have an equivalent to a radar gun to detect weaving, erratic acceleration, etc. as the cop will actually have to see you weave or accelerate erratically as it’s defined by law.
I wouldn’t want a dui stiff penalty (a few grand and loss of license) for weaving or erratic acceleration or drifting slightly towards the center line unless we’re talking about some really outlandish driving, not for something that’s open to the officer’s interpretation…and I don’t think you’d want that either.
Trouble is, they can’t really even enforce the speed limit anyway. I’ve been on expressways where the speed limit is 60, most of us are going 70, then there’s some jerk running 80 changing lanes to get around everyone else. Yeah, they pull someone over every now and then. But they probably don’t even get 10% of those.
If you’ve noticed an uptick in unsafe motorists during the holidays, you’re not imagining things. The season of giving is a prime time for distracted driving and continues to grow year-from-year, according to a survey from Root Insurance. So much so that two in five Americans admit to shopping on their phone while they’re at the wheel.
Cell phone IMO simply because it’s at an epidemic level.
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Cell phone drivers are the worst because they aren’t even looking. At least a drunk person is doing their best.
I am especially mystified by drivers–who are already driving below the speed limit–who brake on an upgrade, just before a gentle curve.
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I’ll takes my chances with the person on summer tires. Some summer tires are usable (I.E. they don’t turn to rolling bricks) once the mercury dips below 40 degrees. I’ve dealt with BFG G-Force Comp 's in freezing conditions and they were fine. Likewise, I had a set of Bridgestone Pontenza RE 760 Sports. That weren’t especially terrible cold weather. But on the other hand the stock Pirelli P-Zeros that came on my Mustang were terrible when it got down to even 45 degrees, they became rock hard, and were sketchy in the wet in cold weather.
So? Half the traffic laws are already open to interpretation. Check out “improper acceleration” some time. What is that? I got a warning for that once back in high school, driving my dad’s 4-banger Dodge Caravan. Its 0-60 was measured with a calendar, but that didn’t stop the cop from pulling me over.
We are, but even so, why wouldn’t you? If you’re weaving around and run into someone, who cares why you did it? You did it and if we’re going to buy in to the penalization system we’ve erected, you should be penalized for it.
As for speeding enforcement, that should be close to the last thing cops worry about. I’d much rather leave a guy going 80mph safely in a low/no traffic situation alone while having cops instead concentrate on the people who are likely to cause wrecks, like tailgaters, weavers, etc. Every time a cop pulls someone and spends 20 minutes writing out a ticket for 10 over, 200 cars go past the traffic stop and a very healthy percentage of them are being driven dangerously.
We need to re-focus traffic cops on law enforcement prioritization, not revenue generation. If the murder rate on a cop’s beat is sky high, then the cop should be concentrating on catching murderers, not writing tickets for littering. If the dangerous driving rate is sky high in a patrol sector, then the cop should be concentrating on the most dangerous driving behavior, which very frequently is not pure speeding.
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I don’t see the point of law enforcement concentrating on the dangerous acts that you don’t like (weaving and tailgating, apparently) vs dangerous acts that you’re more ok with (speeding). You’re probably under the impression speeding is less dangerous, and I agree, if you’re on an open highway. I disagree if you’re running 3 lanes wide in moderate to heavy traffic. In those instances, the weavers, tailgaters, and speeders are usually all the same guy anyway.
But remember the warning you got for excessive acceleration? Let’s assume you’d gotten a ticket. Do you want a night in jail, loss of license for whatever period as in dui laws, and a fine well over $1k? I suppose I’m ok with that if you’re laying a patch of rubber for 100 feet in a school zone. But I’m not ok with it if some mom jumps on the accelerator in her minivan to try and beat a guy at a red light because she’s in the wrong lane a needs to merge. The thought of more tickets written for stuff you can’t objectively define just doesn’t sit well with me. Speeding, at least it’s objective.
I also disagree that “it doesn’t matter” why you got into an accident and killed someone. To me there’s a difference between willful recklessness and an accident. I don’t know if you’ve ever accidentally run off the edge of the road or not, but I have. If someone would’ve happened to have been standing there, I guess I would’ve hit them. But that’s different than driving drunk and hitting them to me. The person is dead or injured either way, but I think the penalties should remain different.
Because speeding is not inherently dangerous. “Speed kills” is oversimplified and flat out wrong. If speed killed, then pilots would be dropping like flies. Some of the slowest, cheapest planes out there can easily go faster than the fastest speed limit in the country. Speed isn’t killing them.
Dangerous driving behavior kills. That includes speeding around other people who are not. But a guy going 70 in a 60 who is not presenting a danger to traffic should be de-prioritized in favor of the guy who is tailgating (inherently dangerous) and weaving (also inherently dangerous).
Good point, and for what it’s worth, “improper acceleration” isn’t one of the things I’d like to see penalized unless, as you say, they’re doing burnouts, etc. “Don’t weave” laws are already in place. They’re pretty specific. Here’s an example:
Subd. 7.Laned highway.
When any roadway has been divided into two or more clearly marked lanes for traffic, the following rules, in addition to all others consistent with this subdivision, apply:
(1) a vehicle shall be driven as nearly as practicable entirely within a single lane and shall not be moved from the lane until the driver has first ascertained that the movement can be made with safety;
It even provides exceptions to keep the cops from getting too ticket happy:
(5) notwithstanding clause (1), the operator of a vehicle with a total length in excess of 40 feet, a total width in excess of ten feet, or any combination of vehicles may, with due regard for all other traffic, deviate from the lane in which the operator is driving to the extent necessary to approach and drive through a roundabout
It’s not difficult to specify driving behavior that is dangerous and should be stopped. A good place to start is to see what elements need to exist for probable cause on a DUI stop, then just make those elements illegal themselves. If someone’s all over the road because they’re distracted by something, a cop can pull them over on suspicion of DUI. It’s kind of silly that once they pass the field sobriety tests, nothing much happens. The fact that they aren’t chemically impaired doesn’t mean their bad driving was safe.
I generally agree and usually support the police and legal structure. However, I learned at a very young age that the legal system is not always fair or consistent. Having both myself and the pastor’s son committing similar offenses but receiving very different penalties from the same judge. I know this happens so when someone claims they were in a kangaroo court, I tend to suspect they were right and I don’t like it. So I like flexibility but then I don’t like flexibility depending on the officer and the judge. Remember “show me the man and I’ll show you the crime”. No one is really safe from a corrupt legal system and you can go bankrupt trying to defend your innocence. Change my mind.
AAAAAHHHHHHHH!!! I HATE that!!! +1 a HUNdred times to VDCDriver for that post!