Posted on July 30, 2010 by Scott Grossman

Second Distracted Driving Summit in September Promises More Advances

The second Distracted Driving Summit will be held in September this year in Washington DC. 

Last year’s first ever Distracted Driving Summit was followed by major advances in combating the effect of technological distractions behind the wheel. Since that Summit in October, the federal administration has banned texting while driving for commercial bus and truck drivers. There is also a national ban on the use of cell phones while driving for federal government employees. The first Distracted Driving Summit also resulted in a lot of media coverage about the problem of cell phone use and texting while driving, and several states have enacted some sort of legislation to tackle the problem.  Besides, there is now an organization dedicated to lobbying against cell phone use while driving. The group is called Focus Driven, and hopes to do for distracted driving what Mothers against Drunk Driving has done for impaired driving. 

 

The Department of Transportation is currently involved in funding a crackdown on distracted driving in the state of New York. The agency is investing more than $300,000 in these efforts. The campaign involves education, awareness, flyers and enforcement. If the campaign is found to be successful in reducing cell phone use while driving in Syracuse, it could be extended to other cities in New York State, and even the country.

Considering the great strides that have been made since the first summit, New Jersey personal injury lawyers, and highway safety groups will be hopeful that the second summit to will increase momentum on this issue. As a New Jersey car accident lawyer, I would like to see more and tougher enforcement of our own handheld cell phone and texting bans.

 

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Posted on May 30, 2010 by Scott Grossman

Distracted Driving Is a Much Bigger Problem Than We Know

The results of a survey released this week prove not only that distracted driving is still a major problem, but also that these distractions are far more broad ranging than we believe.

The survey was conducted by Jabra, which is a division of GN Netcom, and included over 1,800 respondents from Europe, North America and Asia. Internationally, technological distractions, including those from cell phone and texting devices, continue to be a major problem. There are also other distractions that pull driver attention away from the road, and increase the risk of an accident.

 

According to the survey,

  • ·         72% of the respondents admitted to frequently eating while driving.
  • ·         28% frequently text message while driving.
  • ·         25% do their hair or even change clothes while driving.
  • ·         13 % admitted to applying makeup while driving
  • ·         15% of the respondents admitted to having sex while driving
  • ·         10% admitted to reading newspapers or magazines while at the wheel

As a New Jersey injury lawyer, I was even more intrigued to see that more than 24% of the respondents are still not using hands-free devices, in spite of laws that allow them to use these devices in places of handheld cell phones.

From the results, it's obvious that motorists continue to remain under the false assumption that driving is an easy task, and can be done while you're on autopilot performing all kinds of activities. It is attitudes like these that lead to accidents. The results of the survey should be a wake-up call also to those, who would like to ban only technological distractions at the wheel. There are all kinds of other distractions that motorists in New Jersey around the country are indulging in, and these are just as dangerous as talking on the cell phone and texting while driving.

 

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Posted on March 11, 2010 by Scott Grossman

In Spite Of Ban, Cell Phone Use While Driving Widespread in New Jersey

When the law banning the use of hand-held cell phones was passed in New Jersey in 2008, injury lawyers believed that it would dramatically impact the rate of accidents caused by such distracted driving. It turns out that we may not have been as right as we might have hoped. According to the New Jersey Division of Highway Traffic Safety, there are still far too many drivers out there using cell phones while driving and causing accidents.

Since the law went into effect on March 1, 2008, law enforcement officers in New Jersey have issued close to 225,000 citations to motorists for breaking the law. Between 2008 and 2009, there were 3,610 accidents that involved a motorist using a hand-held cell phone. These crashes led to a total of 13 deaths. The number of deaths from cell phone-related accidents seem to be the highest in Camden County with 231 accidents in all related to motorists using cell phones while driving. Burlington County was next with 121 accidents, and Gloucester County was third with 116 accidents traced to the use of hand-held cell phones at the wheel.

According to Division of Highway Traffic Safety chief Pam Fischer, law-enforcement officers are doing their duty, going out there and cracking down hard on motorists who use cell phones while driving. Unfortunately, the number of motorists who break the ban seemed to be far too many for law enforcement to be able to reach them all.

So do I think the laws have failed? No. We simply need better enforcement, heavier fines, and stricter penalties for these laws to work the way they were supposed to.

In related distracted driving news, a new bill proposes that police responding to an accident note down whether the motorist was distracted at the time of the accident. Officers would be given a sheet with a number of distractions - eating, changing radio stations and other distractions - and would have to check on the appropriate one.

Scott Grossman is a New Jersey injury lawyer, representing injured victims of motor vehicle accidents and car crashes in Monmouth, Bergen, Passaic, and Ocean Counties, and across the state of New Jersey.

 

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Posted on March 20, 2008 by Scott Grossman

NJ Drivers Report on NJ Drivers, Roads, Distractions

The results are in! The AAA Clubs of New Jersey biannual transportation survey published the results which revealed that the top five safety issues on our roads are:

1. impaired drivers
2. text messaging while driving
3. big trucks that tailgate
4. aggressive driving
5. using a hand-held cell phone while driving.

New Jersey motorists surveyed also identified the top five driver distractions:
1. reading
2. using a PDA or Blackberry
3. personal grooming
4. talking on a cell phone
5. eating or drinking.

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Posted on December 17, 2007 by Scott Grossman

NJ Bans Text Messaging While Driving

Late last month, New Jersey became the second state in the country to ban driving while sending text messages (Washington State is the first). Text-messaging is a dangerous distraction to drivers, just much as talking on a cell phone, listening to loud music, eating, drinking, attending to children, and watching television can be. Driver distraction is responsible for 30% of all motor vehicle accidents, according to the federal government.
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